[wizzo227]

Intentionally avoiding politics, what would you have done instead to raise £40 Billion a year in taxes ? I'll start with a totally unfeasible alternative to what was announced today, and ask whether anyone can think of a better one:

£40B per year from 28.4 million households in the UK is £1408.45 per household per year. Taking the electricity cap price as £1800 per year, one ludicrously bad way to raise that much would be to increase VAT on electricity bills from 5% to 82%, increasing the cap price incl. monster VAT to £3120 per year.

Present interest paid on national debt seems to be about 70 to 100 billion pounds a year.

What would you do ?

[meldrewreborn]

@wizzo227

The government have met their manifesto promise not to increase the major taxes on working people. They've done it by increasing employers national insurance which will feed into prices and eventually be met by everyone indirectly but not immediately.. So most of us can sit back and breath a sigh of relief -for now.

If I were chancellor I would have banned recruitment into the civil service until numbers were down 20%. I would have further shifted resources into catching more of the tax evaders and benefit cheats that proliferate now. I'd have made savings interest tax free, and imposed a levy on banks to compensate based on the margins between what they pay out in interest and what they charge customers for loans and mortgages. I'd have introduced a minimum tax rate of 25% on high earners who use legitimate schemes like Venture Capital Trusts to diminish their tax bill

I would have set up a national house building corporation with a remit to build 200,000 homes per annum irrespective of the economic cycle and make them available for sale, rent or shared ownership. I'd have prioritised the building of more prison spaces (about 50% up on what we have now) and make scumbags serve the whole of their sentence. And I'd have implemented proposals put forward by Dilnot to solve the social care funding issue. The Dilnot Commission Report On Social Care | The King's Fund (kingsfund.org.uk)

I'd have ended pension tax relief at 40% and capped it at 25%. I think you'll find that package would balance the books. Every option becomes political in my view.

[DebF_EONNext]

@wizzo227 I have moved this into Conversation Corner as it's an off topic subject 😊

[wizzo227]

Originally Posted by meldrewreborn

I would have set up a national house building corporation with a remit to build 200,000 homes per annum

I quite like that one, because it could allow design for whole of lifestyle nil net carbon at best convenience, unlike the two-car suburb detached houses of 20th century post-war usual.

[Andy65]

@wizzo227

Increasing taxes is a fact of life, as long as it's reasonably fair then I don't worry too much about it. However, I'd look at why £40 billion is needed.
The NHS needs to be far more efficient so I'd be telling them to start and sort themselves out before they can get any more money.
School Breakfast Clubs - No.

I've never understood why prisoners aren't forced to learn trades whilst in prison, such as bricklaying, plumbing, electrics etc. Then they can work 40 hours per week to help build new prisons and the millions of houses that KS wants building. If prisoners don't participate then triple their sentence, we've become far too soft.

So I've already dropped the £40 billion to below £15 billion and it's only taken me a few minutes 😉