Do you think income tax ought to rise to a level to pay for the NHS?

THOMOTHOMO Posts: 7,446
Forum Member
I think that income tax should be put up to a level paid for by higher earners, say those who earn more than say 500 thousand pounds and over per year to a level whatever that costs to pay for the NHS and hopefully see some improvements. Political Party's of all colours say it can improve without having to put tax up, but it's been deteriating under all political party's for such a long time. Do you think if and i hope Labour win this year's General Election, eithe as a majority Goverment or as coalition that they should put income tax up for higher earners to pay for the NHS. I'm not that mathmatical about finance, but what do other members think would be a reasonable rise in income tax by higher earners to pay for the NHS.
Ian.
«1

Comments

  • GormagonGormagon Posts: 1,473
    Forum Member
    ✭✭✭
    Sure. Flat rate 30% on earnings.

    No tax rebates, no tax free allowances. Everyone, from minimum wage to the very highest on a flat rate. After all, you want fair.
  • paulschapmanpaulschapman Posts: 35,536
    Forum Member
    THOMO wrote: »
    I think that income tax should be put up to a level paid for by higher earners, say those who earn more than say 500 thousand pounds and over to a level whatever that costs to pay for the NHS and hopefully see some improvements. Political Party's of all colours say it can improve without having to put tax up, but it's been deteriating under all political party's for such a long time. Do you think if and i hope Labour win this year's General Election, eithe as a majority Goverment or as coalition that they should put income tax up for higher earners to pay for the NHS. I'm not that mathmatical about finance, but what do other members think would be a reasonable rise in income tax by higher earners to pay for the NHS.
    Ian.

    There is a lot of waste in the NHS - hows about dealing with that first. Then on top of that the current model of dealing with diseases and health issues when they occur is flawed - we should move to a model of prevention, and early diagnosis.
  • THOMOTHOMO Posts: 7,446
    Forum Member
    I think the more you earn above a certain level you should pay more than you do at present and those on very low incomes shouldn't pay anything. The more you earn, the more you can afford.
    Ian.
  • AndyCopenAndyCopen Posts: 2,213
    Forum Member
    ✭✭✭
    Does anyone know what the £110 billion we spend on the NHS is spent on ? (apart from the salaries of the 1.4 million staff)
  • MeepersMeepers Posts: 5,502
    Forum Member
    No. The NHS has enough money, it just isnt used properly.

    Its more important to be cutting taxes and letting people keep their own money, not throwing more into the bottomless pit of the NHS
  • THOMOTHOMO Posts: 7,446
    Forum Member
    AndyCopen wrote: »
    Does anyone know what the £110 billion we spend on the NHS is spent on ? (apart from the salaries of the 1.4 million staff)
    Lots of the staff like nurses and junior doctors work extremely long hours and some of the staff are very poorly paid. At least the nurses deserve a decent rise.
    Ian.
  • AndyCopenAndyCopen Posts: 2,213
    Forum Member
    ✭✭✭
    THOMO wrote: »
    Lots of the staff like nurses and junior doctors work extremely long hours and some of the staff are very poorly paid. At least the nurses deserve a decent rise.
    Ian.

    Salaries seem to range from 14k (Clinical support worker ) to 98k (Modern matron)

    Nurse in GP practice 21k to 28k (presume that's about average)
  • JohnbeeJohnbee Posts: 4,019
    Forum Member
    ✭✭✭
    Most certainly rich people should pay more tax, and of course companies too ought to be made to pay their taxes.

    Privatisation has cost the NHS a large amount of money - all the services that have been privatised have risen in cost. Have you ever wondered why the Conservatives don't publicise statistics about how much cheaper things are when provided privately? They aren't, so they keep it secret. All they dish out are a few invented anecdotes.

    We in Britain spend less on health than nearly every other industrialised country. To listen to the media you would think we spent double.. The spend has increased a little, and will next year as well, but that is because of privatised services.
  • GormagonGormagon Posts: 1,473
    Forum Member
    ✭✭✭
    Johnbee wrote: »
    Most certainly rich people should pay more tax, and of course companies too ought to be made to pay their taxes.

    Privatisation has cost the NHS a large amount of money - all the services that have been privatised have risen in cost. Have you ever wondered why the Conservatives don't publicise statistics about how much cheaper things are when provided privately? They aren't, so they keep it secret. All they dish out are a few invented anecdotes.

    We in Britain spend less on health than nearly every other industrialised country. To listen to the media you would think we spent double.. The spend has increased a little, and will next year as well, but that is because of privatised services.

    Exactly, and I mean exactly, how much were you invoiced for your last doctors visit?
  • paulschapmanpaulschapman Posts: 35,536
    Forum Member
    Johnbee wrote: »
    Most certainly rich people should pay more tax, and of course companies too ought to be made to pay their taxes..

    Out of interest did you know that the richest 25% are the only net contributors to the exchequer. Or that the top 50% pay 90% of income taxes.
  • AndyCopenAndyCopen Posts: 2,213
    Forum Member
    ✭✭✭
    I don't understand the issue with privatisation. For example, things like catering, why on earth not go to a private catering company for food, it's what they do.
  • SpotSpot Posts: 25,118
    Forum Member
    ✭✭✭
    The best way to fund public services is to have a thriving economy, not drag entrepreneurs down to the point where they can't be bothered to make much effort, or alternatively they move to another country where their efforts will be more appreciated.

    Oh, and as others have said, make better use of the money that's in the system already.
  • MeepersMeepers Posts: 5,502
    Forum Member
    Johnbee wrote: »
    Privatisation has cost the NHS a large amount of money - all the services that have been privatised have risen in cost. Have you ever wondered why the Conservatives don't publicise statistics about how much cheaper things are when provided privately?s.
    Labour privatised far more of the NHS than the Tories have done.
  • skp20040skp20040 Posts: 66,872
    Forum Member
    ✭✭
    I would not want to pay more until they sort it out, they need a complete rethink and purchasing is one main area to start with along with senior management and too many layers of authorities eating up cash.
  • mooxmoox Posts: 18,880
    Forum Member
    ✭✭
    There are a lot of things that need money. I don't understand why the NHS is special and should have taxes raised to directly pay for it vs. other areas of government spending or infrastructure investment

    Labour tried the approach of throwing money at the NHS rather than understanding what the problems were, didn't work too well.
  • AneechikAneechik Posts: 20,208
    Forum Member
    ✭✭✭
    No, taxes are high enough as it is. If the government want more money for services we can't actually afford, either take on more debt or do something about low wages.
  • GormagonGormagon Posts: 1,473
    Forum Member
    ✭✭✭
    Aneechik wrote: »
    No, taxes are high enough as it is. If the government want more money for services we can't actually afford, either take on more debt or do something about low wages.

    or fiscal waste.
  • LostFoolLostFool Posts: 90,623
    Forum Member
    ✭✭✭
    You could double the budget of the NHS and there would still be waiting lists, postcode lotteries and staff disputes. It's a bottomless pit that just swallows up all money your pour into it.

    With an ageing population and medical advances the demands on the NHS will always grow quicker than inflation so the question is how do you manage that. Do you introduce charges for some services (e.g. doctor's appointment or fast track consultations), raises taxes (employer and/or employee) or reduce services. There is no easy solution - but just throwing money at it won't solve anything.
  • TheEngineerTheEngineer Posts: 7,784
    Forum Member
    In 2013 18,000 people earned over £1m a year.(HMRC figures)

    Now obviously we don't know what those people earned but obviously some would earn this amount, some a lot more. If we took £500,000 off each of them on average that would equate to £9Bn a year or about 1 month of the NHS bill.

    Obviously this assumes they will happily hand over £500,000 and not be more "tax efficient" (like Tony Benn did with his estate) or move abroad to a lower tax regime (look at what happened in France).
  • Aye UpAye Up Posts: 7,053
    Forum Member
    THOMO wrote: »
    I think that income tax should be put up to a level paid for by higher earners, say those who earn more than say 500 thousand pounds and over per year to a level whatever that costs to pay for the NHS and hopefully see some improvements. Political Party's of all colours say it can improve without having to put tax up, but it's been deteriating under all political party's for such a long time. Do you think if and i hope Labour win this year's General Election, eithe as a majority Goverment or as coalition that they should put income tax up for higher earners to pay for the NHS. I'm not that mathmatical about finance, but what do other members think would be a reasonable rise in income tax by higher earners to pay for the NHS.
    Ian.

    I think Education, Health and Security (Military, Police, MI6 etc) are 3 things everyone should contribute towards, whether at the bottom ot top of the income ladder. Though lots of people have been taken out of income tax altogether, they are still liable for N.I. contributions. There is a lot of waste in the NHS and even in those areas I mentioned, I just think in order to have a safe, intelligent and healthy society we need those areas to be well funded. Not going into debt and then giving it away in aid.

    I would happily pay more in tax if I was told where and how it was going to be used. We need strong public services like those mentioned, not silly money being wasted on frivolous things like NHS restructuring or the millions spent on wasteful IT at the DWP.

    I work in the private sector, and see a significant portion of my salary taken in Taxn and N.I., if the government wanted an extra 100 quid or so from me to finance needed public service I have alluded to then fine.

    I think one of the problems we have seen is an increase in the tax allowance to its current level. On the one hand they have given millions of people a tax break, yet for those at the bottom of the income ladder who are stuck on low pay and to some degree low hours, it hasn't changed much for them. I just wish the governmen thought outside of the box with these things. Its great they incentivise work, but it isn't helping the people who its designed for. Namely those who are in receipt of in-work benefits because their pay fails to offer an income to cover their outgoings.

    Had the government thought ahead and say only increase the tax allowance to £8500 I suspect we would not be witnessing the rather stubborn reduction of the deficit

    But hey thats a subject for another day.
    Aneechik wrote: »
    No, taxes are high enough as it is. If the government want more money for services we can't actually afford, either take on more debt or do something about low wages.

    I think consensus has it we shouldn't be going into debt to get the things we need, its about time this country started living within its means.
  • LostFoolLostFool Posts: 90,623
    Forum Member
    ✭✭✭
    Obviously this assumes they will happily hand over £500,000 and not be more "tax efficient" (like Tony Benn did with his estate) or move abroad to a lower tax regime (look at what happened in France).

    I can't imagine anyone being "happy" to hand over £500,000 a year. It would be worth anyone in that category paying an expensive accountant to reduce their declared income to £999,999 so they don't have to pay a penny of this charge.

    If anyone needs help on how to be "tax efficient" then they ought to ask Peter Mandelson:

    http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2015/jan/27/peter-mandelson-400000-pound-tax-free-loan
  • GormagonGormagon Posts: 1,473
    Forum Member
    ✭✭✭
    Taxes are pretty much at the right level. The revenue has to be used more efficiently.
  • GormagonGormagon Posts: 1,473
    Forum Member
    ✭✭✭
    If you want to recoupe tax then simplify the tax code.

    At the moment, it costs me about £700 to have my tax advisor save me around about £5000 in tax.

    All legal.

    Change the tax law.
  • plateletplatelet Posts: 26,342
    Forum Member
    ✭✭✭
    Obviously this assumes they will happily hand over £500,000 and not be more "tax efficient"

    Well on £1,000,000 a year you'd be paying £436K in tax and £23K in NI at the moment. I suspect there's very few that wouldn't want to be a bit more efficient than that
  • gulliverfoylegulliverfoyle Posts: 6,318
    Forum Member
    the NHS is extremely wasteful id say 30%?

    there are countrys that spend a lot less than us and have similar death rates

    1st off NO ONE paid for by the state should earn more than the Prime minister

    172 do, thats wrong.if you think your worth more than that go to the private sector

    http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/10200387
Sign In or Register to comment.