Taxpayer strikes. I’m all for a bit of that.
Chancellor Rachel Reeves claims to have identified a £22billion “black hole” in the nation’s accounts that she is desperate to fill by hiking taxes on October 30. But tax experts warn that instead of bringing in more funds, her Halloween tax grab could cost the Treasury money instead.
Instead of meekly complying and coughing up, taxpayers are preparing to take evasive action.
UK taxes are at a 70-year high, thanks to the Tories. Reeves may discover there is a limit on how much higher she can drive them, without triggering a huge backlash.
Many wealthy people and entrepreneurs are likely to up sticks and flee Britain for a country with a less punitive tax regime.
But you don’t have to leave the country to reduce your exposure to upcoming tax hikes. Take capital gains tax as an example.
Reeves is widely expected to increase CGT bands in line with income tax.
Today, higher earners pay CGT at 24% when selling a second home or buy-to-let property. Under Reeves’ plans, they will pay 40% or 45%.
This could cost them tens of thousands of pounds extra CGT.
The problem is – from Reeves’ point of view – is that owners don’t have to sell their properties. Labour can’t force them to (at least, not yet).
The decision is entirely up to them.
This is the problem with politicians. They are cretins. They live in a world of make believe where they pass a law and everyone meekly complies (see also, net zero). As the article goes on to mention, all of these tax hikes can simply be avoided – not selling your property or shares, putting property into trust, moving abroad and so on, will all wipe out any imagined gains. Calling it a taxpayer strike is a hoot as the insane Labour loonies like strikes, so let them have a taste of their own medicine.
All of this was foretold by a chap called Laffer. Talking of cretins, that half-wit Richard Murphy thinks that the Laffer curve doesn’t exist. Like politicians, he thinks we will all meekly embrace the joy of tax, yet here we have emerging evidence that the Laffer curve is alive and well. Long may it continue to be so.
It never occurs to them to spend less money does it?
It never does, yet it would be so simple.
It ought to. We don’t have a cost of living crisis. We have a cost of Government crisis. And we ought to start taking every opportunity to say so.
The inherent jealousy prevalent in the Labour ranks causes them always to pursue to fantasy of ‘taxing the rich’.
Truth is, if you try to grab an extra £1m in tax from one wealthy person, that person has the facility to avoid it with smart lawyers, accountants or departing.
If you try to raise an extra £1m by grabbing £1 from each of a million people, they’ll pay it because they have no facility to avoid it and the individual amount isn’t worth it anyway.
That’s how tax-raising works and always will – Labour can only ever get it from their own natural voting herd. But they still vote for them – shades of turkeys, Christmas etc.
Like real Black Holes the the Gubment fiscal Black Hole will swallow all incoming dosh leaving no trace. There will still be a Black Hole. I think that the NHS is already a Black Hole. The Nett Zero farce will be another. No amount of “funding” will ever satiate the appetite of the Black Hole. Maybe the spondulicks travel through a crack in the Space/Time continuum and strange beings are wondering what they did to deserve this shitstorm.
And nothing will be any better.
I had thought of using the term Hole Of Color. But since our wise Top Pollies assume that Black Hole is PC I follow their example.
From the linked article:
“However, the shape of the curve is uncertain and disputed among economists.”
I would suspect that by now there is enough empirical data from numerous economies over past decades to produce a really accurate graph. I also suspect that the powers that be wouldn’t like the answer that reality presents them with which is a little odd since they are supposedly trying to maximise the amount of other people’s money that they have available to spunk up the wall of public spending.
Kinell Longrider. Not very often I have to call you out for talking bollocks, but saying Murphy is a half-wit is total tosh. I don’t wish to speculate, but the amount of wits therein has got to be considerably less than half.
I was feeling generous. Make the most of it.