Fairness

[KenTheLandlord]

If Chippy wants life fair then let it be fair.

Everyone pays the same tax - 25% then they are charged for items by their ability to pay.

So a three piece suite costs punter A (earning £20k a year) £1000 (not inc vat) Punter B (earning £200k a year) pays £10,000 (not inc vat).
Punter A pays a £60 vehicle fine Punter B pays £600.
Punter A pays £2,500 for a family holiday, Punter B pays £25,000 for the same family holiday.
Punter A pays £150,000 for a house Punter B would pay £1,500,000 for the same.

Suddenly Punter B thinks life is unfair. Tough shit Punter B, that is why you pay more tax, you have a much greater ability to pay for things denied to Punter A.

 

[whp.blue]

Simple answer is id love to pay £76,000 a year income tax, fucking love it and id guess the vast majority would too!

Course you would. But just because you would "fucking love it" doesn't mean its automatically "fair". I'd love it if someone gave me all their savings.

that is only part of it though everyone I have ever known who has worked on he side also did other things to avoid paying like buying dodgy fags and not taxing their cars etc so they would cost the exchequer a whole lot more than that graph shows

 

[nobody can eat fifty eggs]

I always thought that one of the main reasons the rich were taxed more is because they have more assets/capital to lose if there was a war or a takeover for example.

Military hardware and bombs are not cheap you know!

 

[blueish swede]

The premise of the OP is incorrect.

It is an argument often promoted by the right, a nice trick which looks logical at first sight but on critical examination falls down. By choosing one single tax, income tax, it looks as though the system is biased towards the low income end of the population and those with higher incomes are punished unduly.

The truth is that the lower your income the greater proportion of that income you pay in tax, when you use the total tax burden applied i.e. not just income tax but all taxes: VAT, energy taxes, fuel tax, NI , road tax etc. Income tax bands are in part an attempt to redress this unfairness.

 

[5948947]

No such thing as fairness, how is it fair that someone is born and raised in a care home and someone else is born to a sugar daddy in Chelsea????

 

[SkyBlueFlux]

For me fairness is whatever balances the books.

We all (well nearly all) accept that we have to be taxed to provide the infrastructure required in our country, the only question is how do you do it? Quite simply if you want everybody to have an equal amount of opportunity available to them, then this is going to involve taxing some more than others. That leads most people to agree that those with the broadest shoulders in society, i.e. the richest, should be asked to contribute more.

Once you come to the conclusion that this is the correct method of taxation then the rest is pretty much accountancy.

Do we take 20% or 15% from the lower earners? Do we take 40% or 50% from the higher earners?

The answer is that we take the amounts that create fair opportunities and services for all, whilst at the same time not unfairly punishing people for being successful.

The argument coming from the economic left (which I don't proclaim to speak for or be a member of) is that, at the moment, this isn't the case. People at the lower end of the spectrum don't have the social mobility and the opportunity to make the best of their lives. Hence the tax system isn't fair because it's not providing the best outcomes for all of society.

I partially agree with them, in that I don't think low income families are getting the opportunities that middle/upper income families are getting. It's something I've directly had to battle against myself, and still am to this day. What I don't necessarily agree on is that simply raising taxes on higher earners is going to improve this, and thus make society 'fairer'. I think it is a much more complicated problem, and much more nuanced than a lot seem to think.

 

[EalingBlue2]

Improve the schools, improve the clubs facilities outside school time for kids ( especially in deprived areas), ensure every kid has one good meal a day, help kids from areas with generations of benefits get work experience , have a role model etc

If we do that we will have a more productive intelligent populous and also it would then be fairer to be harder on benefits .

In my experience most people pay their tax and claim benefits honestly but there are exceptions. The problem is the tabloid press present this as the norm and as a much bigger problem than it is

One small thing thatcher did as she tried to break society was sell off sports pitches ( councils did under her encouragement) close down thousands of clubs for kids ( through funding and attacks on bodies like unions). Whether needed or not for the economy the infrastructure for kids in deprived areas was a big loss.

 

[101toMR]

Improve the schools, improve the clubs facilities outside school time for kids ( especially in deprived areas), ensure every kid has one good meal a day, help kids from areas with generations of benefits get work experience , have a role model etc

I'm with this 100%.
Look after the bottom and it tells us what we are as a developed altruistic society.

 

[Lucky13]

 

[EalingBlue2]

Improve the schools, improve the clubs facilities outside school time for kids ( especially in deprived areas), ensure every kid has one good meal a day, help kids from areas with generations of benefits get work experience , have a role model etc

I'm with this 100%.
Look after the bottom and it tells us what we are as a developed altruistic society.

I do understand there is a time where as adults we all need to take responsibility and fair enough. But every kid needs to be given the chance and opportunity to succeed and to be a decent member of society