Latest mansion tax should be on top % homes locally not nationallu

[Lionfisher]

Rachel Reeves is front running yet another class warfare policy in the press, this time suggesting everyone who lives in a home over £2m should have to pay 1% on anything above 2m.

First - I’m fine with this. I live in SW London and would probably have to pay some.

But I’m ONLY fine with it if everyone round the country does too. Meaning that it should be on the top 5% of homes by REGION (I’ll leave it to other people to argue what region means, all the data is there to do it).

We could happily sell our 4 bed home and move somewhere else in the country and buy a 10 bed castle. Or just buy another 4 bed home and stash the rest in the markets. TBH we might even do that if this comes in.

But people don’t want us to do this because it prices them out of local homes etc. Which is pretty much what this policy would do, price people out of local homes so they move elsewhere and prices up somewhere else instead.

But more than anything you can be far more rich on far less money in other parts of the country. So this isn’t a tax on property it’s a tax on the south.

As long as top X% of homeowners elsewhere are paying their 1% above their threshold I’ve no issues with this.

But people won’t agree with me as it’s easier to think it should always be “other people” who pay…. or will they?

Left wing greed.

People living in a £2m home - the only home they own - are not the problem, nor are they inefficient wealth 'hoarders'. That narrative is pure government gaslighting, built on strawmen and the politics of envy. They are ordinary taxpayers who followed decades of government advice: work hard, buy property, save, stay put and contribute (+ more recently get a Degree - but that's gaslighting and strawmen for another day). The fact their home is now worth more is a result of planning failures, cheap credit and political choices - not homeowner behaviour. They and other home owners are not costing the government anything. They are paying the bill after bill for its mismanagement of the economy.

Banks and utilities were run/ are being run to the point of failure, investment was deferred, shareholders were paid, and taxpayers were/are left to keep the businesses afloat and fund the repairs.

Poorly negotiated PFI contracts guaranteed private profits, and when the costs ballooned, the taxpayer picked up the bill.

Developers cut corners for profit, regulators looked away, and the cladding bill landed on leaseholders and taxpayers.

Globalisation, combined with weak trade rules and poor worker protections, allows companies to boost profits by cutting pay, while taxpayers are left subsidising wages through benefits and other support.

The NHS has been chronically underfunded and then propped up by profit-driven outsourced providers, with inefficiency and cost overruns borne by the taxpayer.

Same for social care. Private equity extracts profit, provision is cut to the bare minimum, families are forced to sell their homes/ use savings, and whatever remains uncovered is picked up by tax payers.

Same for the benefits system. Cliff edges and poor routes back into work turn support into long term dependency for some and life style choices for others, while the cost is again carried by taxpayers.

Time and time again, the Government presides over a system where private profits are protected, responsibility is offloaded, and taxpayers get to pick up the tab.

So do tell me again why someone living in the one home they own is a 'inefficient wealth-hoarding problem' that needs to be shown the error of their ways with yet more punitive taxes. Why are they enemy number one, while genuinely wealthy individuals/ families and global corporates continue to accumulate wealth and power largely untouched?

A few reasons

Government failure. Years of cheap credit, bad planning and short-term policy choices pushed prices up. That wasn’t caused by people who happened to own a house.

Renovation. Plenty of people bought run down or unfashionable places and poured years of their own money and time into them. That isn’t hoarding it’s grafting.

Time and/ or gentrification. People on ordinary salaries bought in areas no one wanted decades ago, stayed put, raised families and built communities. The area changed around them.

None of these reasons justify punishing them for owning one home.

Quadruple tax is nonsense because its actually 5 times. Income tax, NI, Stamp duty, Council tax, mansion tax.