Old Etonians' Annual Gaudy

[Moshe Gariani]

I remember what happened under Thatcher when North Sea Oil was discovered. All that free money frittered away to pay for benefits for the record numbers of unemployed people. At least some of the money was being spent wisely under Blair - schools were MILES better for my kids than under Thatcher when I was a kid!

Rather a lot of money was also invested by New Labour in massive improvements to the NHS, universities and highly successful inner city regeneration - don't let any inconvenient FACTS get in the way though on the day that Dave so wonderfully shmoozed the faithful...

 

[beorhthelm]

Yes but fewer jobs needed to be created under Labour, because levels of unemployment were lower under Labour than it is under the Conservatives. As always.

but how many of them were economically viable? employing thousands in a northern constituency for some new office of the department of whatever, as noble as that is, isnt a net addition to the economy, requiring much more private jobs to pay for them. or debt of course.

Rather a lot of money was also invested by New Labour in massive improvements to the NHS, universities and highly successful inner city regeneration - don't let any inconvenient FACTS get in the way though on the day that Dave so wonderfully shmoozed the faithful...

great, but paid for on tick. dont let incovenient facts get in the way though. and questionable, if the inner cities have been regenerated so well why are so many still troubled? methinks a few cherry picked examples belie a multitude that didnt see any improvement under Labour either. but thats not thier fault, inner cities are what they are, and im not sure theres any remedy for many.

 

[drew]

There is some stuff here: Labour Market Statistics, September 2012

In general of course, Tories of Cameron's ilk favour unemployment as a method of intimidating working people, lowering wages and increasing profits for their pals.

Thanks for that.

Interesting reading taking from the ONS.

The number of full-time workers increased by 102,000 on the previous quarter to reach 21.44 million and the number of part-time workers increased by 134,000 to reach 8.12 million, the highest figure since comparable records began in 1992. The number of employees and self-employed people who were working part-time because they could not find a full-time job increased by 24,000 on the quarter to reach 1.42 million, the highest figure since comparable records began in 1992.

So, we have more people in part-time work due to be unable to get a full time job since 1992. Well done mr cmd. Now, even though they are working, because they are on part time wages they are now also going to get benefits cut. Nosedive to poverty.

 

[Titanic]

Rather a lot of money was also invested by New Labour in massive improvements to the NHS, universities and highly successful inner city regeneration...

with £bn's of borrowed money, or iniquitous PFI contracts that will cost you, me and the rest of the tax payers £bn's for decades to come.

Is it more sensible... to live within your means? or live high on the hog and mortgage yourself to the hilt only to suffer the inevitable years of misery as the bills roll in?

 

[drew]

with £bn's of borrowed money, or iniquitous PFI contracts that will cost you, me and the rest of the tax payers £bn's for decades to come.

Is it more sensible... to live within your means? or live high on the hog and mortgage yourself to the hilt only to suffer the inevitable years of misery as the bills roll in?

Whilst far from perfect and in many cases verging on extortion, lets not forget they were introduced by Major!

 

[34064 Fighter Command]

Excellent point. Now go away and work out how many of these 1,000,000 jobs were created as a result of government led improvements to infrastructure. Seem to recall that one of the first things they did was cancel the school building project which has yet to be reactivated?

With regard to these 1,000,000 jobs, has anyone done any analysis of exactly what they are, ie how many are full time and how many part time. What wage brackets do they fall into? How many are manual or skilled, how many are service industry etc etc. Someone somewhere must have worked it out?

My suspicion, based on the fact that 1,000,000 is a nice neat round number, is that this figure was plucked from thin air. It saves the politicians admitting to the fact that they've also lost a similar number of jobs in the same period.......

It was probably calculated by the same people who did the number crunching on the West Coast Mainline rail franchise bid process.

"Figures often beguile me, particularly when I have the arranging of them myself; in which case the remark attributed to Disraeli would often apply with justice and force: "There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies and statistics."
- Mark Twain's Own Autobiography: The Chapters from the North American Review "

 

[Seagull58]

I used Council Tax and Overdraft as examples as they are the same in that they involve your personal information which you would, quite rightly, not want sharing with another party for whatever reason.

Your tenant also has the right for her personal information not to be shared with another party.

We'll have to disagree on this. She was in receipt of housing benefit and I was receiving rent. Now I'm not receiving rent. It seems very reasonable that the Council should inform the landlord on request whether housing benefit is still being paid. If she falls 2 months behind on the rent I can request that housing benefit is paid direct to me. Therefore i see no reason why they should not give me an answer.

 

[Seagull58]

Yes but fewer jobs needed to be created under Labour, because levels of unemployment were lower under Labour than it is under the Conservatives. As always.

And I find it amusing that you talk about the "golden economic legacy" that Labour apparently enjoyed. I remember what happened under Thatcher when North Sea Oil was discovered. All that free money frittered away to pay for benefits for the record numbers of unemployed people. At least some of the money was being spent wisely under Blair - schools were MILES better for my kids than under Thatcher when I was a kid!

Labour created more than half a million public sector jobs. That is the main reason why the unemployment was kept down.

 

[Moshe Gariani]

with £bn's of borrowed money, or iniquitous PFI contracts that will cost you, me and the rest of the tax payers £bn's for decades to come.

Is it more sensible... to live within your means? or live high on the hog and mortgage yourself to the hilt only to suffer the inevitable years of misery as the bills roll in?

Hindsight is a wonderful thing. NO-ONE was saying at the time that we should spend less on making those improvements to the lives of ordinary people and investing in our future competitiveness - at the time it seemed that it could be afforded and was the way to go, now the world knows different... at least the money spent in the UK was used to widen opportunity for all and raise standards of public services - the Tories would probably have just abolished the higher rate of income tax for a few years....!!!

 

[BLOCK F]

Hindsight is a wonderful thing. NO-ONE was saying at the time that we should spend less on making those improvements to the lives of ordinary people and investing in our future competitiveness - at the time it seemed that it could be afforded and was the way to go, now the world knows different... at least the money spent in the UK was used to widen opportunity for all and raise standards of public services - the Tories would probably have just abolished the higher rate of income tax for a few years....!!!

Raise standards of public services?
Hmmm,well can't see much of that in most G.P.Practices............huge pay rises for G.P.'s with many now working 9 to 5,for 5 or even 4 days a week.No longer responsible for out of hours care;need I go on.A hell of a lot of cash sprayed around the public sector went on creating non jobs(do you recall all the Sits.Vacant ads in the Guardian,that most sensible commentators took the piss out of?) and giving pay rises to the great and good,who may vote Labour.

 

[Woodingdeanseagulls]

Hindsight is a wonderful thing. NO-ONE was saying at the time that we should spend less on making those improvements to the lives of ordinary people and investing in our future competitiveness - at the time it seemed that it could be afforded and was the way to go, now the world knows different... at least the money spent in the UK was used to widen opportunity for all and raise standards of public services - the Tories would probably have just abolished the higher rate of income tax for a few years....!!!

Instead of just getting all your facts from the Guardian, take a look at the HMRC 60-page report here: http://www.hmrc.gov.uk/budget2012/excheq-income-tax-2042.pdf

Much of the HMRC's report involves extrapolating from academic theories and past academic research to guess what the effect of the 50p rate might have been. If the additional rate had not been introduced, total net incomes for those with incomes over £150,000 would have been around £107bn... a difference of £20bn.

But a key fact leaps out of chart 5.1 on page 27.

The HMRC thinks that the total declared taxable income of those earning more than £150,000 a year slumped from £116bn in 2009-10, to £87bn in 2010-11.

Not all of that can be attributed to a new 50p tax rate. But HMRC reckons some of it can.

The model suggests that if the additional rate had not been introduced, total net incomes for those with incomes over £150,000 would have been around £107bn.

This compares with the observed total income figure of £87bn, a difference of £20bn!

The analysis suggests that between £16bn and £18bn of income was brought forward to 2009-10 to avoid the additional rate of tax.

 

[Moshe Gariani]

Instead of just getting all your facts from the Guardian, take a look at the HMRC 60-page report here: http://www.hmrc.gov.uk/budget2012/excheq-income-tax-2042.pdf

Much of the HMRC's report involves extrapolating from academic theories and past academic research to guess what the effect of the 50p rate might have been. If the additional rate had not been introduced, total net incomes for those with incomes over £150,000 would have been around £107bn... a difference of £20bn.

But a key fact leaps out of chart 5.1 on page 27.

The HMRC thinks that the total declared taxable income of those earning more than £150,000 a year slumped from £116bn in 2009-10, to £87bn in 2010-11.

Not all of that can be attributed to a new 50p tax rate. But HMRC reckons some of it can.

The model suggests that if the additional rate had not been introduced, total net incomes for those with incomes over £150,000 would have been around £107bn.

This compares with the observed total income figure of £87bn, a difference of £20bn!

The analysis suggests that between £16bn and £18bn of income was brought forward to 2009-10 to avoid the additional rate of tax.

all very interesting - to be honest I was thinking about the 40p rate...

 

[beorhthelm]

all very interesting - to be honest I was thinking about the 40p rate...

...and flat tax would be an excellent idea, really sort out alot of issues around avoidance for one thing.

 

[Dandyman]

...and flat tax would be an excellent idea, really sort out alot of issues around avoidance for one thing.

A flat rate would either mean massive tax rises for the low paid or an even greater subsidy for the rich and more slashed services for the rest of us. Tax avoidance and evasion are mainly issues of the political will to tackle them.

 

[beorhthelm]

A flat rate would either mean massive tax rises for the low paid or an even greater subsidy for the rich and more slashed services for the rest of us. Tax avoidance and evasion are mainly issues of the political will to tackle them.

the low paid barely pay any tax in the first place and combining NI into 30% rate with allowance the same wouldnt make any difference for the median paid. tax evasion and avoidance would become less beneficial and simply more difficult with a simpler tax regime - you earn you pay. many studies (accepted by proponents) find a significantly higher total tax revenue. problem is politicans dont have the courage for it (and some vested interest, accounts, treasury, HMRC might not be so happy with less need of their services)

suggesting there is a "subsidy" for the rich show obvious political bais and lack of understand on the how the basic numbers stackup: the top 1% payers contribute 27% of tax, the top 10% contribute >54% iirc. thats a funny sort of subsidy. you may say that shows an uneven distribution and you'd be right, and there are probably ways that could address that productively, but if one did they'd pay more tax in the process. but lets not deliberatly mis-use words or lie about how policies work, like Miliband saying millionaires will be written a cheque for £40k because of a 5% drop in top rate.

 

[drew]

A flat rate would either mean massive tax rises for the low paid or an even greater subsidy for the rich and more slashed services for the rest of us. Tax avoidance and evasion are mainly issues of the political will to tackle them.

That could be the answer, say 25% income tax, corporation tax, CGT etc etc with no tax break incentives for the wealthy to exploit.

 

[Dandyman]

the low paid barely pay any tax in the first place and combining NI into 30% rate with allowance the same wouldnt make any difference for the median paid. tax evasion and avoidance would become less beneficial and simply more difficult with a simpler tax regime - you earn you pay. many studies (accepted by proponents) find a significantly higher total tax revenue. problem is politicans dont have the courage for it (and some vested interest, accounts, treasury, HMRC might not be so happy with less need of their services)

suggesting there is a "subsidy" for the rich show obvious political bais and lack of understand on the how the basic numbers stackup: the top 1% payers contribute 27% of tax, the top 10% contribute >54% iirc. thats a funny sort of subsidy. you may say that shows an uneven distribution and you'd be right, and there are probably ways that could address that productively, but if one did they'd pay more tax in the process. but lets not deliberatly mis-use words or lie about how policies work, like Miliband saying millionaires will be written a cheque for £40k because of a 5% drop in top rate.

The rich pay a significantly lower proportion of their real income in tax than both the low paid and the bulk of society. We have had 30 years of rises in indirect regressive taxation and cuts in progressive taxation for the most well off. If you don't think the rest of us pay for the wealthy than you are clearly even more of an class warrior than I thought.

 

[Greyrun]

Labour party always leaves office owing more money and with higher unemployment.

 

[beorhthelm]

The rich pay a significantly lower proportion of their real income in tax than both the low paid and the bulk of society. We have had 30 years of rises in indirect regressive taxation and cuts in progressive taxation for the most well off. If you don't think the rest of us pay for the wealthy than you are clearly even more of an class warrior than I thought.

interesting. do you have difficulty with real numbers? how exactly do the rest of us pay for the wealthy when the top 10% are paying over half of the total tax rake? percentages mean the same propotion whether you earn 20k or 50k, 20% is the same proportion for both and clearly 40% is a higher proportion. you want to bring indirect tax into it? what do you think the £50k earner does with all that extra money, other than spend it at the same rate of VAT as the chap on £20k? never been called a class warrior, personaly i think notions of class are outdated and rather divisive.