Osborne discovers that the rich avoid paying tax

[Beef Oven]

Not being permitted to speak out to the media etc on internal disputes, trade union negotiations etc, was something which was made very clear to me, when I was employed in an industry covered by the Official Secrets Act. On being made redundant I was further told that I was still under OSA jurisdiction regarding anything to do with these matters during the time of my employ. It becomes permanent keep mouth shut time to anyone with memoirs in mind.

Serial, you didn't have to put up with all that, you could have told them to 'stuff it' and left. I am in the same OSA boat as you some years after I left a certain employer, but I aint complaining

[teamsaint]

i wonder who exactly is giving away more than 25% of earnings to genuine charities?

http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2012/apr/15/charity-tax-relief-plans-philanthropists?newsfeed=true

And this change doesn't actually stop them , does it?

In fact the change would surely just mean the government might have a bit more to spend on good projects.(if only!).

For some reason, I just don't trust the government on this one, and the words Liam and Fox keep popping into my mind.

[scottycelt]

I cannot remember a budget that has been subsequently found to have so many ludicrous flaws ...

The odd unforeseen effect following any budget is understandable and forgivable but Osborne's recent effort smacks of little short of multiple amateurish incompetence.

I wonder how many professional advisers he has and what each of them is paid to then come up with this complete and utter political and moral disaster?

[Paul Sherratt]

Increase the tax on wallpaper !

[amateur51]

I cannot remember a budget that has been subsequently found to have so many ludicrous flaws ...

The odd unforeseen effect following any budget is understandable and forgivable but Osborne's recent effort smacks of little short of multiple amateurish incompetence.

I wonder how many professional advisers he has and what each of them is paid to then come up with this complete and utter political and moral disaster?

'Amateurish incompetence'? Have a care, Sir! The man's a professional!

Cast your mind back to the mid-1980s when Nigel Lawson, instead of announcing the phasing out of Mortgage Interest Tax Relief At Source (MIRAS) let it all go in one fell swoop which led to panic and a wildly distorted housing market.

And we all know what the led to

Anyone for the 10p tax rate?

[aeolium]

Cast your mind back to the mid-1980s when Nigel Lawson, instead of announcing the phasing out of Mortgage Interest Tax Relief At Source (MIRAS) let it all go in one fell swoop which led to panic and a wildly distorted housing market.

Actually, am51, I think it was G Brown who phased out MIRAS completely - Lawson only ended the pooling of MIRAS allowances by couples who had joint mortgages.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mortgage_interest_relief_at_source

[scottycelt]

'Amateurish incompetence'? Have a care, Sir! The man's a professional!

Cast your mind back to the mid-1980s when Nigel Lawson, instead of announcing the phasing out of Mortgage Interest Tax Relief At Source (MIRAS) let it all go in one fell swoop which led to panic and a wildly distorted housing market.

And we all know what the led to

Anyone for the 10p tax rate?

Yes, I think poor old 'Iron Chancellor' Broon had something to do with that, and I did forget the spectacular eccentricity of one Lord Lamont who was reportedly 'singing in the bath' as the UK was humiliatingly forced out of the ERM by (allegedly) a single currency speculator whose name I have long forgotten. I mean, just how crackers can anybody, never mind a flipping Chancellor, actually get?

Possibly just as batty is the sight of the same gentleman occasionally now re-appearing on our television screens boasting how right he was then, and apparently has been all along, in the wake of the current 'Euro crisis'.

[mangerton]

................the spectacular eccentricity of one Lord Lamont who was reportedly 'singing in the bath' as the UK was humiliatingly forced out of the ERM by (allegedly) a single currency speculator whose name I have long forgotten. I mean, just how crackers can anybody, never mind a flipping Chancellor, actually get?:

Well, he couldn't even pronounce his name properly, so I never expected much from him. "Peerie Norrie" just summed him up.

[aka Calum Da Jazbo]

this is a really interesting and informed piece that deals with taxation intelligently in a policy context ..... i have now taken up its author's web site to find a similarly informed riposte to Grayling on working women ...

i am not saying that i or any one else should agree with his conclusions but i very much appreciate the empirical and intelligent quiet of the analysis .... and i tend to his conclusions too ...

[Serial_Apologist]

this is a really interesting and informed piece that deals with taxation intelligently in a policy context ..... i have now taken up its author's web site to find a similarly informed riposte to Grayling on working women ...

i am not saying that i or any one else should agree with his conclusions but i very much appreciate the empirical and intelligent quiet of the analysis .... and i tend to his conclusions too ...

Hmm

I'm not at all sure his economic arguments add up - and the further on he goes the less to get any handle on because the more corpo-rhetorical and generalistic the language he resorts to - I'm an inbred skeptic of that.

[aka Calum Da Jazbo]

me too but i like his respect for accurate numbers and honest interpretation and the drop in taxation has scarce been mentioned in my reading thus far ...

it is all bricolage in the end bricolage ... and death .... and on the way taxes ....

[handsomefortune]

agreed, it's more comprehensive than most current articles calum da jazbo, as it tracks backwards to attlee; addresses the present predicaments, and also predicts the future.

at 35 suicides a week by people who've given up on atos applications & assessments, and life itself - i find it presumptuous that an 'ageing population' is still brandished as such a sure fire, definitive threat tbh! yet, 'the ageing' are so often written about by journos, and i believe the beeb obligingly broadcast a programme (short series)? on this very topic, presumably 'science' in support of tory rhetoric about 'being broke'. however, the future 'result' will possibly be that govt wont offer any help to sick/vulnerable any more.....and that 'welfare' is finished as a concept. but i perhaps shouldn't comment as i got 3/4s of the way through your link, only to give up - (perhaps i'll try the last few paragraphs later)

besides, i got distracted as 'the new statesman' has a picture of the uttely hideous zac goldsmith, who should be denied column inches ideally. certainly not provided with media oxygen by 'the new statesman' (or 'the guardian' who've already given zac the opportunity of a 'wonderful' (self) assessment - the idiots): however, just the sight of zac's face immediately disproves the theory (expressed in your link), that 'the grey vote' will be of any use now, or in future. (and 'the new statesman' hirst review is typically long, and pretentious. including a poor sense of the biology of child birth, and 'news' of dhirst allegedly photographed 'pulling his 'prepuce'........ (puke emoticon, having checked dic. definition). still, i guess it serves me right for getting distracted from your original link eh! at least the author's website won't have 'the usual suspects' detracting from any sense of real purpose, or a broader perspective regarding 'politics' past, current, and possibilities about its future image, in 'a post political age'.

[Lateralthinking1]

The American who quit money to live in a cave -

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-17762033

[aka Calum Da Jazbo]

another press story on the absence of ordure in 221B Baker Street

[ahinton]

I wonder how much tax relief might be available to the purchaser/s of this wonderful property if he/she/they use it for the safe keeping of a business Lamborghini and a ditto Bentley, both of which would surely fit thereinto?

http://www.guardian.co.uk/money/2012/may/01/parking-525000-garage-knightsbridge

Although it's undoubtedly a snip at that asking price as it boasts an electricity supply, I rather think that I'd expect to knock a little bit off that price unless the vendor/s undertook to clean it up prior to sale.