Self-employed musicians.....

[teamsaint]

Most do indeed; it's only NIC2 that's much lower but most self-employed also pay NIC4 which comes with no benefits whatsoever, so any increase in NIC for the self-employed would be most unreasonable and disproportionate.

That said, there will probably also be acrimonious arguments about those above state retirement age (while there still is one) who pay no NIC at all (other than employers' NIC1 if they employ people); perhaps that loophole will be abolished instread so that NIC is payable by everyone who works irrespective of age. I very much hope not, of course, but I daresay that this idea - and the possible alternative of raising state retirement age or abolishing it altogether - will already have occured to someone in government...

Universal basic income could help with all of that. Merging taxes, easing the burden on those in work, cutting out disincentives, dealing with the pressure on ( or desire among some to abolish) the state pension.

It's a question of will.

[ahinton]

Universal basic income could help with all of that. Merging taxes, easing the burden on those in work, cutting out disincentives, dealing with the pressure on ( or desire among some to abolish) the state pension.

It's a question of will.

It could indeed, for a number of reasons and I suspect that the spectre of it will hover increasingly over governments until one of them takes the plunge and implements something along such lines.

[alywin]

HMRC have my tax-returns for the past 40+ years and my bank details. I guess it's a click of a button in my case, so I can't quite understand the June thing.

I'd assumed it reflected the time taken to deal with the records of 5 million-odd people, but I could be wrong, of course.

[ardcarp]

Today's Moneybox on R4 had some useful info. Self-employed people cannot apply for the grant. We have to wait until we are contacted by HMRC (Hmmm) before we start filling in forms.

[Serial_Apologist]

Today's Moneybox on R4 had some useful info. Self-employed people cannot apply for the grant. We have to wait until we are contacted by HMRC (Hmmm) before we start filling in forms.

Presumably HMRC won't actually know if many people are self-employed until they receive such forms completed, so one supposes they will have to contact everyone?

[teamsaint]

Presumably HMRC won't actually know if many people are self-employed until they receive such forms completed, so one supposes they will have to contact everyone?

I think you only qualify if you have already submitted some tax returns .

[ardcarp]

Life is really simple, but men insist on making it complicated. (Confucius)

Promises and words mean nothing without systems and actions. (Ardcarp)

[oddoneout]

I think you only qualify if you have already submitted some tax returns .

I think one is all it takes. Those who miss out are the newbies who haven't yet completed a full year's trading and so haven't filed a tax return. HMRC will know who is self-employed, but will need to sift out those above the £50K cut-off - or more accurately I suppose get the computer to do a sort.

[ahinton]

I think one is all it takes. Those who miss out are the newbies who haven't yet completed a full year's trading and so haven't filed a tax return. HMRC will know who is self-employed, but will need to sift out those above the £50K cut-off - or more accurately I suppose get the computer to do a sort.

Yes, but let's not forget that there is no one-size-fits-all dividing line between the employed and the self-employed; there are many tends of thousands of people who are both employed and self-employed and that will complicate matters just as will many other factors.

[LHC]

I'd assumed it reflected the time taken to deal with the records of 5 million-odd people, but I could be wrong, of course.

It’s to allow people who didn’t file a tax return in January to do so now, and therefore declare themselves self-employed.

[ardcarp]

Yes, but let's not forget that there is no one-size-fits-all dividing line between the employed and the self-employed; there are many tends of thousands of people who are both employed and self-employed and that will complicate matters just as will many other factors.

...and I gather another complication is that (according to the info on Money Box today) you will only qualify for the Self-Employed grant if the income from your self-employment is more than 50% of your total. This may well rule out some people who also have pensions.

[oddoneout]

Yes, but let's not forget that there is no one-size-fits-all dividing line between the employed and the self-employed; there are many tends of thousands of people who are both employed and self-employed and that will complicate matters just as will many other factors.

Indeed and a friend falls into that category as employed part time events assistant and self-employed artist. But surely that is again a computer sort issue, since most of/all the data will be there; isn't that kind of data manipulation and number crunching what computers are for? The lack of capacity(human and hardware) at HMRC coupled with the timing(re tax year) is presumably a limitation on how quickly the details can be dealt with.

[ardcarp]

...I don't want to think the worst of our leaders, but it will not have escaped their notice that the longer they can hold on to the cash the better it will be for them fiscally. So hopeful words combined with a bit of delay is probably a deliberate strategy. Crisis or no crisis, Chancellors of both parties have been using the tactic in Budget speeches for years.

[ahinton]

Indeed and a friend falls into that category as employed part time events assistant and self-employed artist. But surely that is again a computer sort issue, since most of/all the data will be there; isn't that kind of data manipulation and number crunching what computers are for? The lack of capacity(human and hardware) at HMRC coupled with the timing(re tax year) is presumably a limitation on how quickly the details can be dealt with.

Sure but, in addition, the employed / self-employed status of quite a few such people is a moveable feast to the extent that each can change at various times, which complicates matters.

[alywin]

It’s to allow people who didn’t file a tax return in January to do so now, and therefore declare themselves self-employed.

Although you're obliged to register as self-employed within 3 months of commencing self-employment anyway ...