Council tax robbers

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Sticks. said:

I asked you because yo had a headline figure and thought you might have the data to give it context.

I'd like the best possible vfm service delivery too, but the 109% doesn't tell us much. I.e. if the central govt funding has reduced, similar efficiency is possibly a good outcome. If said funding has increased, it's even worse than it first appears. And factoring in inflation, etc.

I wouldn't be surprised if the last govt moved responsibility for a lot of things to local level in the name of democracy, didn't necesssarily fund them properly, pocketed the saving, and let us blame the local councils while saying 'look what we gave you, local accountbility...'

Agreed. Statements like "109% increase" and "100+" stealth taxes don't tell us anything in isolation. It would be far more relevant to look at total Public Sector expenditure and total outputs.

[vonuber]

Well I live (according to the leaflet proudly shoved through the door today) in the area with cheapest council tax in Britain.
They are doing such a wonderful job - the staff even have to pay 5 a month for drinking water, now there's a great way of keeping your bills low.
Still, at least I don't have kids yet and so don't have the pleasure of having to pay for my kids to use the previously free children's playgound.
Ho hum.

[dcb]

Tartan Pixie said:

I can just imagine what the country would be like if the privatize everything crowd got their way.

...

As much as I wince at the the tax bill I understand that what I am paying for is freedom. I don't have to worry about and organize every single aspect of my life, I simply pay the bill and my rubbish dissapears, the roads are there for me to drive on and if I hurt myself then some nice people in green uniforms come along and put me back together again.

That to me is value.

It is if they do it right, but since they are the only provider
of those services and you can't opt out, then there isn't the competitive
element that keeps standards up.

I'd be delighted to have a choice of providers for the services the council
claim to provide. Then it would be like buying almost anything else in the
marketplace. I could choose on price, I could choose on value, I could choose
on quality or any other attribute I care about.

[Tartan Pixie]

dcb said:

I could choose on value, I could choose on quality or any other attribute I care about.

So you want to spend your Sundays perusing whatbinman.com? Well good on you I suppose but it sounds like hell to me.

Caring about these things isn't worth a few quid each month, that's what we pay politicians for. I'd rather vote every few years and if they're doing a bad job then kick them out.

Every time the government privatize something they make a complete balls up of it. If I can buy a rail ticket without having to remove an arm and a leg for the privilege of sitting in a dumpster on rails, that's the point I'll believe the UK can do privatization without shooting itself in the foot.

Privatization = Paying double for half the service, a ton of hassle trying to find the right deal, nobody taking responsibility for anything and at the end of it all finding that the government hasn't lowered taxes anyway.

[turbobloke]

Tartan Pixie said:

dcb said:

I could choose on value, I could choose on quality or any other attribute I care about.

So you want to spend your Sundays perusing whatbinman.com? Well good on you I suppose but it sounds like hell to me.

It's just a choice of hell.

Either
"WhatBinman.com" if possible and you could be arsed
or
"NoChoiceBeyondDecliningButEqualMediocrity.com" if not.

If service levels deteriorate further with CT increasing, can streets or areas collaborate to negotiate alternative providers? AIUI it's not possible to opt out of elements of CT you either pay the lot or join protesting pensioners in jail. So this kind of thing taking place via collaboration between households couldn't happen anyway. Possibly this is an additional service, it's not familiar territory in comparison with watching Council services deteriorate over time at higher cost.

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Tartan Pixie said:

dcb said:

I could choose on value, I could choose on quality or any other attribute I care about.

So you want to spend your Sundays perusing whatbinman.com? Well good on you I suppose but it sounds like hell to me.

For every decent person perusing whatbinman.com there will be at least one person who thinks "sod it - I'll just dump it for free down some quiet country lane/end of my street/in next door's garden". It's the same for every other essential service (eg Police / Fire Brigade / Defence). Why pay if you don't have to ?

[turbobloke]

Countdown said:

Tartan Pixie said:

dcb said:

I could choose on value, I could choose on quality or any other attribute I care about.

So you want to spend your Sundays perusing whatbinman.com? Well good on you I suppose but it sounds like hell to me.

For every decent person perusing whatbinman.com there will be at least one person who thinks "sod it - I'll just dump it for free down some quiet country lane/end of my street/in next door's garden". It's the same for every other essential service (eg Police / Fire Brigade / Defence). Why pay if you don't have to ?

No different to now as both situations involve paying, it's just a matter of degree and how much needs to be paid for what.

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turbobloke said:

It's just a choice of hell.

Either
"WhatBinman.com" if possible and you could be arsed
or
"NoChoiceBeyondDecliningButEqualMediocrity.com" if not.

There is a third option. Move to an economy where you get a better quality of life for your tax "dollar".

For me personally, given my education and skills, the UK provides the best quality of life when compared to the taxes I pay.

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turbobloke said:

Countdown said:

Tartan Pixie said:

dcb said:

I could choose on value, I could choose on quality or any other attribute I care about.

So you want to spend your Sundays perusing whatbinman.com? Well good on you I suppose but it sounds like hell to me.

For every decent person perusing whatbinman.com there will be at least one person who thinks "sod it - I'll just dump it for free down some quiet country lane/end of my street/in next door's garden". It's the same for every other essential service (eg Police / Fire Brigade / Defence). Why pay if you don't have to ?

No different to now as both situations involve paying, it's just a matter of degree and how much needs to be paid for what.

The situations are different. Even if you don't pay CT your rubbish still gets taken away. It's a case of the CT payers subsidising those who don't pay but that is the way the tax system works. It means that society as a whole benefits.

As I mentioned before there are plenty of examples of societies with no tax collection and no public expenditure. In theory these should be the fairest systems; you would get exactly what you pay for via private expenditure and consumption. If you listen to some on PH you would think these would be ideal societies to live in

[turbobloke]

Countdown said:

turbobloke said:

It's just a choice of hell.

Either
"WhatBinman.com" if possible and you could be arsed
or
"NoChoiceBeyondDecliningButEqualMediocrity.com" if not.

There is a third option. Move to an economy where you get a better quality of life for your tax "dollar".

For me personally, given my education and skills, the UK provides the best quality of life when compared to the taxes I pay.

Does that mean you've experienced significant periods of living abroad or just added an international dimension to choices of hell for the sake of that opposing viewpoint?

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turbobloke said:

Countdown said:

turbobloke said:

It's just a choice of hell.

Either
"WhatBinman.com" if possible and you could be arsed
or
"NoChoiceBeyondDecliningButEqualMediocrity.com" if not.

There is a third option. Move to an economy where you get a better quality of life for your tax "dollar".

For me personally, given my education and skills, the UK provides the best quality of life when compared to the taxes I pay.

Does that mean you've experienced significant periods of living abroad or just added a dimension to choices of hell for the sake of that opposing viewpoint?

Significant periods of time living abroad.

[elster]

Countdown said:

elster said:

Pupp said:

elster said:

Yes they are, but the money doesn't go into a fund.

LGPS is funded. Try again

So it is, my mistake. So with local government we are paying for pension payments and contributions at the same time.

No. Councils and employees pay into the Pension Fund. On retirement the Pension Fund pays out the pension. The Council doesn't pay twice.

Local government definitely pay out for current retired staff. Where else do you think the money comes from for the shortfall in the gold plated pension?

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elster said:

Local government definitely pay out for current retired staff. Where else do you think the money comes from for the shortfall in the gold plated pension?

Not sure what you mean by "current" retired staff. If they're retired they're former staff. Once they've retired the Pension Fund pays out their pension - retired staff no longer form part of the liabilities of the Organisation's Pension Fund (except the ones who retired early and their retirement costs weren't capitalised, but these are slowly dying off - these are very rare nowadays).

The shortfall in the PF is the snapshot deficit between Assets & Liabilities at the valuation date. It's funded by the contributions of Employees and Employers (mainly Employers). Employers only pay into the PF when the person hasn't retired. They do not pay the actual pension itself, the pension is effectively a drawdown of the accumulated benefits.

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swerni said:

Nah, just means he doesn't pay much tax

[elster]

Countdown said:

elster said:

Local government definitely pay out for current retired staff. Where else do you think the money comes from for the shortfall in the gold plated pension?

Not sure what you mean by "current" retired staff. If they're retired they're former staff. Once they've retired the Pension Fund pays out their pension - retired staff no longer form part of the liabilities of the Organisation's Pension Fund (except the ones who retired early and their retirement costs weren't capitalised, but these are slowly dying off - these are very rare nowadays).

The shortfall in the PF is the snapshot deficit between Assets & Liabilities at the valuation date. It's funded by the contributions of Employees and Employers (mainly Employers). Employers only pay into the PF when the person hasn't retired. They do not pay the actual pension itself, the pension is effectively a drawdown of the accumulated benefits.

I better get onto a few councils to let them know they are fiddling the books, as they are paying to fund former staff. Those who are currently retired.

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elster said:

I better get onto a few councils to let them know they are fiddling the books, as they are paying to fund former staff. Those who are currently retired.

If they are funding former staff it will only be those who were

(a) Given early retirement AND
(b) the costs of the VER were not capitalised (i.e. the ER wasn't fully funded at the time of retirement)

The LA is still only paying once, it is paying NOW because it didn't pay back at the time of retirement.

[turbobloke]

swerni said:

turbobloke said:

Countdown said:

turbobloke said:

It's just a choice of hell.

Either
"WhatBinman.com" if possible and you could be arsed
or
"NoChoiceBeyondDecliningButEqualMediocrity.com" if not.

There is a third option. Move to an economy where you get a better quality of life for your tax "dollar".

For me personally, given my education and skills, the UK provides the best quality of life when compared to the taxes I pay.

Does that mean you've experienced significant periods of living abroad or just added an international dimension to choices of hell for the sake of that opposing viewpoint?

Nah, just means he doesn't pay much tax

I'm fairly sure diehard collectivists hope that people who pay a lot of tax decide to stay, given how much this small group ponies up. After all, if they left and decided to go private abroad, who would pay for Jeremy Kyle's sofa-bound audience to be kept in the lager fags and muffin top manner to which they've become accustomed.

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turbobloke said:

I'm fairly sure diehard collectivists hope that people who pay a lot of tax decide to stay, given how much this small group ponies up.

Absolutely

I do wonder why they haven't moved already - why stay in this country and subsidise the majority if you do not benefit from it?

One possible answer may be that they benefit financially from living in a safe, stable, educated, democracy. Our society as a whole creates a demand for bankers, lawyers, doctors, IT professionals, BMW dealerships, kitchen fitters, gas engineers, and carpet wholsesalers. Would they be as succesful in a low-tax / low spend economy?

[turbobloke]

Countdown said:

turbobloke said:

I'm fairly sure diehard collectivists hope that people who pay a lot of tax decide to stay, given how much this small group ponies up.

Absolutely

I do wonder why they haven't moved already - why stay in this country and subsidise the majority if you do not benefit from it?

One possible answer may be that they benefit financially from living in a safe, stable, educated, democracy. Our society as a whole creates a demand for bankers, lawyers, doctors, IT professionals, BMW dealerships, kitchen fitters, gas engineers, and carpet wholsesalers. Would they be as succesful in a low-tax / low spend economy?

I imagine it's not always a question of being successful in the present tense but of enjoying the fruits of existing success when those fruits are ripe enough and while there is still time to enjoy them - and as you say, not paying through the nose for everybody else's costly personal habits. In terms of conditions here, relative political stability and the relative transparency of legal processes are two major advantages, but personal factors such as family and friends will always figure. In this context I'm not sure Council Tax would be at the top of the considerations list but the cost of public services compared to their quality won't go away.

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swerni said:

Or could it be down to family ties?

Same rule applies - are those relatives net contributors or net beneficiaries of public services?

Personal example - my mum has arthritis and various other health issues and my dad has heart problems. It would be extremely hard for us to relocate elsewhere and still get the same quality of life as the reduction in taxes would be more than offset by increased costs such as health.

Statistically each powerfully built PH Director will have 9 family members who are net beneficiaries of public expenditure such as CT. it's not just the Jeremy Kyle afficionados who benefit.