Do you pay a lot more tax?

[OwlsR]

I’m in England and just jealous about Scotland not having peak time rail fares.

i know the free university tuition is funded by reducing places and is causing problems for Scottish students.

free prescriptions would not cost a lot as most people who get multiple prescriptions already don’t pay, tbut it would all add up?
Or are there other things we get in England that Scots don’t?

I reckon I pay about £2k a year more tax than I would in England. Doesn’t account for prescriptions or uni fees though to be fair. On the selfish side it is perhaps helping me build a case to my H about why I should go part time ;)

Oh gawd I’d forgotten about the baby boxes!!

That's what I thought. Millionaire territory?

And this just shows how little awareness people have of how much tax some people actually pay!! £650 a month extra between 2 people is really not millionaire territory.

How much then? You both must be on a very high wage for £650 extra a month!!

Scotland is noticeably more socialist than England and Wales.

Higher earners pay significantly more tax, and there is more state funded ‘stuff’ (prescriptions, university education, rail service that is poorly run and at a loss).

Unfortunately it does it in a way that is unsustainable, and approaches policy in a way that destroys the future tax potential.

There’s also a lot that quietly doesn’t happen.

eg. Funded hours start the term after turn 3 and no plans to change. Age based health screenings don’t exist. Chicken pox vaccine, not coming. No peak fares is just a cover for ‘flat rate fares’. School education is 13 years at most and can leave education sooner than that, whereas England and wales have 14. Funded social care nothing like it’s made out to be.

As a household we would be significantly better off in an area in England or Wales with comparable house prices than are in Scotland when account for tax rates and costs.

Nonsense. That’s one person on £100k and one on a bit more. Less than hospital consultants etc (and with a far less generous pension and zero job security). Over 400 university of Edinburgh staff earned more than £100k last year. It may seem a lot but if you live in Edinburgh with Edinburgh’s housing costs and Scotland’s taxes it soon gets eaten up.

someone earning £1m on PAYE would be taxed £2,500 extra a month for living in Scotland, which is why very few do.

It’s a tricky one. Parts of Scotland are very deprived. I feel they would be better to charge for prescriptions (and of course make them free for those with low incomes) as they do in England. Our own council in Scotland is in masses of debt and cutting back on things right left and centre, I’m involved in the additional educational needs network at school so hear about things being cut.

Im Scottish but we moved up from England a few years ago and paid double in stamp duty what we would have done on the same priced house in London.

It's perfectly easy to live in Edinburgh on a joint income of over £200,000!!

I digress…
I always wonder why Scotland is socialist when this is at odds with Scotland’s Wealth of Nations by Adam Smith, from which capitalism is built upon. ok it was 250 years ago and capitalism and Scotland has changed just a wee bit. I’m not all sure socialism is that great for women.

I think Scotland appears more socialist than the rest of the U.K. because the majority of population and hence the majority of the political representation is in the central belt; historically big industry heavy areas where once there was the need for unionised workforce. My rural area like a lot of Scotland was conservative before SNP. Churchill was MP for Dundee at one time!

In rural areas not as many family owned farms but in the past tenanted farms with tied homes for agricultural workers were more the norm; this is going though as big estates sell off housing and change from agriculture to tourism and chase diversity funding for survival. So, people were still answering to some laird/factor/business owner.
I often think the proclaimers song ‘Cap in Hand’ even though concerning Scottish independence, really sums up and can be applied to this relationship with workers and those in charge.
Do we really want to be cap in hand to any Scottish or U.K. government. Are the people really that incompetent we can’t manage our own lives, it seems so. Is it just a variation of the war, pornography and alcohol which kept the plebs in 1984 in check? Instead we have bus travel, free
prescriptions, baby boxes and free university education if you can get it.

Across Scotland we didn’t have the numbers of middle class emerging after the Industrial Revolution relative to other countries and our population. Yes of course there are pockets in Glasgow where there was money (a good indicator of the middle classes is sourcing art Noveau furniture and art work across Scotland, it’s hard).

So in Scotland more working class and upper class who know their place but a tiny minority of aspiring middle class. I have had the mantra ‘we are all Jock Tamsa’s bairns’ trotted out to opine that we are all the same but we are not. One small proportion of people are paying whilst the other is receiving .

I’m not saying it is hard, I’m just saying living in Scotland isn’t cheap.

I think what has changed recently is the attitude around benefits. Back in the 1970s and 1980s there was a shame to being on benefits. People tried their hardest not to take from the state. Now the attitude seems to have shifted to ‘what can I get?’. We have a disabled child. The state sector was totally unable to provide a suitable eduction. We choose to fund their schooling ourselves. We don’t claim anything for this from the state because we choose not to.

My DH and I pay a lot more tax
The DC got their Uni fees paid so that’s good but we would have paid that for them anyway
I think it’s a shame the funded childcare is not as good here as it would really help women to stay in / return to work
Saw so many smart women give up work when my DC were small , and 30 years later so many are in a fairly dire situation

Yes we both pay loads more tax in Scotland . Both higher rate tax payers .
The ‘free’ stuff isn’t free the tax payers fund it .
You can work alongside an individual who lives in England but works in Scotland & they might be a junior or deputy to you but are taking home more salary due to the tax situation.
(Don’t want to be too specific as outing but it definitely impacts on recruitment & promotions in my line of work )

We don’t pay much more at all - but that’s the joys of being in a fairly normal salary bracket rather than the MN 6 figures !

the university one is interesting- so many people now saying that university education isn’t worth it- a lack of jobs needing that education, and that earning potential isn’t any higher despite the debt

I am wondering if the Scottish system of limited places actually makes more sense , I am wondering if there will be a decline in the percentage of English students going to university

ideally I would like all kids to get the experience and additional learning but if it’s done on a financial cost benefit basis only the “free” English system leaves a lot of people with huge debts for no gain

Scotland is an amazing place to live - yes, we pay
a lot more tax and yes, the real worry is Indy will lead to 20 years of economic doldrums/disaster but wild horses wouldn’t drag me away. Unless I couldn’t afford to live a nice life, I wouldn’t base a decision on tax/benefits. Job prospects otoh do matter.

tax/benefit status quo can change - Scot gov is overspent. ‘Free’ tuition can change.

Limited places really is foolish. A society filled with highly skilled workers is far more prosperous than one without. Every £ invested in our university sector pays us back 5 x over. It’s just a shame the Scottish government has sought to undermine Scottish universities for years after year by limiting the funding they can raise.

with the lack of earnings for 4 years and living costs, the Scottish degree system also leaves students with huge debts - any degree is an investment that needs careful evaluation.

No water bills. My friend in Cornwall pays £160 a month for water. I pay around £500 annual sewerage charge as part of my council tax.

It is also much easier for Scottish students to avoid huge debt.
My ds is at uni now, stays at home, no fees. DH is on higher rate tax and says it is well worth the extra to live in Scotland- we have 3 kids who want to go to uni. Commuting distance from Glasgow so 3 unis to choose from.

By contrast in England, MIL is watching an elderly relative spend £8k a month on a nursing home, having had to sell her house to fund it. If she's still alive in 2 years the money will be gone, and the state will have to pay for the private home as she's too ill to move.
She isn't too unwell to have had 4 carers a day, but couldn't afford this because no personal care in England, so she's lost her home and autonomy. She's not got unlimited money, so after its gone the government will still have to pay a private provider an extortionate amount. It seems a totally broken system.

No where is perfect to live, but Scotland is pretty good by comparison to the situation in most of England and Wales.

But then salaries are also lower for many jobs…I would move if I wanted to live in Scotland, bearing in mind no benefits are guaranteed to last. The taxes probably can be relied upon not to go down otoh.

Salaries are a little higher for NHS staff than in England, which is a very large employer.

Yes, another thing that could well get squeezed given the funding crisis we have…

I didn’t realise how much the tax thresholds make a difference, I’d have to pay £160 more for my salary in Scotland which I wouldn’t be very impressed with. DH is the military and they have to offset it for personnel posted in Scotland.

In the 23-24 tax year, more people moved from Scotland to England than vice versa. In total they paid an average of £8k more in tax.

This would indicate most people who move are happy paying any extra tax for benefits they receive in practice.

could be that there are other great reasons for living in Scotland other than an overly
complex growth discouraging tax system - green spaces, community, work life balance.

Teaching salaries are substantially higher in Scotland than England.