To wonder how the UK will look in 3 years time?

[Labradorlover987]

I was inspired to write this after reading the UC post that was just reported - the govt’s welfare bill has passed but was watered down so unlikely to make any real savings.

I earn 40k, have a school age child and just feel like I am living hand to mouth 😩 I 100% think there should be a welfare systems that supports people on low incomes but I wonder how the current system will be sustained in the long run?

Just wondered what other people thought.

I actually wouldn’t mind paying more in taxes if we could be guaranteed more in services etc - for example my council tax just went up and the services seem even worse this year than usual.

But we can't ignore the complexities and practicality of taxing people with foreign/complex financial affairs.

As for "ordinary" people, taxing them is really simple via the PAYE system or indirect taxes such as VAT or fuel/alcohol duty.

That's why there's been such a push over the past couple of decades to move over to indirect taxes on spending and trying to get people onto PAYE by the various attacks on disguised self employment, gig economy etc.

If you had asked me a few years ago I would have said much better. I agree that things will be worse, higher taxes with reduced public services, an even higher cost of living and general increase in public unrest and division between those that are living payday to payday and those that can afford to carry on without making cutbacks.

I have no doubt that by the time I retire the state pension wont be around as it is now. I don’t see how the welfare system will cope as it’s unsustainable, and I think there will be even less access to services for people who need it for their mental health.

I would also imagine we will be under a reform government, although I don’t see how they could make any effective change.

it’s very depressing and I hope I’m wrong.

@NeatCoralMember

Oh and public transport will be expensive and infrequent

Public transport is already expensive and infrequent AND unreliable in the regions outside of the London Public Transport Utopia!

And people never understand this when they post on driving threads and judging non drivers. The roads would be chaos

Where are you going?

Ha ha ha ha

You want to pay pensioners, those who already proportionally hold the most wealth, and overwhelmingly voted to Leave the EU, which indicates they are against migration, to swan off somewhere nicer, because they wouldn’t go otherwise, but they get to keep their assets whilst you still pay them more for heath insurance.

Whilst trapping the youngsters here still having to pay their pensions and more for health insurance because they will still have diabetes and falls. No one in Europe would take them!

If they want to go they have houses to sell and still get a state pension. If they can find somewhere to take them in there currently isn’t anything to stop them.

Much better to create legal opportunities for our youngsters to move, be assets to other countries, still reduce the population so the strain of immigration lessens and the young can go somewhere that isn’t circling the drain right now, like they could before the EU Referendum.

It's a stupid myth that somehow there is a little piggy back that pays people seeking asylum and " the rest"

SERCO makes billions and billions from housing people.

We do have ideas – plenty, in fact. Other countries manage it.

A few examples:

Close the loopholes the ultra-wealthy use to move income into low-tax channels.

Tax wealth like work: capital gains shouldn’t be taxed less than wages.

Actually enforce the law: boost HMRC’s resources to chase down aggressive avoidance.

The “but how would it work?” question is valid once you’ve accepted it needs to happen. In fact it's really important. But too often, it’s used as a polite way of saying “let’s not even try.” Not saying this is your view of course.

At least you took back control thanks to Farage and a popular Tory politician Boris Johnson.

Now it’s human rights lawyers job to turn magician and fix economy damaged by the previous government and their politices.

This thread is nuts.

I think things will have improved in some areas like healthcare. I think immigration will remain intractable.

The internet will continue to create more nutters who'll believe any old conspirational shit.

Ok so solution is to focus on tax. Not to build a more productive economy.

It is working. Benefits recipients now manage their own money. It reduces overheads and fees for DWP and fosters independence and choice, and responsibility.

Now if you don’t pay your rent you’ll be evicted the same way a person who works for all their income would be. Previously people who had their rent paid by benefits wouldn’t give bill paying a second thoughts and had no consequences to checking out of the normal responsibilities of society.

Plenty of “ordinary” taxpayers have complexities too: self-employment, multiple jobs, freelance work, rental income, childcare credits, student loan repayments, pension contributions, benefits that interact with tax thresholds… the list goes on.

We still manage to collect from them, despite those complications, because it’s seen as necessary. That’s the key difference: with ordinary earners, we work around the complexity; with the ultra-wealthy, complexity too often becomes the excuse to walk away.

Having said that, I completely agree that we can’t ignore the complexities – we should be throwing more effort and resources at this.

This is arguably one of the defining questions of our time: how do we ensure the wealthiest contribute fairly in a globalised, loophole-ridden financial system? It’s no less important than tackling climate change – and, as with climate change, the scale of the challenge should be the reason we act, not the excuse we don’t.

Plenty of other countries have made a start on this. Norway, Switzerland, France, Spain, Canada, and even parts of the US manage to tax wealth, capital gains, and cross-border income without the sky falling in. The EU has frameworks for sharing financial data precisely so tax authorities can follow the money.

We already pour time, money, and political capital into problems we decide matter. We need to treat fair taxation with the same seriousness.

No I want it to happen. But I do know about the tax system (I’m not a tax accountant but know a bit) and the problem inherent within any system is that when you close one loophole another opens. It’s not possible to have a system without loopholes.

as I said earlier HMRC have had a massive boost to resources and from my experience I think this will work. You still have the problem of corporations paying people far smarter than HMRC to find and lobby for loopholes but even accepting that, more resources stops the chancers (and imo this is who they’ve gone after first- low hanging fruit)

I agree capital gains should be more highly taxed than work and that IHT should be progressive. My caution here though is as a company that hasn’t been growing or creating value for decades we will dry that pot out.

But you can invest in a private pension you can take 10 years before state retirement age.

You don’t put money into your state pension, you get yearly NI credits which means when you reach state retirement age you are eligible to claim whatever the state pension is, at what age it is, at that time. That’s it that is the system.

If you want more income, or earlier retirement it’s up to you.

I think they will freeze the pension credit eligibility and increase state pension slightly so pension credits and subsequent benefits subside. That’s a long term saving.

Well, would be nice to get your stats right wouldn't it? 90% lol!!!

We all know what you meant by "immigrants"

Made up numbers in your head or AI go it wrong... again.....

We are looking at northern Italy
eldest teen - Germany
youngster - Canada

There are less vacancies being advertised - it is abundantly clear that putting taxes on staff was going to do this.

In my eyes the government has failed to show that they can achieve what they need to by spending taxes, so should rightly lower them and let people make their own choices.

We could all have much better pensions if we could keep more of our own money, cleaner streets if people had to go out to work, happier children if people were made to pay for their kids first and not leave single parents relying on the state. Labour is very much a 'sounds nice and feels good' rather than actually improving the country.

What taxes have been increased for workers?

Actually I have been thinking fuck it and looking at possibilities at overseas “British” territories, mainly Caribbean islands but not sure how possible that will be for much longer.

What would you work as?

Employers now have to pay a higher rate of NIC
It went from 13.5% to 15%. Every business I have worked in would have noticed this increased.

But Canada is going through similar problems too. Though their new government is promising. Hope it works out for your son.
Germany has good engineering and manufacturing business.
Northern Italy is beautiful. Not sure how their economy is doing. I thought they also have high tax and low salaries but maybe I am wrong. I am in Switzerland but miss liveliness of London and hoped could return and waiting for things to improve. Don’t know when it will. Anyways Swiss economy may also have an impact as Trump decide to impose 39% tariff here.

Taxing the ultra wealthy globally is more urgent now as the tech boom has created so many multimillionaires and billionaires and they have already started using AI to replace workers (and AI is terrible for the environment). So they are going to need to share their wealth. Nobody needs billions, it is absurd. Trump is happy to let the billionaires dictate like oligarchs in his country and go after the normal people’s jobs in other countries via tariffs. Like watch makers and chocolate makers in Switzerland or garment makers in India. The whole thing is absurd - whilst his own tech companies are exploiting all of these countries and their data.
The powers to be in the Western world and Asia need to get together and address the issue. Not destroy the wealth creators but come up with a plan for human jobs to continue and the ultra rich to be taxed a reasonable amount everywhere - or at least, everywhere civilised. This may well require the Chinese, US, Indians and Europe actually working together. People without jobs will destroy democracy and create civil unrest. And the billionaires should also be worried about this as if the whole world turns against them it is not going to be a pretty picture for them either.

Computer gurus
Or just with self funding money
(we have dual EU passports so EU isn’t as complicated as it is for some)

or we are thinking for us, once teens have flown, getting a small contained apartment and spending large chunks of time in various paradises