Tax thread, with a slight difference.

[JonB]

In another thread in Current Affairs, Mister James posted up a pie diagram that showed public expenditure in education, armed forces and transport etc.

I noticed a pitiful amount was going towards roads, even though "Vehicle Excise Duty" and petrol duty contribute shed loads of cash to the treasury.

So my question is this, mainly to those who moan about paying lots of tax.

Would you be happier about paying this amount of tax, if you saw more spending in your desired sector?

i.e I would prefer it if there was less provision for social security?
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Be careful whose advice you buy, but, be patient with those who supply it. Advice is a form of nostalgia, dispensing it is a way of fishing the past from the disposal, wiping it off, painting over the ugly parts and recycling it for more than it?s worth.

[plugger147]

Although i Think there are loads of people claiming benefits when they could be doing all the jobs that we have immigrants doing I think there is more wasted on useless arty farty sculptures,unnessacery sprucing up of public areas, religious buildings and sporting advents than benefits. Not to mention overpaid mps and useless public servants who do little but tie up simple procedures. Without even going into the unbelievable amount of stupid legal issues that are paid for by legal aid followed by even more stupid appeals.

The only way I will start being happy with paying my taxes is when I can see the money spent on actually improving quality of life for the average citizen of the country.
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Tristan the wrote: just whipped off my trousers to find a big bruise on my arse, caused by matt rear ending me...

[craigie b]

I would be happier if the money we gave was controled and spent properly. The NHS has shown just how badly Labour is at spending OUR cash. TBH for all the increases in tax I see no real benefits. My bin is collected less, hospitals are going bust (and are filthy), kids are leaving school without being able to read, students have had grants abolished (whilst kids get paid money to stay on at school), there is less police yet more cameras to monitor roads which does little to conter real dangers such as D&D. The navy has been raped, the army is stretched well beyond its capabilities and the RAF is having to use private companies to ferry troops (which in itself is an example of financial mismanagment).

Now your question was if I seen in my improvements in my desired area would I be happier.

Roads...yes, if the york ring road and A64 were improved I would see a substancial saving in time and fuel costs, which over a year may recoup my raod tax increase. The conveniance in itself would be good.

NHS. If I had a dentist I could see and hospitals that were run correctly witht he nurses and doctors being paid corectly then I would see that as being a positive thing for everyone.

Education- This doesn't affect me, but Blairs vision of 50% of the popuation with degrees is ridiculous. Bring back higher standards of education so a degree means something. This may exclude people from entry to uni but I fail to see the need for students with useless degrees in media studies. It would save a lot of unnessary debt for a lot of people. Possibly by reducing figures we could then reinstal grants and make a degree mean something once again (and I say that from the point of view of an employer). Blairs education was free, so should yours if you cut the mustard.

I would still not support the collection of revenue through fines, which is a favourite tatic of Brown. Fines should not be used as a valid source of income, since as a government you are actually hoping people do wrong rather than encouraging them to do right.

[pwntifex]

If France manages to have successful & efficient education, business, road and health sectors, why can't we?
I find it astounding, especially considering how small in terms of land we are compared to France, yet still have a similar population size.
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the warped one: This is a follow up from the thread 'my willy hurts'

[Kickstart]

Hi

There seems to be a hell of a lot of waste. One example is the entire tax system, with lots of petty little taxes each with their own army of bureaucrats to enforce.

Personally simplify the whole system. Scrap most of the taxes and put the extra onto income tax. Scrap the seperate NI. Single rate of tax with a higher tax free limit. Scrap VED (put the amount onto petrol), meaning we could get rid of loads of dvla staff.

Get rid of the amount wasted on playing round meeting targets. Measure the odd thing that is important, rather than just what is easily measured.

Once that is done, if money is needed then fine, raise it as income tax. At least it will be directly used, rather than half of it squandered on government job creation schemes.

All the best

Keith
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Traxpics, track day and racing photographs - Bimota Forum - Bike performance / thrust graphs for choosing gearing

[Itchy]

Yup I agree with Keith again here, income tax for every £1 they collect it costs them 4p, 96% efficient
(namely as costs are shunted onto businesses) , ditto with NI which is a similar system.

In the bad old tory days it was 98% efficient , the extra 2% is sucked up by tax credits which have
an army of staff to deal with and means test. And also that as of 2007 it now takes 7 people to
process tax returns , in 1995 it took 2 people who knew what the hell they were talking about.
now with file online, which is supposed to cut down on staff it takes 400% more staff than before.

A great example is the road pricing idea Blair wants, simple solution put it on fuel, BP,Shell,Total,
Esso , complete VAT returns each month they hand over a huge cheque.

Road price? they have to :

one set up a tracking system
get people to maintain it
send out 31 million invoices each month
have staff checking those invoices
have staff dealing with complaints
have staff processing the payments
have staff processing the charges
have staff maintaining the system

Which means super inefficiency so Gordon wants £1 into the treasury , after taking into account the
overheads etc the tax from your POV is £15, wheras £1 via a simple income tax stream would be
+X% on income tax , cost him absolutely nothing (other than political points) , and for Gordon to get
his £1 out of you the tax only needs to be £1.04 instead of £15., but hey what'd you prefer?
£1.04 or £15, I know what I'd prefer,

But alas they have to hide the unemployment stats somehow, its funny how NL sychophants
always say ohh in Thatchers day there were 3 million on the dole, well there are now 1.2 million
on the dole several million on disability , and 8.7 million "economically inactive" , effectively
we have only 25 million working people and 15 million on the dole.

[Itchy]