So I’ve filled in my tax return and due to selling some shares etc I have a fairly hefty whack of money to pay. No problem, I’ve got it, happy (as you can be) to pay out so someone else can benefit from my luck too. Around the time I made the sale, I had a conversation with a friend about what level would it take for people to reach a point where you’d consider trying to avoid or evade tax that you reasonably owe.

For my level, I honestly couldn’t work out a time when I’d do it. My personal morals make me feel that people less fortunately should be supported by those of us who’ve earned. Yes it’s MY money but I don’t feel bad about handing a portion of it over.

For the record, my friend said that once the tax payment was over 250k, they’d be looking for some legal route to lower their payment.

So, over to the STW hive-mind. Do we approve, is there a level where you feel it’s acceptable to short change the taxman?

I had a conversation with a friend about what level would it take for people to reach a point where you’d consider trying to avoid or evade tax that you reasonably owe.

At the end of the day, aren’t you just cheating yourself?

I’d argue it depends how much money you’re talking about. I’m pretty sure I’d get a bigger slice of what I’ve just paid out if I kept it all than by paying it to the government, especially as I now live abroad. However, that’s not how it works for me so I’m happy (again, ISH) passing it along.

You must have done OK on the share sale if you’ve exceeded your CGT allowance for the year 🙂

I’d argue it depends how much money you’re talking about.

I think I’d disagree, I’d be more than happy paying 500k tax per year. When we get to larger amounts it simply becomes a game. Several years ago I was the beneficiary of a foreign salary with the choice of paying UK tax or spending more time abroad. More time was spent abroad whether it was wanted or not.

People are weird about tax tbh. I used to work in sales in a bank, and I’d have people in front of me with a few grand in a terrible savings account, refusing to upgrade the account because they “don’t want to pay more tax”- even though o’course they’d get more interest back, and actually come away better off

So, just do what feels right for you, even if it’s irrational you’ll not be alone.

(personally, I can’t understand why people would be happy to pay full tax when they have a relatively small amount of money, and would then start to fight against it when they have more… Seems absolutely backwards, if you’re ever going to try to save tax surely it should be when you have less money not more?)

As another moral person, I say only pay the absolute mimimum you can legally get away with. The reason I now take this stand is that after paying all my taxes all my working life when I needed the help every obstacle has been placed in my way whilst millions live ln benifits.

Never going to happen but if everyone paid all they owed then taxes could be lower.

Not for me. Even though my last couple of years trading have been falling off a cliff and I’m making hardly anything after expenses, I don’t mind paying it. A few years earlier when I was making good money I just put some aside for tax and paid like I should.
One of my best mates has done exceptionally well for himself and moved the family to Monaco – he’s done everything by the (inland revenue) book and severed all ties with the UK, so he’s not broken the law but he has saved a shed load of money.
The the people inbetween, such as a certain football manager in the news right now, who think they can break the law are the ones with few morals.

For the record, my friend said that once the tax payment was over 250k, they’d be looking for some legal route to lower their payment.

Really? they’d pay 1/4 million pounds in tax BEFORE looking to lower their payment by a LEGAL route? So they wouldn’t be claiming tax relief on pensions, legit expenses, investment losses etc? I assume he’s never used bike to work, childcare vouchers etc either?

Does he mean before moving from legit tax avoidance (which is often designed to encourage sensible (for the country) behaviour like saving for pensions and investment in small companies) to dodgy tax evasion.

Any saving from more creative/complex tax avoidance has to justify the cost of expert accounting/legal advice, set up costs for any scheme, and the risk that a loophole may be closed after you’ve invested in working out a “scam”, as well as the possible inconvenience and expense that a tax investigation would entail, not to mention the chance of having to pay any money, plus penalty etc…

As well as helping people less fortunate than you, just remember that some of the tax you pay will go to support corrupt politicians and their false expenses claims etc etc.

Be happy

I’ve got it, happy (as you can be) to pay out so someone else can benefit from my luck too.

I’ve seen some naive comments on this site in the past, but this probably takes the prize…

For me, I am prepared to pay no more than the absolute minimum – as per the law.

It becomes Immoral when you pay below the basic paye rate of 25%, your taxes btw are not for some less fortunates, they pay for the infrastrucure that allowed you to make money in the first place.

Tony Blair for instance has paid 2% on the 12 million he earnt this year , which just supports the view he is a lying ****.

Warren Buffett conversly often points out the absurdity of his own meagre tax bill in comparison to his employees.

Just put crankbrat into his cot given that I owe his very existence to the tax funded NHS I would never avoid tax and would happily pay more. I’d also be happy to see Blair deprived of his ill gotten gains.

IanW – Basic rate of income tax is 20% not 25%.

As I read the story, Tony’s companies had INCOME of £12 million, but they didn’t make profit of £12 million. Tax is only ever payable on profit – there is a question of how his accountants have calculated the profit he did make, but it wouldn’t be absurd for a company to turnover £12m and only make about £1m of tax. The tax the companies did pay was at the corporate rate of 28%. It stuck me as a “non story” at the time, unless there is any evidence that the costs were not genuine – of course it all depends if you are trying to fill newspapers or not.

It does amuse me that some of the folk on here who think its acceptable to avoid tax also complain about the service that tax pays for

Here we go then.

Basset hounds running are amazing

Thread killerz, this could have been a viable alternative to Top Gear or the Top Gear thread.

TandemJeremy – Member

It does amuse me that some of the folk on here who think its acceptable to avoid tax also complain about the service that tax pays for

Perfectly coherent viewpoint tbh… Not one I agree with, but naturally people who think they don’t get a good service are less inclined to pay for it.

Also I would return those dogs to the shop, obviously defective.

You couldn’t possibly get away with dodging any tax- there’s a bit on the self assessment return asking if you take part in any tax avoidance schemes.. Brilliant!

I’d work to pay as little tax as legally possible. Nothing morally wrong with taking advantage of the tax relief available to you.

TJ – It does amuse me that some of the folk on here who think its acceptable to avoid tax also complain about the service that tax pays for

I rarely see people on here moaning about public services but I don’t read every thread, so maybe I am missing it. Not sure why you think those views are any different from society in general though!

Personally I don’t see your issue. If the system is set up to encourage (particularly high earning) people to avoid tax then if you are can avoid tax and don’t you are merely subsidising the other tax payers who do minimise their liabilities. I will take any easy steps I can to reduce my liability but actually believe tax needs to go up – but why would I elect to pay more than I need to when others will not? (You won’t be pleased to hear that I think it is basic level of income tax which needs to increase not simply taxing the highest earners).

I also think that the tax system is far too complicated and would welcome a much simpler approach – but until they do I’m not going to pay more than my “fair” share (as defined by tax law, rather than anyone else).

I suppose the point really is at what point would you bother paying an expert to look for loopholes or whatever. I would have been liable for some CGT a few years ago but was able to offset it against a capital loss a few years previously. Nothing wrong with that right? Just filled in the right bits on my tax return.

Do all higher tax payers here declare all the interest they’ve been paid that has only had basic rate tax paid on it? Maybe many don’t realise they have to?

It does amuse me that some of the folk on here who think its acceptable to avoid tax also complain about the service that tax pays for

Or put another way it seems perfectly sensible to me that folk on here who have had terrible service / experience of the public sector aren’t overly happy to keep handing over large chunks of their earnings.

Two sides for every argument.

As someone above pointed out every time I could have done with some help none has been forthcoming. In fact last time I was made redundant in September the job centre guy told me I would be a ‘light touch client’ as there wasn’t much they could do for me, lucky I got off my backside and found a job myself then.

I’d also be happy to pay my taxes if I thought they were consistent and fair. For example when my wife was out of work for a year she wasn’t entitled to any benefits except JSA (nothing wrong with that in principle) but then I couldn’t use her tax allowance. On the one hand the tax system treats married people as one entity and then as individuals when it suits, it’s not consistent.

I’ve seen some naive comments on this site in the past, but this probably takes the prize…

For me, I am prepared to pay no more than the absolute minimum – as per the law.

Yes, and that’s what I did. I took advice and the advice was “unless you want to do something that is dodgy or on the edge of it, pay the lot” so I did. There’s nothing naive about it. Yes, I could have been more creative but I have a spectacularly straightforward tax profile.

Other people who invested more and made more have done a number of slightly dodgy things and one person did something really quite dodgy but believes the VERY expensive accountants/tax consultants that advised him. That said, he’s paranoid about being caught even though he has the money to pay (although maybe not a fine too).

You couldn’t possibly get away with dodging any tax- there’s a bit on the self assessment return asking if you take part in any tax avoidance schemes.. Brilliant!

Tax avoidance schemes are perfectly legal

Or put another way it seems perfectly sensible to me that folk on here who have had terrible service / experience of the public sector aren’t overly happy to keep handing over large chunks of their earnings.

But that doesn’t make much sense. In what way do you think removing funding from public services would make them improve?

For example when my wife was out of work for a year she wasn’t entitled to any benefits except JSA (nothing wrong with that in principle) but then I couldn’t use her tax allowance.

Could you ever do that? Seems a bit cheeky to me.

Ironically TJ’s contribution to the upkeep of our great country equates to less than most on here, yet he still uses exactly the same services.

For example when my wife was out of work for a year she wasn’t entitled to any benefits except JSA (nothing wrong with that in principle) but then I couldn’t use her tax allowance.

My wife has been out of work for 24 years
They must owe me an awful lot if that were the case

Ironically TJ’s contribution to the upkeep of our great country equates to less than most on here, yet he still uses exactly the same services.

No he doesn’t.

RichPenny, yes you used to be able to do that, regardless it is isn’t consistent to treat married people as one when it comes to assessing benefit entitlement and then seperately when assessing tax. Two households earning £ 40k, household one has two people earning £ 20k each, household 2 has one person earning £ 40k, household 2 pays more tax, why?

But that doesn’t make much sense. In what way do you think removing funding from public services would make them improve?

Makes perfect sense, you wouldn’t offer a shop or other private business more money after you got poor service from them, quite the reverse. A lot more money got pumped into public services over the last decade and from my experience the service levels have hardly improved. As far as I’m concerned unless there is a massive shift in culture in the public sector towards focusing on the ‘customers’ rather than being run for the benefit of the staff I’m happy to pay less tax (to cover those who are on lower incomes) and pay for services like health care myself. Not a popular viewpoint, let the outraged left wing flaming commence.

Jota180.. I was not aware that was the case.. How’s that then?
I obviously pay nowhere near enough to need to know about things like that!!

In your example, your wife was assessed as an individual for JSA? And then as an individual for tax purposes? One of those benefits you, the other doesn’t. If you got your wish and all benefits were means tested on household income then might you not be worse off?

See now I understand what you mean about the NHS. What you mean is that you’re happy for the service to get worse, as long as you don’t have to use it? Nice 🙁 BTW, I’d have a look at that thread about German Healthcare if I were you.

Ironically TJ’s contribution to the upkeep of our great country equates to less than most on here, yet he still uses exactly the same services.

that would be a life spent in public service.

that would be a life spent in public service.

See that > .

…world’s smallest violin…
😉

that would be a life spent in public service

I think some of my taxes should go to organise you a parade 😉

Well said earbyphil. I got no help when i really needed it.

I ain’t looking for sympathy or praise – just to point out that there is more to contributing to the country than paying taxes.