We Should Pay Civil Servants Just Their Net Salaries,

[Tired of Waiting]

We should pay civil servants just their Net salaries, and stop this silly charade of them "paying taxes" as well.

Many do think that the public sector also "pays taxes". On Question Time last week a teacher union leader said that she was also "a tax-payer". I think she honestly believes that. Yesterday on Radio 4 "Any Answers", a public sector worker went a step further: She said that since she pays into her pension pot, and also pays taxes, she is in fact paying twice for her pension!

I think that if the government paid public sector workers just their NET salaries, the fact that they are not really tax-payers would become completely obvious and unquestionable.

Thoughts?

PS: To avoid misunderstandings, I am not saying public services are not important. They are essential! Education and health for instance. But they are not really tax-payers. They must be funded by the private sector tax-payers.

Edit: Voters must understand that only the private sector actually pays taxes, NET.

.

Edited July 4, 2011 by Tired of Waiting

[piece of paper]

We should pay civil servants just their Net salaries, and stop this silly charade of them "paying taxes" as well.

Many do think that the public sector also "pays taxes" as well. On Question Time last week a teacher union leader said that she was also "a tax-payer". I think she honestly believe that. Yesterday on Radio 4 "Any Answers", a public sector worker went a step further: She said that since she pays into her pension pot, and also pays taxes, she is in fact paying twice for her pension!

I think that if the government paid public sector workers just their NET salaries, the fact that they are not really tax-payers would become completely obvious and unquestionable.

Thoughts?

PS: To avoid misunderstandings, I am not saying public services are not important. They are essential! Education and health for instance. But they are not really tax-payers. They must be funded by the private sector tax-payers.

I agree.

HTH

p-o-p

[Chesnor]

We should pay civil servants just their Net salaries, and stop this silly charade of them "paying taxes" as well.

Many do think that the public sector also "pays taxes" as well. On Question Time last week a teacher union leader said that she was also "a tax-payer". I think she honestly believe that. Yesterday on Radio 4 "Any Answers", a public sector worker went a step further: She said that since she pays into her pension pot, and also pays taxes, she is in fact paying twice for her pension!

I think that if the government paid public sector workers just their NET salaries, the fact that they are not really tax-payers would become completely obvious and unquestionable.

Thoughts?

PS: To avoid misunderstandings, I am not saying public services are not important. They are essential! Education and health for instance. But they are not really tax-payers. They must be funded by the private sector tax-payers.

In the real world, rather than some idealistic fantasy world, there is a symbiosis between the public and private sectors, e.g. public infrastructure without which the private sector couldn't do its stuff and education/health etc.. Of course these functions could be provided by the private sector, but they are not, and whether they should be is another argument.

So, the public sector do add some value, or, they do generate wealth (in the sense they make it easier for the private sector to generate profit, think motorways, soldiers, coppers, border controls etc..). Therefore any public sector employees involved in actual wealth creation are taxed. Without analysing every single publicly provided service etc... it would be almost impossible (and hugely expensive) to actually determine those parts of the public sector which are wealth creating and those which are not. This is why the public sector and its state/government manifestation never does, as it is pathologically unable to do anything other than expand. This is also why even the libertarian wet dream nano-state will always and inexorably end up as a the kind of states we see in almost every nation state.

And besides, if you did not directly tax public sector workers that would lead to disenfranchisement, and probably even more resentment from the private sector.

Cue: idealogues insisting that the public sector don't and never can generate any wealth whatsoever under any circumstance ever.

[Injin]

We should pay civil servants just their Net salaries, and stop this silly charade of them "paying taxes" as well.

Many do think that the public sector also "pays taxes" as well. On Question Time last week a teacher union leader said that she was also "a tax-payer". I think she honestly believe that. Yesterday on Radio 4 "Any Answers", a public sector worker went a step further: She said that since she pays into her pension pot, and also pays taxes, she is in fact paying twice for her pension!

I think that if the government paid public sector workers just their NET salaries, the fact that they are not really tax-payers would become completely obvious and unquestionable.

Thoughts?

PS: To avoid misunderstandings, I am not saying public services are not important. They are essential! Education and health for instance. But they are not really tax-payers. They must be funded by the private sector tax-payers.

Aside from the fact that most of your post is illogical gibberish - the reason the PBS "pay tax" is because a lot of people, yes <gasp> even public servants have more than one form of income and they are allocated a tax band/demand etc based on the whole (or potential whole, or some random number the tax office made up for the lulz.)

If there was any saving, the state would already be doing said saving and keeping the extra.

[Tired of Waiting]

In the real world, rather than some idealistic fantasy world, there is a symbiosis between the public and private sectors, e.g. public infrastructure without which the private sector couldn't do its stuff and education/health etc..

(...)

Sure, like I wrote in my OP :

PS: To avoid misunderstandings, I am not saying public services are not important. They are essential! Education and health for instance. But they are not really tax-payers. They must be funded by the private sector tax-payers.

[Injin]

Cue: idealogues insisting that the public sector don't and never can generate any wealth whatsoever under any circumstance ever.

Oh no, the PBS can only destroy wealth.

That's a fact, not an opinion or ideoology.

[Tired of Waiting]

Aside from the fact that most of your post is illogical gibberish -

(...)

Still upset because of this post Injin?! Link: http://www.housepricecrash.co.uk/forum/index.php?showtopic=158901&view=findpost&p=2919869

I'm sorry, my intention was not to "humiliate" you, but help you, by teaching you a little monetary policy.

Let it go Injin, let it go.

[Unexpected]

It quite a good idea. It would provide scope for a future government to say "Hey, these public sector workers aren't paying any tax or national insurance". "We need to do something about that".

[Tired of Waiting]

Ditto 'Tax Credits'...as though it is something people have paid into in the past. Call a benefit a benefit I say and make them realise they are being given charity.

On the tax payer thing, it think it is important for public sector employees to be outraged as tax payers too...like everyone else.

I think you may have two good points there.

[Chesnor]

Oh no, the PBS can only destroy wealth.

That's a fact, not an opinion or ideoology.

Perhaps true if the bureaucracy always expands, which it does. I.e. an ever expanding public sector will need an ever expanding revenue collecting branch to administer tax collection etc... on gross salary. It does eat itself. I am still minded to claim that the private sector almost always creates wealth while the public sector almost always destroys it, but I can't really make the jump into the world of absolutes. Just call it a logical failure on my part...

[Timak]

Labour and capital (the act of working rather than the party) create wealth, the sector is irrelevant.

[stormymonday_2011]

Aside from the fact that most of your post is illogical gibberish - the reason the PBS "pay tax" is because a lot of people, yes <gasp> even public servants have more than one form of income and they are allocated a tax band/demand etc based on the whole (or potential whole, or some random number the tax office made up for the lulz.)

If there was any saving, the state would already be doing said saving and keeping the extra.

Yes incredibly some civil servants (particularly at the bottom) also have second jobs in (gasp) the private sector to make ends meet. Funny old world.

[uptherebels]

Aside from the fact that most of your post is illogical gibberish - the reason the PBS "pay tax" is because a lot of people, yes <gasp> even public servants have more than one form of income and they are allocated a tax band/demand etc based on the whole (or potential whole, or some random number the tax office made up for the lulz.)

If there was any saving, the state would already be doing said saving and keeping the extra.

Yes, but I think most of them don't declare their BTL income.

[Injin]

Still upset because of this post Injin?! Link: http://www.housepricecrash.co.uk/forum/index.php?showtopic=158901&view=findpost&p=2919869

I'm sorry, my intention was not to "humiliate" you, but help you, by teaching you a little monetary policy.

Let it go Injin, let it go.

Your post was illogical gibberish. In fact, I haven't seen a single one from you that isn't illogical gibberish. Quite why I would be bothered at you giving me the repeated chance to air my (factually correct) views while you make yourself look ridiculous by evading a question 15 times I have no idea. You aren't Michael Howard by any chance?

I hope I taught you something about why the PBS is "taxed" on this thread though. Did you understand my answering to your OP?

[Injin]

Perhaps true if the bureaucracy always expands, which it does. I.e. an ever expanding public sector will need an ever expanding revenue collecting branch to administer tax collection etc... on gross salary. It does eat itself. I am still minded to claim that the private sector almost always creates wealth while the public sector almost always destroys it, but I can't really make the jump into the world of absolutes. Just call it a logical failure on my part...

Well I can do that.

But the real world facts will remain. The PBS only destroys wealth.

It isn't possibe to steal and come out the other side better off than no stealing occured (from a macro economic POV.)

[The Ayatollah Buggeri]

There does seem to me to be a case for paying public sector salaries at a lower level but exempt from income tax and NI. Presumably it boils down to administration costs. Is it cheaper to do the admin needed to pay these people a 'normal' salary from the public purse and then collect tax on it, or to do the admin needed to keep records of which jobs are tax-exempt and which are not? I can't see that it would cause a problem with other sources of income, though. Just like everyone else, if a tax-exempt public sector worker had another source of taxable income, they would be required to submit a tax return and cough up, just like anyone else who has another source of income besides their PAYE salary.

There is, however, a fairness issue. In a system where public sector workers are lower-paid but tax exempt, then when income tax and NI is increased or reduced, private sector workers are affected but not public sector ones not. You'd have to raise or lower their salaries to compensate, and when it came to lowering I can anticipate a fair amount of political kickback.

[Tired of Waiting]

Labour and capital (the act of working rather than the party) create wealth, the sector is irrelevant.

Agree - regarding wealth creation. But regarding taxes, the public sector is not a NET tax payer.

[stormymonday_2011]

There does seem to me to be a case for paying public sector salaries at a lower level but exempt from income tax and NI. Presumably it boils down to administration costs. Is it cheaper to do the admin needed to pay these people a 'normal' salary from the public purse and then collect tax on it, or to do the admin needed to keep records of which jobs are tax-exempt and which are not? I can't see that it would cause a problem with other sources of income, though. Just like everyone else, if a tax-exempt public sector worker had another source of taxable income, they would be required to submit a tax return and cough up, just like anyone else who has another source of income besides their PAYE salary.

There is, however, a fairness issue. In a system where public sector workers are lower-paid but tax exempt, then when income tax and NI is increased or reduced, private sector workers are affected but not public sector ones not. You'd have to raise or lower their salaries to compensate, and when it came to lowering I can anticipate a fair amount of political kickback.

It will never fly because gross earnings are used everywhere as a benchmark. HMRC and DWP would also have to rewrite many of their computer systems to account for the different ways public and private sector workers would be paid and taxed. There would also have to be transitional arrangements for when staff moved from one sector to another. The cost would far outweigh any notional benefit.

In addition how would you treat private sector employees who soley provide goods and services to the state particularly as these might swap back and forth from private to public contracts quite quickly.

Edited July 3, 2011 by stormymonday_2011

[Tired of Waiting]

There does seem to me to be a case for paying public sector salaries at a lower level but exempt from income tax and NI. Presumably it boils down to administration costs. Is it cheaper to do the admin needed to pay these people a 'normal' salary from the public purse and then collect tax on it, or to do the admin needed to keep records of which jobs are tax-exempt and which are not? I can't see that it would cause a problem with other sources of income, though. Just like everyone else, if a tax-exempt public sector worker had another source of taxable income, they would be required to submit a tax return and cough up, just like anyone else who has another source of income besides their PAYE salary.

Good point.

There is, however, a fairness issue. In a system where public sector workers are lower-paid but tax exempt, then when income tax and NI is increased or reduced, private sector workers are affected but not public sector ones not. You'd have to raise or lower their salaries to compensate, and when it came to lowering I can anticipate a fair amount of political kickback.

Actually the average public sector salary in now higher than the average private sector salary.

I think the main advantage of paying them just the NET salary would be to make obvious (for them and the voters in general) the fact that public sector workers' salaries and pensions are entirely funded by the taxes paid by the private sector workers. That you can't increase that sector too much, or the whole system becomes unsustainable.

[Injin]

Good point.

Yes, that's why I made it as well.

Actually the average public sector salary in now higher than the average private sector salary.

I think the main advantage of paying them just the NET salary would be to make obvious (for them and the voters in general) the fact that public sector workers' salaries and pensions are entirely funded by the taxes paid by the private sector workers. That you can't increase that sector too much, or the whole system becomes unsustainable.

Incredibly innocent, really. Cute, almost.

Why would hidden thieves want to go into the open?

[KingBingo]

Would only be possible as part of a massive tax simplification exercise.

At the moment there are literally volumes riders, qualifications, allowances, subsidies, that would conflict with this.

But since we need a massive tax simplification exercise I am all in favour.

[gimble]

Well I can do that.

But the real world facts will remain. The PBS only destroys wealth.

It isn't possibe to steal and come out the other side better off than no stealing occured (from a macro economic POV.)

What's the difference in these two scenarios:

You go to see a private doctor for a consultation and you pay him £100. You have received £100 of medical services, your health improves (hopefully) and the doctor gets paid £100 for that service.

You go to see an NHS doctor for a consultation and the government pays him £100 collected from you by taxation. You have received £100 of medical services, your health improves (hopefully) and the doctor gets paid £100 for that service.

Unless I'm misunderstanding you, you're saying that the first scenario sees the creation of wealth and the second scenario sees the destruction of wealth.

[Injin]

What's the difference in these two scenarios:

You go to see a private doctor for a consultation and you pay him £100. You have received £100 of medical services, your health improves (hopefully) and the doctor gets paid £100 for that service.

You go to see an NHS doctor for a consultation and the government pays him £100 collected from you by taxation. You have received £100 of medical services, your health improves (hopefully) and the doctor gets paid £100 for that service.

Unless I'm misunderstanding you, you're saying that the first scenario sees the creation of wealth and the second scenario sees the destruction of wealth.

Yes, the first is voluntary payment.

The second one is extortion.

[GBdamo]

If that pisses you off get this-

If half the UK workforce are pubic sector workers then we are also paying to to recover these faux taxes by employing more public sector workers as tax collectors - good here init

[gimble]

Yes, the first is voluntary payment.

The second one is extortion.

Ok, you have a problem with the method of payment but where is the wealth destruction?