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Original poster

Would those on higher incomes pay more tax to support those affected by restrictions?

78 replies

nutmegtea · 15/10/2020 11:19

Myself and most of my friends and family are not affected by the lockdown financially. They can work from home, have savings and so on.

Most support further restrictions although not all. Some are happy to pay more tax to help pay for it all but others are resentful of those who got paid on furlough while they had to keep working and essentially see it as them getting paid out of their pocket to do nothing. I can see why they think that although I don't agree with them and its inevitable that some jobs are going to be more impacted than others but it has made me curious is people who do earn more would be happy to see a steep rise in the tax they pay to help pay for an extended furlough scheme, grants to businesses, the arts and self employed or does it annoy you to have tp pay out more for some to sit about while you are still having to work?

OP posts:
Ihatemyseleffordoingthis · 15/10/2020 13:13

"Agree - very happy to donate to charities and food banks."

Fucking hell. how benevolent of you. So furloughed hospitality workers, whose livelihoods and future prospects have been wiped out because it turned out our economy didn't even have 3 months resilience in it, can go to food banks can they?

Original poster
nutmegtea · 15/10/2020 13:14

Pretty shocked at the responses here actually, seems like Thatcher was right, no such thing as society!

I agree with the others who think that strong comprehensive state support is needed.

OP posts:
BunsyGirl · 15/10/2020 13:15

My DH pays higher rate tax. His business has suffered but he has had no help whatsoever because he previously took more than £50k out per annum. We live in the SE. £50k is not a massive income when it costs £500k for a bog standard three bed semi. So no, I wouldn’t support paying extra tax. But you can bet your bottom dollar that my DH will end up paying more tax for nothing in return. On top of everything his back is knackered and it looks like he needs a disc replacing. The chances of him getting this done anytime soon on the NHS are zero to none. So, we are going to have to get a loan to pay for it privately. Otherwise, he won’t be able to work at all.

Caroncanta · 15/10/2020 13:18

Fucking hell. how benevolent of you. So furloughed hospitality workers, whose livelihoods and future prospects have been wiped out because it turned out our economy didn't even have 3 months resilience in it, can go to food banks can they?

I don't support another lockdown so I don't support continuation of furlough. If jobs have been wiped out then it's time to look for another job whatever it is. People that can't get work is one thing, people who don't want to because it's not what they did before is something quite different. And locking down is going to make prospects even worse. People need to get back to work where they can.

username40583 · 15/10/2020 13:18

@Remmy123 I'm furloughed my DH lost his job. We both are 'very highly educated and worked our socks off.' We are currently on a third of our income pre lockdown. People's attitudes on this thread and in general are shocking.

Ihatemyseleffordoingthis · 15/10/2020 13:21

@Caroncanta - but support it or not, the whole of the North West will be in that position by the weekend.

What jobs do you propose they do? I don't think there will be enough "Cyber" jobs being recruited in the next 6 months......

Devlesko · 15/10/2020 13:21

No why shouid a hard working individual who has studied and worked socks off help support someone who didn't????

Gosh, many I know in Hospitality, Leisure, T&T have degrees and studied as long as anyone else for their degree, or their Btec's specific to their industry. try getting a job as a chef without your quals.
Try being employed as a leisure officer in the council without a degree and likely PG study.

You must live in a parallel universe or be very dim.

username40583 · 15/10/2020 13:23

And for telling people to find a different job. From my experience that's what most people are doing. My DH has been rejected from a lot of different jobs many minimum wage due to the number of people applying. Don't get me started on how often the over qualified excuse has been said. He is now removing his life's work from his cv.

LearnedResponse · 15/10/2020 13:23

As a Keynesian I think that significant government support for affected people and sectors is probably a good investment in the long term. I don’t mind paying more tax, but even the IMF is currently saying that we shouldn’t be narrowly focussed on “balancing the books” at the moment, and that long term borrowing/aka the Magic Money Tree is the way to go especially given that we’re entering a period of negative interest rates.

Caroncanta · 15/10/2020 13:23

but support it or not, the whole of the North West will be in that position by the weekend.

I know. Its crap.

What jobs do you propose they do? I don't think there will be enough "Cyber" jobs being recruited in the next 6 months......

Anything that's available in their area. Not that it will be possible with another bloomin lockdown to screw the economy even further.

loobyloo1234 · 15/10/2020 13:23

No why shouid a hard working individual who has studied and worked socks off help support someone who didn't????

I'm alright Jack. FFS

HavelockVetinari · 15/10/2020 13:31

I would. I think taxes should be increased anyway to help pay for the social care and NHS crises.

I do donate to charities, but the NHS and social care are in crisis and really do require increased government funding.

MunaZaldrizoti · 15/10/2020 13:33

This reply has been deleted

Message deleted by MNHQ. Here's a link to our Talk Guidelines.

Pomegranatespompom · 15/10/2020 13:41

That was not what I meant as you know @Ihatemyseleffordoingthis
I’ve donated to various things for 20+ years happily.
I also support the furlough scheme, not entirely sure what you expect. In reality we’ll all be paying more.

Dollyparton3 · 15/10/2020 13:41

There's a "middle impact" group here who will already be badly hit by this that I think some people don't think about.

I'm a relatively high earner but in COVID we've taken a 20% payout at our firm to try and protect jobs. With me being on a commission bonus for a large percentage of my pay and a 2 month collapse on client work earlier this year that bonus has gone.

So at the moment my true pay cut is 50%. I didn't manage to take any time off this year as we were all pedalling so hard as a management team to keep people in work even though some of our staff were furloughed. Now we're making redundancies and workload will undoubtedly be spread among the remaining staff who all still feel incredibly lucky to have a job but we're not machines with infinite energy or capacity to do more.

I will have taken a 6 month mortgage payment holiday by the end of this year and my savings have taken a hit. By this time next year the impact on my finances will be huge.

So, when I go back up to the money I earned before is it right that I'm taxed more? There's no way of catching up the lost earnings, it could take years to get back to where I would have been if it weren't for COVID.

I'm not saying I wholeheartedly object to it but if I put my team UK hat on I think I've worked my socks off, far more than the people who were furloughed who were undoubtedly stressed beyond belief but at least didn't work 70 hour weeks for 3 months. A few friends of mine who were furloughed feel incredibly lucky in comparison to the year I've had.

Pomegranatespompom · 15/10/2020 13:44

Good post @Dollyparton3

MessAllOver · 15/10/2020 13:48

Higher earners will have to pay more tax. Because they're the only ones who will have the money to do it. So it doesn't matter whether we're "happy" or not about it.

What I can't stand (apart from the vitriol directed at those on furlough through no choice of their own) is the short-termism. Most of those furloughed will not be earning mega-bucks. It will cost far less in the long run to pay them a fair percentage of their salary (80% to 100%) to make ends meet and keep businesses open than it will to deal with the consequent problems of unemployment, homelessness and a rise in claiming benefits, poverty and child neglect. With luck, there will be a vaccine next year...We should try our best to keep businesses and the arts going and people in their jobs and houses until then. Then we might potentially have a functioning society when normal life resumes.

Scoobidoo · 15/10/2020 13:54

I think higher earners already do pay a huge amount in tax. For comparison (including NI):

£25,000 earner pays approx £4,350 per annum in tax, so 17.4% tax.

£50,000 earner pays approx. £12,350 per annum, so 24.7% tax.

£100,000 earner pays approx £33,500 per annum, so 33.5%.

£400,000 earner pays approx £172,000 per annum, so 43% tax.

JamSarnie · 15/10/2020 13:56

The short answer is NO. But that is because I think everyone should and will have to pay more to fund this crisis across all tax bands and all purchases like VAT.

Doingitaloneandproud · 15/10/2020 14:02

No I don't, if there are tax increases it will have to be across the board.

Mustbe3ormorecharacters · 15/10/2020 14:06

I would rather not pay higher taxes but I have donated about 30% of my salary this year to causes affected. I don’t have time to find many links right now but this is an example.
www.helpmusicians.org.uk/support-our-work/make-a-donation

CayrolBaaaskin · 15/10/2020 14:14

I think it’s easy to say “the rich” should pay when you don’t consider yourself to be one of them. You need to be a higher rate taxpayer to pay for the benefits, healthcare, etc you receive in the uk. Otherwise someone else is paying for you. I’m not saying that’s wrong but it doesn’t give you the moral high ground and the right to start deciding that others should pay for your choices.

Caroncanta · 15/10/2020 14:19

I’m not saying that’s wrong but it doesn’t give you the moral high ground and the right to start deciding that others should pay for your choices.

Yep.

Original poster
nutmegtea · 15/10/2020 14:20

I am a higher rate taxpayer and I think we should pay more, I also think that tax avoiding businesses should cough up after all they are the ones benefiting from the corporate welfare our taxes pay for, not to mention the infrastructure spending.

OP posts:
unmarkedbythat · 15/10/2020 14:25

@Doingitaloneandproud

No I don't, if there are tax increases it will have to be across the board.
1% of your income on £50k is a very different kettle of fish to 1% of your income on £19k. When your income is low losing even a small amount of it means you have to make choices about not affording necessities, when your income is high losing a small amount of it means you have to make choices about not affording luxuries. Richer people who don't want to pay more in tax can avoid doing so by resigning their well paid roles and taking low paid work.