(no subject)

[andrewducker]

I'm quite remarkably fed up with people claiming that Labour and the Conservatives are exactly the same.  Here are some interesting figures from The Guardian which show how they quite definitely aren't...

The actions of this Robin Hood Chancellor have certainly benefited poorer Britons at the expense of the rich. The calculations of the Institute for Fiscal Studies - the respected independent think tank - have shown that Brown's measures have cost the richest tenth of the population around 3.4 per cent of their houeshold's disposable income, or around £1,600 per year.

The poorest third of the population have seen their income increase by between 12 and 15 per cent as a result of measures directly attributable to Gordon Brown's Budgets. In cash terms, this has meant a gain of about £1,000 per year.

Because even the 'almost very rich' - the second richest tenth of the population - have been relatively unscathed by our fearless fiscal outlaw, losing out to the tune of around £312 per year.

'Pensioners, and families with children, are the biggest gainers from the Brown years, especially those on lower incomes,' says Wakefield.

Non-earning couples with children have been the biggest winners from Brown's package of tax credits, gaining about £2,600 over the course of a year. Single parents have hauled in just under £1,500 because of Brown's measures, and pensioners just over £1,000.

The redistributive pattern is echoed in property taxes.

The latest IFS figures show that, of the £1.2 billion extra raised by the Chancellor's overall changes to stamp duty, £825 million has been paid by the richest 30 per cent of the population. About £450m is attributable to the richest tenth.

Most of this redistribution has been done without ever registering in the threatened tax revolt from 'middle Britain'.

Those concerns have instead coalesced around fiscal drag - the rapid acceleration in the number of people paying the 40p rate of tax. When Brown came to office there were just over two million higher-rate taxpayers. Today there are 3.25 million - an increase of 9 per cent per year over the seven years of Brown's chancellorship.

But defining a higher-rate taxpayer as 'middle Britain' is a bit like saying that Canary Wharf is an average tower block.

'Higher-rate taxpayers do not generally come from the middle of the income distribution, but are drawn almost exclusively from the top third, and mainly from the richest tenth,' points out Wakefield.

Comments

[bohemiancoast.livejournal.com]

They're very, very redistributive. They're also very quiet about the fact that they're very redistributive, as if it were somehow unpopular or vote-losing. They've also restructured the tax and benefits systems in a way that facilitates further redistribution. In 1997, it was actually quite hard to give money to poor families in a way that didn't also give money to rich people, or harm work incentives. Result, a huge improvement in the rate of child poverty (from terrible to merely bad). Child poverty is pretty much a key to everything -- because poor children do much worse in school, have bad health, and are much more likely to become disruptive teenagers who steal and destroy things. But it's hard for governments to tackle because you don't see the benefits for years and years.