I am one of the 10 million pensioners who did not need the £300 WFA. Apparently it wasted £1.4 billion of tax payers money to give us a benefit that in 1997 might have been useful but by 2024 was not needed and a waste of revenues needed for other purposes. Why not raise the level at which pension credit comes into operation and encourage pensioners with incomes less that £15,000 to apply and obtain the additional £300 they need. There are people out there who claim that the £1.4 billion is a pittance in comparison with the social care budget. If any one person had a fortune of £1.4 billion they would be amongst the wealthiest people on earth.
Rachel Reeves’ 2018 paper, ‘The Everyday Economy’, referenced Richard Murphy’s work: “reform strategies [that] could raise over £20bn per year of tax revenues and a further £20bn of investment funds” [1].
Murphy, now a professor at Sheffield university, has recently, in his paper 'the Taxing Wealth Report 2024', updated his work. He estimates that wealth in the UK is undertaxed each year by £170bn and that straightforward reforms to the UK’s existing tax system could collect around £90bn of additional tax revenue each year. Such additional tax being paid only by those who are better off, [in the top decile], he says. An amount that could fund Labour's original Green transition plan, and fund removal of the 2-child benefit cap and fund the winter fuel allowance for all who ight need it. I cannot fathom what's stopping Labour taking Murphy's advice.
I would have voted for “Rejoin the EU”, or at least get close as possible to the benefits of the Single Market. We can only grow the economy fast enough, protect our security, face down fascism, and be a world class social democracy, if we are fully engaged with and ultimately back in the EU. Let’s start with a big deal on freedom of movement for - at a minimum - students, creatives and swathes of professionals: most Britons don’t even object to this any more.
I find these surveys rather frustrating. Today's, for example, one has to pick one of five options. I chose ''Driving new jobs in communities'' but in reality I would have added a rider that at least two of the other options ''Boosting UK trade'' and ''Accelerate the net zero transition'' would be necessary to achieve this.
There was another survey recently the question being who would win the US presidential election. I didn't take part because from all I can read it is much to close to call so a ''don't know'' button ought to have been the third option. The 89% of those who took part in the survey and chose Harris must know something that very few if any pundits or opinion pollsters in the US know.
I am one of the 10 million pensioners who did not need the £300 WFA. Apparently it wasted £1.4 billion of tax payers money to give us a benefit that in 1997 might have been useful but by 2024 was not needed and a waste of revenues needed for other purposes. Why not raise the level at which pension credit comes into operation and encourage pensioners with incomes less that £15,000 to apply and obtain the additional £300 they need. There are people out there who claim that the £1.4 billion is a pittance in comparison with the social care budget. If any one person had a fortune of £1.4 billion they would be amongst the wealthiest people on earth.
Why is The Guardian taking such a negative view of the Labour Government,after 14 years of Tory disaster.?
Rachel Reeves’ 2018 paper, ‘The Everyday Economy’, referenced Richard Murphy’s work: “reform strategies [that] could raise over £20bn per year of tax revenues and a further £20bn of investment funds” [1].
Murphy, now a professor at Sheffield university, has recently, in his paper 'the Taxing Wealth Report 2024', updated his work. He estimates that wealth in the UK is undertaxed each year by £170bn and that straightforward reforms to the UK’s existing tax system could collect around £90bn of additional tax revenue each year. Such additional tax being paid only by those who are better off, [in the top decile], he says. An amount that could fund Labour's original Green transition plan, and fund removal of the 2-child benefit cap and fund the winter fuel allowance for all who ight need it. I cannot fathom what's stopping Labour taking Murphy's advice.
I would have voted for “Rejoin the EU”, or at least get close as possible to the benefits of the Single Market. We can only grow the economy fast enough, protect our security, face down fascism, and be a world class social democracy, if we are fully engaged with and ultimately back in the EU. Let’s start with a big deal on freedom of movement for - at a minimum - students, creatives and swathes of professionals: most Britons don’t even object to this any more.
I find these surveys rather frustrating. Today's, for example, one has to pick one of five options. I chose ''Driving new jobs in communities'' but in reality I would have added a rider that at least two of the other options ''Boosting UK trade'' and ''Accelerate the net zero transition'' would be necessary to achieve this.
There was another survey recently the question being who would win the US presidential election. I didn't take part because from all I can read it is much to close to call so a ''don't know'' button ought to have been the third option. The 89% of those who took part in the survey and chose Harris must know something that very few if any pundits or opinion pollsters in the US know.