Sunday, September 20, 2009
The numbers are so large that most people will not understand them!
Daily Telegraph
Today, the national debt stands at £804.4 billion, equivalent to more than £25,000 for every family in Britain. Ouch, but not every family has a job so how about telling us how much each tax payer has to pay back - or is that to scary to say?
Posted by who stole my pension? @ 11:59 AM (1139 views)
12 thoughts on “The numbers are so large that most people will not understand them!”
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bidin'matime says:
Too scary. But people will find out – I just hope that Brown is brought to account one way or another. Maybe, as one commentator on the Telegraph site says, people will one day put down their TV remotes and pick up their pitch-forks…
Fg says:
Interesting times ahead!!! Let see how sleigth of hand Grodon get us out of this mess.
crunchy says:
1. bidin’matime
HPC will not be truely honoured untill that day.
That’s the only thing that will get Thatchers children to march as one. Sad but true.
Smithofborneo says:
Thatcher’s children have already marched as one – to the trough. That’s why all the food has been eaten and no work has been done. It is also why so many of the people of Britain are such pigs. (Many are not, but many (more than in other countries) are. Mrs Thatcher wasn’t responsible for that but she certainly helped to increase that tendency. She said she didn’t believe in society and lo! what did she help to create? A failing society!
bidin'matime says:
Mrs T is often misquoted – she simply pointed out that society is us – not some separate entity – we have to stand on our own feet, not expect ‘society’ to look after us. And she was right. The welfare state will be the undoing of society in this country…
bidin'matime says:
For accuracy, I’ve found the Mrs T quote on society in wikiquote, which tells us “The original context was a remark on “people constantly requesting government ntervention”, but it is usually quoted out of context.
The quote is as follows:-
“They are casting their problems at society. And, you know, there’s no such thing as society. There are individual men and women and there are families. And no government can do anything except through people, and people must look after themselves first. It is our duty to look after ourselves and then, also, to look after our neighbours.”
Sounds fair enough to me. Why is it that people who like to demand their rights as individuals are the very same people who like to have a dig at Mrs T for pointing out that we are all individuals?
And before anyone picks up the ‘look after themselves’ but, don’t they always tell you to put your own oxygen mask on before helping anyone else..? People in need of help are in no position to help others – any first-aider will tell you – the first thing is to make sure you don’t become a casualty as well…
crunchy says:
6. bidin’matime
She also sold off council estates and did untold damage to industry which this country is suffering from severely not only at present but way ahead into the future.
Defending this women to me is akin to trying to defend Brown in 20 years time.
Sorry Thatchers mistakes far outstripped her successes.
She has more to do with why you are on this site than you think. Ask Sid!
drewster says:
I agree with Crunchy (mostly). Thatcher’s great council-house giveaway was a shameless short-termist bribe for working-class voters. Also the 1986 “big bang” in the City of London paved the way to today’s financial boom-and-bust.
She did some good though. What would the 1980s have been like if James Callaghan had still been in power? More strikes? More IMF loans? More double-digit inflation? People are quick to forget what the 1970s were like.
mytimeisnigh says:
And the new labour project has been in power since 1997 and what have they done to reverse the decline of society? Other than support the feckless and greedy?
drewster says:
mytimeisnigh,
I refer you to Labour’s Top 50 Achievements.
Some of those figures are statistically skull-duggery, and the spending will be unsustainable in the lean years ahead (particularly with the recent news of school cuts). Nevertheless Labour has made some lasting changes. The Freedom of Information Act in particular stands out as a model for open governance.
who stole my pension? says:
Drewster,
While the freedom of information was a step in the right direction lets no forget that this government didn’t want to comply with it when it came to MP’s expenses. Another case of one law for us and another, more favorable, one for them!
kruador says:
Let’s take an approximation. The income tax allowance last year was £6,035, about £116 per week. That’s approximately where the 10th percentile falls, i.e. 10% of the working population didn’t pay tax (data from Annual Survey of Hours and Earnings, 2008, table 1.1). The same table gives 24,630,000 employed people, so 90% of that is 22.1m people. On that basis it would be £36,288 per taxpayer.
However, people don’t pay the same rate of tax. Income tax is progressive, with high and low rates and allowances, which in effect give a sliding scale. Someone earning £35,000 pays nothing on the first £6,475 (this year), and 20% on the remainder, paying £5,705 total or 16.3%. A £50k earner pays 20% of £37,400 = £7,480 plus 40% of the residual, £6,125 (50,000 – 37,400 – 6,475), which is £2,450, for a total of £9,930, or 19.8%. This person is paying ‘higher rate tax’ but isn’t actually paying even 20% of their overall income. They are way into the 90th percentile of all earners, which starts at £44,345 (again from table 1.1).
The fact is that a very small proportion of this country ‘earns’ most of the wealth. The problem is extracting the tax from these very wealthy people who will do anything to hide how much they really earn and avoid paying what is due. I don’t see that Land Value Tax will actually help do this. My view is that we should be looking to close as many loopholes in the tax system as possible so that there are fewer opportunities for tax-dodging.
Newspapers tend to fudge this as they are generally owned by very wealthy people who don’t want to pay their share of the tax burden.