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Post by shrewed46 on Feb 16, 2015 15:15:36 GMT 1
The accepted meaning that you reference is for 'tax avoidance schemes' not 'tax avoidance' which is simple English and not an attempt to be technical. If you look at training material for financial planners the most basic part of 'optimising the tax position of the client' lists Isa accounts as "the most basic method to avoid tax on investment income which is applicable to most, if not all, clients." when tax avoidance schemes go wrong ? that is normally because the interpretation of the tax law was incorrect or where HMRC re-write history and go back to clarify what they meant to write in the tax law. As you say, there are grey areas - wrong to suggest that those having to pay late interest charges are doing anything illegal or improper - or even hidden. This is a bit different to the poor persecuted benefit cheats referenced as having the same intent to defraud the nation. Once again Percy you seem to miss the point - Most people do not have financial tax advisors they just aren't beneficial to the average man on the street. Most investors are only interested in the rate of return that is why most of my friends have reduced their ISA's (tax free) to put their money into the Pensioner bonds (taxable) many have also put money into 123 accounts rather than ISA's. Together these investments can total £100,000 what percentage of the population have more than that to invest.
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Post by darkshrew on Feb 16, 2015 15:29:53 GMT 1
And that is the heart of this - for those with more than a couple of million in savings you have to look around to avoid wasting money on tax (which they pay a hell of a lot of already). For those that don't, they think it's unfair that they don't have a tidy nest egg and so want the rich bar stewards to be taxed until they squeal like the rich capitalist pigs they are ?
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Post by neilsalop on Feb 16, 2015 17:01:07 GMT 1
If I'm not mistaken an ISA is offering tax free 'interest'. If I were to have £15,000 hanging around (which I don't) and wanted to put it into an ISA for 12 months paying 1.5% I would get about £225 interest tax free. If I were to put into a regular account paying the same interest rate I would only gain about £170. The difference of about £55 over a year hardly puts me into the Jimmy Carr/ Gary Barlow bracket of tax dodger, let alone the Google/ Amazon/ Vodafone/ Bernie Ecclestone range.
Everyone has avoided tax or aided someone else at some stage, be that bringing over your limit of duty free fags from holiday or paying the garage to fix your car in cash. Unfortunately most of don't have the resources to employ accountants to move our money around through off-shore accounts and have to rely on good old PAYE.
At work we have the option to pay into our pension the old way or through salary sacrifice, which would save me and the company a few quid a year in NI contributions. As far as I know I'm the only one out of several hundred employees to refuse SS, as I believe that my taxes (which NI is) are needed to run the country and personally I think that it is a duty to pay tax. It's a shame that those that have gained most from this country and its cultures and laws seem to think that they owe nothing.
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Post by shrewed46 on Feb 16, 2015 17:05:22 GMT 1
If I'm not mistaken an ISA is offering tax free 'interest'. If I were to have £15,000 hanging around (which I don't) and wanted to put it into an ISA for 12 months paying 1.5% I would get about £225 interest tax free. If I were to put into a regular account paying the same interest rate I would only gain about £170. The difference of about £55 over a year hardly puts me into the Jimmy Carr/ Gary Barlow bracket of tax dodger, let alone the Google/ Amazon/ Vodafone/ Bernie Ecclestone range. There is a regular account that would pay you £360 after tax no need for an ISA.
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Post by neilsalop on Feb 16, 2015 17:15:39 GMT 1
If I'm not mistaken an ISA is offering tax free 'interest'. If I were to have £15,000 hanging around (which I don't) and wanted to put it into an ISA for 12 months paying 1.5% I would get about £225 interest tax free. If I were to put into a regular account paying the same interest rate I would only gain about £170. The difference of about £55 over a year hardly puts me into the Jimmy Carr/ Gary Barlow bracket of tax dodger, let alone the Google/ Amazon/ Vodafone/ Bernie Ecclestone range. There is a regular account that would pay you £360 after tax no need for an ISA. Don't worry about it, at the end of the month I'm lucky to have £15, never mind £15k.
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Post by mattmw on Feb 16, 2015 19:45:43 GMT 1
I'm probably missing something here but for most people paying into an ISA they will already have payed income tax and NI through their wage packet. The tax they are "avoiding" is on interest from the ISA which as others have said is a fairly small amount, so they are still contributing tax through their wage packet to the NHS, roads, welfare etc
Tax Avoidance amongst big business, as I understand it at least, are accounting methods designed to not pay the full rate of tax or indeed any tax at all, which has seen the likes of vodaphone, amazon and Starbucks make millions in this country yet end up paying less than 5% tax, despite benefiting from things payed for through tax like roads, railways and in some cases tax breaks for workers whose pay at these companies isn't enough to live on.
It's just a case of asking these companies to pay their fair share, we're not talking about the 90% tax rates of the 70s
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Post by percy on Feb 16, 2015 22:26:17 GMT 1
Corporate tax issues are a bit off topic and the issue is more the ability of multinationals to move profits around the world to countries like Luxembourg or Eire which attract their head offices with very low tax rates. I think this topic is summed up above quite well - the rich are hacked off because they feel they are paying too much tax to support the Undeserving, whilst the majority are annoyed with the rise for trying to lighten their tax burden by taking advantage of tax law to arrange their finances. Milliband is trying to capitalise on the "bash the rich" sentiment to stir up interest - the right are limp wristed in defending what is perfectly legal because they fear that the common man will not believe / follow it. Why not really tackle the issue - should we have a wealth tax like the French and Spanish ? That would really separate the haves and have nots.
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Post by Deleted on Feb 18, 2015 17:01:15 GMT 1
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Post by SeanBroseley on Feb 21, 2015 1:08:06 GMT 1
The 'ISA's are tax avoidance' line is a right wing trope punted out by w****rs like Peter Hitchens whenever the issue is debated. There's only one flaw in this argument - it's b******s. From HMRC's own literature... Avoidance is exploiting the tax rules to gain a tax advantage that Parliament never intended. It often involves contrived, artificial transactions that serve little or no commercial purpose other than to produce a tax advantage. It involves operating within the letter, but not the spirit of the law. It does not include international tax arrangements such as base erosion and profit shifting (BEPS). Measures for tackling this are overseen by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD). The OECD defines BEPS as tax planning strategies that exploit gaps and mismatches in tax rules to make profits disappear for tax purposes or to shift profits to locations where there is little or no real activity, but the taxes are low resulting in little or no overall corporate tax being paid. Tax avoidance is not the same as legitimate tax planning. Legitimate tax planning involves using tax reliefs for the purpose for which they were intended. For example, claiming tax relief on capital investment, saving in a tax-exempt ISA or saving for retirement by making contributions to a pension scheme are all legitimate forms of tax planning.www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/364009/4382_Measuring_Tax_Gaps_2014_IW_v4B_accessible_20141014.pdfYou avoid tax by investing in an Isa rather than a normal investment account - it is therefore tax avoidance. you avoid IHT by investing in forestry rather than shares - it is tax avoidance. this is the English language. the HMRC literature quoted above re avoidance is somewhat hypocritical and I would suggest written / approved by someone with a political weasel view rather than the actual tax practitioners at HMRC who do not share that view and know that the "loopholes that are unintentional are not that difficult to close quickly. No Percy - it's just that the HMRC website and literature doesn't fit your argument. Your eventual point that there are grey areas caused by misinterpretation/refining/redefining of the law through the courts and HMRC change of policy is nearer the mark. The other one is poor execution. The English language can be used - for whatever motive - to incorrectly conflate ISA subscriptions with tax avoidance schemes, and thereby allow the unwitting reader to assume that both are one and the same. What ShrewsAce quotes here, and the document that I quoted from, accords with my experience of sales pitches of schemes that are, in the parlance, "aggressive".
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Post by atcham jack on Feb 21, 2015 11:15:47 GMT 1
top 3 banks ceo's due bonus's totalling £3.2 million. nice we are all in it together.
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Post by Minormorris64 on Feb 21, 2015 11:19:38 GMT 1
top 3 banks ceo's due bonus's totalling £3.2 million. nice we are all in it together. 50p per person in this Country, is it really worth getting so het up about ?
If you let this sort of stuff worry you too much, you will end up making yourself ill, life's too short as it is.
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Post by shrewed46 on Feb 21, 2015 11:46:37 GMT 1
top 3 banks ceo's due bonus's totalling £3.2 million. nice we are all in it together. 50p per person in this Country, is it really worth getting so het up about ?
If you let this sort of stuff worry you too much, you will end up making yourself ill, life's too short as it is.
If it was just £3.2 million it wouldn't be worth worrying about but the politician that supposedly run this country are dependent on bankers and hedge fund managers to get re-elected. The average family is £1600+ worse off over the last 5 years and that is very worrying.
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Post by percy on Feb 21, 2015 12:33:55 GMT 1
You avoid tax by investing in an Isa rather than a normal investment account - it is therefore tax avoidance. you avoid IHT by investing in forestry rather than shares - it is tax avoidance. this is the English language. the HMRC literature quoted above re avoidance is somewhat hypocritical and I would suggest written / approved by someone with a political weasel view rather than the actual tax practitioners at HMRC who do not share that view and know that the "loopholes that are unintentional are not that difficult to close quickly. No Percy - it's just that the HMRC website and literature doesn't fit your argument. Your eventual point that there are grey areas caused by misinterpretation/refining/redefining of the law through the courts and HMRC change of policy is nearer the mark. The other one is poor execution. The English language can be used - for whatever motive - to incorrectly conflate ISA subscriptions with tax avoidance schemes, and thereby allow the unwitting reader to assume that both are one and the same. What ShrewsAce quotes here, and the document that I quoted from, accords with my experience of sales pitches of schemes that are, in the parlance, "aggressive". I hear what you are saying, but it is simply not correct to say that there is a clear dividing line that separates tax avoidance schemes in the minds of the wider public and "vanilla" tax avoidance to coin a phrase. It's also not correct to imply that tax avoidance is in some way dodgy or illegal - it is simply not by definition. To say that investing in an ISA does not avoid tax on the interest income is not correct, it is a feature of the product and I'd class it as vanilla tax avoidance. To say that my estate will not avoid IHT from PETs I have made is not correct - am I in a tax avoidance scheme or vanilla ? My investment in forestry avoids both IHT and income tax on the sale of the timber - is that a tax avoidance scheme or vanilla ? My earnings from foreign directorships avoids income tax until I bring them onshore - is that a tax avoidance scheme or vanilla ? My pension is domiciled offshore to avoid the pension scheme cap in the uk - is that a tax avoidance scheme or vanilla, it certainly avoids income tax and I imagine it will be stamped upon at some point ? All are above board and perfectly legal done in full sight of HMRC - they may not be publicised and accessible to all like an ISA is and I'm sure that some would class them as tax avoidance schemes - but they are NOT - schemes are tax avoidance methods that are under investigation and they are clear to all just like the rules on ISA accounts are. If rules are changed / clarified (even retrospectively which I think is unfair) then it is no big deal and everyone accepts it as tax risk.
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Post by Minormorris64 on Feb 21, 2015 12:58:34 GMT 1
50p per person in this Country, is it really worth getting so het up about ?
If you let this sort of stuff worry you too much, you will end up making yourself ill, life's too short as it is.
If it was just £3.2 million it wouldn't be worth worrying about but the politician that supposedly run this country are dependent on bankers and hedge fund managers to get re-elected. The average family is £1600+ worse off over the last 5 years and that is very worrying. I really would like to see a breakdown of the £1600 A YEAR that all of our average families are allegedly worse off by ?, that millipede keeps bleating on about.
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Post by percy on Feb 21, 2015 13:30:15 GMT 1
top 3 banks ceo's due bonus's totalling £3.2 million. nice we are all in it together. Or the story could be "The banks that the taxpayer bailed out (RBS and LTSB) cut bonuses again in 2014" - really depends on the message you want to give doesn't it.
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Post by shrewed46 on Feb 21, 2015 13:47:15 GMT 1
If it was just £3.2 million it wouldn't be worth worrying about but the politician that supposedly run this country are dependent on bankers and hedge fund managers to get re-elected. The average family is £1600+ worse off over the last 5 years and that is very worrying. I really would like to see a breakdown of the £1600 A YEAR that all of our average families are allegedly worse off by ?, that millipede keeps bleating on about. For the record it is £1600 over the last 5 years not A YEAR. As these figures are confirmed by the IFS Institute of Fiscal Studies that might convince you that Cameron has hit the average man in the street so that he can help his hedge fund backers and millionaires. www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/2014/01/22/uk-1600-cost-living_n_4644143.html
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Post by Deleted on Feb 21, 2015 14:09:13 GMT 1
top 3 banks ceo's due bonus's totalling £3.2 million. nice we are all in it together. 50p per person in this Country, is it really worth getting so het up about ?] What an utterly bizzare statement to come out with! Do you apply the same logic to the benefit cheat up the road who has scanked £5000 in housing benefit he wasn't entitled to? After all that's fractions of a penny per person in this country. Is it really worth getting het up about?
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Post by percy on Feb 21, 2015 14:31:45 GMT 1
I'm not sure that the size of the bank ceo bonuses is worth focussing on as compared to others, for example the Goldman Sachs bonuses, they are quite frankly small in the context of the city.
The real issue is the widening gap between the lowest and the highest salaries which goes unchecked and the lack of opportunities for state educated people - it is becoming a real issue not just in banking but across all industries.
Just look around at the new non-proprietory board members in the FTSE 100 and the partners in legal and accounting practice, there are none aged below 40 who came from state schools. I know that there is no way I could have the career that I have had if I was starting out today as I did not go to the right school to have a CV that will be considered - I'm desperate to recruit non-public school background staff but the quality just isn't there any more.
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Post by Deleted on Feb 23, 2015 14:16:53 GMT 1
Head of HSBC using a Panama registered company to keep his bonus offshaw and under the radar.
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Post by shrewed46 on Feb 26, 2015 16:04:52 GMT 1
And now the Queen's bank Coutts, part of RBS, 85% owned by the taxpayers, is being investigated by the German authorities over tax evasion advice
Surely now even Cameron and Osborne must realise that capitalism isn't working.
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Post by Minormorris64 on Feb 26, 2015 16:19:11 GMT 1
I really would like to see a breakdown of the £1600 A YEAR that all of our average families are allegedly worse off by ?, that millipede keeps bleating on about. For the record it is £1600 over the last 5 years not A YEAR. As these figures are confirmed by the IFS Institute of Fiscal Studies that might convince you that Cameron has hit the average man in the street so that he can help his hedge fund backers and millionaires. www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/2014/01/22/uk-1600-cost-living_n_4644143.htmlNot something that Millipede puts over clearly, the way he spouts it comes over as per year but hey ho.
So £1600 over 5 years = 88p a day, doesn't sound so grand then does it ?
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Post by Minormorris64 on Feb 26, 2015 16:24:22 GMT 1
I'm not sure that the size of the bank ceo bonuses is worth focussing on as compared to others, for example the Goldman Sachs bonuses, they are quite frankly small in the context of the city. The real issue is the widening gap between the lowest and the highest salaries which goes unchecked and the lack of opportunities for state educated people - it is becoming a real issue not just in banking but across all industries. Just look around at the new non-proprietory board members in the FTSE 100 and the partners in legal and accounting practice, there are none aged below 40 who came from state schools. I know that there is no way I could have the career that I have had if I was starting out today as I did not go to the right school to have a CV that will be considered - I'm desperate to recruit non-public school background staff but the quality just isn't there any more.
Minimum wage £6.50 x Basic 40 hour week =£260 x 52 = annual gross earnings of £13520
Wayne Rooney £300,000 per week = annual gross pay pf £15,600,000
A multiple of 1153.846, I couldn't agree more, the difference between the top and the bottom is outrageous
Average pay of a premiers**te player (Deloitte report) =£31,500 per week = annual gross pay of £1,638,000
A multiple of 121.15384 , shocking enough as well
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Post by venceremos on Feb 26, 2015 16:31:23 GMT 1
Not something that Millipede puts over clearly, the way he spouts it comes over as per year but hey ho.
So £1600 over 5 years = 88p a day, doesn't sound so grand then does it ?
Are you seriously claiming that the ability to divide one big number by another big number to produce an inconsequential number somehow makes the whole topic immaterial? That's a get out of jail card (not literally) for every fraudulent benefit claim, every theft, every ponzi scheme - jeez, be serious!
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Post by shrewed46 on Feb 26, 2015 16:38:46 GMT 1
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Post by venceremos on Feb 26, 2015 17:11:10 GMT 1
I'm not sure that the size of the bank ceo bonuses is worth focussing on as compared to others, for example the Goldman Sachs bonuses, they are quite frankly small in the context of the city. The real issue is the widening gap between the lowest and the highest salaries which goes unchecked and the lack of opportunities for state educated people - it is becoming a real issue not just in banking but across all industries. Just look around at the new non-proprietory board members in the FTSE 100 and the partners in legal and accounting practice, there are none aged below 40 who came from state schools. I know that there is no way I could have the career that I have had if I was starting out today as I did not go to the right school to have a CV that will be considered - I'm desperate to recruit non-public school background staff but the quality just isn't there any more.
Minimum wage £6.50 x Basic 40 hour week =£260 x 52 = annual gross earnings of £13520
Wayne Rooney £300,000 per week = annual gross pay pf £15,600,000
A multiple of 1153.846, I couldn't agree more, the difference between the top and the bottom is outrageous
Average pay of a premiers**** player (Deloitte report) =£31,500 per week = annual gross pay of £1,638,000
A multiple of 121.15384 , shocking enough as well
By your early reasoning, the entire cost of the new Premier League TV deal is only 21p per person, per day. That'll cover all these outrageously high salaries. Doesn't seem much when you put it like that, but then what would? One number that doesn't easily shrink is the £27,000 that every household in the country could have received as an alternative to the amount the UK paid bailing out the banks. It's arguable it would have had a more beneficial effect on the economy, given the increased spending power we'd all have had, rather than the weakest recovery from recession in history that we're now "enjoying". It would certainly have resulted in far less inequality the bail out and QE have produced.
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Post by Minormorris64 on Feb 26, 2015 17:18:04 GMT 1
Okay lets say no Banks had been bailed out and then on the particular day when the $hit hit the fan, that people went to ATM's and none were dispensing money, I'm sure that would have gone down really well ?
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Post by venceremos on Feb 26, 2015 17:29:30 GMT 1
No Percy - it's just that the HMRC website and literature doesn't fit your argument. Your eventual point that there are grey areas caused by misinterpretation/refining/redefining of the law through the courts and HMRC change of policy is nearer the mark. The other one is poor execution. The English language can be used - for whatever motive - to incorrectly conflate ISA subscriptions with tax avoidance schemes, and thereby allow the unwitting reader to assume that both are one and the same. What ShrewsAce quotes here, and the document that I quoted from, accords with my experience of sales pitches of schemes that are, in the parlance, "aggressive". I hear what you are saying, but it is simply not correct to say that there is a clear dividing line that separates tax avoidance schemes in the minds of the wider public and "vanilla" tax avoidance to coin a phrase. It's also not correct to imply that tax avoidance is in some way dodgy or illegal - it is simply not by definition. To say that investing in an ISA does not avoid tax on the interest income is not correct, it is a feature of the product and I'd class it as vanilla tax avoidance. To say that my estate will not avoid IHT from PETs I have made is not correct - am I in a tax avoidance scheme or vanilla ? My investment in forestry avoids both IHT and income tax on the sale of the timber - is that a tax avoidance scheme or vanilla ? My earnings from foreign directorships avoids income tax until I bring them onshore - is that a tax avoidance scheme or vanilla ? My pension is domiciled offshore to avoid the pension scheme cap in the uk - is that a tax avoidance scheme or vanilla, it certainly avoids income tax and I imagine it will be stamped upon at some point ? All are above board and perfectly legal done in full sight of HMRC - they may not be publicised and accessible to all like an ISA is and I'm sure that some would class them as tax avoidance schemes - but they are NOT - schemes are tax avoidance methods that are under investigation and they are clear to all just like the rules on ISA accounts are. If rules are changed / clarified (even retrospectively which I think is unfair) then it is no big deal and everyone accepts it as tax risk. That list merits a response, percy. PETs are really potentially taxable, as you have to survive at least 3 years before any tax is avoided and 7 years to avoid it all. They were established specifically by law which, in my book, means they can't be classed as tax avoidance. It's simply tax planning. Forestry - similar. The tax code sets out a special tax treatment. Parliament intended it to be taxed in that way, so not avoidance. Foreign earnings are taxable in the UK if you're resident here, otherwise it's evasion, not avoidance. If you're not domiciled here you can pay £30k (or £50k) per year to apply the remittance basis and then only pay UK tax on amounts brought into the UK (not necessarily as cash, using the offshore money to pay for a holiday or credit card bill or buying an asset from it and bringing it to the UK would be taxable remittances). So that's not an avoidance scheme, again it's tax planning. Offshore pension - that's tax avoidance. The law permits it, so no reason not to do it, but the law doesn't specifically create the opportunity. I'd define tax avoidance as a scheme (which might be simple or complex) that sets out to interpret tax law so as to reduce tax. "Vanilla" tax avoidance just describes the lowest risk schemes, such as the simpler film scheme arrangements that were intended by Parliament to enable tax to be deferred so as to encourage investment in the UK film industry. The more complex schemes, such as that which recently failed in the Court of Appeal, seek to exploit the relief further than Parliament intended. I agree that a tax avoidance scheme isn't illegal until the courts decide that it is, or Parliament changes the law to make it so. But it's absurd to compare that to the use of a specific measure set out in statutory tax law and thus not requiring court interpretation. I can understand why tax evaders/avoiders would throw up that smokescreen to confuse the issue though - "hey, we're all doing it, so why make a fuss about it!?" Not true.
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Post by atcham jack on Feb 26, 2015 17:53:33 GMT 1
RBS loses £3.4 bn for 2014, an improvement on £9bn loss for 2013. expect big bonuses for this improvement
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Post by percy on Feb 27, 2015 9:41:48 GMT 1
I hear what you are saying, but it is simply not correct to say that there is a clear dividing line that separates tax avoidance schemes in the minds of the wider public and "vanilla" tax avoidance to coin a phrase. It's also not correct to imply that tax avoidance is in some way dodgy or illegal - it is simply not by definition. To say that investing in an ISA does not avoid tax on the interest income is not correct, it is a feature of the product and I'd class it as vanilla tax avoidance. To say that my estate will not avoid IHT from PETs I have made is not correct - am I in a tax avoidance scheme or vanilla ? My investment in forestry avoids both IHT and income tax on the sale of the timber - is that a tax avoidance scheme or vanilla ? My earnings from foreign directorships avoids income tax until I bring them onshore - is that a tax avoidance scheme or vanilla ? My pension is domiciled offshore to avoid the pension scheme cap in the uk - is that a tax avoidance scheme or vanilla, it certainly avoids income tax and I imagine it will be stamped upon at some point ? All are above board and perfectly legal done in full sight of HMRC - they may not be publicised and accessible to all like an ISA is and I'm sure that some would class them as tax avoidance schemes - but they are NOT - schemes are tax avoidance methods that are under investigation and they are clear to all just like the rules on ISA accounts are. If rules are changed / clarified (even retrospectively which I think is unfair) then it is no big deal and everyone accepts it as tax risk. That list merits a response, percy. PETs are really potentially taxable, as you have to survive at least 3 years before any tax is avoided and 7 years to avoid it all. They were established specifically by law which, in my book, means they can't be classed as tax avoidance. It's simply tax planning. Forestry - similar. The tax code sets out a special tax treatment. Parliament intended it to be taxed in that way, so not avoidance. Foreign earnings are taxable in the UK if you're resident here, otherwise it's evasion, not avoidance. If you're not domiciled here you can pay £30k (or £50k) per year to apply the remittance basis and then only pay UK tax on amounts brought into the UK (not necessarily as cash, using the offshore money to pay for a holiday or credit card bill or buying an asset from it and bringing it to the UK would be taxable remittances). So that's not an avoidance scheme, again it's tax planning. Offshore pension - that's tax avoidance. The law permits it, so no reason not to do it, but the law doesn't specifically create the opportunity. I'd define tax avoidance as a scheme (which might be simple or complex) that sets out to interpret tax law so as to reduce tax. "Vanilla" tax avoidance just describes the lowest risk schemes, such as the simpler film scheme arrangements that were intended by Parliament to enable tax to be deferred so as to encourage investment in the UK film industry. The more complex schemes, such as that which recently failed in the Court of Appeal, seek to exploit the relief further than Parliament intended. I agree that a tax avoidance scheme isn't illegal until the courts decide that it is, or Parliament changes the law to make it so. But it's absurd to compare that to the use of a specific measure set out in statutory tax law and thus not requiring court interpretation. I can understand why tax evaders/avoiders would throw up that smokescreen to confuse the issue though - "hey, we're all doing it, so why make a fuss about it!?" Not true. Yes - I know how it works and I am fortunate that I am able to dable in tax planning to avoid UK tax and yes that includes playing with residency status which is increasingly common in global groups - a point that the UK benefits from at the moment with very low social taxes. My point is, and has always been, that tax avoidance is not illegal, immoral or anti-UK. The politicians and posters here who constantly reference it along with evasion are simply seeking to "bash the rich" creating a common focus for vilification for political gain. If we were targetting any other minority with such enthusiasm the PC brigade would be in uproar. Bashing the rich may be good sport, but when countries like Portugal are offering 10% flat rate income tax for 10 years if you relocate there it is a dangerous game to play.
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Post by Deleted on Feb 27, 2015 16:19:06 GMT 1
Not sure what premierleague footballers and their wages has to do with the increasing inequality in society. I am more concerned with the lobbying that goes on on behalf of large multinational organisations, the movin of money internationally and the spiel that comes out of the CBI about government taxation and making the UK an attractive place to do business. All the time these organisations sit on billions of ££££/$$$$, they refuse to invest, they buy back their own shares to boost their share price which boosts the bonus payments to those at the top whilst the suppress that salaries of their own work force.
Also all regulated UK accounts are safeguard upto £85K. The real losers had the banks gone under would not be regular savers and normal folk. You honestly believe that the the Greeks, Spannish and Irish population have benefited through the national bail outs of their banking system?
I see Iceland stuck two fingers up to the international community and as an economy and society appear to have been recovering far more efficiently and smoothly than the rest of us.
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