Millionaires leaving UK- are you concerned?

[anonhop]

Read today that 10,800 millionaires left the UK in 2024 which is equivalent in tax take for the government to half a million average tax payers. I don't think that factors in their reduced reliance on public services either.

Do you think this is concerning in terms of investment & spending in our economy?

I understand the moral arguments for the wealthy paying more tax but if so many are leaving, will it practically leave us worse off?

Curious to see what people think

It wouldn’t have worked in recent years in 99% of cases - I haven’t had a single client (of hundreds) leave and be able to avoid inheritance tax. But now they’ve got rid of the concept of domicile, it’s now much easier to leave the UK inheritance tax net, you just have to leave the UK and survive 11 years, and don’t move back here permanently.

So for many before the Autumn Budget it wasn’t worth leaving the UK, but now is provided they can commit to spending the majority of the rest of their life overseas.

Where are you thinking of moving?

Problem is we've been paying what feels like high levels of tax for years, and getting nothing for it. We now need to keep paying higher tax, but need to have faith it's going in the right direction. I do have some faith in this government, but think they'll be too short lived due to the media corruption and bullsh*ttery meaning it's not reported correctly what is actually happening.

The nordic countries are often cited as being the healthiest and happiest, and we are a LONG way from their tax levels.

The millionaires leaving are in a lot of cases at retirement age... and this isn't uncommon. The media will have you believe it's all the dynamic entrepeunerial youngsters who are itching to make the country a better place, but can't because of the stifling government, and it's not really the case. It's older people liquidising their assets and disappearing to warmer climates where they can protect their wealth, and ignore the country that has looked after them in their less successful years..

Brexit has had a much bigger impact on emigration than the recent change in government.

We do need some massive changes in this country to encourage business growth, but we do also need to raise wages and get the economy moving again, and get people healthier which will then result in a more productive nation. Here's hoping...

If we as a couple sold all our assets, we would have significantly more than a million. But we like it in the UK. We also like the seasons and the changing weather. I went to Dubai once on business. I can't imagine ever living there.

I don’t know how relevant this is but I know quite a few people in London who live mortgage free in a property worth a million or more, but basically inherited it, or bought and paid it off when it was less than a quarter of that. Mostly now retired and on comfortable incomes (obviously they don’t feel compelled to release equity in the house by downsizing) but not massive. The astronomical rise in property values means that many homes that haven’t changed hands since the 90s or so have realised huge profits even though people were able to buy them on salaries that weren’t huge, and may live fairly modestly in them but just don’t want to sell.

We have a government who are actively repelling wealth and aspiration. No wonder they're leaving.
It's quite scary to read pp's who seem happy about it. Where do they think the money for public services comes from?

I wasn’t aware of this.
Are you saying anyone living here can’t just sell up and move abroad. Are you saying they are tracked in some way in case they die within 11years and if they do they are stung for UK IHT

lol, I don't think a lot of mumsnetters can get their heads round that fact, given the number of posts you see here that say pensioners don't pay tax.

People question why don't working pensioners pay NI...

Two from our Surrey village. ‘Proper’ millionaires, not just by virtue of owning a house in the Home Counties which has gone up enormously over the years . One has already set up two new businesses abroad.

Yes I think it is concerning. The UK is no longer a place where people who make good money and pay good taxes feel their future lies. I suppose it's cyclical. We were due a good hard dose of the 1970s again.

Only a very small percentage of the population are net contributors (they pay more in tax than they cost). The majority of people are net beneficiaries (they cost the country more than they pay in). If there are too few contributors, the welfare state will fall over.

It hasn't changed that much over the years but what has changed is demographics....

I suppose it's cyclical.

We never recovered from the 08 crash

Italy though....they like our millionaires...

Listen Tory, you lot are not going back into power any time soon. We are not that demented.
Get that into your thick skull.

True. It will be Reform, looking at recent polls.

Why do you think that?

DH earned circa £450k last year and paid tax and NI on that.
I earned £320k and also paid tax and NI on that.
We also pay the highest level of council tax, tax on everything we buy etc. We have cleaner a gardener and a dog walker. I also have a PA.
Plus we don't take out as much as others since our children went to private schools, they don't have student loans and we have private health care.

We certainly pay tax.

We are UK born (working class backgrounds - both lawyers)

We're shooting ourselves in the foot with this culture of envy rather than aspiration we are cultivating. Celebrating that the net contributors are leaving - rather than wondering why and why there aren't more of them.
We're not millionaires, but total assets aren't miles off - we've been toying with leaving for a while. The tax bill gets bigger and bigger and the lifestyle get worse and worse. We're certainly not investing our money here....

I have never voted Tory in my life, and I am still concerned about the declining numbers of tax payers.

Yep! Productivity is at an all time low. People in the UK population aged over 66 are at an all time high.

"Using anonymised data from personal tax returns, we show that in 2015-16 the average rate of tax paid by people who received one million pounds in taxable income and gains was just 35 per cent: the same as someone earning £100,000. But one in four of these paid 45 per cent – close to the top rate – whilst another quarter paid less than 30 per cent overall. One in ten paid just 11 per cent—the same as someone earning £15,000. The rich, it seems, are not all in it together."

I'd be concerned about mobile high earners, whether they are British or not. Lots of Europe wide finance jobs have left London since Brexit, and these people are very mobile and while lifestyle will play a part, will definitely move if tax burdens become too high. Many of these jobs can be done from multiple locations. Given our overreliance on highly paid individuals I think it's very worrying. Millionaires in assets matter slightly less as its income that is excessively taxed here

and neither of us voted conservative (or reform). We voted Lib Dem (despite their warped gender policies)

From April 2025, you pay UK inheritance tax on your worldwide assets if you were UK resident for ten or more tax years in the 20 tax years before you die. So anyone who dies anywhere in the world needs to look back to assess if they’re due to pay UK inheritance tax. Obviously if you have never lived in the UK then it’s easy, but if you have spend a lot of time here then you could have to pay the tax even if you’ve lived abroad for a reasonable amount of time.

Before April 2025, you would pay UK inheritance tax if you were domiciled in the UK. That broadly means if you perceived the UK as ‘home’ you could still pay the tax here even if you’d lived abroad for 60 years. From April it’s much easier to not pay inheritance tax as you can just manage the number of days you spend in the UK, rather than the current subjective and hard to prove test.

We are very comfortably net contributers as are most of our family and friends.

Many of us are dual nationals too

I don't know anyone who is leaving the UK.

It's not all about tax - I love London and would never want to live in Dubai or similar.

I have lived in a couple of other countries, I really liked the Netherlands in particular, but all the countries I would consider have higher rates of tax not lower!

For me, earning a high salary is what gives me the freedom to live where I want - London - I wouldn't want to live somewhere I didn't like to save on tax

Millionaires in assets matter slightly less as its income that is excessively taxed here

They need to target wealth but it won't be popular. Far too much money is tied up in housing.

where are people planning to go to on this thread. A fair few countries have age restrictions.