Whilst I agree with Mel B that we should be looking for major reform of Corporation Tax, surely the key point about the 9% that pays 'supertax' is that more of that politically significant constituency to which she refers SHOULD be paying higher rate tax???
>>> Mel Bartley <[log in to unmask]> 06/07 6:35 pm >>>
Dear colleagues
I do agree with what John V-W and David Byrne are
saying. But it does make you wonder, you know.
Only 9% pay 'supertax'? really? Given that this starts
at a level which, in London, would not buy a shoe box
for a single person with no inheritance, where are all
these people who can afford private this and private
that?? I just dont get it -- how is it demographically
possible for this number of people to determine
so much else of what goes on? And why does the
entire political programe of all the major parties
appear to also be determined by it? Or is this some
kind of smokescreen -- what really matters is not the
taxes paid by any income earner but Corporation
Tax (which I saw G Brown bragging about on CNN
yesterday). Does anyone know how much could be
made available for public services if Corporation Tax
were imposed to any reasonable extent on any
reasonable number of companies?
I am still not sure if I can bring myself to vote
today. For a health inequality researcher to
vote NL seems like a chest physician voting
for Phillip Morris.
regards
Mel B
Mel Bartley
Dept of Epidemiology and Public Health,
University College London.
[log in to unmask]
020 7679 1707
07740 438775
[log in to unmask]
----- Original Message -----
From: "D.Byrne" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: 07 June 2001 16:39
Subject: Re: Blair and the rich-poor gap
>
> I very much agree with what John Veit-Wilson said in his post but would
wantto emphasize the significance of high incomes. High incomes cannot be
> considered as some stratospheric irrelevance in relation to adequacy,
which
> is one effect of working with median figures. I have just been writing a
> polemic on tax and thinking rather hard about the 9% of UK income tax
payers
> who pay higher rate tax. Things are complicated by the disastrous
> disaggregation of household incomes for tax purposes but I don't think we
> will be far wrong if we think about the highest income households as
having
> at least one income at this level. The effect of low taxation of incomes
> like this is that such households have significant resources for private
> services in education and health as well as the traditional area of
housing.
> Given the enormous significance of differential educational performance
for
> inter-generational transmission of advantage, such households can easily
> purchase achievement by their children - I certainly see this at the
> University of Durham in terms of the privately educated intake. What this
> all boils down to is that we must think about these issues not only in
terms
> of adjacent reference groups but rather in terms of a social norm. In the
UK
> now the top 10% of household incomes seem to be setting a normative
standard
> of aspired to adequacy which is very much removed from any statistical
norm.
> This was well illustrated by the recent debate about moving up the cut off
> level for national insurance contributions, which actually provoked a
> leftish comment by Blair in his TV confrontation with a property
developer.
> This is interpreted as a tax on middle incomes when it applies only to the
> top quintile of incomes - a strange definition of middle but now middle
> income has to be read in the same way as middle class. There are no
uppers!
>
> David Byrne
>
|