to think that people who threaten to leave the country because they resent paying more taxes should just bugger off without trying to elicit sympathy form the rest of us?

[AllFallDown]

Oh and, many of those on high salaries earn that much either directly or indirectly because of the deregulation that caused this whole bloody mess in the first place. So to hear them moaning now they're aksed to pay a bit back ... Grrrr.

A 400k house in London is certainly not "lavish"

400k isn't lavish in most parts of London for a family home - it is in the cheap end for many areas and impossible for some.

The point with housing though is that very few people jump on the ladder at £400k - they buy a starter flat, build up a bit of equity, trade up when they get a better job, trade up a lot when they meet someone (who hopefully also has a property to sell and equity to pour into joint home).

If someone sretched themselves with an unmanageable mortgage then that was always going to be a risk, regardless of what happened to taxes.

custardo..£400,000 is not that lavish..my house is worth that and i'm just an uneducated oik from the back streets of brixton.

400k for a nice place in London is a myth anyway. I can never fathom why London is always used as an example of high living costs.
You would pay that and more in certain parts of Surrey for example for a smallish house with a postage stamp garden if you were daft enough to be bothered about post codes.

It's not just people who are on higher salaries that live to their means rather than just within their means.
Most people are only 1 pay packet away from being unable to pay their mortgage/rent.

Not all the higher earners are in the financial sector. I wasn't but my salary was still in the top 95% of the country iyswim.
It doesn't make me greedy or lavish, it just means that i managed to find a well paid career that i enjoyed immensely and worked very hard at. The pay was a nice bonus to that really.

I agree with others that have said it is not a good thing if all the high earners were to leave the country.
For example, someone in a high earning post could own and run his.her own business, he/she will have employees but will also have regular suppliers.
If they choose to relocate their business to another domicile most of the staff barring key employees will be made redundant. All of the suppliers will lose a revenue stream. For many small suppliers at thye moment the loss of one client is enough to push them into insolvency.

You may not like the idea or agree with the morals of a high earner complaining about a higher tax bill but the reality is that it can and will have a knock on effect for a lot of people.

not worth - mortgage on

so if you can afford to move to london and buy a 400k house - i'd say that was quite a lavish thing to do

litchick..i know plenty of people earn alot of money and have nothing to do with the banking system....fwiw, i don't think anyone who writes books/paints/ or has anything to do with the arts should pay tax at all.

Well surely that depends what you sold your old house for or, if you had no house to sell, what you were earning now?

the thing is though - the more unequal society is the worse place it is for everyone to live in.

If I earned that much I would like to think I would be ok with contributing more to make the whole country a better place rather than buggering off to some place where it is even more unequal and but the haves are definitely running it so they will let me keep most of what I "earn".

Even with 50% tax ate £150K+ you still get a pretty good take home salary compared to most.

How so Daftpunk?

why should somebody who works in the arts not pay tax? sod it, i;m going to take up painting in my spare time and become tax excempt

I believe that is the case in Irland which is why Dublin has such a thriving artistic comunity.
Personally I don't mind that my income is subject to tax like any other self employed person.

Though if my next book reaches Harry Potter levels you might see me hopping on a ferry .

lol litchick..i was just about to ask if you're really JKR..

fember - sorry if I misunderstood things.

My understanding is that someone on say £160,000 will pay tax at 20% for the first c£35k, then at 40% up to £150k then at 50% for any amounts over £150k

Surely this would give a lower rate than 51%

I didn;t realise that the 51% incl NI contributions so I apologise.

If someone on £160k actually ends up with £78400 after tax then there is an effective 51% rate but I still don;t think so, if anyone can explain it to me I would appreciate it so I can be better informed.

(£78k sounds like a high net income to me anyway £6.5k a month after tax.)

Riven - we all benefit from the provisions of the state. But high earners pay maybe 10x as much for them as lower earners. They don't get 10x as much benefit from the state. So even those who think it's reasonable to pay 10x as much might think it's a bit harsh to suddenly have to pay 12x as much.

Just felt the need to repeat these words of wisdom...

'I think that MN should reflect the full spectrum of life. If someone can start a thread about life on benefits or about redundancy, I think it's a bit unfair that all the Mumunists pile in to give a thorough pasting to anyone who admits earning over 20,000 a year. One of the things that makes MN interesting is the glimpse of other people's realities, whether that's life as a single parent on benefits or life as the spouse of a hedge fund manager.

I don't know. I don't have a religious bone in my body but I never feel the need to go onto the Christian prayer threads and call their children "brats". Live and let live'

wannaBe on Thu 23-Apr-09 10:02:43
"And what do you think would happen to the economy if they left? serious question.

Because if the high earners all left the country they would also be taking with them a large part of the country's income."

this is exactly what my father's generation were muttering 40 years ago in Scandinavia (and have been repeating ad nauseam ever since)

of course most of them couldn't be arsed to leave

and as for the ones that did leave- they don't seem to have been all that irreplaceable

others came in their place

it turned out the disgruntled high earners were not, as they themselves thought, the only ones uniquely placed to contribure to the country's economy

yawn

YABVU.

What a nasty thread.

It's a thread about a thread.

The OP of the other thread wasn't complaining or trying to gain sympathy. Anyone who thinks otherwise was obviously not reading it clearly.

The OP is only thinking about moving to Asia because her husband's boss is thinking of relocating the company. So the OP's husband and her have a choice: move or get a new job here.

I have seen lots of sympathy on here for people who are on benefits and people who can't afford without state help to provide for the children they have, yet they continue to have more children. I'm not judging them. I don't understand why someone who is well off - presumably from hard work whatever you think of the guy's profession - should elicit such bitterness. And the person who referred to the women's children as 'brats' should be ashamed of herself.

I completely agree with ninedragons's post.

Chillicrab, the OP in the other thread did say:

"AIBU to be PLEASED?" about the relocation.

She did, in her last paragraph. I think this is what got people's backs up.

The context + the subsequent text made it quite clear that her pleasure derived not from a personal desire to live in Hongkong, but from a feeling that it would serve this country right if the firm left.

If her post was about struggling with the decision of whether to leave the country or lose his job, then I am sure she would have had sympathy. But she would presumably have worded it rather differently in that case?

cory I didn't get the impression that she felt it would 'serve the country right' if the firm left, rather that she felt this country doesn't necessarily offer her her tax money's worth anymore. She's entitled to her opinion. I honestly don't think she was playing the 'woe is me' card as at least one person on her has stated.

curlygal - I am also puzzled by this 51% business. Have just been on a tax calculation website and plopped in £160k salary - don't think it has been updated to allow for yesterday's changes - and figure comes in at £100k net. Take off £1k for the extra 10% tax over £150k and it is still £99k net even including payment of NI contributions. It does say that employer's NI contributions total another £19k odd but that does not affect the employee surely? Don't know, not an accountant, but it literally doesn't add up.