To think that the mansion tax breaks the principles of taxation

[NorthXNorthWest]

Most taxes fall into:
Income you receive
Profit you realise
Spending you choose

Council tax sit outisde of this. Its more like levy based valuation bandings and was a quick and dirty fix after the poll tax fiasco. It is effectively a service charge not a wealth tax.

Whereas mansion tax is the government estimating the value your actual house, then treating this valuation as pure profit then taxing you on this. Given the majority of homes are purchased with mortgages and paid for by already taxed money:

Why is

Mansion Tax = Estmated value × %

More reasonable than

CGT = Profit * % (Profit = Actual sales price - (Purchase price + actutal costs)

With actual costs being renovations not stamp duty or interest paid on your mortgage

I am not in the mansion tax bracket. I do accept that some taxes need to rise but I don't believe this is the solution.

Yup. I held that little gem back :-)

I am sure the PP is well aware of it though.

They also top the human development index rankings. The standard of living metric.

But oddly, they don't rank well on the highest minimum wage tables. So that might be brought up, because the UK does rank fairly high on that.

Then again, Iceland, Denmark, Norway, Sweden and Finland don't have a minimum wage.

We can keep the per capita GDP for tomorrow.

This is poor taxation. Taxation in your lifetime for something you bought that you paid tax on to buy it with.

it’s a bad premise for the country

By this logic then, scrapping the mansion tax and increasing the inheritance tax is the way to go ?

Sounds ok.

There is talk of deferring the mansion tax till sale or death. So that fits in with the lifetime thing.

My comment wasn’t an abstract attack on welfare. It was a direct response the other poster sneering at savers and mocking the £120k couple being upset about ISAs. A point you’ve conveniently ignored. Dressing up contempt for productive people as ‘sympathy for starving children’ isn’t virtue. It’s posturing.

Your laaazy Nordic ‘gotcha’ only works if you pretend all welfare is the same. That false equivalence is doing Olympic-level heavy lifting. I criticised cheques + passive dependency, not cheques + active systems that tax heavily, retrain and support/push people back into work. That mix of cash, support and pressure is why the Nordics work. We have high tax, weak productivity and failing services. People are allowed to complain about the effects of this.

Wealth taxes are ideal though, as they good for preventing too much wealth accumulating in the hands of too few people.

This is exactly what has happened in the last 10 years - wealth has consolidated into the hands of shrinking pool of global elites, and its why we all just feel poorer. The share of global wealth that most ordinary people are sharing has become smaller.

As well as high taxes, high-quality services and a well-invested infrastructure, Norway has greater stability because of its sovereign wealth fund. Something we don't have. Why wouldn't they be happier.

Ask them about their capital flight though...

Yup. I held that little gem back :-)

Because you are the only person that knows about Norway and the rest of the nordics 🙄

It is well managed. Two of the four main Nordic countries are in budget surplus as of 2024 and one more has low debt. (I do not see data on Iceland or the Faroe Islands)

All the Scandinavian countries are happy, not just Norway with its oil wealth

Yes, there’s a lot to like about how the Nordics do things. I have said that several times. It’s a strong model to aspire to. But Labour simply don’t have the tools for the job. Smoke and mirrors, including the mansion tax, won’t fix the very real structural problems this country faces. @poetryandwine

I was not ignoring the PP @BitOutOfPractice , I was responding to your post where you brought up the Nordic nations.

And reading back, BitOutOfPractice did state "I’m not jealous or ignorant. ". I see no contempt, just mention of a small violin.

Where you say this above, quote " Dressing up contempt for productive people as ‘sympathy for starving children’ isn’t virtue. It’s posturing.". I see no contempt or posturing. I do think funding funding food for kids is virtuous though.

The only mention of contempt I see is what you said. " I save my contempt for the people who hand out sympathy and cheques just to keep people stuck where they are. "

I am pointing out that the Nordic model is one of very high tax and big cheques. I don't know if the Nordics hand out sympathy as well, but as another poster pointed out, they do top the tables on happiness metrics.

My reply was not a lazy Gotcha. I spent a fair bit of time on that reply, finding links and basic fact checking to make sure what I posted was true, so far as I could ascertain.

I have no idea if Nordic countries have "passive dependency. But a quick net search does shows Norway long term unemployed at 0.6%. Finland has overall unemployment of 8.9%, cant find longterm, but Nodic Times says it has risen 20% ( from what no idea), Denmark 2.5% total I can't find long term data. Sweeden unemployment 10.4%, with 173,000 people long term unemployed.

Sorry for the mixed up data, most of the web is blocked where I am. So I have to do this the old fashioned way.

UK long term unemployment rate is 1.97%, but that is old data up to 2020.

So yes, certainly in the case of Norway they have less long term unemployed. Much less than the UK for sure. From the data I can find.

They also have much higher tax and much bigger cheques. They have to fund their proactive measures somehow.

So the UK needs to raise it's tax, and public spending if it wants to match Norway ?

Perhaps you can present data that lower tax regimes can get Norwegian levels of long term unemployment.

Having lived and worked in two of ‘the Nordic’s’ for a number of years there are key differences between our countries.

Benefits for those who have been in work reflect the salary they earned when they were in work. In Sweden you get 80% of your salary as benefits when you are made redundant and that’s lasts for 2 years. Pay in get out. Childcare is pretty much free. Pay in, get out. People work because that’s what’s expected of society. You work and pay taxes to get good public services. People who refuse to work - even stay ant home mums - are very much looked down on. Benefits for those who don’t work are the bare minimum. Taxes on higher earners are similar to those we have here. Taxes on those who earn less are far higher than our basic rate of tax and the personal allowance is minimal. Higher tax payers would see barely any difference to the tax they pay but would get access to far more for that tax. Those on lower incomes would think the income tax rates eye watering.

This system would never work here but always find it so surprising how many lefties think Scandinavia would be a great place to live. It is, but only for those that are prepared to work hard and pay tax.

I see no contempt, just mention of a small violin.

Perhaps you can present data that lower tax regimes can get Norwegian levels of long term unemployment.

Ok. Have a nice day.

Yes, the Nordics show high tax can work, if it delivers genuinely good public services and everyone who can is pulling their weight.

Labour seem to want high taxes to fund an ever-expanding, politically protected welfare state, from a position of no growth. It’s economically unsustainable.

Yup. The Romans actually taxed urine.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pecunia_non_olet

So if you think this government is taking the piss.......

whilst actively blocking the highest earners from accessing services they pay for - childcare. It’s a totally bonkers stance.

Agree. Wealth taxes are necessary. But an individual or family whose only asset is a home worth £2m is not part of the global elite. If the issue is them tying up home or unearned wealth etc There must be better mechanisms than the mansion tax.

I think you have me mixed to with another poster!

What I really hate is the fact that it has been informally described as a mansion tax. I agree it’s about the government making a statement.

Sorry :-)

There is a couple of threads on these tax things, and a bit of crossover is happening in my head I think.

Most countries don’t have stamp duty or council tax. The property tax is instead of, not as well as, stamp duty and council tax.

A quick web search, Australia, Dubai, France, HK, Italy, Japan, Portugal, Singapore, Thailand, UK, Spain, Denmark, India, Pakistan,Uruguay, Isreal, Poland, Russia, Ireland, Romania....

All have stamp duty.

Yes, but PT is a % of current value, generally much higher than CT.

The US doesn’t have Stamp Duty but there is capital gains tax due at one’s usual rate to both federal and state governments upon the sale of the primary residence. For high earners in California, for example, these rates add to 33.3%.

The amount of exempt profit is $250K for a single, $500K for a couple.

In expensive states, that doesn’t begin to touch the sides of the rise in house prices in expensive areas for homeowners who bought twenty or more years ago. Again, much more than stamp duty

Fair point. However in the US, property tax sits inside a housing system that can still expand through cheap land, mass building and also real escape routes in many areas ie you can move to the edge of town and still keep transport links, jobs and affordability. In the UK, the same regressive tax is forced on people trapped in a market shaped by decades of under-building and extreme shortage. You can move further out, but transport is limited, expensive and inefficient if it exists at all. We have less land, tighter planning, higher prices and higher mortgage rates, yet we tax as if people have endless mobility and choice. Same tax label, completely different reality.

Do you mean public transport?

Public transport in many places in America is terrible. We had great PT where I lived but it was sustained by a property tax of 2% pa. In an expensive housing market

I was thinking cars.+ public. I was under the impression it could be hit and miss in some places but that it was better in general. We have friends across the US and they have all commented on how bad it seems here. @poetryandwine