Is Lenihan playing a dangerous game??

imme

murphaph wrote: »

It should never have been allowed to escalate to a point where so many people now pay no tax.

would you include BILLIONAIRES in that category as well as the low paid

murphaph

imme wrote: »

would you include BILLIONAIRES in that category as well as the low paid

You do know that the top 20% or so of earners pay 80% of Ireland's income tax, right? How much more "taxing the rich" do you think can be done before the rich get completely pissed off and leave?

irish_bob

Pete4779 wrote: »

People should start paying taxes towards their healthcare at around 10k, but that's an entirely arbritrary figure I just picked. For example, someone in Germany on 20k will pay around 5k in taxes. 12-14% of income goes to health insurance.

Economic stimulus packages are for industrialised countries; Ireland is not one of those. They work in large economies like US, Germany, UK which have large internal economies. In Ireland, a huge amount of income if spent is spent on imported goods, moving the money brought in by trade back out again.

Our industries, what little there is, is pharmaceuticals and possibly software. We do not have a large market for people to spend on Irish electronics, cars, the items with porfits that would go back to Irish companies.

Minimum wage here is ludicrously high and those earning it pay nothing towards social insurance costs, healthcare, further education, etc., . Ireland's minimum wage level is around the same as Netherlands, but crucially, the level is only a fraction if you are under 22, and we are also not rich enough to have companies paying that much, but with nothing paid into the system back.

Interestingly, Switzerland, Sweden, Norway - countries we would do well to imitate - have no minimum wage.

excellent post although id like to add that if minimum wage is reduced , the dole must be reduced by an even greater amount

thebman

dvpower wrote: »

Not so, according to the Irish Times

Also rents have dropped considerably in many circumstances so its unreasonable to say only people with mortgages have gotten a decrease.

TCP/IP_King

murphaph wrote: »

You do know that the top 20% or so of earners pay 80% of Ireland's income tax, right? How much more "taxing the rich" do you think can be done before the rich get completely pissed off and leave?

Read more about income inequality in Ireland
http://www.tascnet.ie/upload/file/HEAP%20POSTER%2005-11C.pdf
explained by
http://www.tascnet.ie/upload/file/9644%20HEAP%20BOOKLET%281%29.pdf

before spewing more IBEC/ISME/FF spin

nesf

TCP/IP_King wrote: »

Read more about income inequality in Ireland
http://www.tascnet.ie/upload/file/HEAP%20POSTER%2005-11C.pdf
explained by
http://www.tascnet.ie/upload/file/9644%20HEAP%20BOOKLET%281%29.pdf

before spewing more IBEC/ISME/FF spin

You respond to alleged spin by responding with spin from a thinktank on the other side of the debate? Seriously, the mind boggles.

imme

nesf wrote: »

You respond to alleged spin by responding with spin from a thinktank on the other side of the debate? Seriously, the mind boggles.

have you nothing to add to the debate nesf?
someone made a point and another poster hit back with another point and you say they shouldn't have responded. 'the mind boggles'?

When I made the point that set them off (re billionaires not paying tax), I had the case of a small number of 'Irish' people who get away with paying very little or no tax.
I am aware that in general higher earners contribute greatly to the exchequer and to the country, as another poster said.

Here's an interesting story that some people might remember from earlier this year.
http://www.sbpost.ie/post/pages/p/story.aspx-qqqt=NEWS+FEATURES-qqqm=nav-qqqid=40646-qqqx=1.asp

nesf

imme wrote: »

have you nothing to add to the debate nesf?
someone made a point and another poster hit back with another point and you say they shouldn't have responded. 'the mind boggles'?

When I made the point that set them off (re billionaires not paying tax), I had the case of a small number of 'Irish' people who get away with paying very little or no tax.
I am aware that in general higher earners contribute greatly to the exchequer and to the country, as another poster said.

Here's an interesting story that some people might remember from earlier this year.
http://www.sbpost.ie/post/pages/p/story.aspx-qqqt=NEWS+FEATURES-qqqm=nav-qqqid=40646-qqqx=1.asp

The story has been dealt with at length, as has the topic of taxation and how ordinary PAYE workers and self employed who don't earn absurd amounts of money and who don't benefit from these tax breaks are the ones who pay the vast majority of tax in this country. That's who the "wealthiest quintile" are. Ordinary workers earing 80-90K plus. Double income families and couples, two teachers or two Gardaí well advanced in their careers could break 80K easily and 100K some of the time.

The issue is this, it's a fact that most tax is paid by the wealthier quintile of the population. This isn't surprising and isn't news to anyone with any understanding of the area. Someone then responds to this, calling it spin and links to an inequality survey by a group dedicated to highlighting inequality which has nothing to do with the first point! If anything it would be shocking if there wasn't such inequality and we had such a progressive tax burden on society since in an equal society we wouldn't have to tax the wealthiest quintile of the population so heavily now would we?

murphaph

TCP/IP_King wrote: »

Read more about income inequality in Ireland
http://www.tascnet.ie/upload/file/HEAP%20POSTER%2005-11C.pdf
explained by
http://www.tascnet.ie/upload/file/9644%20HEAP%20BOOKLET%281%29.pdf

before spewing more IBEC/ISME/FF spin

Totally irrelevant to the issue at hand. The top earners pay the most tax in Ireland. FACT.

TCP/IP_King

murphaph wrote: »

Totally irrelevant to the issue at hand. The top earners pay the most tax in Ireland. FACT.

Very relevant.
As another poster pointed out, it's a valid point to make about income inequality in the context of taxation.

People need to read a bit wider than the indo and turn off joe duffy et al.

TCP/IP_King

nesf wrote: »

blah blah blah ... etc etc

Did you bother to read the links?

TCP/IP_King

imme wrote: »

....

Here's an interesting story that some people might remember from earlier this year.
http://www.sbpost.ie/post/pages/p/story.aspx-qqqt=NEWS+FEATURES-qqqm=nav-qqqid=40646-qqqx=1.asp

No takers ??