PDs tax cut plan

Sam Vimes

i was reading about the pd's latest election ploy. they plan to:
"help the poor by cutting tax"

first of all, they're planning to "help the poor" by cutting the higher rate of tax. i know of very few poor people who are on the higher rate. perhaps the PDs consider a million a year poor.

secondly, they're planning to cut it from 42% to 40%. to a person earning 1000 euro a week (not by any means poor), estimating 600 is paid at the 42% rate, they will have a massive €12 extra a week, or €624 a year. so people who aren't poor will be able to get one more taxi a week or three more pints (if they're lucky)

assuming 2 million people in the country pay this higher rate, the PDs will have €12.48 billion less a year to spend on fixing the "national crisis" they've made of the public hospitals, which of course they don't have to use because they can afford to go private.

i have to wonder how making rich people pay less while cutting funding to all public services because of a drop in revenue is "helping the poor".

unfortunately all the idiots will hear tax cut and flock to the voting booths. i think you should have to pass a test of IQ your knowledge of the issues before being allowed vote

opinions?

and how do i add a poll?

Cork

Commander Vimes wrote:

first of all, they're planning to "help the poor" by cutting the higher rate of tax. i know of very few poor people who are on the higher rate. perhaps the PDs consider a million a year poor.

The PDs are right. Why should people be paying income tax at 50%. (PRSI+TAX)?

Why is it ok to tax labour and not property?

Bring in more consumption taxes?

As for the poor? Nothing has helped more than finding employment.

At least the PDs have put it up to FG and Labour to say what they are going to do on tax.

At least, the PDs have stated what they intend to do - FG and Labour choose to remain silent.

Sam Vimes

Cork wrote:

The PDs are right. Why should people be paying income tax at 50%. (PRSI+TAX)?

people should be paying income tax at 50% if that's what it takes to have public services. people seem to forget the connection between the tax they pay and the ambulance that brings them to hospital or the firemen that pull them out of their burning house.

Cork wrote:

Why is it ok to tax labour and not property?

i never said it was. i'm all for taxing property as long as i see my money going towards something more useful than a gigantic syringe in o'connell street.

Cork wrote:

As for the poor? Nothing has helped more than finding employment.

i agree that finding a job helps the poor but that's neither here nor there. they're claiming that cutting the higher rate of tax helps the poor and that's an outright lie. they pay the same tax and have to, for example, pay more for the bus because their budget just got just. remember €1 per week per person is about 100 million a year to the govt.

Cork wrote:

At least the PDs have put it up to FG and Labour to say what they are going to do on tax.

At least, the PDs have stated what they intend to do - FG and Labour choose to remain silent.

this is true. i'm glad they told me that they're going to do exactly the opposite of what needs to be done to fix the mess they created in the hospitals and i'm glad they showed that they think we're stupid enough to believe cutting the higher rate helps the poor. because i know this, i won't be voting for them

The_Minister

Commander Vimes wrote:

i never said it was. i'm all for taxing property as long as i see my money going towards something more useful than a gigantic syringe in o'connell street.

Should no public monuments be built? Should our city lie bare of all commemoration and decoration?

Commander Vimes wrote:

this is true. i'm glad they told me that they're going to do exactly the opposite of what needs to be done to fix the mess they created in the hospitals and i'm glad they showed that they think we're stupid enough to believe cutting the higher rate helps the poor. because i know this, i won't be voting for them

Given past posts from you, you never would have voted for them anyway:rolleyes:
I thought Harneys plan for the health service was good.

Cork

I think Mary Harney also spoke some sense with regards Health. You cannot simply throw money at a problem. It is about time - the taxpayers of this country got value out of public expenditure.

It should mean modern and efficent work practices.

The PDs also called for tax cuts for low and middle income people.

This is to be welcomed.

TheVan

Commander Vimes wrote:

people seem to forget the connection between the tax they pay and the ambulance that brings them to hospital or the firemen that pull them out of their burning house.

Unfortunately throwing money at the problem doesn't necessarily work, as we have seen in Health. Mary Harney seems to be making some inroads into a reform of the Health service, we'll just have to wait and see the results.

Also I imagine she was referring to this:

"Credits will be increased so that couples (both working) earning up to €40,000 will pay absolutely no tax (€20,000 for a single worker)."
http://www.progressivedemocrats.ie/press_room/1762/

And not saying that reducing the upper rate will help poor people. I think this was a case of careful editing....

jesus_thats_gre

I think they plan to take couples earning up to 40K a year complete out out of the tax system and couples earning up to 100k a year will be taxed at the lower rates..

Victor

Cork wrote:

The PDs are right. Why should people be paying income tax at 50%. (PRSI+TAX)?

How can income tax at 42% and PRSI at 4% add up to 50%?

Theres a word I can't use.

New_Departure06

Personally I agree with further tax-cuts, but they shouldn't be aimed exclusively at the better off.

To those who say how then would we pay to fix the health-service, I disagree. Because I believe the problems with the health-service are bureaucratic rather than resources based e.g.

A: Too long to admit patients e.g. a consultant, nurse and student doctor have to give approval I understand. 1 person should have the job of doing this.

B: Too many people going to A+E when they could go to a GP.

C: Some nurses having too short a working day e.g. ending a 17.00pm.

Consultants allowed to work in both private and public practices. Hence they cannot devote enough time to the public-patients.

Sort these out and we'll be in a better position.

Victor

New_Departure06 wrote:

Personally I agree with further tax-cuts, but they shouldn't be aimed exclusively at the better off.

Tax-cuts only benefit those "rich" enough to be paying tax in the first place.

New_Departure06

Victor wrote:

Tax-cuts only benefit those "rich" enough to be paying tax in the first place.

That is sadly true but there is nothing that can be done about that.

Akrasia

i don't understand how people can say the health service is in a shambles purely because of beaurocracy.

There is an obvious shortage of bed capacity in the system. Hospitals are running at more than 100% capacity when they should be running closer to 80% capacity. There needs to be more capital investment in healthcare, and everyone agrees with this. the problem with Hearney and the PDs is they are ideologically opposed to state investment in any services. Hearney wants all the health care investment to come from the private sector, they're basically 'Starving the beast' to make it look as if private health care is the only option instead of just opening up the empty wards in new hospitals that were built and then never used.

There is a problem with beaurocracy, but there is also a problem with capacity, and right now, neither of these problems are being dealt with properly.

How has hearney performed as a health minister? How many of her targets has she met?
How has McDowell performed as a Justice minister? How many targets has he met?
The PDs are full of hot air ad they rarely achieve anything.

The_Minister

New_Departure06 wrote:

Personally I agree with further tax-cuts, but they shouldn't be aimed exclusively at the better off.

Thes ones aren't. There was some selective editing by the OP

mickcarroll10

Akrasia wrote:

i don't understand how people can say the health service is in a shambles purely because of beaurocracy.

There is an obvious shortage of bed capacity in the system. Hospitals are running at more than 100% capacity when they should be running closer to 80% capacity. There needs to be more capital investment in healthcare, and everyone agrees with this. the problem with Hearney and the PDs is they are ideologically opposed to state investment in any services. Hearney wants all the health care investment to come from the private sector, they're basically 'Starving the beast' to make it look as if private health care is the only option instead of just opening up the empty wards in new hospitals that were built and then never used.

There is a problem with beaurocracy, but there is also a problem with capacity, and right now, neither of these problems are being dealt with properly.

How has hearney performed as a health minister? How many of her targets has she met?
How has McDowell performed as a Justice minister? How many targets has he met?
The PDs are full of hot air ad they rarely achieve anything.

Thats is the most factless(if its a word) post i ve seen here,ever

Sam Vimes

Firespinner wrote:

Should no public monuments be built? Should our city lie bare of all commemoration and decoration?

that's obviously a bit much but to be honest, it pisses me off to see money wasted when people are dieing because they have to wait on a trolley for three days. they should put things in order of roughly this priority:
health care
education
everything else

the order at the moment seems to be:
looking good in front of the europeans
keeping corporations happy
pissing people off
burning money
looking good in front of the europeans

Firespinner wrote:

Given past posts from you, you never would have voted for them anyway:rolleyes:
I thought Harneys plan for the health service was good.

you're right, i wouldn't have. i think the fact that it failed so very miserably shows her plan wasn't very good

TheVan wrote:

Unfortunately throwing money at the problem doesn't necessarily work, as we have seen in Health. Mary Harney seems to be making some inroads into a reform of the Health service, we'll just have to wait and see the results.

Also I imagine she was referring to this:

"Credits will be increased so that couples (both working) earning up to €40,000 will pay absolutely no tax (€20,000 for a single worker)."
http://www.progressivedemocrats.ie/press_room/1762/

And not saying that reducing the upper rate will help poor people. I think this was a case of careful editing....

the article i read said nothing about their plans except dropping the top rate. i didn't "edit it out". i suppose i'll let them have that. but i don't think that dropping tax helps the poor anyway. as i said above €1 per person per week is over 100 million a year to the govt*. each person gives €1 less in income tax but they'll have to pay more for everything else because the public services will have their budgets cut. the only people who benefit from tax cuts are peope who are rich enough that:
a: the money they save makes up for paying more for everything else
b: they don't have to use the more expensive public servies like the buses etc

*it would actually be far more than 100 million. that figure is assuming no one in the country earns more than 1000 a week

New_Departure06 wrote:

To those who say how then would we pay to fix the health-service, I disagree. Because I believe the problems with the health-service are bureaucratic rather than resources based e.g.

A: Too long to admit patients e.g. a consultant, nurse and student doctor have to give approval I understand. 1 person should have the job of doing this.

B: Too many people going to A+E when they could go to a GP.

C: Some nurses having too short a working day e.g. ending a 17.00pm.

Consultants allowed to work in both private and public practices. Hence they cannot devote enough time to the public-patients.

Sort these out and we'll be in a better position.

someone from the health system (can't remember who) on today fm used an analogy to explain the flaw in this. if there are 200 people waiting at a train station but the train can only hold 100, you can make the train drive faster but there are still 100 people waiting at the station til the train comes back. the answer is to add more carriages to the train.
ie more capacity is needed. the answer is not to make nurses run between patients (metaphorically). that will only lead to more mistakes as people are rushing and get more tired.

mickcarroll10

[
.[/QUOTE]


someone from the health system (can't remember who) on today fm used an analogy to explain the flaw in this. if there are 200 people waiting at a train station but the train can only hold 100, you can make the train drive faster but there are still 100 people waiting at the station til the train comes back. the answer is to add more carriages to the train.
ie more capacity is needed. the answer is not to make nurses run between patients (metaphorically). that will only lead to more mistakes as people are rushing and get more tired.[/QUOTE]

Well surely by removing private beds from the public hospitals,which is Harneys plan after all(you always forget to mention it) will increase the number of beds for public patients.

Hardly privatising the health service. At the moment public patients and tax papers are subsidising private beds,you apparently want to keep that going.

:mad:

Heinrich

I shudder to think what would happen if we had a disaster here, bomb explosion, rail crash or the like!!! We keep listening to excuses from Ms Harney but it seems that all that is being done is waffling about the problem.

As for the other members of that spin party, the Justice Minister calling TDs nazis and then apologising (through his teeth) his role is not great. Of course there are a myriad of excuses as to the traffic fatalities but we are not seeing much action. Lots of words but little action.

A change is as good as a rest so roll on ecection time. Woll we continue with this lot?

mickcarroll10

Commander Vimes wrote:

i was reading about the pd's latest election ploy. they plan to:
"help the poor by cutting tax"

first of all, they're planning to "help the poor" by cutting the higher rate of tax. i know of very few poor people who are on the higher rate. perhaps the PDs consider a million a year poor.

Stop misrepresenting their policies,fine you dont have to like them but your are distorting the arguement to suit your warped ideas.

How many people are on the top rate of tax,please??????

Are they all rich ??????

Do they all earn 1 million????

Stick to the facts if you can:mad:

The_Minister

Heinrich wrote:

As for the other members of that spin party, the Justice Minister calling TDs nazis and then apologising (through his teeth) his role is not great.

I think he really ment that apology. (but not Gormley's one). He obviously lost his temper.

Heinrich wrote:

Of course there are a myriad of excuses as to the traffic fatalities but we are not seeing much action. Lots of words but little action.

I find people like you mind-boggling. Per car we are getting safer.

New_Departure06

i don't understand how people can say the health service is in a shambles purely because of beaurocracy.

Bureaucracy is the correct spelling!

You are wrong. Spending has been more than doubled since 1997. We are spending more per capita than France. The problem IS bureaucracy. There are vested interests interesting in frustrating reform in the health-service - not least certain consultants.

Heinrich

Firespinner wrote:

I think he really ment that apology. (but not Gormley's one). He obviously lost his temper.


I find people like you mind-boggling. Per car we are getting safer.

He should not be losing his temper. This show a colossal irresponsability!

What the heck does "per car mean"? People should not be dying on the roads. Laws are being made and not being enforced.

Consider how safe motor racing has become! That is the way ordinary motoring should be progressing.

But you are free to believe what you like.

Sand

The PDs are clearly angling themselves towards the middle class, counting on them being more self interested at voting time rather than paying more taxes. Theyre a most unfortunate party tbh, FF, FG and Labour all are nervous of being associated as them, yet are equally terrified of being seen to stray far from the PD doctrine for fear of startling the middle class. And ironically the middle class are almost ashamed of accepting that the PD idealogy (if not the PDs themselves) is the one that speaks to their heart...

Either way theyre right - more tax money will not solve the institutional problems in the Health Service. It simply is not a case of throwing more money at the various unions/special interest groups to bulk up their members takehome pay with little or no return. Health wont be fixed without an almighty war and quite a few sacred cows being reduced to hamburgers. Harney deserves top marks for guts alone in taking on the interests there that are blatantly holding out to see if they wring a better set of concessions out of Labour. If the PDs are in the next government and take Health again, then they might be willing to accept they need to change.

There appear to be two basic problems with A&E - Drunks and Junkies clogging up the system with their self inflicted conditions, and people who go straight to the A&E without being able or willing to go to the GP first. Each of these is solvable but would require controversial measures. I think the PDs are better equipped to deal decisively with the Health system than Labour would be.

What the heck does "per car mean"? People should not be dying on the roads. Laws are being made and not being enforced.

Id imagine it implies that the number of deaths/accidents per car on the road has fallen over the past while? Obviously people *shouldnt* be dying on the roads, and yet they do. Indeed people have died on roads since the invention of roads. Laws have indeed been made and not enforced, that is unfortunately the norm and there is little to suggest in either track record or otherwise that Labour/FG would do much better.

He should not be losing his temper. This show a colossal irresponsability!

People complain about politicians being boring. Then they complain when theyre not being boring. He lost his temper, had a bad day, whatever. Nobody died.

Cork

Sand wrote:

There appear to be two basic problems with A&E - Drunks and Junkies clogging up the system with their self inflicted conditions, and people who go straight to the A&E without being able or willing to go to the GP first. Each of these is solvable but would require controversial measures. I think the PDs are better equipped to deal decisively with the Health system than Labour would be.

I agree. My dad was in hospital last year & it is no fun sharing a ward with somebody who drank themselves stupid.

I believe Mary Harney is getting to grips with Health - She is far more capable than many other Ministers for Health.

My only gripe is that this reform was needed years ago & it represents a big time failure to implement reform.

fly_agaric

Firespinner wrote:

Per car we are getting safer.

Thank God for that eh Firespinner! I've been terrible worried about our poor cars suffering needless death and injury in RTA's on Irish roads - but now you've set my mind at ease.

New_Departure06 wrote:

We are spending more per capita than France.

I wonder, what was France spending on health in the eighties?

Cork wrote:

She [Mary Harney] is far more capable than many other Ministers for Health.

Why do you say that?

The_Minister

Heinrich wrote:

What the heck does "per car mean"? People should not be dying on the roads. Laws are being made and not being enforced.

It means per car on the road. ie. if 500 cars in Ireland and 10 people die, and 50000 and 100 people die then the second case, even though more people die, has the safer roads. People will always die on the roads unless you take all the cars off them.

fly_alargic wrote:

Thank God for that eh Firespinner! I've been terrible worried about our poor cars suffering needless death and injury in RTA's on Irish roads - but now you've set my mind at ease.

I'm amazed that you can type. Oh, and what I said was true so its not spin.

Delboy05

Commander Vimes wrote:

i was reading about the pd's latest election ploy. they plan to:
"help the poor by cutting tax"

first of all, they're planning to "help the poor" by cutting the higher rate of tax. i know of very few poor people who are on the higher rate. perhaps the PDs consider a million a year poor.


assuming 2 million people in the country pay this higher rate, the PDs will have €12.48 billion less a year to spend on fixing the "national crisis" they've made of the public hospitals, which of course they don't have to use because they can afford to go private.

after reading this post, I'd hate to have seen any of the 1,000 odd other's you've put out:eek:
Are there even 2 million people working in this country!!!! But for sure, there is'nt 2 million people on the top rate of tax.

They've made it clear that couples earning 40k will not pay any tax; couples earnign 100k will only pay tax at the lower rate (a 9.2k saving on what they pay in tax now).
Read the details here:
http://www.unison.ie/irish_independent/stories.php3?ca=39&si=1603694&issue_id=13960

Personally, I don't see anything too radical or outlandish in their policies. They're aimed at both the lower and middle classes. Perhaps a 3rd tax rate of 50% on the portion of an individuals earnings over 120k or so and maybe the introduction of a minimum rate that each person must pay so as to stop the really rich avoiding tax alltogether - that would balance it all out, in my opinion.

murphaph

Hmmm, I tend to favour taxation on consumption rather than labour so if I choose to be more frugal I can save my tax bill that way. I'd have to accept indirect tax hikes to pay for my tax cuts on my labour.

Let's also remember that by taxing more on consumption we can net higher taxes from self employed people who may not be exactly straight when it comes to paying their income tax. The PAYE sucker has no such opportunity to underpay his incme tax (remember the taxi drivers all using the same accountant declaring €11k a year income :rolleyes:).

I don't favour slashing taxes across the board as I believe strongly in social services provision from the exchequer. The PD's are less than convincing to me overall however. I can't see them cleaning up at the polls because of this policy as everyone knows they'll be a minority party in any govt and will not be able to simply implement this promise because they want to.

As for the health service, clearly there are major managment problems in there. A figure of twice the rate per capita of spending on our HS over the UK's per capita spending on the NHS was mentioned on Q&A tonight. Clearly there's something badly wrong with the structure and management of the HS if that figure is true seeingas their NHS is in much better shape than our HS and they even have completely free (virtually) healthcare.

Anyway, the old chestnut about the spire is a complete red herring. In the cntext of the HS or education (the two top budget gobblers by far) the few million on the spire would make virtually no difference.

fly_agaric

offtopic...

Firespinner wrote:

I'm amazed that you can type.

and hurt by your cutting insult.

Firespinner wrote:

Oh, and what I said was true so its not spin.

If you are correct about the cars, you are using a fact to distract from another more fundamental and important truth - aka spinning. Spinning != lying necessarily. I thought you'd consider being called a spinner a compliment anyway. It is part of your handle and you have a "Machievelli" quote as your signature.

The_Minister

fly_agaric wrote:

and hurt by your cutting insult.

Sorry, I thought you were serious, I didn't realise it was a joke.

fly_agaric wrote:

If you are correct about the cars, you are using a fact to distract from another more fundamental and important truth - aka spinning. Spinning != lying necessarily. I thought you'd consider being called a spinner a compliment anyway. It is part of your handle and you have a "Machievelli" quote as your signature.

The spinner in my name does not refer to that kind of spinning and Machievelli is a much maligned and misunderstood writer.

If my fact was correct then there is no problem it is all just a construction by the media. It is not spin to point out that a crisis does not exist especially one that a lot of money could be spent fixing.

samb

As one of the panelists on Q&A pointed out, they have not outlined what they would cut back on in terms of pubic spending. I would worry that they will cut back on badly needed investment in public transport, education etc which could do with much more in the long term. What will happen when (if) there is a slump in revenue from housing sales etc. I think we need to take a longer term view instead of looking after our short term personal finaces.
Some people seem to be in favour of lower taxes full stop. But obviously we need revenue for health, infrastructure, education, local governement etc etc etc. For those advocating lower taxes--how low would you like them to go?

For me, I think they are fine at present (or could be slightly higher). More investment in society might mean that we can't enjoy such a high high at present, but I believe it might make any low less low.

Does anyone have any figures on tax revenue breakdown from housing sales (capital gains), other capital gains, income, vat, etc. ?

democrates

Must be a bug in my wordcount code, tried to analyse Berties speech but all I got was:
eh - buffer overflow