Budget 2012

[gary1979666]

You say "rude and bullying", but I'm simply being succinct and to the point. There's no point calling a brick to the head a tap with a pretty flower.

I'm replying against a point you've made, so I've personalised it around you - but it's not necessarily about you.

But the fact that you've chosen to take it personally gets to mean it does apply and it's hit home. That's a good thing and not a bad thing.

[eFestivals]

Not really - by calling someone not agreeing to your line of thinking a think shit, you've detracted from the point. OK, accept it might not necessarily be about me in particular - though it is in general - but my reaction to reading it wasn't thinking about your point - it was just getting angry at the way you'd written it. All I'm saying is that if you want people to seriously take your points, then stop insulting them.

what you're missing is that I feel insulted by all sorts of ideas. It's an insult to the idea of fairness, of people working for what they get, of people being able to improve their lives via their own hard work, etc, etc.

It's not the one way street you wish to think of it as being, where the status quo is all fine and there's nothing bad to be suggested about it.

Can see your point to an extent, but isn't it the banks / people's greed that shot house prices up....subprime problems....credit crunch - rather than the current state of inheritance tax. If there'd been sensible lending/borrowing, then the demand wouldn't have been there to make the problems we have today getting on the housing ladder.

Perhaps - but it's the greed of individuals which is stopping any correction of those problems.

The house I've just bought was bought 13 years ago for £56k. At the peak of the market it was worth around £150k. I paid a bit less than that for it, but not much - because the person selling was seeing it as a loss against the peak price rather than as a gain against what they paid.

So while it might not have been individual's greed that was the cause of the initial problems, it's very definitely the cause of why the problems aren't being addressed very well.

I don't agree - a simplistic example - if I have £10k today and decide to spend it on a family holiday (assuming I had children...) and later died, the children, other family members don't pay any tax on that. However if I save that money (for a rainy day or some other cautious reason) and then die - the heirs get the money less the tax. (I know the threshold is higher, more a hypothetical). The timing of the "gift" is everything. So if they have no right to be given money - should any provision of anything from deceased to heir prior to death be taxed?

If you spend the money, it goes to an entity that then pays tax on it, and is recirculated around generating more tax. If you tuck it under your bed for your kids you are denying the economy use of that money.

Gifts should be taxed no differently to any other income that a person receives - which is what I said earlier. Income is income is income; it shouldn't matter where any income comes from.

[Rufus Gwertigan]

At least I will die safe in the knowledge that my kids will get fuck all except a memento. Be buggered if I am going without when I should be enjoying life and relaxing. At the end of the day it is all just stuff and I will just have enough to fill my shopping trolley with, that I plan to live out of with a bag full of cats.

[kaosmark2]

Can see your point to an extent, but isn't it the banks / people's greed that shot house prices up....subprime problems....credit crunch - rather than the current state of inheritance tax. If there'd been sensible lending/borrowing, then the demand wouldn't have been there to make the problems we have today getting on the housing ladder.

[eFestivals]

Tax Benefits then ? Its income

I've no real problem with that in principle, but in practice it's a stupid idea given that the level of benefit payments is based on need - all taxing them would do is mean that the govt would have to put up the amounts by the amount they take back in tax.

[feral chile]

So the budget....

Basically it amounts to this. A significant tax reduction for the very rich (if you earn £500,000 a year, it puts £1500 in your pocket), funded by taking money out of the pockets of pensioners, by hitting the disabled and the poorest in society. And a further £10 billion cut in public spending which promises more of the same

it ought to be enough to have people on the streets

[feral chile]

So I take it we are all against pension reform...

Great... The growing issue of us living longer isn't going to be addressed properly anytime soon...

I think people need to get real... Whoever is in government should be tackling this issue much tougher than they are...

There is a lot of bullshit out there being pushed but dealing with an ageing population is a massive real issue for this country and it needs dealing with. I keep telling people I know who are my age or younger to start putting into a pension now, and heavily... We won't ever see a state pension I reckon... Its just not going to be affordable...

Some people need to grow up a bit around here...

[feral chile]

What hasn't it got to do with it ?

[feral chile]

How many 65 year olds aren't retired ?

Sorry its totally related... While the technicality of your point is right the reality is different... Its how we approach the old... Its all one and the same...

[grumpyhack]

And I can tell you from experience that quite a lot of 65 year olds are still working, and have deferred their pensions. And there are a lot of 70-and even 80-year olds who are working part time.

[feral chile]

I admit some work out of choice but many are still working because they can't afford to stop.

[feral chile]

What's "a lot" though...

I reckon vast majority are retired...

Edited March 22, 2012 by feral chile

[feral chile]

If I get it wrong I'll be working until the day I die... or will die by not being able to work... I wouldn't worry about the current silver dears... I would worry about what waits the future elderly... Thats where the real problems lie...

[feral chile]

Well at least the raising of the state retirement age makes me feel less ancient.

[kaosmark2]

While the aging population is an issue, pensions will be an entirely different matter in a generation's time. The current generation of pensioners is the last one where women will have been expected to not work. In future generations most people will have worked for a fair part of their life, the days of being married and helping out with bits of the family business behind the scenes are gone, and surely that will have an impact on savings, planning, etc.

[gary1979666]

my daughter is earning an average wage. She's paying off her student debt, paying a stupid amount on rent, and just about has enough to eat and maybe go out once in a while.

There should one tax that everyone pays that includes enough for a pension when the time comes

It should be illegal for pension companies to gamble the money you've put away for your pension

[abdoujaparov]

So I take it we are all against pension reform...

Great... The growing issue of us living longer isn't going to be addressed properly anytime soon...

I think people need to get real... Whoever is in government should be tackling this issue much tougher than they are...

There is a lot of bullshit out there being pushed but dealing with an ageing population is a massive real issue for this country and it needs dealing with. I keep telling people I know who are my age or younger to start putting into a pension now, and heavily... We won't ever see a state pension I reckon... Its just not going to be affordable...

Some people need to grow up a bit around here...

[eFestivals]

Well we have one don't we... National Insurance... Unfortunately its a tax on the current young to fund the growing numbers of old and its just not going to work going forward.

I disagree, tho accept that things can't continue on the same basis as they have to date.

But before we start turning the poor against the poor, there's a much bigger issue that needs addressing if this country is ever to drag itself out of the shit - and that's the fact of the rich stealing all of the money. If/when that has been addressed, we might get to find that the 'pensions crisis' is not the crisis that we're told it is.

For a start, the main thing which started this pensions crisis were the 'pensions holidays' that Thatcher allowed in the eighties and which continued into the nineties, where the shareholders stole the money from the pension funds with govt approval - it was nothing different to what Maxwell did, but with no one being labelled a criminal for doing it.

In the interests of those shareholders and against the interests of the pensioners, a myth was created around the idea that investments only ever go up - and a whole new branch of economics was created to support that myth. The final result was the crash of 07/08.

Given the current budget crisis facing the government why do you trust the government more than anyone else...

I saw someone interviewed on TV the other night - I've no idea who it was, but it was raving right winger - who was screaming "look at the treasury's own figures, spending is not being cut at all".

I've no idea if he was right or not, but I suspect there was something to what he was saying. And if what he was saying is right, the robbery is greater than ever.

Yes, I know that spending on services is being cut, but what are the actual outflows from the treasury for all things? I'm guessing that his version of the numbers includes the vast amounts of money that is still being given to banks.

I get to set my risk profile so I am some what in control of the risk.

PMSL - yeah, the bankers know what a good risk is and what a bad risk is, eh?

Edited March 23, 2012 by eFestivals

[eFestivals]

We have to look forward and not back to be frank.

One good thing is the rule brought in by the last Labour government that all companies have to start contributing to their employees pension pots. I think its something like 3% employer contribution

for a employee 5% contribution. Although it is up to the employee if they want to do the scheme.

It might be wise to say this is mandatory rather than voluntary.

I am looking forwards. And the most important thing to address going forwards is to stop the robbery. Nothing gets close to how important that is.

Freedom for the pike is death for the minnow. And that's precisely what has been happening, and is still happening.

Boastful pieces in the papers about how many billionaires and millionaires this country has is no meaningful statement on the economic viability or success of this country, and people need to start waking up to that fact.

[eFestivals]

Joking aside though if I had to trust them or the government I would STILL trust them more...

yeah, cos the nice trustful people habitually refer to their punters as "muppets", eh?

I trust the govt more, for one simple reason: accountability.

That's something which the bankers do not have and will never have. They are only accountable to their own pay-packet.

[eFestivals]

I think you are wrong there...

If a MP stands for elections for four years... and then thirty years later I retire and that guy has gone... So has any accountability...

How many of the current MPs accept responsibility for anything done in the 70s/80s/90s ? I mean FFS the whole Labour party has took a collective memory shit over some of the things they did just a couple of years ago

Accountability is a myth.

I'm not trying to suggest it's anywhere near as meaningful as the word suggests, but it's there in some form, along with an amount of openness about their doings thru the likes of FoI, etc.

Which is far more than exists with any investment firm that has ever existed or ever will.

[feral chile]

So what... Its only going to get worse for us...

The burden being felt by the current elderly is nothing in comparison to the burden future generations will face... While there ability of saving for themselves has been held back by the demands of the current elderly...

On BBC news today one of them said... "It is probably fair.... but only after I have gone" and started laughing... I didn't think that was very funny...

Edited March 23, 2012 by feral chile

[kaosmark2]

which is why I think it's wrong to put everyone's pensions at risk by gambling.

[feral chile]

I said the removal was the right thing to do... Something that people seem to want to ignore over and over again.

If we are "all in this together"... and we are... Then how can we keep special rates for the old when the young are being fucked over while being expected to fund them!

Of course its clear the Tories are looking after the rich again but thats besides the point.

[Rufus Gwertigan]

I bet the next thing to go will be the Winter Fuel Payment. Nowt better than a few iced old bids to reduce the pension bill.