When will the government start taxing lump sum pension payments?

Zzippy

jimmmy wrote: »

As P. Breathnach ( a retired public servant ) has explained , some in the public service use this windfall tax free cheque to pay towards their childrens ( + perhaps grandchildrens ? ) houses ....why would it be unfair to tax this cheque when many other peoples pensions ( for those lucky enough to have them - many do not ) have fallen by 60% ? Especially given the state of the countries finances / no other country in the world can be found to have such highly paid retired public servants ?

As regards the size of the tax free windfall cheque lump sum, P. Breathnach has confirmed it is 60/40 of annual salary at retirement. Given annual public service salary of approx 50,000 ( the c.s.o. will confirm average public sector pay is 966 per week ), and bearing in mind this is across all ages / grades etc of over 300,000 people, what do you think the average salary of those at retirement age is ? The CSO will not answer this question. ( they are probably on another sickie / stress day lol ). 60/40 of the retiring salary , or 1.5 times to you and me, is the tax free lump sum. Half the retiring salary is the pension after that.

I notice you didn't address a few of the points made, particularly concerning backing up your quoted figures with facts, and you actually go on to quote the €966/€50,000 figure again without providing a link. From personal experience, I can safely say that the vast majority of the people where I work will not earn that much even by the time they retire, as that is well above the top of the pay scale.

Regardless of what some people choose to do with their lump sum (that's their business, and as P. Breathnach said, you were very selective in your quoting of him) the fact is PS workers took a job with certain conditions and pay, and one of those conditions was the pension, which swayed a lot of people into joining. People whose pensions have fallen (and I have a lot of sympathy for them, my uncle lost a huge amount of his pension) took the risk of working in the private sector and investing in a private pension.

They are unrelated - even if the PS lump sum is taxed, the money will not be used to prop up those people's pension funds, it will disappear into the government budget. Its just begrudgery, my pension is taking a hit so why shouldn't yours. Its a facetious argument. You should stick to economics and the fact that the government is broke, and that maybe the lump sum untaxed is too generous, or not affordable. Bringing private sector pension crashes into the argument is just playing the sympathy card.

Finally, you didn't answer my question about private sector defined benefit schemes - why are you not saying those lump sums should be taxed too?

jimmmy

Zzippy wrote: »

I notice you didn't address a few of the points made, particularly concerning backing up your quoted figures with facts, and you actually go on to quote the €966/€50,000 figure again without providing a link.

The link was in other threads. Check with the CSO yourself, they confirmed it.

Zzippy wrote: »

From personal experience, I can safely say that the vast majority of the people where I work will not earn that much even by the time they retire, as that is well above the top of the pay scale.

" Where you work " , means nothing...the CSO took the statistical average from 300,000 plus people

Zzippy wrote: »

Finally, you didn't answer my question about private sector defined benefit schemes - why are you not saying those lump sums should be taxed too?

Check back and you will see I did call for those to be taxed too. However very few people of the 1,800,000 in the private sector receive a cheque for close to 100,000 tax free when they retire.....even though their taxes go towards paying the cheque for many of those who do receive it.

Zzippy

jimmmy wrote: »

The link was in other threads. Check with the CSO yourself, they confirmed it.

I wouldn't mind if it was in other posts in this thread, but other threads? Its common practice to quote a link to back up facts and figures if you want people to believe them when you quote them. Lack of backup casts doubt on any figures you quote. If you're going to throw figures around its up to you to show where you got them from, not up to us to go look for them or consult the CSO.

jimmmy wrote: »

" Where you work " ,eans nothing...the CSO took the statistical average from 300,000 plus people

Fair enough, but you extrapolated from that figure a lump sum of €100,000 - without any backup or proof. The vast majority of people in the PS will receive a lump sum much smaller than that, yet you make it sound like we all get that much. I would guess 10% of workers in the PS would get a lump sum that big or larger, but as I can't prove it I'm not going to claim it as fact, like you do.
If you can prove it please do, if not please stop quoting the €100,000 figure and especially stop trying to make out like we all get that.

jimmmy wrote: »

Check back and you will see I did call for those to be taxed too.

OK. Must have missed that. So we can stop arguing about the public service and start talking about all defined benefit schemes then? Thats great. Glad we can get back to your original thread topic.

P. Breathnach

jimmmy wrote: »

But paying for houses for offspring was at the top of your list. The pension of half salary pays for security for declining years. I pointed out that most people retiring do not need to go in to nursing homes.

The order in which I listed things was entirely random, so you can not fairly use that as proof of anything. I can say that most people who retire do not provide children with assistance with house purchase.

Every permanent public servant who does the required numbers of years service does, do they not ? The required number of years can vary eg for a Garda it is shorter, for a judge shorter still, is it not ?

Now you are getting closer to being accurate. There are many public servants who have no chance of completing the required number of years because of the age at which they were recruited.

Yes.

Given your record in generating evidence (typically citing the Indo or piggybacking on links provided by others) I find this truly surprising. What did the CSO say to you?

It would be of great interest to the vast majority of the 1.8 million private sector workers ( who do not get a lump sum payment tax fee of close to 100,000 euro ) to know more about the 300,000 public servants who they pay taxes to and whom are entitled to such payment, tax free.

It's not a secret. The data exists in some form: the amount paid each year in retirement gratuities is recorded. I have seen it. Go find it.

jimmmy

P. Breathnach wrote: »

I can say that most people who retire do not provide children with assistance with house purchase.

But yet its the first thing you mention that retired public servants spend their tax free windfall on ?

Dimitri

jimmmy wrote: »

The "gratuity" lump sum of one and a half years salary which some people receive when they retire ( as well as their normal weekly / monthly pension )....I understand this is tax free ?
If so, given the state of the countries finances, is it not time to tax this one-off payment / cheque, said to average over 100,000 euro ? Do the people who currently receive this one off payment really need it to be tax free...after all they still also have a pension well in excess of the normal old age pension , most would have their kids reared, mortgage paid off etc.

Given the state of the public finances i can see it a realistic means to bring in some much needed revenue. But bear in mind many of the professionals and graduates in the public service consistenly earn less than their private sector counterparts and took the less well paying job because of job security pension and a tax free lump sum. I know saying that will have people outraged because public sector pay is so high compared to the average working wage. But that is an overall average that is thrown out of proportion by the ridiculous wages paid to those in administrative roles, some departments warrent paying it most dont and all get them once they are on that grade. It also has to be taken into acoount that the county and city managers are grossly over paid, also often when public sector pay is mentioned it is taking into account our politicians pay which is sickening as they can hardly be called elite employees in this country by any means!
However the point i wish to make is we need our professionals and graduates in the public sector to deliver the public services we require, it is simply pointless trying to match the market prices for these people, are we shooting ourselves in the foot by making the job even less appealing?

I also know that many people will respond that the public sector don't do a very good job at delivering public services and in some cases are an absolute disaster but if you look deeper they are doing exactly what we employ them to do its the policy that they are employed to follow is the disaster and if you speak to many of them off the record they'll all give you many reasons why and means to how it can be improved made more efficient and ultimately cost less but sadly these people are routinely ignored in favour of loud unions who demand even more pay for people who are already overpaid (imho) which bothers me even more.

While i appreciate that the ops point is a vaild one i feel there are far better ways to sorting out the finances all of which involve changing wasteful policies in favor of more cost effective ones.

Edit I also think it is utterly pointless discussing what they are doing with their lump sums, its their business what they do with it as it was part of the renumeration package offered to them when they signed up for the job in question.

Riskymove

jimmmy,
even using your own much-loved figures you can see that plenty of public servants will not get €100,000 or more on retirement; you need to be earning c. €67k (and serve the full requirement which is 40 years for most) to get that. You might even like to use a favoured phrase of yours and say that the "majority" wont get €100k

in any event the Commission on taxation has now recommended taxing lump-sums (public and private) of over €200,000; it remains to be seen how the Government respond

p.s. if you really want to see a nice pension (which if taxed would help the economy), read up on our good Mr Fingleton

P. Breathnach

jimmmy wrote: »

But yet its the first thing you mention that retired public servants spend their tax free windfall on ?

Yes. It happened to be the first example that came to mind when I did a mental scan of people I know who have retired from the public service. Twist your own words as much as you like, and I will simply conclude that you are weaselling; twist my words, and I conclude that you are being dishonest.

Twist the ordinary meaning of language, and I conclude that you do not know what you are talking about. See http://www.thefreedictionary.com/windfall and note the word "unexpected".

jimmmy

Riskymove wrote: »

jimmmy,
even using your own much-loved figures you can see that plenty of public servants will not get €100,000 or more on retirement;

I said the lump sum was close on 100,000, and of course plenty of public servants will not get €100,000 ( lump sum ) or more on retirement. Some may have to make do with only 80 or 90 k as a tax free lump sum when they retire in adiittion to half their annual salary, when they have served the required period of service.

As has been said before, very few people of the 1,800,000 in the private sector receive a cheque for close to 100,000 tax free when they retire.....even though their taxes go towards paying the cheque for many of those who do receive it. As has been said, the commission on taxation has now recommended taxing lump-sums (public and private) of over €200,000; it remains to be seen how the Government respond. Given the dire state of the nations finances, and govt borrowing of 400 million per week ( much of which is used to pay for these lump sum windfalls ), why not tax all of these lump sum payments over say 10,000 ?

jimmmy

P. Breathnach wrote: »

Yes. It happened to be the first example that came to mind when I did a mental scan of people I know who have retired from the public service.

Good. Paying for houses for offspring was at the top of your list of what retired pub,lic servants do with their tax free lump sum cheque. Given the large numbers of people who retired from the public service during the boom years, do you not accept that retired public servants, using this windfall cheque, were in some part responsible for helping create the property bubble so ?

Zzippy

jimmmy wrote: »

Good. Paying for houses for offspring was at the top of your list of what retired pub,lic servants do with their tax free lump sum cheque. Given the large numbers of people who retired from the public service during the boom years, do you not accept that retired public servants, using this windfall cheque, were in some part responsible for helping create the property bubble so ?

And what do you think private sector workers on defined benefit schemes did with their lump sums? Or the big bonuses and share options many of them earned during the boom years? My old man got a very nice lump sum when he retired from his private sector company, and guess what he did - helped my sister with a deposit for her house.

Besides, to use figures you made up earlier in the thread, which were a gross exaggeration anyway, PS retirees hardly made a dent in the property bubble which was in the order of billions.

jimmmy wrote: »

a back of an envelope guesstimate ...how many people retire each year with this tax free lump sum of over 100,000....say 30,000...if each of these paid just 50,000 income tax on that single cheque each, that would yield 15 million euro per year....hardly a pittance. Especially when you remember the govt is currently borrowing so much.

To get back to the thread, given the dire state of public finances, when will the government start taxing lump sum pension payments? ( all lump sum payments, from all sectors ).

As you said yourself earlier, let's get back to the topic (which you started), and talk about all lump sum payments. If you're going to start a PS-bashing thread then call it that.

jimmmy

Zzippy wrote: »

And what do you think private sector workers on defined benefit schemes did with their lump sums? .

I only know the pensions of a limited number of people in the private sector, and none those had or have a defined benefit scheme ...certainly nothing on the same scale as a public service pension. Very few of the 1.8 million people in the private sector get a tax free lump sum of 1.5 years service ( or 60/40 as P. Breatnach calls it ) , as well as the state guaranteed half finishing salary pension. Maybe there are a few people from the private sector who can answer this, although most people posting during the day seem to have public sector backgrounds.

Zzippy wrote: »

Or the big bonuses and share options many of them earned during the boom years?.

"many of them" ???????? How many of the 1, 800,000is is "many of them" ? Do you have statistics for how many people received such " big bonuses and share options", or even how many people were entitled to
" big bonuses and share options". How much were there big " big bonuses and share options" ? Is the percentage who received them as high as the percentage of public servants who have got or are entitled to public service pensions.

Zzippy wrote: »

My old man got a very nice lump sum when he retired from his private sector company, and guess what he did - helped my sister with a deposit for her house. .

Lucky him, most people do not get such "very nice lump sum" on retirement, certainly not 1.5 times annual salary anyway.

Zzippy wrote: »

As you said yourself earlier, let's get back to the topic (which you started), and talk about all lump sum payments.

Certainly. When will the govt tax most if not all each each of these lump sum payments ( from both public and private sector ; both should be taxed in my opinion ).

Zzippy

jimmmy wrote: »

I only know the pensions of a limited number of people in the private sector, and none those had or have a defined benefit scheme ...certainly nothing on the same scale as a public service pension. Very few of the 1.8 million people in the private sector get a tax free lump sum of 1.5 years service ( or 60/40 as P. Breatnach calls it ) , as well as the state guaranteed half finishing salary pension. Maybe there are a few people from the private sector who can answer this, although most people posting during the day seem to have public sector backgrounds.

Have you even read your own thread, or the links other people post to back up the figures they quote? (which you conveniently forget to do).

parsi wrote: »

Leaving aside Pubic Sector pensions the whole idea of tax relief on pensions (and lump sums) was to ensure that folk made provision for the future.

So banks and many other large companies all had generous defined benefit schemes (in 2003 this stood at 67% coverage http://www.mhc.ie/news-+-events/legal-articles/328/ ). Other schemes were even more generous for senior management who could divert vast amounts of income into nebulous pension funds.

And I quote the report:

The last 5 years have seen a rapid decline from 67% to 37% coverage of defined benefit occupational pension schemes in Ireland.

So its gone from 2/3 to just over 1/3. See, we can come up with figures we haven't made up, and back it up. Whereas all you can quote is anecdotal evidence from "people you know".

jimmmy wrote: »

"many of them" ???????? How many of the 1, 800,000is is "many of them" ? Do you have statistics for how many people received such " big bonuses and share options", or even how many people were entitled to
" big bonuses and share options". How much were there big " big bonuses and share options" ? Is the percentage who received them as high as the percentage of public servants who have got or are entitled to public service pensions.

I don't know how many. That's why I didn't use terms you seem to like a lot, such as

large numbers

or

vast majority

or

very small minority

, because I don't know. However, to dispute that a lot of people got bonuses during the Celtic Tiger would be a bit far fetched. Everyone knows they did. I know lots of friends in private sector who got bonuses and share options. Actually do. That's not quantitative though, but see, like you, I can quote anecdotal evidence. Difference is I don't claim it as fact or representative of the whole sector.

jimmmy wrote: »

Certainly. When will the govt tax most if not all each each of these lump sum payments ( from both public and private sector ; both should be taxed in my opinion ).

Why keep banging on about public service pensions then?

On topic so - seeing as its probably going to happen, I reckon the budget is when it will be introduced, and in line with the recommendations of the Commission on Taxation. I agree that the threshold should be lower, but like the income levy, it should be incremental so that the higher the lump sum, the higher the rate paid.

P. Breathnach

jimmmy wrote: »

Good. Paying for houses for offspring was at the top of your list of what retired pub,lic servants do with their tax free lump sum cheque. Given the large numbers of people who retired from the public service during the boom years, do you not accept that retired public servants, using this windfall cheque, were in some part responsible for helping create the property bubble so ?

I don't think you are really stupid, so I am driven to the conclusion that you are intentionally misrepresenting my position. Read that to mean that I am calling you a liar.

Your persistent misuse of the word "windfall" is, by comparison, just pettiness.

jimmmy

Zzippy wrote: »

So its gone from 2/3 to just over 1/3. See, we can come up with figures we haven't made up, and back it up..

But that figure is not relevant, is it? Its not what is being discussed. The percentage of pensions which are "defined benefit occupational pension schemes" is not relevant ; what is relevant is the number of people / percentage of the 1,800,000 people in the private sector who have sizeable lump sum payments / pensions, similar to that enjoyed in the public sector. Few of the 1800000 people in the private sector ( shop assistant, factory workers, farmers, mechanics, professional people, creche assistants, salesmen, cleaners, security company workers, tradesmen etc) can look forward to close on a 100,00 tax free lump sum windfall, as well as 50% salary govt guaranteed on retirement. Neither 2/3 or 1/3 or anything like that enjoy such a pension.

jimmmy

P. Breathnach wrote: »

Your persistent misuse of the word "windfall" is, by comparison, just pettiness.

At least one other poster have thought it a windfall too. Certainly tax free payments of that magnitude are not enjoyed by most citizens in the country. I will however not use the "windfall" word so, if you answer the question below, which you have so far failed to do :

Paying for houses for offspring was at the top of your list of what retired public servants do with their tax free lump sum cheque. Given the large numbers of people who retired from the public service during the boom years, do you not accept that retired public servants, using this tax free cheque, were in some part responsible for helping create the property bubble so ?

Zzippy

jimmmy wrote: »

But that figure is not relevant, is it? Its not what is being discussed. The percentage of pensions which are "defined benefit occupational pension schemes" is not relevant ; what is relevant is the number of people / percentage of the 1,800,000 people in the private sector who have sizeable lump sum payments / pensions, similar to that enjoyed in the public sector. Few of the 1800000 people in the private sector ( shop assistant, factory workers, farmers, mechanics, professional people, creche assistants, salesmen, cleaners, security company workers, tradesmen etc) can look forward to close on a 100,00 tax free lump sum windfall, as well as 50% salary govt guaranteed on retirement. Neither 2/3 or 1/3 or anything like that enjoy such a pension.

It was quoted to reply to your point that

I only know the pensions of a limited number of people in the private sector, and none those had or have a defined benefit scheme

. You used anecdotal evidence from people you know, and I quoted statistics to better inform you. So yes, it was relevant.
Listen mate, you keep banging on about the €100,000 figure that you came up with, with no facts to back you up. If you can't back that figure up, stop using it. Exaggeration seems to be quite a talent of yours. There are only 2 people in my job out of a total of 50 who will get a lump sum anywhere near that, most will be in the region of 60-70k, so bandying that figure about is misrepresenting things.
Lies, damn lies, and statistics. Only, you don't seem able to quote any real statistics.

I thought we were getting back on topic -

When will the govt tax most if not all each each of these lump sum payments ( from both public and private sector ; both should be taxed in my opinion ).

So, when do you think it will happen?

parsi

jimmmy wrote: »

Given the large numbers of people who retired from the public service during the boom years,?

How many people retired during the boom years ?

I imagine (or so I heard from a friend who sort of read it in the indo) that it was only a very small number.

I doubt that they were responsible for purchasing the 90,000 new houses built in 2006.

See this :-> http://www.environ.ie/en/Publications/StatisticsandRegularPublications/HousingStatistics/FileDownLoad,14648,en.pdf

That's a link to a statistic - often used for backing up arguments, providing evidence etc.

P. Breathnach

jimmmy wrote: »

At least one other poster have thought it a windfall too. Certainly tax free payments of that magnitude are not enjoyed by most citizens in the country. I will however not use the "windfall" word so, if you answer the question below, which you have so far failed to do :

Paying for houses for offspring was at the top of your list of what retired public servants do with their tax free lump sum cheque. Given the large numbers of people who retired from the public service during the boom years, do you not accept that retired public servants, using this tax free cheque, were in some part responsible for helping create the property bubble so ?

Your pettiness does not bother me greatly. It's a minor irritant.

Your question, however, does vex me, because it is premised on a deliberate misapplication of what I said. That is dishonest. You are repeating that dishonesty. It is my opinion that you are doing so for motives that have little to do with a genuine interest, and much to do with trying to get under my skin.

parsi

jimmmy wrote: »

Few of the 1800000 people in the private sector ( ..... tradesmen etc) can look forward to close on a 100,00 tax free .

Tradesmen ?

Seeing as they were earning 400-500 per day in cash then every day was a lumpsum day.

Seeing as every time they changed their Van (it's January then it must be new van month) they got tax relief (that's money foregone by the taxpayer Jimmmy..) every Jan was a lumpsum month.

No wonder they got browned off when the New Europeans came in and started offering reasonable rates.

(I decided that this would be a linkless post - no links, no stats, no proof)

di2772

I for one am glad i do not work in the public sector.
I sorted out my own pension and am expecting a hell of a lot more than any public sector worker i know personally.

Why? Because by the time i retire i will have been paying into it for 40 years.
Anyone can have a pension bigger than the equivalent salaried public sector worker if they pay into their pension for 40 years, like most public sector workers do. And im sick of litening to people complaining that the value of their fund has dropped in the last year. **** happens. If you got a proper pension, ups and downs dont matter over the long term. If you are retiring soon, your pension should be mostly in safe areas.

There seems to be a lot of lealousy that public sector workers went out and got themselves a job that would look after themselves in their retirement. If people thought about and did something about their own situation, rather than wasting their energy whining about others, maybe they wouldnt have to feel so jealous.

Here
http://www.pensionsboard.ie/app_adv_pensions_calc.asp

Give yourself 40 years and see what you come out with.

jimmmy

Zzippy wrote: »

Listen mate, you keep banging on about the €100,000 figure that you came up with, with no facts to back you up. If you can't back that figure up, stop using it. Exaggeration seems to be quite a talent of yours. There are only 2 people in my job out of a total of 50 who will get a lump sum anywhere near that, most will be in the region of 60-70k, so bandying that figure about is misrepresenting things.
Lies, damn lies, and statistics. Only, you don't seem able to quote any real statistics.

You say you "There are only 2 people in my job out of a total of 50 who will get a lump sum anywhere near that, most will be in the region of 60-70k", and lets assume like most people who post on this board during office hours you are a public servant. Given the CSO statistical average weekly pay of the 300,000 plus public servants to be 966 per week, this is 50 grand a year in round figures. ( as you are working in round figures too ). Bear in mind this is across all age groups, grades , etc, and you would naturally expect people at retirement age to be better paid than the average public sector worker, due to promotion, experience etc. Yet you claim that out of " 50 who will get a lump sum anywhere near that, most will be in the region of 60-70k"....in other words,you think 48 out of 50 of your colleagues will only be on a finishing salary of 40 to 46.66k at retirement age ? I acknowledge there are people in the public service who will at retirement age be earning between 3 and 10 k a year less than the average pay in the public service ....but you must acknowledge you are choosing a very select group out of the 300,000 plus public servants. Even so, should their lump sum cheque for 60 to 70 k not be taxed, just as all lump sum cheques should be taxed ( public + private sector ) ? Bear in mind the state of the economy and most people in the 2.1m workforce in the country do not receive windfall cheques of 60 to 70 k plus at all.

jimmmy

parsi wrote: »

How many people retired during the boom years ?

I imagine (or so I heard from a friend who sort of read it in the indo) that it was only a very small number.

I would say it was a considerable number. The point is the cost of paying for same...we all know how government expenditure soared during the boom years. Even our friend Mr. Breatnach has acknowledged , in his own list of things which retired public servants spend their tax free lump sum on, the first thing he mentioned was them helping their children to buy houses. Few people in the private sector had pensions which paid out one and a half times annual salary in the past few years as a lump sum payment , as well as a pension of half retiring salary ! Were the people who got large lump sum tax feee windfalls and who helped their children buy their houses not in some part responsible for helping create the property bubble ?

P. Breathnach

jimmmy wrote: »

... Even our friend Mr. Breatnach has acknowledged , in his own list of things which retired public servants spend their tax free lump sum on, the first thing he mentioned was them helping their children to buy houses ... Were the people who got large lump sum tax feee windfalls and who helped their children buy their houses not in some part responsible for helping create the property bubble ?

That post is dishonest, and is not related to the question that was put to you.

jimmmy

P. Breathnach wrote: »

That post is dishonest, and is not related to the question that was put to you.

The post is actually honest, as everything in it is true. See your post no. 15 on the first page of this thread. In your own list of things which retired public servants spend their tax free lump sum on, the first thing you mentioned was them helping their children to buy houses.
You have failed to answer the question that was put to you several times since then....so as a general question I ask are the people who got large lump sum tax feee windfalls and who helped their children buy their houses not in some part responsible for helping create the property bubble ?

P. Breathnach

jimmmy wrote: »

The post is actually honest, as everything in it is true. See your post no. 15 on the first page of this thread. In your own list of things which retired public servants spend their tax free lump sum on, the first thing you mentioned was them helping their children to buy houses.
You have failed to answer the question that was put to you several times since then....so as a general question I ask are the people who got large lump sum tax feee windfalls and who helped their children buy their houses not in some part responsible for helping create the property bubble ?

It is dishonest in implying that the first thing I listed is the primary thing, especially after I pointed out that it wasn't.

I already indicated that I was not going to answer a question based on a false premise. I note that you have modified the way in which you put the question, which is also dishonest.

Further, you are pulling this thread away from the original question in order to pursue a petty point -- a point that has more to do with your usual agenda of attacking public servants than it has with the tax treatment of lump sums paid on retirement.

jimmmy

P. Breathnach wrote: »

It is dishonest in implying that the first thing I listed is the primary thing, especially after I pointed out that it wasn't.

I said it was the first thing on your list, which it clearly is. You say now its not the primary thing, but I never questioned what the primary thing was, I merely am asking you about the first thing on your list which you gave voluntarily. I have already commented on the other things you mention.

P. Breathnach wrote: »

I already indicated that I was not going to answer a question based on a false premise. I note that you have modified the way in which you put the question, which is also dishonest.

Its not a false premise. I also did not modify the way in which I put the question, my question on the first page of this thread is unmodified. You have failed to answer questions since then, for whatever reasons.

P. Breathnach wrote: »

Further, you are pulling this thread away from the original question in order to pursue a petty point -- a point that has more to do with your usual agenda of attacking public servants than it has with the tax treatment of lump sums paid on retirement.

I have already stated that in my opinion all such lump sums - both public and private sector - should be taxed. Do not worry, I doubt if the revenue will look for tax on lump sums already paid out ! I do not think public expenditure / what helped drive the property bubble , is a "petty point"....its interesting to see McCarthy now proposing that lump sum payments above 200k should be taxed....but I think lesser sums should be taxed too. After all, why should the govt borrow money so retired public servants can "Help offspring with house deposits" ( as you put it ), among other uses ?

P. Breathnach

jimmmy wrote: »

I said it was the first thing on your list, which it clearly is. You say now its not the primary thing...

I said it before. It is dishonest to suggest that it is a new claim.

... I also did not modify the way in which I put the question, my question on the first page of this thread is unmodified...

The way you first put the question was

Given the large numbers of people who retired from the public service during the boom years, do you not accept that retired public servants, using this windfall cheque, were in some part responsible for helping create the property bubble so ?

The most recent version was

so as a general question I ask are the people who got large lump sum tax feee windfalls and who helped their children buy their houses not in some part responsible for helping create the property bubble ?

What you say does not accord with the facts. That amounts, in my book, to telling a lie.

P. Breathnach

Sauce for the goose: I put my question again

What did the CSO say to you?

jimmmy

P. Breathnach wrote: »

The way you first put the question was
.

The question was
"What, do you suspect , are these tax free lump sums of over 100,000.00 euro, are spent on so ?" First on your list was " "Help offspring with house deposits" . I asked you several times " do you not accept that retired public servants, using this windfall cheque, were in some part responsible for helping create the property bubble so ? ", and you refused to answer, so I changed the question slightly, in an effort to help you answer it, but you failed to answer all these questions. It certainly is not telling a lie ! lol lol.