What is the question?
I don’t normally blog on a Sunday but two things struck me about the papers today and I will be blogging a bit less in the next few weeks.
So the Sunday Torygraph has a leader saying that it is obvious that we have to get closer to the USA under Trump, which is the perfect illustration of the self-delusion of the increasingly ideologically driven dreamers of the Tory party.
The idea that we can learn from the employment of Elon Musk to increase government efficiency, that tariffs are nothing to worry about, that US isolationism is not a problem for us and everyone else, that Ukraine will not be betrayed, is amazing. So too is the delusion that Trump will let the economy boom and fund tax cuts with higher growth, it is a sad joke.
A far more realistic comment in the S. Times points out that the crises in Germany, France and the UK are all based on the willingness of an increasingly elderly population to live beyond the countries means and not want to pay for it at all.
Although it does miss the obvious conclusion that in the UK Margaret Thatcher far from following a policy of living within your means and balancing the budget as if it were the household accounts; was actually the first cakeist.
We have been having our cake and eating it for 50 years. You cannot have a European style Health service and social services and American level taxes.
It is really that simple.
The Labour government is still as stuck in this trap as France and Germany, or the Tories. The rich have to pay their taxes, they cannot be allowed to make billions here and then swan off to tax havens, the elderly have to pay more or retire later, the young need to be freed from student debt and huge house prices, the monopoly profits of the huge corporations which dominate almost every sector have to be broken.
We can all dream of being like Vietnam or India but that is never going to happen, we don’t have millions of young, determined people leaving the land to work in cities, we did that 150 years ago. Anyone who says more liberalisation and entrepreneurship, less government and lower taxes are the answer doesn’t even know what the question is.
We have tried that and it failed. It was called Thatcherism.
From Jonty Bloom Media Ltd
Economics, trade and Brexit, not necessarily in that order but the dog always comes first.
One aspect of the American tax system that is often overlooked is that people just focus on the federal taxes and not the state, local taxes. I.e. I had a colleague who moved to Virginia because he said the taxes were lower, then he admitted that he didn’t get the same services as he got from Maryland. When we calculated the extra services he now had to pay for, like trash pick up, it was more than what he was paying in Maryland. That usually brings it up to 26% to 30% (and doesn’t include sales tax).
The other aspect of course is healthcare costs. Something like 20% of my salary goes towards healthcare costs. So if you include like for like, it’s usually a myth that the US has lower taxes unless you’re in your 20s, don’t get sick, and don’t need any help. And we always need help sooner or later.
Not a problem paying taxes when the poor can’t - massive issue when the rich won’t