Osbornes budget

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

I keep on hearing that cliche, "wealth creators", applied to the employer class. The owners of the property and its means of production are not, repeat not "wealth creators": those they employ to make things and add value to the transmission from base materials to finished commodities are the wealth creators. The rest just pile it up and/or move it around.

I think I agree with you. The wealth creators are the people who do the work; they make the P.M's chums wealthy.

[Flay]

A neighbour told me that there is a plan for employees to be paid indirectly via the government. If I understand him correctly, the employer is to send the statement of pay and deductions etc, and the money, to a government department who will then pay the employee. This sounds crackpot to me. Has anyone else heard of this, or is my neighbour misinformed?

[aka Calum Da Jazbo]

misinformed i'd say flay can not imagine hmg wanting to take on the national payroll .... more likely to outsource HMRC!

[Flay]

misinformed i'd say flay can not imagine hmg wanting to take on the national payroll .... more likely to outsource HMRC!

Yes it could be to HMRC. It would be a cunning way of getting in extra money if only short-term. Like the banks do by taking our payments but not clearing them for 3 or more days.

[Lateralthinking1]

Yes, of course there were plenty of differences, Lat1. Thatcher reduced the top rate of tax from 83% to 40% during her period in office. I'm not sure what you mean on your second point; she was certainly responsible for a lot of job losses in both public and private sectors and the compensation for the jobs lost by the miners, for instance, was not great. Private sector pensions were not on a sound footing, at least legally: the Maxwell pensions scandal broke just months after Thatcher left office, and there was also the widespread misselling of personal pensions brought about as final salary schemes were progressively closed. I don't think the banks were any more ethical - just that they were more constrained by regulation. AFAIK they didn't break the law leading up to the financial crash - that was part of the problem, that their reckless gambling was entirely legitimate and part of the 'system'. No-one in the financial world has been convicted as a result of what happened, at least in the UK. There was quite a lot of lobbying at that time, but of course the financial sector had the government on its side and did not really need to lobby. I don't think part-privatising the NHS was 'unthinkable' at that time - it was just unsayable, though arguably the reforms introducing the internal market to the NHS which Thatcher brought in at the end of her period in office (and carried on enthusiastically by New Labour) were the precursor to the increase in private involvement which the present bill provides for. I agree with your last three points but was trying to make the point that given the utter disaster of financial deregulation which was one of the landmark policies of the Thatcher era it is all the stranger that we seem to be carrying on with a failed economic theory.

Yes, thank you aeolium. I agree with you on the failed economic theory. I was also vehemently opposed to the Thatcher Government. If I was in Bradford West now, I would have to think seriously about voting for George Galloway in next week's election so that it is an indication of where I am coming from. I also think that the Labour Governments of 1997-2010 were worse than the Thatcher Government and that the Coalition Government is worse still. I see all as being significantly further to the right.

- I accept the directional point about the upper tax rate under Margaret Thatcher, ie it steadily decreased. But the tax rate was only reduced to 40% in Margaret Thatcher's final year - 1989. With hindsight, on tax, Geoffrey Howe was almost socialist - far more so than Gordon Brown. I doubt that even Keith Joseph would have spoken about an ideal rate of 15% or 20%.

- On the miners you are wholly right in principle although I don't know about their levels of compensation. The Civil Service compensation scheme was reformed in 1987 to much opposition and yet it mainly honoured earlier commitments. It was in some cases three times more generous than the despicable scheme that was attempted by Brown and overturned by the courts and three to six times more generous than that introduced to accompany savage cuts by Maude.

- I take the point about Maxwell and would not claim to be an expert on private pensions. I do believe though that they were on a comparatively sounder footing. No Government since 1979 looks good in regard to them but in the 1980s they were not being decimated across the board. Again it is Brown who is particularly to be deplored for measures taken that really rocked them. Public sector pensions were not threatened under the leadership of Thatcher, Major and Blair.

- I think the banks were more ethical in the 1980s for being properly regulated. We probably don't disagree hugely there. I am not entirely convinced though that they were as inclined to gamble recklessly. Rather like the unions now, they knew their place then.

- I stick with my point about the NHS. Part-privatisation was unthinkable for any party wishing to win an election. Now parties just go into elections saying whatever sounds good and then do whatever they feel like once in power.

[Anna]

Yes it could be to HMRC. It would be a cunning way of getting in extra money if only short-term. Like the banks do by taking our payments but not clearing them for 3 or more days.

Just been an item on Radio 4 re the clawing back of child benefit. The burden of this will fall on HMRC to retrieve the money as it seems the benefit will still be paid, i.e. employers, DSS and HMRC do not share the same database. Nightmare scenario as HMRC are not the most efficient (as in wrong tax codes being issued) and just another thing that has not been properly thought out. This alchohol minimum price per unit, whilst I agree with it, is squeezing out the more important aspects of the budget (ie taxing your granny if she was born on 4th rather than 6th April) in other words, a good way to bury bad news I think.

[Flay]

It's a total mess, Anna. This "government" should leave things alone unless they can prove significant benefits. The NHS carve-up is totally potty. Why ask GPs (who are expensive commodities - locums cost about £90 an hour to employ) to spend their time on administering the NHS - they are independent contractors. I cannot think of other major organisations who would hand over their management and governance to their subcontractors.

IMHO child benefit should be paid to everyone (ideally to the mother). There is no point trying to means-benefit it - too much hassle. Those on higher incomes are paying higher taxes so it's swings and roundabouts.

[Flosshilde]

Just been an item on Radio 4 re the clawing back of child benefit. The burden of this will fall on HMRC to retrieve the money as it seems the benefit will still be paid, i.e. employers, DSS and HMRC do not share the same database. Nightmare scenario as HMRC are not the most efficient (as in wrong tax codes being issued) and just another thing that has not been properly thought out.

This sounds like a recipe for disaster. People will be paid the benefit & quite reasonably assume that it's right & spend it. Then HMRC will come along & demand (possibly substantial) repayment, which many people will not be able to afford. So HMRC will then fine them?

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

This alchohol minimum price per unit, whilst I agree with it, is squeezing out the more important aspects of the budget (ie taxing your granny if she was born on 4th rather than 6th April) in other words, a good way to bury bad news I think.

[Anna]

This sounds like a recipe for disaster. People will be paid the benefit & quite reasonably assume that it's right & spend it. Then HMRC will come along & demand (possibly substantial) repayment, which many people will not be able to afford. So HMRC will then fine them?

Well, yes. That was the gist of the R4 item, the Revenue will be demanding possibly thousands of pounds back per family .... once it's been spent. Totally unworkable, going to cost huge amounts of money to recoup ......

[scottycelt]

I keep on hearing that cliche, "wealth creators", applied to the employer class. The owners of the property and its means of production are not, repeat not "wealth creators": those they employ to make things and add value to the transmission from base materials to finished commodities are the wealth creators. The rest just pile it up and/or move it around.

Maybe that's an over-simplification, S_A ...

Surely, you cannot produce things unless you also have the capital and the means to move it around and people to sell the stuff, assuming the demand is there in the first place The reality is that everyone is dependent on the other in this process. There is of course a separate argument that such capital should be more evenly spread and not in the hands of the comparative few.

The really clever people for me are the inventors and those who design the actual hardware, but even clever people need the rest of us to be successful.

[Serial_Apologist]

Maybe that's an over-simplification, S_A ...

Surely, you cannot produce things unless you also have the capital and the means to move it around and people to sell the stuff, assuming the demand is there in the first place The reality is that everyone is dependent on the other in this process. There is of course a separate argument that such capital should be more evenly spread and not in the hands of the comparative few.

The really clever people for me are the inventors and those who design the actual hardware, but even clever people need the rest of us to be successful.

Yes scotty the rest of us drones are adjuncts to the wealth-creation process of adding value, and indispensable to that end. It's the *ownership* of the means of production that for me is at issue; all the rhetoric about the spreading of it through share ownership is pretty indirect, given that share ownership is largely subliminal in most people's minds, being tied up in bank accounts, pension insurance and annuity schemes, etc., and made seemingly irrelevant to the still comparatively small proportion of any given population's direct acquisition of stocks and shares for playing the market, due to the generalised manner in which company finances are presented at shareholder meetings. As maybe a modest share owner yourself (as I am) you as an individual are in even less of a position to, let's say, fight off a hostile takeover of the company you bought shares in out of good faith, than that company itself; meanwhile the majority shareholder of either company is going to do very well out of it - even though "he" may not think so!

[french frank]

Nightmare scenario as HMRC are not the most efficient

I was just going through all my tax papers for the year last night and only just noticed that the tax refund I received unexpectedly earlier in the year was for 2007/08. No less welcome for that, however.

[Serial_Apologist]

I was just going through all my tax papers for the year last night and only just noticed that the tax refund I received unexpectedly earlier in the year was for 2007/08. No less welcome for that, however.

Well, all I can say to that is, thank heavens you're still alive, FF!

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

I was just going through all my tax papers for the year last night and only just noticed that the tax refund I received unexpectedly earlier in the year was for 2007/08. No less welcome for that, however.

That sounds great, but sometimes the tax office makes horrendous mistakes. I had a letter recently stating that I owed £14,000 in tax because of my second job with the Handsworth Working Men's Club. There's just one snag. I've never been to Handsworth, though I told the tax office I was seriously thinking of going there, if I could earn enough to pay that much tax.
After a couple of letters, they sorted it out and gave me a refund.
Then they started on my mother's tax, again citing ficticious incomes. I'm still working on that one.