Tory Marriage Tax - makes me feel a bit icky

[HohohoBumperlicious]

Am I right to feel a bit - for want of a better word - icky about marriage tax. I am married but it just seems wrong to put a financial and moral (as after all the root of the tax is surely a moral one) premium on marriage.

It's not always the best state and certainly isn't one that should be the default, it is, after all, a purely social construct designed to fit in with perceived views on what is 'moral'. I'm sure people can be perfectly happy and good members of the community without being married.

Am I missing the point somehow?

i represent more than just me
thats lots of 'unmarrieds' out here abra!d..
it does drive me nuts reading the sanctimonious comments about how we should live to best serve society

thank you monkeyfeathers! that's the clearest way of putting it yet!

"BOLLOCKS to the tories if that is not good enough and UP YOURS Cameron if he thinks it MATTERS"

Haha, NotAnOtter, I love this. High five.

My dad will love it if David Cameron gets in. He gets married all the time.

My aunt got married recently. She's a management consultant, her DH is a solicitor. They don't have kids. They have two houses. They don't need a tax break.

If you move to a couple taxation system, you can only really do it if the couple are married (or in a civil partnership) as that is the only way that we have to formalise these relationships.

How is the HMRC supposed to know when someone is entitled to the allowance if there is no marriage certificate, especially in households were mum has a string of 'boyfriends'. And when does someone stopping over turn into a lifelong partnership? Marriage is the only reasonable way to prove that you are what you say you are.

And children do not need to be part of this system as they are already catered for by Child Benefit.

As for widows, there was certainly an allowance alongside the married couples allowance.

I haven't read all of this but from the OP I would respond that if a party is trying to reinforce family values then giving people who marry a tax break it is valuing marriage.

I believe children feel more stable in a married family, I waited until I was married to have them. I know I'm lucky it worked out that way, but I would love a tax break for it please!

I take it you can't find any evidence that marriage makes for a better enviroment for dc to grow up in... a loving stable family of whatever ilk will do fine and poverty will be a drag No not going round in cirles - there is no evidence and you want me to do your leg work and find your evidence cos you cant find anything to back up what your spouting

For those on less than 16k the tax is unfair - they dont get benifit unless they have children - and now if there conterpart is married the torys will give them a tax break, but not i they are single they lose out all round

I flounced off this thread in a huff on page one I think but can't seem to stay off it...

I'm not getting back into the married/not married discussion again but one thing that doesn't seem to have cropped up much on here is that if you do combine the tax allowances (oh, and the reason that SAHP doesn't get this automatically is because they're not actually paying tax) the family income will increase. I suspect, therefore, that any other benefits ie tax credits will probably be reduced.

I would suggest, therefore, that this will not benefit those on lower incomes at all but only those on incomes higher than £66k.

And, for the record, I am a single mother, work full time and get no benefits other than child benefit.

belle surely any reasonable calculation could take this into account. What we need is the Lib Dems to take this idea and implement it fairly - it could be done!

Thing is the SAHP really is paying tax. It appears that only the partner who works in a paid job is the only one paying tax because the tax is deducted in his or her name. However, since the income from which that tax is taken is treated as the household income (and all means-tested benefits and tax credits are based on that) then it must be the income of both adults in the partnership/marriage. This means that the household pays more tax on the single income than they would if both partners worked in lower paying jobs that added up to the same salary.

I'm not entirely convinced the tax system is unfair to those on less than £16k a year though. People on low incomes are taxed in exactly the same way as me (since I do not pay any higher rate tax). The problem is that a less than reasonable amount is left over and this is not (adequately) addressed through the tax credits system. I don't know much about how working tax credit, but I'm sure the system probably isn't great for those without kids. There may also be some issue with the way in which national insurance is calculated that disadvantages lower income earners, but again I don't really know much about this.

I don't think pooling tax allowances would only help households with an income in excess of £66k. People with a household income far less than that are only entitled to child tax credit at the basic rate, not working tax credit, especially since couples where one parner is a SAHP do not qualify for the childcare element of this. Since taxing by (married) household would affect both those with children and those without, then child tax credit would (should?) remain the way in which people with children were relieved of some of their tax burden.

Of course, we're probably all going to get a tax hike anyway.

Thank you both. Monkeyfeathers, you've made me think a bit differently about this.

I suppose, for me, it feels a bit like I'm being told I'm a second class citizen because I have a child "out of wedlock" and I do resent having to work so very hard and then get absolutely nothing back at all. I am aware that I earn a lot of money but one third of my income goes on childcare and I see no respite from anywhere/anyone. I suppose I could just get married

I would vote Tory if they dropped this elitist policy

Monkeyfeathers you have stated the case very eloquently and I agree with you. I don't think I should get a tax break just for being married. I don't think my relationship is neccessarily better or stronger than anyone elses just because I am married.

However, I chose to be married because, amongst other things, it makes mine and DH's partnership a legal and binding one. When we (hopefully) have children, we will have to make decisions about who works full time and who reduces their working hours (and income). If finaces allow, we might even make the decision to have oneof us stay hope and be a full time stay at home parent. We will make those decisions on the basis of our joint income, if one of us stopped working entirely then the one who earns will be earning on behalf of us both. It seems only fair that he should be able to transfer his tax allowance to me in that situation. We are a partnership, we arrange our live as such. It seems eminently reasonable to expect the tax system to be flexible enough to recognise this.

Belle and I'm second class in Labour and LibDem's views because I'm a SAHM and therefore am a lady of leisure (Brown) or less offensively not eligible as a family for the same tax allowance as another family with a different working structure. I hate that the parties seem to have picked a group of mothers to support and don't care about the rest of us. (When I was still working around 90% of my income went to childcare. Labour didn't value that work (trying to axe childcare vouchers was rather revealing about how they felt about all of us middle class mums).)

did brown actually use the term 'lady of leisure'?

i don't know if he used it, but i'd like to offer GB a chance to swap with me for a day. i can be PM and he can sort out the kids and see if he can keep the kitchen floor clean (oh and breastfeed DD maybe not) and we'll see if he still thinks i am a lady of leisure.
actually i don't think i could be pm for the day- unless i got to meet obama (swoon)

it = the term lady of leisure, sorry bit tired

i have 6 kids - gordon ...fancy a day chez nous??

oh i forgot - all the MPs have cleaners and gardeners (not that much gardening goes on at the moment but anyway) and the like paid for at our expense! So perhaps they have a misguided impression of what life is really like for the average SAHM?

yes could be - need to research if he said it before i really go stern

Sorry to be selfish but I don't feel the least bit "icky". It's about time we were on the right side of a Government financial policy for once.

I think that childcare should be a tax deductible expense, but with the current economic climate, I just can't ever see it happening. If any political party truly wanted to help working families, that would target them well.

i cant believe people would rather money go on an aribtrary tax allowance rather than, e.g, schools, hospitals, care for the elderly.

At this risk of going wildly off tangent none of us get to choose where our tax or allowances go or are applied.

I resent every penny of public money spent on the Olympics but I have no interest in spectator sports. I also think all the money spent on space exploration (worldwide) would be better directed at alleviating world poverty but that's not a very popular view either!

Anyway, if this comes to pass I remain convinced that what is given with one hand will be taken with another. And, given that it's Tory "policy" I would suspect that the taking will come from benefits currently paid.

And, the irony of this for me is that I never, ever thought that I would vote Conservative but I was seriously considering it. This "policy" makes it unlikely that I will. I'm not voting for a party that makes me feel like I'm NQOCD (Not Quite Our Class, Darling).

They've just been discussing this on Any Questions and Polly Toynbee made a very good point - a man who unilaterally dumped his wife and children and left her for a younger woman, would keep the tax break if he married said younger woman, while the dumped wife would lose the tax break.

Do women really think that's fair?