[Archived] Cameron Gone, Osborne To Follow?

[K-Hod]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-36727853

Worth a read for those of the "pay for everything by upping corporation tax"/"Tory scum only look after their own" persuasion.

France's SOCIALIST government try to outdo Osbourne in cutting Corporation tax to try and steal the financial hub from London.

This says 3 things:

1. Upping taxes to the rich/big business doesn't always benefit society. It's complex, and has certainly never been a fix-all solution. As some of us have been saying until we're blue in the face.

2. Europe isn't a paradise of socialist principles and looking after the little man, the knight in shining armour who could have saved us from the dastardly Tories. Oh no, at the moment France's SOCIALIST party are trying to out-Tory the Tories and Germany are begging the rest of Europe not to out-Tory France!

3. If you subscribe to the fairyland teachings of Jim, be prepared for this kind of huge surprise whenever reality is studied too closely.

I don't think it's as extreme as that, but ethically it's pretty far from right to be punishing some of the most vulnerable in society and letting the richest pay 3/5 of feck all in tax. Call it naive, but there could surely be a middle ground? There are some dole dossers that take the proverbial, but when tax avoidance costs the country more than benefit fraud and there is far more funding available from the government to the latter and always has been it does make one wonder.

Not everyone who could be described as left leaning is as extreme as some on here and it shouldn't be assumed that they are either. Plenty of shades of grey kicking about.

[Baz]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-36727853

Worth a read for those of the "pay for everything by upping corporation tax"/"Tory scum only look after their own" persuasion.

France's SOCIALIST government try to outdo Osbourne in cutting Corporation tax to try and steal the financial hub from London.

This says 3 things:

1. Upping taxes to the rich/big business doesn't always benefit society. It's complex, and has certainly never been a fix-all solution. As some of us have been saying until we're blue in the face.

2. Europe isn't a paradise of socialist principles and looking after the little man, the knight in shining armour who could have saved us from the dastardly Tories. Oh no, at the moment France's SOCIALIST party are trying to out-Tory the Tories and Germany are begging the rest of Europe not to out-Tory France!

3. If you subscribe to the fairyland teachings of Jim, be prepared for this kind of huge surprise whenever reality is studied too closely.

1) please change your name, or at least abbreviate the first part, it puts a negative light on your posts to begin with

I don't think people are talking about upping taxes, more about collecting what is due, and not cutting them for business. If you are doing it to encourage investment in the uk then there are surely other ways than to give every business owner a bit more in their pocket whilst telling disabled people that their benefits are too expensive. As the german guy says - a race to the bottom is no good for anyone (bar the companies).

Putting your far right against Jims far left is always going to be a major difference. The majority of people though are in between.

I was reasonably unsure wether to be Brexit or Remain, and eventually went for the less risky remain. I haven't called for a re- vote, for parliament to not pass the legislation etc... But I am fearful of the current situation with our economy, and upset at the lack of planning that has been clear since the Brexit vote. We are in a shameful position as a country at the moment, the key people wanting out have gone, the PM has gone, Osborne is in hiding, Corbyn and Tim Farron could have a joint meeting of the mps supporting them in a minibus. No one is able to give a clear answer to even what type of arrangement we would want with the EU, let alone be in a position to put a negotiating team together. A lot of the stories about companies looking to move away are because we have no certainty in what our position is. Then we have Teresa May who wont even say to EU nationals who are settled here that they can stay and work here, as thats a bargaining chip she doesn't want to throw away. That includes tens of thousands of NHS employees. Does she realise these are actually people, with jobs, homes, families etc? Lets just put their life up in the air as they're a bargaining chip? I thought people wanted their country back? Thats not any British value I recognise.

[Guest]

Jim, I agree that a reduction in corporation tax (on the face of it) is pretty crap. The only way it can be effective as a means of encouraging companies to pay tax is to close the other loopholes they exploit.

Income Tax is banded depending on income amount. Is there any good reason why the same principle could not apply to Corporation Tax? Corporation Tax is a tax on profits only. Surely we can encourage more startups and wealth creation by offering a lower rate of Coporation Tax to businesses with smaller profits, and offset it with a higher rate to businesses with larger profits.

[yoda]

Income Tax is banded depending on income amount. Is there any good reason why the same principle could not apply to Corporation Tax? Corporation Tax is a tax on profits only. Surely we can encourage more startups and wealth creation by offering a lower rate of Coporation Tax to businesses with smaller profits, and offset it with a higher rate to businesses with larger profits.

You are not going to win friends on here with that kind of common sense

[Mike E]

Income Tax is banded depending on income amount. Is there any good reason why the same principle could not apply to Corporation Tax? Corporation Tax is a tax on profits only. Surely we can encourage more startups and wealth creation by offering a lower rate of Coporation Tax to businesses with smaller profits, and offset it with a higher rate to businesses with larger profits.

Do you mean (for example):

Profits up to £1m = 10%

Profits up to £5m = 20%

Anything over £5m = 40%

?

[Baz]

Income Tax is banded depending on income amount. Is there any good reason why the same principle could not apply to Corporation Tax? Corporation Tax is a tax on profits only. Surely we can encourage more startups and wealth creation by offering a lower rate of Coporation Tax to businesses with smaller profits, and offset it with a higher rate to businesses with larger profits.

And allow foreign or new businesses to trade at the rate below or bottom % rate for their first 3 years, as an incentive.

[Biddy]

Banded corporation tax is a good idea on the face of it. However, do you not then think that will then stop some companies deciding to grow? Take Mike E's example above. Say a company is hitting £4.5m one year and only paying 20% tax. They will more than likely choose not to grow to hit the 40% hike as there wouldn't be as much profit in it.

Then take the other angle which we all already hear about, companies moving or hiding profit. Suddenly there is a nice cheap 10% bracket to aim for so suddenly all the profit is moved elsewhere (dividends perhaps), less tax is collected and, as the profit is written down, smaller investment back in the company.

not saying any of this is possible, but everything has good and bad sides to them which is probably why its been set at a single figure for so long.

Still, contractors here are over the moon at the potential 15% corporation tax. Soon be 5% better off than they were before!

[Al]

Income Tax is banded depending on income amount. Is there any good reason why the same principle could not apply to Corporation Tax? Corporation Tax is a tax on profits only. Surely we can encourage more startups and wealth creation by offering a lower rate of Coporation Tax to businesses with smaller profits, and offset it with a higher rate to businesses with larger profits.

Sounds good in principle but so easy to get around. Big businesses would just split up into smaller units and thus get around the higher rates of tax.

[Steve Kean's Hypnotoad]

Think the recent posts have only served to show how complicated and difficult a system it is to get the best results (I.e. most tax) out of. And I'd imagine the points raised so far are about 1% of the iceberg.

As I say, just shows what an unsuitable stick it is to bash the Tories with. Speaking of which has Jim been banned or is this one topic he will now avoid like the plague?

[K-Hod]

All parties have been guilty of not fixing that problem tbh. My issue is though, what's the point of these taxes when there are so many loopholes that people can use to avoid paying them? Makes a mockery of the system/ethics/honesty etc.