The Rich According to the Guardian

[Judy1234]

www.guardian.co.uk/money/2008/aug/04/workandcareers.executivesalaries

swedes, I know it's illegal and I understand that some people are purely looking at what is legal and illegal and then deciding that as long as something is legal, it's ok.

I disagree. After all, laws are fallible, often pushed through by wealthy people who want to preserve their wealth and status. More privileged people find it far easier to go to great lengths to avoid legal restrictions. There are some things that you cannot make workable laws for or against.

Just because something is legal does not necessarily make it fair or right.

I see msdem has made a similar poitn

'MsDemeanor I'm sure then that you are happy with the murder of 1M people in Iraq. I question your morality.'

Am I alone in finding this absurd and distasteful? I don't think anyone on here is condoning murder.
I am sure there are aspects of the taxation system which many of us aren't happy with.
I would also have more respect for the anti-tax voices if people were a little more consistent. If you don't agree with paying income tax, I assume you home educate, never visit a doctor or use the NHS (so I assume you 'free birthed' or whatever it's called when you give birth with no medical assistance?)
Too many people have a pick n mix approach to taxation - they whinge about it but are all too happy to use the services that suit them.

"Polly Toynbee wrote an excellent book about life on minimum wages and lived that way for several months. So while she may be rich she has at least visited 'the other side'"
oh well, several months. that'll inform her then

PT is, as others have described, a champagne socialist. I have nothing but contempt for people like her. Yes, she may have played at living on the minimum wage temporarily. I imagine her life is the total opposite the rest of the time.

"After all, laws are fallible, often pushed through by wealthy people who want to preserve their wealth and status"

How are laws pushed through by wealthy people?

Laws are either as a result of statutes - govt driven, details drafted by MPs in committee - other interested parties can make statements/lobby, but no direct involvement and certainly no "wealthy people pushing them through"; or by case law - eg the recent stuff on how pensions will be dealt with on divorce has largely come through case law; and tax stuff will also be by regulation (statutory instruments - see statutes above) or drafted largely by civil servants (by and large not wealthy people with an agenda to further their own wealth).

Pointydog, to be clear are you suggesting that people actually seek out ways of paying tax. For example, do not use ISA's, do not contribute to pension schemes, do not use tax allowances etc. Tax avoidance is optimising your allowances etc to pay the least tax you actually have to: I'm actually a huge believer in proper taxation, but I can't agree that people should not make use of all the tax breaks available to them and I genuinely ccannot see what is "immoral" about that.

I don't understand thiscontempt for Polly Toynbee at all. It's inverted jealousy. She has succeeded in our society and managed to get high-paid jobs, sometimes by writing her opinions on wealth and poverty. SHe makes choices about what she thinks is best for her family.

So what? Really.

I didn't mention immoral

well, yes, I garbled. Wealthy people can get round the law, not be punished the same, since they are often judged by similarly wealthy people.

I am not jealous of anyone's wealth, I don't see immorality in it, I just think there is alot of unfairness. And, yes, life's not fair but I much prefer a society where that saying is not just accepted by everyone.

Why inverted jealousy? Not at all. I'm not denying that she has succeeded in getting well paid jobs, and I have no issue with that. It's the hypocrisy that i don't like. If you make certain choices, then be upfront about it! Don't act the socialist when you're not - have a bit of integrity!

I would like a flat tax of about 10% as in Hungary and no allowances or reliefs but a minimum state provided income of £200 a week to everyone over 18 regardless of income or working status and abolition of all tax reliefs and other complexities

Why are people jealous of others? If a non dom or a businesswoman pays doluble the tax I do but then has a lot of money on top ofo that which is taxed at 10% as capital gains because she just sold her business why is that an issue? She's already paid more than twice what I pay. I just don't believe in redistribution of wealth or the need to ensure everyone has the same income.

MsDemeanor - You really are astonishingly naiive if you believe that article from the Guardian [laugh up sleeve emoticon] you linked to is telling us that poor people give more to charity. They don't.

In order to be even handed, here is a quote from philanthropyuk:

"Charities are reliant on a small proportion of donors for the majority of their income from individuals. While two-thirds of the population donate up to £5 in a typical month - including over 40% who give nothing at all - less than 5% of the population, represented largely by the mass affluent, give over £50 a month, accounting for over half of the total amount donated."

Philanthropy UK's website is here for anyone who wants to read further about how much the wealthy really leave to charity.

When I went to University (quite a long time ago now but not so long ago I actually got a grant) I knew quite a lot of people who's parents were wealthy enough to have sent them to private school but also managed to blag the system somehow that they got full grants also. I can imagine that these parents, while seeing nothing wrong with this beahviour, think benefit cheats are the scum of the earth.

I have no truck with either group frankly but I do think the very wealthy often justify the same behaviour in themselves that they would condemn in others/

I think everybody should be given £25,000 by the state. Thereafter tax of 25% should be paid on all earnings. No child tax credits. No working tax credits. No personal allowances. No higher rate tax payers. No need for pension contributions as pensioners would also receive the £25,000 per annum. The idle could then afford not to work if they don't want to. The creative could afford to be creative. The industrious and hardworking could work as much as they wanted - no EEC working time directive.

I knew people like that too wasabipeanut when I was at University. Students with divorced parents could get the full grant regardless of the parents' income, whereas if your parents had stayed together, you didn't. I remember asking my parents quite seriously why they didn't divorce for the years that my siblings and I went through higher education and then get back together!
It was yet another loophole in the system that penalises couples who stay together.

"But I am suprised a wealthy persons conscience doesn't prickle a bit. How can you walk past a homeless person on your way to a mercedes showroom for a new car and not feel a pang?"

What an absolutely ridiculous statement - pure projection: how do you know it doesn't? How do you know what a wealthy person feels like when they walk past a homeless person? Would it be ok if it were a middle income person walking past to a vauxhall showroom? A student walking past to a coffee shop?

(For what its worth - I'm a "wealthy person" but don't have a mercedes, so not completely within the demographic here - I spent several Christmases working for Shelter's Crisis at Christmas and think the causes of homelessness are varied and complicated, but frankly I feel sorry for every homeless person I see on the street, because however they got there, through whatever series of choices and circumstances, it can't be what they or anyone who loved them wanted. I also donate to Shelter via direct debit so often don't give money to homeless people on the street).

Agree with you there Anchovy. By the logic of riven's argument, all of us in the UK should constantly feel pangs of conscience, as there will always be millions of people in poverty somewhere in the world.

And we should! Don't you?

19th-century philosopher Alexander Herzen, who in From the Other Shore (1855) wrote "It is they, none other, who are dying of cold and hunger...while you and I in our rooms on the first floor are chatting about socialism 'over pastry and champagne.'

IorekByrnison - riven's post suggested that only the wealthy should feel pangs of conscience. My point was that this is illogical. As you say, either we should all feel it, or there is no reason for any of us to, since everyone in the UK is signficantly better off than many others globally.