4/10 income earners not paying income tax?

r3nu4l

Now I'm not sure if I'm reading this correctly or not so perhaps someone can help me.

Apparently Brian Lenihan Jr said yesterday:

"With up to 40% of income earners paying no income tax at all, we can no longer meet our fiscal needs."

Does this mean that of all the people earning income in Ireland, 4/10 are not paying any income tax?

Are the majority of these people earning so little that they don't meet the tax paying threshold or is it that the majority of these people have accountants who help them (legally) dodge the tax bullet?

I will reserve comment until I know exactly what was meant and who these non-tax-paying earners are.

regi

They earn amounts below the tax threshold

r3nu4l

regi wrote: »

They earn amounts below the tax threshold

4/10 people?
I'm assuming then that this figure includes students and others who only have part-time or weekend jobs. I'm getting a clearer picture. That's a lot of people not paying tax! :eek:

L'prof

r3nu4l wrote: »

4/10 people?
I'm assuming then that this figure includes students and others who only have part-time or weekend jobs. I'm getting a clearer picture. That's a lot of people not paying tax! :eek:

Let's just say your tax credits are €80 a week, that means your gross wage can be up to €400 and you don't earn enough to pay PAYE, that's €20800 per annum and no PAYE.

ixoy

I'd expect that to all (rightly) change in December. As it currently stands it's too difficult to implement right now but it will change (alongside tax relief at 20% on everything and other popular and exciting measures).

Pedro K

Did they touch the artists exepmtion scheme?
I know before this budget that they were able to earn up to 250,000 without paying tax..

The_Minister

r3nu4l wrote: »

4/10 people?
I'm assuming then that this figure includes students and others who only have part-time or weekend jobs. I'm getting a clearer picture. That's a lot of people not paying tax! :eek:

We have AFAIR the highest level at which people start paying tax in Europe.

thebman

Well we have levies now for everyone earning 15,000 or more don't we?

Fair enough only 2% and I'm not against people being brought into the tax net who are outside it.

But like social welfare, you have to be careful when imposing percentages of these peoples wages as the little amount means a lot more to them than people that fall into the tax net. Not saying they shouldn't pay, just that it needs to not sink them.

beggars_bush

everybody should have to pay a small bit of tax.
if only to be contributing to the running of the country

now, as for people on huge salaries who use all sorts of schemes to reduce their tax bill and avoid paying tax. They are the people who should be really hit.

basically, the more money you have the easier it is for you to reduce your tax bill

Allah Hu Akbar

Pedro K wrote: »

Did they touch the artists exepmtion scheme?
I know before this budget that they were able to earn up to 250,000 without paying tax..

No...

Dannyboy83

The_Minister wrote: »

We have AFAIR the highest level at which people start paying tax in Europe.

Yes, we have (had) one of the lowest levels of taxation.

As far as I can gather, a lot of people wouldn't mind paying more tax into a socialist system like Sweden, if we had a goverment that could actually implement correctly.
There is no chance people will agree to that with the current FF setup, and thats before we even consider the gross government waste.
This government could resurrect Leonardo Da Vinci and people would have no faith in them now. They are finished imo, just counting down the weeks now.

Fratton Fred

I read somewhere that the 200 top earners pay on average 5% tax, that's what the government needs to tackle.

thebman

Fratton Fred wrote: »

I read somewhere that the 200 top earners pay on average 5% tax, that's what the government needs to tackle.

Are you saying they should be paying less or more tax?

K4t

Does anyone have a figure for the amount of money earned in the black economy not included in GDP? I heard it's over a billion :rolleyes:

thebman

K4t wrote: »

Does anyone have a figure for the amount of money earned in the black economy not included in GDP? I heard it's over a billion :rolleyes:

I imagine that is an estimate given if they knew the amount, they must have calculated it and to do that they'd have to know they were and if they could do that, it wouldn't be a black economy because they'd go after them :P

Fratton Fred

thebman wrote: »

Are you saying they should be paying less or more tax?

They should be paying the same as everyone else