Tories campaigning to remove the childcare maximum income threshold

[FlakyPastries]

Kemi Badenoch has announced that the Tories want to remove the upper income threshold on childcare.

This means all working families will be able to claim it, including those earning over £100k.

Do you agree with this policy?

My baby’s nursery charges £30,000 and the free hours and tax free childcare is worth around £15,000 - so this is quite a significant benefit for those currently unable to claim.

There wouldn’t be a shortage if airlines paid for the training needed. I expect they will when their bottom line is hit.

I think it demonstrates yours.

No but lots of my friends are. And we are affected by other 100k tax grabbing.

Ok well don't enjoy your flights, enjoy your long wait for your specialist consultant in the NHS instead 🫠

The USA seems to manage it!

Except there's a shortage of some professionals. I've been talking to a few firms of accountants over the past year and all have said they're struggling to fill experienced/qualified/manager vacancies, to the extent that they're limiting the number of new clients they're taking on. They are taking on trainees (school leavers and graduates) but are limited as to numbers because they need experienced/manager/qualified staff to train and supervise them!

Specialist consultants are not effected by lack of free childcare either.

You mean like the three month wait my bloke had for a liver transplant and the two week wait for his initial cancer diagnosis? Those long waits?

It takes 5-10 years to become an airline captain, hence the shortage caused by Covid when huge numbers decided to take "early retirement".

Like hospital consultants.

You can't replace these people overnight. The "pipeline" takes many years.

So, say, a senior NHS consultant (or airline captain) who either retires early to goes part time, can't have the "hours" replaced as easily as you think, if there's no one sufficiently qualified/experienced to fill the gap.

Same with train drivers. They need to learn all the routes they "sign" for, and all the different types of train they drive. Older/experienced ones will be able to drive a greater variety of trains and a greater range of routes. When they retire or reduce their hours, there isn't always "someone else" ready and able to take their routes. Even worse, is that other drivers have to be taken off their "normal" rota of driving passenger trains, to "train" on new routes/trains, causing even more driver shortages, and hence cancellations!

Senior/experienced workers going part time to avoid the insane £100k tax trap ARE causing damage to the economy. We need to find ways to get rid of all these crazy tax cliff edges, so beloved of the Lefties as their hate/spite/envy gets in the way of common sense and what's good for the country.

The economy tin the duldrums!
The most productive should be incentivised to earn more thereby adding more value to their enterprise and improving the economy.
This country will not get better if the inventors, risk takers, business owners, entrepreneurs, the wealthiest, those striving to and aspiring to be wealthy are demonized and punished for daring to not look to the government to feed, house and clothe them.
I used to think big government was good but not anymore. It needs to be shrunken!

You don't think there are long waits in the NHS? I'm glad for you that it worked out but I think you should look around

I wouldnt agree with doing that. 15hours is fine. But I probably would extend that to year round rather than term time only.
Most people round here werent working ft with young kids anyway. And a couple can get up to 100 each. And that doesnt include pension. So they can put extra in pension.
i do think limits should but so should CB and tax free amounts etc. its at moat 3 years of a childs life so even if it cost 15k over the free amounts thats 45k.
so between working less hours and also putting in pension..

maybe they could increase everyones from 15-20 hours but make it all year??

But there really will he a big difference for those having to get into work vs wfh etc because i would have had to leave dc in childcare 8-6 and even then wasnt sure i would always get back before closing due to the traffic/buses.

Right? you couldn't make it up.

"On the other hand his company may decide to employ another part time person and even if it doesn't make up the whole amount there will be someone not receiving benefits"

yeah, exactly, someone will move from benefits into pilot's role. Or surgeon, or dentist

How do you work that out. My DH's haematologist only works 3 days per week - she's the only consultant at the hospital who deals with his type of cancer. She has a young family, the eldest has only just started primary school. I would imagine that childcare costs and the tax cliff edge are major drivers as to why she doesn't work more days/hours. As a result it causes long waiting times, not just for consultations with her, but even for dealing with simple/routine queries sent via the cancer nurses that need her input, which often take a few weeks to get a response.

@nearlylovemyusername

yeah, exactly, someone will move from benefits into pilot's role. Or surgeon, or dentist

I think some people actually think that such things are possible!

You're confused.

USA don't have wealth tax, only some property taxes.

USA have double tax agreements with most countries, but their tax bands are considerably more generous than UK ones, e.g. the highest rate is 37% but for the income of $640k, so about £490k
Income tax on $100k-200k is only 24%, whereas ours is 62% on £100-125k
They have extremely generous IHT, CGT etc.

It's worrying isn't it! But it's interesting to see the way people think, because this is what the politicians are dealing with trying to get votes. I think Kemi is being pretty brave saying these things - we know it makes sense economically, but it's a difficult political sell to those not in that position

It's worse than this. Many politicians, mostly lefties, think like this themselves.

They really don't understand behavioral economics at all.

Labour, politicians on the left and a large part of the electorate. It means they’ll keep having to lump on extra taxes.

Not necessarily directly from unemployed. Although there are plenty of unemployed doctors and other professionals around at the moment.

It is possible in some professions at the moment.

Possible yes, more common now than previous years... yes. But honestly I highly doubt that doctors and pilots are a significant portion of our benefits bill.

The most important thing for job creation is a strong economy. Taxing everyone into oblivion and discouraging people from earning does not make a strong economy

I found it easiest working full time when kids where in nursery as you drop them at 7.30/8 and pick them up at 6pm. No homework etc, it is open all year round except Christmas for a week and a few bank holidays when we were mostly off. So if you are going to work part time, it is early primary that is much harder to juggle unless you find a really good childminder or have family help. And primary won’t even let your kids walk home from school until year 6 where I live. So latch kids not even possible these days until very late primary.

‘Only’ £15k a year over three years.

So £45k net. Which is around £105k gross.

So you need to earn an extra £105k over three years - and you think that sounds fine? Seems quite a lot to me.

And of course that is only for one child.

The book Daylight Robbery explains it!

A little of a lot is more than a lot of nothing

In my circle it unfortunately isn’t possible to go part time due to client demands. But people are salary sacrificing pension, buying annual leave, taking sabbaticals, doing car and bike buying schemes etc. I think actually there will be a positive to the figures here, as in a lot more income tax will be collected as people don’t look for ways to avoid this massive cliff edge.

My children will be too old for it (just) by the time it’s bought in. But I still think it’ll be a really good thing for the economy and for a sense of us all being in this together. I know there’s a lot of resentment that people who are paying £50k plus tax a year, using private healthcare etc are not able to get anything back out at a point when they need it. My nursery bill became well over £5k a month once for two children - the nursery had to up the fees to subsidise the shortfall in what the government were paying for ‘free’ hours.