Establishment steal another £10K of your pension and 1 year of your life

[wish I could afford one]

18 minutes ago, fru-gal said:

The problem is that people have realised that if you save you are penalised. If you earn a high income you are penalised. If you are prudent and do the right thing both morally and fiscally you are penalised and spoken about  as though you are some idiot relic from the previous century. If you don't save and don't work you are rewarded with everything and seen as a martyr. Nobody believes in doing the right thing anymore and the government don't exactly lead by example (in fact they are a great example of corruption, greed, avarice, perversion etc).

This is a very good point.  To demonstrate with my example.  Over the last 5 years my tax to spending ratio has been 4:1 so I've paid £4 in tax for every £1 I've spent.  Maybe I'm just a glutton for punishment though as this type of nonsense has just made me more determined to escape this broken once great country. 

Edit: can't do maths...

Edited July 23, 2017 by wish I could afford one

[Millaise]

21 hours ago, Tulip_mania said:

There are 3 ways to deal with the increase in life expectancy and the impact on pension costs; lower pension (not going to fly), higher taxes (not going to fly) or fewer years in retirement.

Things I've learnt from this site and others are that experts invariably know little more than Mr average; the press knowingly mislead; the government play a game feigning ignorance; what you think is true probably isn't.  A reasonable person could have expected the pension age to decrease with the passing of the years because of technological progress leading to increased productivity. The confounding factors are that the UK turned itself into a service provider in the 1980s, and services are resistant to technological progress, unlike manufacturing (for example, what is the equivalent in lawyering of 3D printing in manufacturing?). Another factor is global mobility in resourcing labour, where wages and working conditions have decreased with time in order to compete with far off, poorer, countries. Globalisation is the antithesis of technological progress because the arithmetic often favours moving the process to somewhere cheaper rather than investment in improving the process technology. A third layer of turd icing on the cake is that the wealth of a nation is tied to the number of productive workers, and we haven't been reproducing  at a rate to replace our workers because of distressing living conditions caused by high house prices, poor pensions, and laws that favour dis-integration of the family. If you follow MMT, you might even think the  need to pay pensions from current taxation is a large red herring, but I accept that not many people can override their programming to believe.

For more mind blowing on MMT: see http://www.taxresearch.org.uk/Blog/2017/07/06/why-we-can-never-be-greece-when-it-comes-to-national-debt/

Edited July 23, 2017 by Millaise
added link

[durhamborn]

27 minutes ago, fru-gal said:

What I don't really get is why tptb are so obsessed with importing a pseudo workforce (who in reality cost the country far more in terms of benefits, education, healthcare, pension provision than they pay in tax) under the mantra that we need more people to pay for the pensions of the older generation, yet technology is advancing exponentially to the point where we have machines which can be worked by one person which pick all the fruit/veg pretty efficiently (and in other industries do similar things). Of course the argument is that an employer would rather pay minimum wage with no NI/tax liabilities and let the taxpayer subsidise their employee than buy a machine costing £100k but why isn't the Government encouraging technology to take up the slack as in the long run it means less debt (as less people to subsidise in order for them to be able to survive in the UK on minimum wages), better efficiency and they can tax robots/technology without worrying about the morals of having to subsidise their living costs/healthcare/education for their children etc plus technology itself incourages further innovation.

They vote for more government.Its as simple as that.I knew Labour councillors who werent very happy when the unemployment rate went down on the council estate.Theyl be buying a house and voting tory next were the words that came out of their mouth to me.People in power are paid for by the state.They want people to vote for more state.Plus most of them are rentiers.Immigrants are a great way to direct middles class tax to themselves.

[pmgdawau]

1 hour ago, fru-gal said:

What I don't really get is why tptb are so obsessed with importing a pseudo workforce (who in reality cost the country far more in terms of benefits, education, healthcare, pension provision than they pay in tax) under the mantra that we need more people to pay for the pensions of the older generation, yet technology is advancing exponentially to the point where we have machines which can be worked by one person which pick all the fruit/veg pretty efficiently (and in other industries do similar things). Of course the argument is that an employer would rather pay minimum wage with no NI/tax liabilities and let the taxpayer subsidise their employee than buy a machine costing £100k but why isn't the Government encouraging technology to take up the slack as in the long run it means less debt (as less people to subsidise in order for them to be able to survive in the UK on minimum wages), better efficiency and they can tax robots/technology without worrying about the morals of having to subsidise their living costs/healthcare/education for their children etc plus technology itself incourages further innovation.

for a government to take out more debt it must be backed by the lifetime taxation of the population, so the premise must be that the newcomers will eventually be productive.

[MrXxx]

WICAO,

 

I have looked at your site/blog on a number of occasions and have learnt a lot BUT can imagine when you start talking 100's of £1000's or even a cool £1Mil people find this intimidating and 'give up'.

One thing I would suggest if you want to improve it and its footfall (not that you have to or should do), is to make it a little more simple or have some very simple articles, as I can imagine for a lot of people its not simple enough...yes, I know you may find that hard to believe (and so would perhaps the majority on here) but with 'Average Joe' you only have to mention shares and they panic or say 'Nah, don't understand those'; this is reflected by why BTL is so popular as 'Me pension innit'

Suggestions could be a tab called 'Pension lite' or FIRE lite'er'...in this tab you could cover 'saving and the benefits of compound interest', ' Five easy tax savers', 'Isa inside out (cash and shares)', 'How to pay the minimum tax when you finally get your private pension'...etc, these would then be more accessible and less intimidating...OK, they may not make someone an immediate overnight FIREer or give them a massive FIRE budget, but even a little benefit is better than nothing (or ignorance).

Just a thought :-)

 

As for DurhamBorn, I have read this series of postings and am still an having difficulty understanding the finer details in this 30-40 year cycle...do you know of a simple source/website that I could look at to give me a better understanding (before I start asking questions)..and as for the story, great, a bit good kharma goes a long way :-)

[Democorruptcy]

3 hours ago, fru-gal said:

What I don't really get is why tptb are so obsessed with importing a pseudo workforce (who in reality cost the country far more in terms of benefits, education, healthcare, pension provision than they pay in tax) 

It's for GDP. Every person has to eat, clothe themselves, visit the NHS etc. Tax isn't just what they pay on income, they pay it on fuel, VAT on stuff, etc.

[ExiledMatty]

I am working on the assumption that I won't get much from the state when I retire. 

This means that I have accepted that I will be working for virtually all my life. Having your own business, however small, is a way of tackling the system. 

Better still, if you can make your work location independent then you have a whole world of options open to you. This includes being able to buy very cheap property and having a very low cost of living.

I would love to see more people taking this route. We all have skills that can produce valur. Being a native English speaker is big one, straight off the bat! It's often only yourself that's stopping you (or your family of course!).