Higher taxes incoming on Tueaday

[Choosychoice]

If you earn £100-£125k you currently pay income tax at a marginal rate of 63%. This isn’t enough for the SNP who next Tuesday are increasing it to 65%. 🤯 in what world is this a reasonable thing to do, when money is being wasted left right and centre by these imbeciles on embassies with no political purpose, ferry contracts so bad we pay 10 x the going rate, and a department for constitutional affairs who’s whole purpose is outwith the devolution agreement. We’ve just spent millions trying to get the GRR past section 35 when the case was so weak it took 46 seconds for the judge to throw it out and rUK are (quite rightly) considering asking for the Scottish government to pay their costs.

I don’t mind paying more taxes for the child poverty measures, but raising taxes to allow these fiscally incontinent 5 year olds to waste again and again and again is farcical.

The tories are venal and corrupt. The SNP are venal, corrupt, unbearably pious and also thick.

They may not be more competent in England but they would be demanding less of my earnings to fund their incompetence…

Why are you so obsessed with England's public spending? We live in Scotland. Our public spending is dictated largely by scot gov. The economy, education, health, justice, rural affairs, housing, environment, equal opportunities, consumer advocacy and advice, transport and taxation are all devolved powers. What england does in these areas makes no odds to us. Its like conctantly refercing the French education system saying its worse than ours - who cares, Im not in England or France, im in Scotland, iv got a problem with the Scottish system which actually affects me.

Im told by the website on tactical voting to vote labour. I long to be snp free but i cant vote any party who voted GRR. Il be voting tory, the only party to stand up for women and children. I dont think il ever forget the GRR vote.

As for the north [of Ireland] , don’t take this the wrong way but I don’t think many will make that move from Scotland.

There are a lot (a disproportionate number) of Northern Irish people in Scotland who will be earning a salary that will be impacted by this tax, because they will have moved across for university and stayed. Many of them would be happy to return, once the good things about of living in Scotland is no longer enough to compensate for being away from family, and thousands of pounds a year extra in tax, each, is a significant hit to that cost-benefit analysis.

Scotland is pretty sectarian too.

This has made me think about finances a lot. I will most likely make the move back to Northern Ireland once my kids have finished school. For the price of my house in Edinburgh I would be able to get a small holding/ large garden and large house in south Belfast AND a cottage up north in Portrush.
Now that I'm typing it out it seems daft not to do it.
Until then I'll be increasing my contributions to my pension. I fully agree with tax abd those who can should pay more but this is too much to pay for incompetence.

Even the SNPs economic guru is saying it's going to damage the economy.

twitter.com/andrewwilson/status/1737718669881278493?s=46&t=AjtjSItRj-kgZwRzL-pdyQ

Oh well if there's a silver lining at least well paid people who are still stupid enough to favour independence are getting a taste of what it would be like.

For me the silver lining is increased likelihood of cashing my pension at 57 and becoming "economically inactive" - though would likely still be paying some income tax on the pension withdrawals.

Also think there’s a small irony in that the tax-hammered private sector will overwhelmingly have DC pensions that are safe in the (unlikely) event of independence - ie it’s a real pot of assets out there.

Whilst I would not like to be relying on only a (Scot gov backed, not U.K. gov backed) state pension that relies on future taxpayers…

To be fair I couldn't believe how cheap housing is around Belfast. My friend bought a huge mansion for less than £300,000. Would be nearly double anywhere else.

Humza Useless now getting pelters on Twitter for referring to Lockerbie as an "air disaster" and not a "bombing" or "terrorist attack". Bit misjudged.

I think one worrying aspect of the tax rise is that doctors and other NHS staff will quite understandably choose to go part time or not work overtime to avoid paying more tax. Leading to more NHS staff shortages and even longer waiting lists. The SNP are just so arrogant in their thinking and get these big decisions wrong all the time.

This has always been my worry about this scheme.

In Scotland a significant number of people in this bracket will he hospital consultants and GPs and we already have a national shortage.
So if some of them start going part time and others don't take on extra shifts waiting lists will grow and it will be even more difficult to get a GP appointment.

I hope the BMA will do research on this over the next year and publish the results

I have just spoken to an old uni friend, works as a band 7 health visitor, single parent, so not exactly rolling in it or the SNP’s ‘Broad shoulders”. They are burnt out with the job and the impact of fiscal drag on their pay packet. Just told me they are going to take partial early retirement and come back 3 days a week at a lower grade. This constant erosion of our salaries by the SNP govt is going to have a significant impact on tax take and NHS service provision. They are now an ex SNP voter, so there is that to celebrate I guess.

@AuContraire I couldn't agree more. I even know a couple of families who made the move recently (after covid) and they couldn't be happier. NI is not what it once was and I do feel a positivity when I go back which is often. Lovely housing for the price, great schools.

All parts of the UK seem to have shambolic govts but only in Scotland are you taxed more - and at the higher end of incomes those differences would make someone think seriously about moving.

As a NHS doctor , I can confirm I have already started the process of reducing my hours

And if Scotgov were anything other than second rate regional administrators who are sorely out of their depth they would grasp basic economics and concentrate on growing the economy and supporting business then far fewer would need Scottish Child Payment .

I think the SG doesn't understand that it's not just a question of money for many people. For many it will be a question of time. If they can reduce working time, or increase pension contributions and then retire earlier, that will be a very attractive draw for a lot of people who are otherwise fairly comfortable. It shows a real lack of insight into what drives people.

It's not a great look when even your own economic gurus are voicing objections to this policy. Watch the hear-no-evil-see-no-evil-crowd try to paint the sensible SNP elements (and there are / were many) as pseudo-tories etc. The wheesht for indy force is strong.

Its just such a short sighted policy. To begin with dh and i will increase pension contributions with a view to making a decision depending on what happens in the next few years of either tollerating that scenario and retiring early or moving to Northumberland. The majority will simply raise pension contributions but for the minority and the ambitious graduates who leave Scotland that will be Scotlands loss. Id think it would be extremely unlikely that once that decision was made that any of these families or individuals will ever come back - and as pp have stated, its already a relatively small pot of people so Scot Gov cant afford to losing members of the pot.

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/d93182b6-9861-4f80-ba73-a96148d751bc?shareToken=548b567deafea0e7f26ce79abb28a121

yet another article pointing out that this isn’t any sort of end to much higher taxation, and that cuts in other areas will be needed.

its an interesting one, I support the Scottish child payment, and a disability friendly society. Overall though, Scottish public spending is heading for a big crash, and nobody is grappling with it.

@BYDboard A very interesting article. Thanks for posting. It makes very depressing reading.. our social security bill will increase more than 50% over the next 5 years. Tax rises won’t be able to pay for it all so cuts will be needed to other things which help the poorest eg social house building. I think some of the freebies should go but which ones ? No one would like these withdrawn and obviously it would not be politically popular at all.

Yes any Scottish govt is going to have to make tough choices

But at the moment the SNP is refusing to make those tough choices, and just saying it's all England's fault.

Over the festive season came into contact with several North Sea offshore workers employed by the majors who are planning to job share rather than pay the extra tax . They said it’s particularly galling to be working along side workers based in other parts of Uk who are earning the same but paying less tax . However what really angered them
was the way the SNP fecklessly squanders their hard earned money while not supporting the oil industry which will be needed for many years yet.