Simplify the TAX system

pjh

I don't know about the rest of you but I get really cheesed off with our ever more complex tax system and the barrage of stealth taxes that our supposed masters think they can get by us without us noticing! (I also happen to think that this is one of the reasons people aren't so interested in politics anymore i.e. because most people are fed up with feeling 'done over' by the Government (indirect, sneaky taxes rather than just being honest).

I'm proposing a whole new and very simple TAX system like the one below;

Earnings;

<£8K - NO TAX
£8K - £12K p.a. - 10%
£12K - £50K - 40%
£50k - £100k p.a. - 45% tax
£100K - £200k p.a. - 50%
£200K - £400K p.a. - 60%
£400K p.a. - 75%

In all cases you'd only pay the higher rate tax on earnings over the limit .. so to speak.

This would be one tax and all other taxes, council/road taxes, Insurance premium taxes, fuel taxes, National Insurance, VAT .... would ALL vanish!

This might sound horrendous to many, but once you add up all the stealth and indirect taxes we all pay .......

Am I mad ?

LingfieldXC

then people start 'company benefits' to bring their earnings down to 8k a year by having company cars, company petrol, company property buying scheme. You name it people will get round it. Then you will makea law to stop people getting, round it and you will have to involve some kind of tax with the law.

I think you are right that tax needs simplifying but i do not feel that a one hit tax is the solution because people will rush to become swill citizens to avoid your one tax (especially those on 100k + a year) and so the top tax bands will yeild virtually nothing.
It is the smaller taxes that should be ridded of. I think road tax for instance should be combined with fuel duty meaning you pay only for what you use in terms of milage etc. You are also at an advantage if your car does more mpg.

Denny69

LingfieldXC wrote:

I think road tax for instance should be combined with fuel duty meaning you pay only for what you use in terms of mileage etc. You are also at an advantage if your car does more mpg.

Something I've been saying for years...I totally agree...do this and EVERYBODY is then paying tax and no-ones vehicle(s) will be crushed!! The more you use a vehicle the more you pay...completely fair, at the moment I'm paying the same as a Taxi driver does for the same length of time even though he'll be doing 1000+ miles a month and I'm only doing 300 tops.

Gavin Gilbert

How about taxing everyone 100% of their income and then giving them back what the government thinks they should need to survive on?

:twisted:

Denny69

Gavin Gilbert wrote:

How about taxing everyone 100% of their income and then giving them back what the government thinks they should need to survive on?

:twisted:

So glad you ain't chancellor!!!!!! :P

beverick

pjh wrote:

I don't know about the rest of you but I get really cheesed off with our ever more complex tax system and the barrage of stealth taxes that our supposed masters think they can get by us without us noticing! (I also happen to think that this is one of the reasons people aren't so interested in politics anymore i.e. because most people are fed up with feeling 'done over' by the Government (indirect, sneaky taxes rather than just being honest).

I'm proposing a whole new and very simple TAX system like the one below;

Earnings;

<£8K - NO TAX
£8K - £12K p.a. - 10%
£12K - £50K - 40%
£50k - £100k p.a. - 45% tax
£100K - £200k p.a. - 50%
£200K - £400K p.a. - 60%
£400K p.a. - 75%

In all cases you'd only pay the higher rate tax on earnings over the limit .. so to speak.

This would be one tax and all other taxes, council/road taxes, Insurance premium taxes, fuel taxes, National Insurance, VAT .... would ALL vanish!

This might sound horrendous to many, but once you add up all the stealth and indirect taxes we all pay .......

Am I mad ?

From memory income tax raises something like 4% of the UK's total tax 'take'. If I'm right it's quite likely that you could tax everyone at 100% and still not even make a dent in the amount of tax needed.

.....you haven't costed this one have you?

Bob

OffTheBackAdam

Have you actually worked this out in terms of £/Week?
£8,000 is about £160 per week.
Simplify by all means, combine Tax & NI so we can all see exactly how much we're paying and prevent deceitful Chancellors of the Exchequer and Prime Ministers from claiming that they won't increase tax, then stick NI contributions/limits up.
Taxes should be low, compulsary and with no offsets.
That'd help with filling in tax forms no end, my IQ is about 135, but bloody hell, trying to fill a tax return in!!!

don_don

IIRC, income tax was only invented to fund the Napoleonic wars or something? Excuse my crap history knowledge :oops:

What did we do before then? If income tax is only 4% of the total, why not scrap it altogether and be 4% less ambitious as a nation (as in, not going to places like Iraq or bringing in ID cards etc) :?: :roll:

Gavin Gilbert

don_don wrote:

What did we do before then?

It's what we didn't do. Things like pensions, free healthcare, free education, drains, public transport.....

Squaggles

Tax credits ? whats that all about ? Why not just have a minimum wage that allows people to live on it ? As it is big employers ( supermarkets etc. ) can employ people on a 30 hour a week basis and rely on tax credits to make up the difference .

And don't get me started on the abolition of the 10% rate and the total cock-up in trying to rectify it .

OffTheBackAdam

Squaggles wrote:

Tax credits ? whats that all about ? Why not just have a minimum wage that allows people to live on it ? As it is big employers ( supermarkets etc. ) can employ people on a 30 hour a week basis and rely on tax credits to make up the difference .

And don't get me started on the abolition of the 10% rate and the total fool-up in trying to rectify it .

How about having a nil tax band which means that people on the minimum wage don't have to pay tax in the first place and so make "Tax Credits" redundant? Ah- because that would mean that tens of thousands of non-productives would be removed from the Labour voting pool.
Minimum wage is currently £5.52/hr, so work just about 20 hours/week and you'll start paying Income Tax (Plus NI!)

don_don

What did we do before then?


It's what we didn't do. Things like pensions, free healthcare, free education, drains, public transport.....

I take your point, but if income tax is really only 4% of the total, then most of those things must be almost totally paid for by other means. :?:

I guess the answer must be that income tax is actually more than 4% of the total. Otherwise, any canny political party would do the sums, propose scrapping the tax and win a landslide victory at the polls...

,,,now there's an idea. Wonder how you start a political party. Anyone fancy being shadow chancellor?

pjh

Ermm ... I was trying to make a general point about simplifying the tax system ... my figures were illustrative only

I'm not sure I followed Beverick's logic either. If everyone paid all of what they earned to the tax man and you're saying we'd still be significantly short ???? Am I missing something ... where is this extra money coming from at the moment then?

OffTheBackAdam

pjh wrote:

where is this extra money coming from at the moment then?

It's being borrowed!

pjh

.... what 96% of it ..... I don't think so :shock:

combat_wombat

don_don wrote:

IIRC, income tax was only invented to fund the Napoleonic wars or something? Excuse my crap history knowledge :oops:

and a huge amount of it still goes to fund the army.
and we still only pick on people with Napoleonic technology.