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this post was submitted on 09 Mar 2024
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UK Politics
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Like, with the crumbling social infrastructure all around us, we’re meant to cheer that they’re cutting taxes to underfund it further whilst they strongly refuse to properly tax the rich tax evaders? It’s kinda obvious that when labour gets into power they’ll have no choice but to raise them. So what is this for? Bags of mushy spiderwebs the lot of them are.
Given the now 4% cut to NI, I'm nearly a hundred pounds richer a month in a cost of living crisis, that's not pocket change to me, , ,
I fucking hate the Tories, but am I supposed to trust that Labour will spend that money better than I can?
Shoveling your problems forward I see...
Right now the 100 pounds help, when you need social services it will cost you more than whatever you've saved because that 100 pounds didn't go to financing them.
Because all the taxes I've paid so far have been so worth it.
If you want people to be inspired to pay more tax. Show them something for their money.
Cool, so lets elect a party that doesn’t use tax payer money to line their own pockets
Yes, you've paid so much tax, are you not pissed off that the Tories are stealing it? And £100 is all it costs to buy you out?
So you don't trust Labour to be responsible with your taxes because a different party wasn't responsible with your taxes?
Eh?
You seem like the type of person who is determined to be grumpy no matter what.
You question ma,es me ask your age.
While right of center labour are far from huge in social investment.
If you worked during that time. Its gotta be pretty hard not to see how much better taxes were handled.
The NHS hugly improved after tories destruction before and dropped much much worse again under the tories since.
Same goes for the welfare safty net. Can't say I love all that. As I feel working families should earn a wage that allows them to survive. And the net should be there for those that cannot. But under labour low income families had a much more reliable safty net to ensure childhood poverty was reduced. The tories destroyed it. To the point that it changed from hard to rent privately on that safty net. To close tonimpossible for huge parts of the nation.
And all of this sounds not so awful. If you think. OK but they are spending less of our money.
Except they are not. Pretty much every austerity measure has ended up costing them or you more. There inflation adjusted spending is higher.
This is a 4% cut on ni. Making up for what. How much more rent are you paying. Vat transport. Water, food.
What ever way you look at it. You are getting less for your money. The government inflation adjusted tota, spendingbis higher. And they have hugly moved taxation from those benifiting/profiting from that spending. To the working people they have removed the services from.
I think you have a totally reasonable point.
The two ideas I'd raise in response would be to point to the early 2000s when people generally felt more prosperous because the economy was being well managed and was growing and taxes were well spent till provide (more) effective services.
Secondly, at the logical conclusion of your argument everything would be privatised and there would be no government, but that would only be good for the mega rich who would be able to do what they want
You're acting like those cuts will not be taken from those services that aren't doing well and they won't just become even worse while the things that don't profit you will stay the same.
Hell, if a 4% cut is 100£ a month it means you're making 30k£ a year, you're the person that should be asking for more taxation because you'll be the first one who will need to use safety nets!
Over the last ten years I've lived in a van, waited on NHS waiting lists for longer than 12 months whilst I bled from the arse, had an abscess rot my jaw away and had the pleasure of paying a landlord £1K a month for a shitty and freezing cold flat. All this for someone that's never been unemployed from the age of 16.
Safety nets? Away with your pish.
And if you think cutting taxes will make it better then you're hopeless.
An extra 100£ per month wouldn't have stopped your ass from bleeding or fixed your abscess, but cutting taxes will mean that it will take even longer to get the services that already take too long to get.
People like you never win when taxes are cut, but people like you are also gullible enough to believe conservatives when they tell them cutting taxes will improve their life.
You can't blame someone for being disenfranchised after being in a lose/lose situation the last ten years.
Well we already have local councils going bankrupt, school ceilings collapsing, money wasted on deportation schemes going to court and dodgy covid contracts under the Tories now.
So either you vote Tory and that almost certainly continues or you vote Labor and you find out if they do spend it better.
All those things were failing before the tax cut. If we can't effectively run these things during times of the highest rates of tax in recent history, maybe it's not a problem we can simplify tax ourselves out of.
Call me a cynical old bastard but I don't trust either the Tories or Labour to spend my hard earned cash effectively. For the record, I will be voting against the Tories at the next GE, although I don't think that has anything to do with this debate.
You know what lower taxes can do though? Give me some cash to fix all the cracked plaster and flaking paint on my house, give me enough money to pay the bills and buy some meals that don't come from the "Tesco's cheap dinner recipes" website and maybe even have enough money left over at the end of the month to spend on some things that I personally enjoy.
The years since the 2008 financial crisis have been fucking dog shit and you don't expect me to be pleased that I'm for the first time in a very long time getting to keep a little extra of my own hard earned cash?
Yeah, they were failing due to chronic under funding. So the Tories took the extra taxes labour had suggested to fund the public services and used them to cut our taxes.
Make the most of the extra money, but honestly if you want to see a doctor easily or for the council to keep collecting your trash, those taxes are probably going to have to come back up.
I totally get it, mate. Honestly, no I don't expect you not to enjoy that bit of extra money, life is really hard right now! I hope the next few months are kind to you and hopefully the next government can do some good work to build the economy and restore some of our faith in the political systems by working, not the line their own pockets and support their father-in-laws business interests but to actually make life easier for regular people.
Spoiler, Blair II won't.
I mean, Blair 1 did spend it better.
You may not like new Labour, but it's pure delusion to suggest they were as bad as the criminals in office now.
Blair was the one who saddled the NHS with terrible PFIs.
I still maintain, that overall for the majority of people he spent the government money far better than the current conservatives party have been spending their money.
So your solution is to simply continue to vote for the status quo is it?
Interesting tactic but I'm not sure it will work.
You're standing on the sinking ship and you're refusing to get in the lifeboat because there is an outside possibility that the lifeboat will also sink. But also quite a high possibility that it won't. Simple game theory would suggest that you get in the lifeboat.
I live in a tory safe seat, so my vote barely matters, but I won't be voting for any of the big three.
There are no safe seats in this election I highly recommend that you look up tactical voting.
Voting for a different party simply because you have a chip on your shoulder and it's an imagined chip as well is only counterproductive for yourself.
You have to ask yourself what you want, Which would be a worse scenario for you another conservative government, or a labor government, because those are the only two possible outcomes here. It would be nice if that wasn't the case but it's the case.
Looking at polling data. Your safe seat really might not be so safe. When polling gets to the low 20s everything is up for grabs. The 2 party advantages start to collasps at the 20s. Add to that the 3rd of the big 3 is around 10%.
Then the ability for any of the smaller parties to change things a little seems less extream. So voting habits can change Drematically.
With 1 party at about 40% and no other seeming like the obvious only option to beat them. Absolutely every seat starts to look at the polling at home. People who don't like labour are less willing to vote them to avoid the tories. Meaning many smaller parties may get a push from left of labour.
But much more the case. People who would normally vote tories to keep Labour out. Have to start thinking tactically. And will think about how to reduce the labour lead from a land slide while placing People who they may turn to and compromise with if weak. When so many parties can potentially gain seats from losing tories. Any one non labour MP may make the difference in a weak labour government.
The problem is that you'll be richer in a much poorer society which means in real terms you still lose out. You'll be living in a country with basically no social safety net. Under the Tories if you get sick there's no more NHS and you'll have to go private and it will cost a lot more than those £100. Your kids will have to go to underfunded schools which will negatively affect their education and life prospects, you'll need to continuously run a car because public transportation infrastructure will be non-existent. Hopefully your house never gets broken into because you you'll never get justice due to the underfunding of the police. Which will lead to more crime.
In the long run you'll lose out. I'd much rather give up £100 today to mitigate future problems
It's about long-term sustainability. They know they'll be out of power soon so they don't give a rat's arse about sustainability.
Yes
I admire your optimism.