Budget 2013

[Wolfshade]

So it is that time of the year again. The Chancellor is to deliver his budget, with a single minded approach, reduce the deficit to reduce the debt.

Everyone will see some benefit from this, though whether or not they are outweighed by increasing duties elsewhere is what remains.

What we are to expect.

Cuts - simple everything everywhere everyhow. For every £100 the government is spending it only claws back £87, this then adds to the national debt.

Increase in personal tax allowance, the LibDems have pleged to reach £10,000 limit before tax and has increased the personal tax allowance, so I expect to see this raised to the £9000 level.

Benefits to rise by only 1% rather than the previously expected 2%.

What I think will be annouced.

Beer, Wine, Cigarette and Petrol duties to all increase.
UK economic growth to be lower than expected (again)
Increased borrowing.

More of the same. Without signficant growth to the economy it is hard to see how this issue is going to be resolved other than through more years of the same cuts, and contraction to public services.

[DrLove42]

They've said all government departments must cut by a further few percent.

Except Foreign Aid, which is going to continue to increase.

I think we need to understand help starts at home and cut foreign aid payments before we start cutting policing and healthcare.

Either way its a Tory budget. It'll hit the poorer hard and help the wealthy, same as they always do

[Wolfshade]

I'm not sure I would agree with you, the proposed tax rate for the highest rate is higher than in any labour governement, those out of tax altogther are again in higher numbers than ever so it doesn't seem to stack up.

[DrLove42]

Well corporation tax got slaughtered, making it much easier for big businesses to amass more money

On the other hand lower of people have seen a big increase in NI, but a decrease in normal tax (saving an average person £350 on normal tax...before the increased NI)

Beer tax cut, all other alchohols go up 2% above inflation

Smaller cheaper loans for first time home owners

Forecast growth falls 50% from 1.2 to 0.6%

1% cap on pay increase in all public sectors (other than the military)

So suprisingly balenced. But still not going to fix most things in the long term

[Deadlift]

I see lower corporate tax as being a good thing personally. Make it cheaper to run a business and they should be more profitable. This in turn means growth and more employment (hopefully)
Whatever your politics historically the Tories have always been better at handling the countries finances. Labour unfortunatly not so much.

[DrLove42]

My problem is that

a) The 10 years Gordon Brown was chancellor for was a golden time for this country

b) Everyone blames the recession on whatever government was in charge when it happened (be they in the UK, the USA or wherever). It wasn't. The recession was a result of a collapsing international economy. No one political power could have stopped it

[Deadlift]

Golden time, your not half wrong :). That's when good old Gordon sold off most of our gold reserves at 20% less than its worth.

Your right about the recession though, it wasent Labours fault. But they certainly dragged the country into massive debt. The deregulation of the banks didn't help either with people able to take loans they had no hope of paying back.

[eldargal]

He sold off the gold reserve when it was around 300USD an ounce, it is now around 1600USD an ounce and peaked at 1890 or so an ounce in 2011.. He was warned too, whatever he might claim. It was clear to many the gold price was unnaturally low.

The ten years he was chancellor were a golden time for most developed economies, which was part of the problem. A lot of nations started relaxing regulations and letting the banks do whatever the hell they wanted because they were obviously so successful. It is simplistic to say the government of the time could have stopped it, but they could have minimised its impact and handled it better when it hit as quite a few countries did.

[Psychosplodge]

The collapse is a separate issue to the previous government unsustainably borrowing endless amounts of money.

Looking at it I'll probably be better off.
Not something I could ever say under blair/brown.

[Mr Mystery]

I'm better off once again. Beer has gone down by a penny, and my untaxed earnings are higher.

And to be honest, that's about all I give a rat's arse about!

[Mr Mystery]

The collapse is a separate issue to the previous government unsustainably borrowing endless amounts of money.

Looking at it I'll probably be better off.
Not something I could ever say under blair/brown.

First bit is untrue. Labour spent less than the previous Conservative parliament. The deficit occurred after the financial collapse.

And you are aware the current parliament has borrowed more than Labour?

[Deadlift]

I'm better off once again. Beer has gone down by a penny, and my untaxed earnings are higher.

And to be honest, that's about all I give a rat's arse about!

You will have to drink 100 pints though just to save £1. Good luck with that on Sunday night ;)

[Denzark]

They've said all government departments must cut by a further few percent.

Except Foreign Aid, which is going to continue to increase.

I think we need to understand help starts at home and cut foreign aid payments before we start cutting policing and healthcare.

Either way its a Tory budget. It'll hit the poorer hard and help the wealthy, same as they always do

Beer duty frozen and I believe the beer escalator (not an inexplicable mechanism that gets you upstaris when drunk) is to be abolished. The thing about 'the wealthy' is that the top 1% of earners pay 25% of the taxes. If a banker buys a £100k Porsche 911, the 20% which is VAT pays for a nurses wage for the year. The poor don't contribute as much to society - not even proportionally.

[Psychosplodge]

First bit is untrue. Labour spent less than the previous Conservative parliament. The deficit occurred after the financial collapse.

And you are aware the current parliament has borrowed more than Labour?

We always had a deficit. How is that even possible?

All I know is everytime Brown did a budget I was out of pocket at the end of the month compared to previously.

[Mr Mystery]

I'm hoping they do seriously clamp down on tax avoidance of all stripes. Them pledging it and pulling it off are sadly two seriously different things.

[DrLove42]

Just saw a wonderful quote in the BBC comments section


Labour didn't fix the roof when it was sunny, and now its raining. So the Conservatives have decided to remove the roof completly and subsidise everyone for buying Umbrellas

[Wildeybeast]

First bit is untrue. Labour spent less than the previous Conservative parliament. The deficit occurred after the financial collapse.

And you are aware the current parliament has borrowed more than Labour?

Spending less has nothing to do with it. They utterly failed to predict and prepare for any kind of financial collapse, to the extent that Brown laughably declared he had ended 'boom and bust' economics for good. This lot have done a pretty ham-fisted job of trying to fix it, but it should never have been allowed to get so bad.

On the plus side, beer is cheaper! Huzzah and hurrah!

[Deadlift]

Lol you have to love Osbourne, "yep life is still crap and your all going to stay poor, BUT I will knock 1p off a pint and you will all celebrate". You know what judging by comments here and elsewhere you would be forgiven for thinking he had given us all a sack of money. It's one fecking pence of a pint. If you drink 2 pints a day on average you will save around £7 annually, whoopee do. That's what ? A third of a box of tactical marines.

[Wildeybeast]

I think it's more that a) for a change the government has actually listened to a public campaign and b) it's good news for the struggling pub industry. Osbourne claims that with the beer escalator taken into account we have in fact saved 4p a pint. Now if he will just address the difference in VAT between pubs and supermarkets, we could possibly have a thriving pub industry again. It's a token gesture, yes, but it is step in the right direction and gives us a chink of light in the otherwise relentless financial gloom. You have to take the wins where you can find them.

[Mr Mystery]

Yup.

BBC has a nifty calculator up to show how the budget has affected you. I'm a couple of hundred quid a year better off, so I really cannot complain.

And the important thing, as stated above, is that the beer escalator has been axed, which is a massive win for the pub industry! And seeing as my local is run by responsible, hard working staff, this is excellent news. Add in that Yve, the land lady also makes a £2,000 saving on NI, and her business has just received a much needed shot in the arm!

This is a definitely 'we know we've pissed off a lot of voters, time to start punching for the general election' budget. Though as much as I've done well out of this, I still won't vote Tory :p

[Denzark]

10 pints to save 40p. Seeing as £4.00 pints seem de rigeur, think of it as a 1% cash back scheme.

[Deadlift]

10 pints and I would be spending £50 to have the Taxi cleaned after my journey home ;) 6 and I'm happy, 10 and I'm technicolor yawning.

[Denzark]

My old man's bladder means no more than 4 before I go onto Vodka...

[Mr Mystery]

10 pints and I would be spending £50 to have the Taxi cleaned after my journey home ;) 6 and I'm happy, 10 and I'm technicolor yawning.

You big girl's blouse!

On a good night, I can do 15, and still not drive the porcelain bus. Unless I've been drinking Ddark Star. Something in their brewing process doesn't agree with me!

[Deadlift]

You big girl's blouse!

On a good night, I can do 15, and still not drive the porcelain bus. Unless I've been drinking Ddark Star. Something in their brewing process doesn't agree with me!

Yeah I'm afraid so lol, I used to be quite serious about eating and drinking "clean" and alcohol was a big no no for the longest time, I was tee total for about 10 years or so.

I did lots of steroids instead lol j/k

[Wolfshade]

I'm a budget winner.

[Wolfshade]

Here is the beebs calculator:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-17442946

I don't blame Gordon for selling the gold, at the time the economy was becoming further and further removed from the actual price of gold, although some advisors told him not to do it. In hindsight it was a bad call, had the economy kept growing, then the value of gold would continue to depeciate, however, it didn't and lots of money evapourated as it was connected to non-physical assests so the price of gold rocketed (as it usually does in such times) as it is something you can see and handle.

National debt isn't anything new, at its height it was 260% of GDP during the Napoleonic wars.

But public debt in actual £s has rapidly increased since the 1980s, which while the economy was growing wasn't too much of a problem as it was a small fraction of GDP, now we are spending more on interest than Defence, Local Government, International Aid, Transport, the only thing we spend more on is Pensions & Benefits, Education and Healthcare.

This is a massive problem of trying to deal with this and an economy that isn't growing (or at least very slowly).
One solution is a huge cash injection to kick start, but that doesn't seem to be working, even when VAT was dropped to 10% we didn't see any massive improvement. But this is a gamble as it could just create further debt which will then need servicing.
The other is to cut budgets to try and tax more than you spend, this has the knock on effects that it then can create lower standards of living, poorer services and in some places could stiffle investment.

I suppose one of the arguments is that we were living beyond our means, and so the pensions and benefits schemes were too generous and indeed quite a few people will look at recent examples and suggest that this true. Unfortunately popularist governments work by offering more and taking less, which is an unsustainable model.

[Psychosplodge]

which is another reason democracy doesn't work, but short of me running things I can't think of a better system... O_o

[Wolfshade]

The best would be a beneolvent dictator, in effective this is what the papcy is O_o

Or perhaps a technocracy

[Psychosplodge]

The best would be a beneolvent dictator,


That's what I said, me running things.

[Wolfshade]

Well it got the dic part right :p

[Psychosplodge]

uhhh handbags

:D

[Deadlift]

I'm a budget winner.

Me too, according to that BBC calculator I am £562 per annum better off :) that my Tau order covered then.

[Wolfshade]

Me too, according to that BBC calculator I am £562 per annum better off :) that my Tau order covered then.

You say that now....

[Psychosplodge]

Obviously your beer consumption is slightly higher than mine...

[Mr Mystery]

And that might just have cost them the election. Had a peep at the headlines this morning, and it seems it wasn't nasty or racist enough for the right, and not huggy benefits enough for the left.

Many are slagging off the 'penny off the pint' thing, but don't seem to grasp how important the axing of the beer escalator is for the pub industry. It means prices don't go up, which to me is the most significant thing.

Helping people buy homes? Lots of comparisons to the idiocy that humped the world economy. I'm not convinced either way. Previous issue wasn't the 99% mortgages so much as them being dished out to pretty much anyone who wanted one, regardless of income. Provided that particular lesson is now learned, this could work. Pretty big caveat though.

I kind of hope it does cost them the election though. As much as I've done well, I've never enjoyed watching the poor suffer for the mistakes of the rich. And the things that have benefitted me seem unlikely to be changed. It would be a desperate or extremely stupid parliament that takes away the tax rate changes!

[Psychosplodge]

I dread the idea of Labour getting back in, every single time, as a low paid unmarried male with no kids I've been out of pocket.

[Wolfshade]

I wonder how much would be saved if all benefits were slashed by 50%.... :eek:

Daily Mail have just called, they want me to be a columnist...

[Psychosplodge]

We don't even need to do that. Just apply them properly.

[Mr Mystery]

I dread the idea of Labour getting back in, every single time, as a low paid unmarried male with no kids I've been out of pocket.

Yet I prefer that to watching the conservatives feather their, and their donors nests at the expense of common sense and one might say common decency.

I'm all for the aspiration nation. It's more than just a snazzy catch phrase. But telling people to go get a job is kind of dependant on there being jobs to apply for.

Again I've been massively lucky, significantly increasing my income and benefitting from a couple of tax changes. Whilst I feel the opportunities I found are far from unqiue, they aren't exactly all that common at the moment. Whichever political party has the reins doesn't affect me overtly, and as such I now vote on my principles. And that means wanting my fellow man to be offered the same opportunities regardless of their background. Though I do get riled when I see people fritter them away!

[Wolfshade]

1,000,000 new private sector jobs under the coalition?

[Mr Mystery]

2,500,000 odd still unemployed under the coalition?

And how many of those new jobs are full time? How many are permanent?

[Wolfshade]

Lowest claiment count since June 2011. More employed than 1994. Also, welfare bill is lower despite more claimants than under labour...

Normally high unemployment could be resolved with big government expenditure to create jobs for people, unfortunately there isn't the money in the coffers for that sort of thing and with the global downturn even making UK more favouable to do business in (lowest corporation tax) there are still high numbers of unemployed.

It's a pickle.

But while we have lower unemployment rates than Spain it is ok.

[Deadlift]

I suggest that the rise in unemployment in comparison to the mid to late 90s may have something to do with the rise in immigration since then ;)

[Psychosplodge]

I suggest that the rise in unemployment in comparison to the mid to late 90s may have something to do with the rise in immigration since then ;)

Quick duck DL before the looney left lynch you

You can't use common sense.

[Deadlift]

Quick duck DL before the looney left lynch you

You can't use common sense.


lol I am sure I will be fine, they are all too busy eating muesli and drinking green tea.

[Wolfshade]

My biggest complaint is that there seems to be no credible alternative.

I listen to PMQs all the time, and quite a lot of debates on other days but what I am unaware of is Labour's plans. I hear how they object to various taxes/welfare reforms/legislation and some of those I agree with but on the whole they seem to just object to most things. As to a coherent plan to deal with the debt, sort out welfare reform and get the economy going I am unaware of it.

[Psychosplodge]

My understanding of it Borrow more money, and buy more votes

[Deadlift]

My understanding of it Borrow more money, and buy more votes

and use this borrowing to spend our way out of recession, I am not convinced

[Psychosplodge]

Sorry that's what i meant *facepalm*

[Mr Mystery]

and use this borrowing to spend our way out of recession, I am not convinced

No less sense making than firing thousands of public sector workers to help economic recovery.

I for one feel we should be borrowing to invest in infrastructure. To what degree I dunno. But start providing jobs, and you create liquidity. Private sector follows, things start turning. Pay off debts when best able to afford.

And remember. Much of the UK's debt came from buying up shares in failing banks to keep them going. Those shares are already gaining value. Ergo, a large chunk of the debt can take care of itself once things are stable. Unless Osbourne sells them cheap to his mates again. Like Northern Rock's were....

[Deadlift]

Removed, wrong thread ;)