Omega Owners Forum
Chat Area => General Discussion Area => Topic started by: TheBoy on 17 April 2013, 18:04:43
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Suppose that once a week, ten men go out for beer and the bill for all ten comes to £100. If they paid their bill the way we pay our taxes, it would go something like this.
The first four men (the poorest) would pay nothing.
The fifth would pay £1.
The sixth would pay £3.
The seventh would pay £7.
The eighth would pay £12.
The ninth would pay £18
And the tenth man (the richest) would pay £59.
So, that's what they decided to do. The ten men drank in the bar every week and seemed quite happy with the arrangement until, one day, the owner caused them a little problem. "Since you are all such good customers," he said, "I'm going to reduce the cost of your weekly beer by £20.” Drinks for the ten men would now cost just £80.
The group still wanted to pay their bill the way we pay our taxes. So the first four men were unaffected. They would still drink for free but what about the other six men? The paying customers? How could they divide the £20 windfall so that everyone would get his fair share?
They realized that £20 divided by six is £3.33 but if they subtracted that from everybody's share then not only would the first four men still be drinking for free but the fifth and sixth man would each end up being paid to drink his beer.
So, the bar owner suggested that it would be fairer to reduce each man's bill by a higher percentage. They decided to follow the principle of the tax system they had been using and he proceeded to work out the amounts he suggested that each should now pay.
And so, the fifth man, like the first four, now paid nothing (a 100% saving).
The sixth man now paid £2 instead of £3 (a 33% saving).
The seventh man now paid £5 instead of £7 (a 28% saving).
The eighth man now paid £9 instead of £12 (a 25% saving).
The ninth man now paid £14 instead of £18 (a 22% saving).
And the tenth man now paid £49 instead of £59 (a 16% saving).
Each of the last six was better off than before with the first four continuing to drink for free. But, once outside the bar, the men began to compare their savings. "I only got £1 out of the £20 saving," declared the sixth man. He pointed to the tenth man, "but he got £10"
"Yes, that's right," exclaimed the fifth man. "I only saved £1 too. It's unfair that he got ten times more benefit than me"
"That's true" shouted the seventh man. "Why should he get £10 back, when I only got £2? The wealthy get all the breaks"
"Wait a minute," yelled the first four men in unison, "We didn't get anything at all. This new tax system exploits the poor"
The nine men surrounded the tenth and beat him up.
The next week the tenth man didn't show up for drinks, so the nine sat down and had their beers without him. But when it came time to pay the bill, they discovered something important - they didn't have enough money between all of them to pay for even half of the bill.
And that, boys and girls, journalists and government ministers, is how our tax system works. The people who already pay the highest taxes will naturally get the most benefit from a tax reduction. Tax them too much, attack them for being wealthy and they just might not show up anymore. In fact, they might start drinking overseas, where the atmosphere is somewhat friendlier.
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Try explaining this in the pub, after the beer :y
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Keep up. ::)
http://www.omegaowners.com/forum/index.php?topic=113626.0
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Yeah, keep up. ;D ;D
I know you're quite elderly but....... ;)
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Keep up. ::)
http://www.omegaowners.com/forum/index.php?topic=113626.0
Was gonna say......i saw that a week or so ago on oof ::) ;D
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Why such a big gap between man nine and man ten?.
It's fixed. ;)
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opps, missed the other.
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Why such a big gap between man nine and man ten?.
It's fixed. ;)
Of course. A bit like the actual tax system.
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Sent to my accountant with a note saying hes still paying for all the beers ;D
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The facts do get in the way of this beer fairy story which seems to be doing the rounds: Britain’s richest people are actually paying 4p in the pound less in tax than any other section of the population.
Sorry for the repeat but:
The Sunday Times
September 16, 2007
Treasury reveals tax burden is heaviest on poor
Holly Watt
BRITAIN’S richest people are paying 4p in the pound less in tax than any other section of the population, according to new figures released by the Treasury.
The data show the top 1% of households hand over 31% of their income when all direct and indirect taxes are accounted for, compared with an average of 35% for everyone else.
Much of the gap has opened up because, while the rich pay a higher rate of income tax, they pay a smaller proportion of their income in indirect levies such as television licences and Vat on goods and services.
The Treasury analysis, which covers figures for 2005-6, the latest available, has been seized on by critics who believe the figures show Labour’s tax regime has excessively favoured the rich.
Vince Cable, the Liberal Democrat shadow chancellor, to whom the figures were released, said: “People at the very top pay a smaller percentage than people at the bottom. Despite the claims that the tax system is progressive, it seems that people right at the top are paying less.”
Cable is concerned that the tax burden has increased most on the lowest earners.
It is unclear whether the figures include the tax paid by people with nondomiciled status. If it does not, it may understate the disparity between the rich and the rest.
Gordon Brown has shied away from new taxes on the rich to avoid undermining the City and scaring off investors.
During the summer there was public controversy about the low rates of tax enjoyed by private equity tycoons, some of whom can pay as little as 10% on their earnings.
The controversy was stoked in June when Nicholas Ferguson, chairman of SVG Capital, admitted in an interview that he felt uncomfortable paying lower taxes than his cleaner.
“Any commonsense person would say that a highly paid private equity executive paying less tax than a cleaning lady or other low-paid workers . . . can’t be right,” he said.
Although the Labour government initially claimed it would promote a progressive tax system, whereby the highest paid contribute more in taxes, the figures undermine the claim.
For the lowest 10% of earners, the average annual income per household is £8,366, of which 44.2% is paid as tax.
At the other end of the spectrum, the top 10% of households receive an average £88,334 and pay 35% in tax. The highest-earning 1% have an income of more than £92,300. Households on the median income of £24,700 pay 35.3% in tax.
Mike Warburton, senior tax partner at Grant Thornton, the accountancy firm, said: “Up to certain income levels, whatever income people get they spend and get hit with taxes. But at the top end people start putting money into their savings and some of the big items of expenditure for these people - notably private school fees - do not attract Vat.”
The tax status of nondomiciled residents, who are taxed only on the investment income they remit to the UK, has also been questioned.
A number of donors and lenders to the Labour party have benefited from this status. They include Lakshmi Mittal, Britain’s richest man, Lord Paul, the industrialist, Sir Gulam Noon, the curry tycoon, and Sir Christopher Ondaatje, the publisher.
The provisions have been officially “under review” by the Treasury since 2002, but no conclusions have been published. Treasury documents published under the Freedom of Information Act showed that there were 77,000 people in Britain benefiting from nondomiciled status in 2002. The number is now put at nearly 200,000.
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So - if someone is wealthy and lives in a house big enough to own loads of TV,s but only pay one licence fee the same as everyone else,or spend their money on making sure their kids arent educated in our useless marxist infested comprehensive system,thats used as a means to demonstrate that their tax burden is relatively unfair.Politics of envy yet again tbh,this country has become awash with it again post Thatcher,and it will drag us back down the same slippery slope.
Good luck to them,I wish I had worked hard enough and been less stupid when I was young,and then I may have ended up having the same advantages in life. ;)
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So - if someone is wealthy and lives in a house big enough to own loads of TV,s but only pay one licence fee the same as everyone else,or spend their money on making sure their kids arent educated in our useless marxist infested comprehensive system,thats used as a means to demonstrate that their tax burden is relatively unfair.Politics of envy yet again tbh,this country has become awash with it again post Thatcher,and it will drag us back down the same slippery slope.
Good luck to them,I wish I had worked hard enough and been less stupid when I was young,and then I may have ended up having the same advantages in life. ;)
Why?.....because you can bet that most of them didn't. Most of them have a 'rich daddy'.
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So, where does my 40p a pint home brew come into this? :D
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dbdb is correct. :y
The wealthy may pay more tax, because they earn more.......but they have never in the history of taxation paid their 'fair share' :-\
Sadly, New/ Blue labour was no better than the tories in this respect. Blair and Brown spent far too much time arse-licking the boys in the city.
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So, where does my 40p a pint home brew come into this? :D
........that tempts me to experiment.
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So, where does my 40p a pint home brew come into this? :D
........that tempts me to experiment.
That's quite high for homebrew....I reckon mine is closer to 32/33p per pint :y
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I like UKIP,s idea of a flat rate 25% tax paid by absolutely everyone wo earns more than £13,000 pa. Simple,easy to collect and no dodgy avoidance schemes allowed.
http://ukip.org/content/ukip-policies/2993-ukip-proposed-tax-policy
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Until you £13,001.
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25% of £1 is hardly worth jumping up and down over. :D
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I like UKIP,s idea of a flat rate 25% tax paid by absolutely everyone wo earns more than £13,000 pa. Simple,easy to collect and no dodgy avoidance schemes allowed.
http://ukip.org/content/ukip-policies/2993-ukip-proposed-tax-policy
Great idea, I wonder if you could take it one stage further and do away with all duties and taxes, and I do mean all inc business rates and council tax, fuel tax corporation tax etc.
Then just have income tax, if a business receives an income then it is taxed, when it pays staff they are taxed, if it pays shareholders they are taxed. Seems very simple to me and very difficult to avoid.
Seems simple but then I am simple person. ;D
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25% of £1 is hardly worth jumping up and down over. :D
That's 25p. A fortune to some. ;)
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25% of £1 is hardly worth jumping up and down over. :D
Sorry, it read that once you earned over £13k you were taxed at 25%, not that you were taxed at earnings over £13k :y
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That's quite high for homebrew....I reckon mine is closer to 32/33p per pint :y
It's a stab in the dark guess, TBH. It's beer like leccy was supposed to be - "too cheap to meter", after all. :D
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25% of £1 is hardly worth jumping up and down over. :D
Sorry, it read that once you earned over £13k you were taxed at 25%, not that you were taxed at earnings over £13k :y
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It did,but thats because im semi literate,at best. ;D
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So, where does my 40p a pint home brew come into this? :D
........that tempts me to experiment.
That's quite high for homebrew....I reckon mine is closer to 32/33p per pint :y
35p a pint for cider - tescos apple juice just add yeast.
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Tax avoidance.Tut tut. ::) ;D ;D