I'm sick to death of being taxed to death !

Skommando

K-9 wrote: »

Ireland is pretty unique in that over a third of the population pays no income tax, so how can people demand excellent services if that's the case.

Neither do the very wealthy, nor do large corporations, but all people here cowardly complain about is the people less well off than them.

BoatMad

Jim2007 wrote: »

Nonsense! Only about 45% of Americans pay income tax, here in Switzerland it's about 40% of the population, hell you don't even need to submit a tax return if you earn less than about 150K and in India only about 26M people pay taxes.  There is nothing special about Ireland, but perception.

The stats are there to be googled , Ireland has the 2nd lowest tax burden on low paid people, according to the OECD.

as for tax returns, no paye worker on any income including 150K is required to submit a tax return

BoatMad

Skommando wrote: »

Neither do the very wealthy, nor do large corporations, but all people here cowardly complain about is the people less well off than them.

the wealthy are somewhat irrelevant, primarily because , while we might feel better taxing them to death , the actually number of " wealthy " people is very small and therefore the actual monetary value the exchequer could accumulate is also small. only 1 in 20 people ( 5% ) in ireland earn over 100K

this is why Gov come back again and again to the middle classes for tax, there just so many of them about the place

BoatMad

The funny thing is good old Allied Irish Bank is still strutting about despite costing the Irish taxpayer a comparable amount to keep alive as a dead bank like Anglo. Anglo cost 35 billion euro. AIB 21 billion to recapitalise.

where is the evidence that AIB will not return a gain to the exchequer on the shares invested in.

BoatMad

Well, again, the whole claim of NAMA was that it could manage the banks loans better than the banks could. Long term economic value was thrown around. So yes, it was claiming to be Mystic Meg. But it could only manage market value and often much worse. Again, it failed by its own definition.

not really, the point of NAMA was to remove loan books that the market viewed as vulnerable and therefore so that capital adequacy ratios could then be built in a " solid " foundation of a good loan book.

To some extent the state then of course frigged the books, by ensuring the haircut was such that anyone was likely to make a profit and on the other hand, the state recapitalised an arguably better off banking system them NAMA made it appear.

Skommando

BoatMad wrote: »

the wealthy are somewhat irrelevant, primarily because , while we might feel better taxing them to death

the wealthy are irrelevant ?

No need to 'tax them to death', just the affordable level of tax would be fine instead of little or none. And to claim that the nationalisation of billions of their private speculation debts, while they remain extremely wealthy, and ordinary people pay their debts off has no effect on our finances , and the tax border of ordinary workers, is not true.

BoatMad

Personally, as an Irish person I remain dismayed that Bank of Ireland is bailed out by the Irish people but retains control of the Irish Parliament building, fulfilling its old pledge to the British crown to ensure the building can never be used as a parliament again.

how are those two issues relevant , bailing out a bank , ( well actually the exchequer re-invested ) doesnt mean a shere holder gets to avoid or sidestep the law. the sale terms of the building are still legally binding

BoatMad

spuddy wrote: »

I think you're right, it should be equitable, but the tax rates themselves only tell half he story... I've lived and worked in a few mainland European countries and the tax rates in Ireland are in or around the same as I paid there. Where Ireland differs is the value its citizens get relative to the taxes paid. This was clear in two ways.

1. The level and quality of services you got access to. Free/heavily subsidised health care and medication, excellent public transport, inexpensive childcare, plus a lower cost of living (heat, light, food, insurance etc).
   
2. The benefits were available universally. There was no talk of middle/higher earners being well-off enough to pay for the benefits themselves. As they earned more, they paid more into the system, and therefore they were as entitled to these benefits as anyone else.

That's where the equity really lies... While I never encountered anyone who liked paying taxes in any of my travels, there was far less disquiet as people felt they got some value from their contribution. Ireland has some way to go here.

there is no real evidence that somehow in ireland , we squander our tax take, we do have some different priorities , for example , we have a very generous social welfare system for example

The key thing you miss when comparing us to other European countries is population density. Here tax is raised from comparatively a small group of people and hence funding large tax consuming projects is difficult. couple that with the fact that we have huge swathes of lower income groups from paying hardly any tax and you have the situation where a relatively small group of tax payers are in essence funding the whole show. Given our demographics and political realities, there is little that can be done to correct this. Those that scream for more public services are exactly those that in fact pay very little tax towards them relatively

BoatMad

Skommando wrote: »

the wealthy are irrelevant ?

No need to 'tax them to death', just the affordable level of tax would be fine instead of little or none. And to claim that the nationalisation of billions of their private speculation debts, while they remain extremely wealthy, and ordinary people pay their debts off has no effect on our finances , and the tax border of ordinary workers, is not true.

the fact remains , there are simply too few that qualify as tax resident , to make any appreciable difference,

as for " And to claim that the nationalisation of billions of their private speculation debts" , I have no idea who this applies to. companies fail and leave debts, people go bankrupt and leave debts, etc . You cannot get blood out of a stone and businesses and businessmen must be allowed to fail and get back on their feet to try again, Other wise you would have no businesses at all.

BoatMad

Yes the Euro is a fiat currency and in case you did not know, that is not a good thing.

well that boat sailed in ww2

BoatMad

The rhetoric from the ECB is not fact, it is Keynesian nonsense. A better authority is the Bank of International Settlements and unfortunately for poor old Europe, the ECB is not doing what the BIS recommends.

The BIS has warned the ECB and bank of japan , that excessive negative interest rates may have unexpected consequences, especially where such rates do not percolate into ordinary businesses.

However the BIS has no more foresight then the ECB , and the consequences of a contraction of money supply at this point in the Eurozone would over inflate the currency , further adding to deflationary pressure and depressing exports , either of which would be disastrous for the Euro economy. Arguably german intransigence in not allowing QE early enough has made the ECBs job harder to boot

Skommando

BoatMad wrote: »

as for " And to claim that the nationalisation of billions of their private speculation debts" , I have no idea who this applies to. companies fail and leave debts, people go bankrupt and leave debts, etc . You cannot get blood out of a stone and businesses and businessmen must be allowed to fail and get back on their feet to try again, Other wise you would have no businesses at all.

so you believe that private debts should be nationalised, and the wealthy by in large should not be taxed ?
if they are so irrelevant , why is it so important that they pay little or no tax ?
what should the tax bands and rates be and why ?

BoatMad

Skommando wrote: »

so you believe that private debts should be nationalised, and the wealthy by in large should not be taxed ?
if they are so irrelevant , why is it so important that they pay little or no tax ?
what should the tax bands and rates be ?

as a general comment , I do not believe that private debt should be nationalised, however in the recent banking crash , I can well understand why it happened as there was a systemic risk to the Euro . I personally would have selectively guaranteed AIB and BOFI and let the rest go to the wall, but I can well understand what the Eurozone was terrified of that and prevented it

As for the wealthy being taxed, other then a sense of shadenfreude , there is simply not enough uber wealthy people that fall inside the tax residency net , that would constitute any meaningful additional tax take, Most of those individuals that might have such incomes, have in general very mobile capital and are personally mobile, hence can easily remove wealth from the clutches of any one country.

The fact remains , we dont have enough wealthy people within the tax net to make any appreciable difference , so it doesnt matter , its not important to me whether we waste time trying to chase these people into the tax net, most likely we will fail, and the net outcome is not materially beneficial to even start trying

Skommando

BoatMad wrote: »

As for the wealthy being taxed, other then a sense of shadenfreude , there is simply not enough uber wealthy people that fall inside the tax residency net , that would constitute any meaningful additional tax take, Most of those individuals that might have such incomes, have in general very mobile capital and are personally mobile, hence can easily remove wealth from the clutches of any one country.

The fact remains , we dont have enough wealthy people within the tax net to make any appreciable difference , so it doesnt matter , its not important to me whether we waste time trying to chase these people into the tax net, most likely we will fail, and the net outcome is not materially beneficial to even start trying

So by and large the wealthy should not be taxed or at least taxed very little, is that correct ?

What should the tax bands and rates be, can you give some examples ?

BoatMad

Skommando wrote: »

So by and large the wealthy should not be taxed or at least taxed very little, is that correct ?

What should the tax bands and rates be, can you give some examples ?

no stop putting words ( or letters ) into my mouth,

what I said is the the wealthy , i.e. the uber wealthy , are typically mobile , both personally and financially , therefore its very difficult to tax them unless globally everyone acts together and thats unlikely

Therefore we have very few " resident " uber wealthy , so the amount of tax raised will not be materially sufficient to make any real difference. therefore I dont care how the user wealthy are taxed in Ireland , its not the source of a solution

in fact arguably what we need to do is raise taxes (or constrain benefits ) on the lower paid , to european levels, however in this country thats not politically possible, so therefore , for the foreseeable future , the burden will fall onto the middle classes

Skommando

BoatMad wrote: »

no stop putting words ( or letters ) into my mouth,

I didn't, I asked you was it correct.

BoatMad wrote: »

what I said is the the wealthy , i.e. the uber wealthy , are typically mobile , both personally and financially , therefore its very difficult to tax them unless globally everyone acts together and thats unlikely

Same could be said about Uber criminals, do you think that is also acceptable ?

BoatMad wrote: »

Therefore we have very few " resident " uber wealthy , so the amount of tax raised will not be materially sufficient to make any real difference. therefore I dont care how the user wealthy are taxed in Ireland , its not the source of a solution

So if the uber wealthy are irrelevant and should get a free pass from paying taxes because it's too difficult to make them pay any, what taxes should the merely wealthy pay ?

BoatMad wrote: »

in fact arguably what we need to do is raise taxes (or constrain benefits ) on the lower paid , to european levels, however in this country thats not politically possible

Excluding the Uber wealthy from paying any txes, what should the tax bands and rates be from poor to wealthy ? Can you give some examples ?

BoatMad

Same could be said about Uber criminals, do you think that is also acceptable ?

of course in an utopian world , neither uber criminals escaping the justice system nor uber wealthy escaping the taxation system should exist. I denounce all of them ( are you happy )

define the " merely wealthy " in ireland that has typically been pitched at individuals earning over 100K , in other countries thats simply seen as " comfortable ". here people earning 100K are very heavily taxed

Excluding the Uber wealthy from paying any txes, what should the tax bands and rates be from poor to wealthy ? Can you give some examples ?

I would bring up low income tax take to standard European norms, typically around 15% of aggregate income, middle income here is around 30%-35% of aggregate income and higher earners ( over 100K ) are on about 40% of aggregate earners . without dramatic reductions in the exchequer budget , theres not much room to change that . There is more scope for asset taxes ( farmer land tax etc, land bank taxes etc ) , but they are very politically difficult to stomach

I dont think we have much room for change in that regard. The demand for services cannot be really afforded in this country , given the low population and its been a huge challenge since the foundation of the state to square this issue, and repeatedly we have beggared the country in the process, because voters want less tax and more services and those two things are essentially incompatible

Skommando

BoatMad wrote: »

I would bring up low income tax take to standard European norms, typically around 15% of aggregate income, middle income here is around 30%-35% of aggregate income and higher earners ( over 100K ) are on about 40% of aggregate earners

what would be the bands and the tax rates applied to them ?

BoatMad

Skommando wrote: »

what would be the bands and the tax rates applied to them ?

Thats a complex subject, because tax and bands and allowances and benefits and rebates etc all play a part and the tax code, combined with social welfare codes, benefits all comprise in effect an income for lower paid .

Hence my comment that " tax rate " aggregate rates on the lower paid arguably need to rise European levels , and therefore middle earners rate need to fall closer to European aggregate levels . However , Ireland has engineered itself into an almost unique position where it provides benefits funded by one group of earners and gives them to another group of earners , that make little or no contribution. Politically thats not going to change and that leaves the Exchequer in the same old quandary , where do you go to get maximum tax take ,

marienbad

Skommando wrote: »

So by and large the wealthy should not be taxed or at least taxed very little, is that correct ?

What should the tax bands and rates be, can you give some examples ?

you are just demanding a simplistic answer to a question that will have little or no effect on the overall picture .

Tax them out of existence if you wish and when they are gone what will you do as our problems remain the same ?

K-9

Skommando wrote: »

Neither do the very wealthy, nor do large corporations, but all people here cowardly complain about is the people less well off than them.

That's quite a sweeping statement. Surveys have consistently shown a large majority of people think corporations should pay more tax and people don't approve of loopholes etc.

K-9

BoatMad wrote: »

there is no real evidence that somehow in ireland , we squander our tax take, we do have some different priorities , for example , we have a very generous social welfare system for example

The key thing you miss when comparing us to other European countries is population density. Here tax is raised from comparatively a small group of people and hence funding large tax consuming projects is difficult. couple that with the fact that we have huge swathes of lower income groups from paying hardly any tax and you have the situation where a relatively small group of tax payers are in essence funding the whole show. Given our demographics and political realities, there is little that can be done to correct this. Those that scream for more public services are exactly those that in fact pay very little tax towards them relatively

A lot of tax comes back in social transfers, we've huge amounts in EU/OECD comparisons.

It means we've a quite equitable society, not Scandinavian levels obviously but better than the UK or US. When Mary Harney said we were closer to Boston than Berlin she was very wrong!

flutered

i paid 80% tax back in the day, as a worker on a factory floor, back then there land rates also, which had to be paid regardless of income, there was an attempt at that when the lpt was first drafted, but all of a sudden that was removed to only include the old half or quarter of acre that houses especially cottages were built on not so long ago, like how could the likes of john burton be expected to pay lpt on 250 prime meath acres, then that wally kenny demanded that politicians be excused the lpt on their second home as they required one for work in dublin, it was then pointed out to him that it could be claimed under the politicians expenses

Skommando

This week Oxfam has said Ireland is part of a toxic global tax system servicing the very wealthiest while ordinary people pay the price and lose out on essential public services.

Research conducted by the charity puts Ireland sixth in a list of 15 countries which, it says, are helping big business to cheat countries and their citizens out of billions of euro in tax every year.

Chief Executive of Oxfam Ireland Jim Clarken said governments were falling over themselves to ensure corporations paid as little tax as they wished.

He said that, in the process, governments were starving their countries of the money needed for education, healthcare and generating jobs.

Mr Clarken said it was "no badge of honour" for Ireland to be known as a haven for coporate tax dodging.

http://www.rte.ie/news/2016/1212/838197-oxfam-tax-ireland/

Stheno

Skommando wrote: »

Oxfam has said Ireland is part of a toxic global tax system servicing the very wealthiest while ordinary people pay the price and lose out on essential public services.

He got shredded about that in an interview on the last word last week

Skommando

Stheno wrote: »

He got shredded about that in an interview on the last word last week

oh I'm sure it didn't sit will with the agenda all right.

K-9

Stheno wrote: »

He got shredded about that in an interview on the last word last week

Well I think the general point is correct. I suppose interviewers can nit pick at definitions and stuff like that, but our low CT rate is like a national treasure now and can't be questioned!

Suryavarman

realitykeeper wrote: »

Yes the Euro is a fiat currency and in case you did not know, that is not a good thing.

Considering the alternative to fiat currency is macroeconomic instability having a fiat currency is very much a good thing.

The rhetoric from the ECB is not fact, it is Keynesian nonsense. A better authority is the Bank of International Settlements and unfortunately for poor old Europe, the ECB is not doing what the BIS recommends.

You really haven't a clue what Keynesianism was do you? Let's pretend for a minute that the term even has any relevance to modern mainstream economics. Keynesians historically placed far greater emphasis on the importance of fiscal policy in stabilising the economy leaving monetary as an after thought. ECB policy is basically the opposite of what Keynesianism historically would have led people to support.

At the end of the day though it isn't 1970 anymore. Economics has moved on since then and economists now display greater homogeneity in terms of views on the economy. As such terms such as Keynesianism are meaningless.