Elite Tax Haven Details Leaked

[anonymous-user]

James_B said:

Number of pounds paid, or percentage of earnings paid, the outcome is the same under either measure.

I don’t think, no matter how contrived a measure you come up with, that anyone can claim that the lower paid near the greater tax burden.

Why can't we just pay them more, so they pay more tax?

[anonymous-user]

It's a bit late for me to be answering 3 or 4 posts in a lovely multi quote manner.

In summary, if I were you, I'd move to Geneva. It really is a lovely place to live.
We'll be ok without you - there are loads of people waiting for the opportunity,

You really aren't that special.

[Trolleys Thank You]

desolate said:

It's a bit late for me to be answering 3 or 4 posts in a lovely multi quote manner.

In summary, if I were you, I'd move to Geneva. It really is a lovely place to live.
We'll be ok without you - there are loads of people waiting for the opportunity,

You really aren't that special.

Quite. More than enough tax dodgers in this country already. Should go and indulge his greed elsewhere.

Edited by Trolleys Thank You on Saturday 11th November 00:24

[AW111]

desolate said:

Why can't we just pay them more, so they pay more tax?

This is the bit of UK economics I really don't understand. People in full-time work needing benefits to bring their income up to a reasonable standard, which requires a larger tax take.
Pay people a living wage, less benefits required, less total tax required.

In Australia the principle was set over 100 years ago (1907) with the Harvester case :

judgement said:

H.B. Higgins declared that "fair and reasonable" wages for an unskilled male worker required a living wage that was sufficient for "a human being in a civilised community" to support a wife and three children in "frugal comfort", while a skilled worker should receive an additional margin for their skills, regardless of the employer's capacity to pay.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harvester_case
It doesn't seem to have impoverished the country.

[anonymous-user]

AW111 said:

This is the bit of UK economics I really don't understand. People in full-time work needing benefits to bring their income up to a reasonable standard, which requires a larger tax take.
Pay people a living wage, less benefits required, less total tax required.

Raise minimum wage
Lower/abolish employer ni
Lower/abolish in work benefits

It's in vogue to assert that complex problems don't have simple solutions but IME complexity usually causes more problems than it solves.

[Alpinestars]

James_B said:

roachcoach said:

You realise the reality of the situation though, right? That those at the top are not tied to a country and if the tax situation becomes overly hostile in their eyes, they will simply leave.

Would you support reducing the percentage the "rich" pay if it actually resulted in a higher treasury take thus allowing a high governmental spend. The logical answer is "of course". Sadly the emotional horsest the media and other elements have dragged into this mean a very disappointing percentage of people would say "no".

So few seem to understand that idealism must be balanced against pragmatism and reality when it comes to implementation.

Edited by roachcoach on Friday 10th November 09:45

I know that many people deride this idea, but it’s clearly true. People earning millions a year tend to have a choice about where to live. You can nearly double your take-home if you spend a year in Dubai, and you’re not far off doubling it in a fair few other places. I’ve a few friends who’ve done this, so the UK went from getting half a million a year from them to getting nothing at all.

It doesn’t take many people doing this to more than offset the increased take from those who stay.

The idea that no-one will move tends to be based on an idealised person, born here, tied to London, spchikdren settled in schools, but there are huge numbers of people who are earning large salaries who are from overseas. Lovely though crowded, polluted, London is, it’s not exactly travelling to the seventh circle of hell to spend a couple of years living in Lake Geneva, or commuting in from Antibes to Monaco.

Doing what? Anyone can go and get a job in Dubai and "double" their salary if there's a job out there.

[Zed 44]

James_B said:

We?

If you want to pay your workers more, knock yourself out.

Ask yourself this, though, if you’ve a worker who can only add about £10 an hour economic value to your firm, how much do you intend to pay them?

Next, how are you going to compete with the firm next door who pays them £9 an hour, and so who can undercut your prices for an identical product?

Quite agree James. What's wrong with paying as low wage as possible and leveraging our profits. Also, why shouldn't I avoid paying tax if I can. I'm healthy and don't need the NHS. My child got through school with a state grant so why should I pay for anyone else's? I'm a long way off needing social care so why should I pay for anyone else's? Perhaps a flat rate tax of 20% would be a good idea to run the military and try to restore the Empire. But I would still have my shell company and avoid paying any tax at all.

I'm with you bro.

[anonymous-user]

Zed 44 said:

James_B said:

We?

If you want to pay your workers more, knock yourself out.

Ask yourself this, though, if you’ve a worker who can only add about £10 an hour economic value to your firm, how much do you intend to pay them?

Next, how are you going to compete with the firm next door who pays them £9 an hour, and so who can undercut your prices for an identical product?

Quite agree James. What's wrong with paying as low wage as possible and leveraging our profits. Also, why shouldn't I avoid paying tax if I can. I'm healthy and don't need the NHS. My child got through school with a state grant so why should I pay for anyone else's? I'm a long way off needing social care so why should I pay for anyone else's? Perhaps a flat rate tax of 20% would be a good idea to run the military and try to restore the Empire. But I would still have my shell company and avoid paying any tax at all.

I'm with you bro.

Some of the posts from posters like James B are a fascinating insight into the kind of mindset that helped cause the financial crisis. It would be more amusing if they didn’t hold positions of responsibility in financial institutions but there you go.

[anonymous-user]

James_B said:

You do realise, don’t you, that you’re failing to answer any of the points raised, and have instead taken the really childish step,of just trying to insult me?

I’m not claiming to be special, petal, I’m just trying my best to help you to understand some pretty simple points.

I’ll give up now, though, you seem unlikely to benefit.

You really are a patronising bellend. That's an insult, but it's also a fact.

[hyphen]

James_B said:

We?

If you want to pay your workers more, knock yourself out.

Ask yourself this, though, if you’ve a worker who can only add about £10 an hour economic value to your firm, how much do you intend to pay them?

Next, how are you going to compete with the firm next door who pays them £9 an hour, and so who can undercut your prices for an identical product?

That is very simplistic.

We can go on and on
- The £10 an hour job will get better employees applying.
- The £9 worker will eventually apply for that £10 job, with all the training done by previous employer.
- the £9 employer will see higher employee turnover, recruitment, training, and risk of poor quality new employee are all relevant costs.
- the £10 worker may be happier and so more productive.

and so on. Far too many variables than just upfront wage.

[Dr Jekyll]

hyphen said:

That is very simplistic.

We can go on and on
- The £10 an hour job will get better employees applying.
- The £9 worker will eventually apply for that £10 job, with all the training done by previous employer.
- the £9 employer will see higher employee turnover, recruitment, training, and risk of bad employee are all relevant costs.
- the £10 worker may be happier and so more productive.

and so on. Far too many variables than just upfront wage.

They can be as happy and productive as they like but if they aren't generating £10 an hour of value they aren't going to be employed. Of course they might generate £9 an hour of value, and with experience may be able to generate £10 +, but they need the £9 an hour job in order to gain that experience.

[Halb]

El stovey said:

Some of the posts from posters like James B are a fascinating insight into the kind of mindset that helped cause the financial crisis. It would be more amusing if they didn’t hold positions of responsibility in financial institutions but there you go.

I for one hail our newold crony capitalist overlords.

[anonymous-user]

desolate said:

James_B said:

You do realise, don’t you, that you’re failing to answer any of the points raised, and have instead taken the really childish step,of just trying to insult me?

I’m not claiming to be special, petal, I’m just trying my best to help you to understand some pretty simple points.

I’ll give up now, though, you seem unlikely to benefit.

You really are a patronising bellend. That's an insult, but it's also a fact.

He's also a complete fantasist.

Quite funny to see him reprimand someone for getting 'to' and 'too' wrong - whilst littering his post-pub offerings with spelling mistakes and words out of context.

[edh]

James_B said:

desolate said:

Why can't we just pay them more, so they pay more tax?

We?

If you want to pay your workers more, knock yourself out.

Ask yourself this, though, if you’ve a worker who can only add about £10 an hour economic value to your firm, how much do you intend to pay them?

Next, how are you going to compete with the firm next door who pays them £9 an hour, and so who can undercut your prices for an identical product?

One word: productivity.

Why does a French worker produce more in 4 days than a British worker does in 5?

Our productivity gap is a major issue, probably due to financial short termism and underinvestment. What drives this? The financial sector.

Oh, and can you explain why you deserve such high wages? Surely in an efficient free market the price for your job would be bid down by the hordes of very smart people across the globe? You said yourself that your work could be done from anywhere.

I'm also interested to know if you add any value or just extract economic rent? Maybe your contribution to national wealth is a bit less than you'd like to think.. .

[Granfondo]

Roman Rhodes said:

He's also a complete fantasist.

Quite funny to see him reprimand someone for getting 'to' and 'too' wrong - whilst littering his post-pub offerings with spelling mistakes and words out of context.

This how I imagine James



But more self important.

[Mrr T]

edh said:

One word: productivity.

Why does a French worker produce more in 4 days than a British worker does in 5?

Our productivity gap is a major issue, probably due to financial short termism and underinvestment. What drives this? The financial sector.

It's one of the stock answers that the UK economy has a problem with low productivity. It's actually not that simple. French productivity maybe higher than the UK but French unemployment is also much higher than in the UK. Those two facts may be related.

As for this being the result of short term view in financial services just does not add up since the investment structure in France is very similar to the UK.

[andy_s]

I don't think the French is a particularly good example to bring into the discussion in this context, business is severely hamstrung, anyone employed in the public sector is unsackable and small business' have great difficulty expanding due to the draconian employment laws; Macron is trying to rectify this, watch this space - it's not going well.

[Zed 44]

Where's James? Maybe waiting til he gets back to his City job on Monday where he has to slog away paying 45% to the government.

[edh]

Mrr T said:

edh said:

One word: productivity.

Why does a French worker produce more in 4 days than a British worker does in 5?

Our productivity gap is a major issue, probably due to financial short termism and underinvestment. What drives this? The financial sector.

It's one of the stock answers that the UK economy has a problem with low productivity. It's actually not that simple. French productivity maybe higher than the UK but French unemployment is also much higher than in the UK. Those two facts may be related.

As for this being the result of short term view in financial services just does not add up since the investment structure in France is very similar to the UK.

It's the answer to James' question. It has been the answer for the last 200 years or more.

There is no disputing that UK productivity growth has been dismal over the past 10 years. Interested to hear what other explanations you have for it.

Can't be regulation can it? Not if the French and Germans do better than us.

[hyphen]

edh said:

Mrr T said:

edh said:

One word: productivity.

Why does a French worker produce more in 4 days than a British worker does in 5?

Our productivity gap is a major issue, probably due to financial short termism and underinvestment. What drives this? The financial sector.

It's one of the stock answers that the UK economy has a problem with low productivity. It's actually not that simple. French productivity maybe higher than the UK but French unemployment is also much higher than in the UK. Those two facts may be related.

As for this being the result of short term view in financial services just does not add up since the investment structure in France is very similar to the UK.

It's the answer to James' question. It has been the answer for the last 200 years or more.

There is no disputing that UK productivity growth has been dismal over the past 10 years. Interested to hear what other explanations you have for it.

Can't be regulation can it? Not if the French and Germans do better than us.

Perhaps our low wage/openness to Zero hours and so on encourages employers to throw more bodies in, rather than invest in training/skills. That would account for the lower unemployment compared to France.