Tax Made Simple
I was, as you probably know, brought up on a diet of near-constant politics with Communist meetings in the house and strange people greeting me with "Hello, Little Comrade".
The result of all this was a lifelong (well, so far) lack of interest in party politics.
But I thought I'd better explain to a waiting world all about Gordon Brown's proposed tax rise for the rich.
From next April anyone earning over £150,000 a year will have to pay 50% tax.
There are four views on this and here's what they are:
1) Anyone who earns less than this, and knows they're never going to earn as much as this, thinks "Rich bastards! Seventy-five grand a year's plenty to live on and they probably got it by crooked means anyway. Excellent! Let them make a proper contribution to everything."
2) Anyone who earns less than this, but hopes they might one day get to a hundred and fifty grand a year or even more, thinks "Those people got there by their own hard work! Everyone has the opportunity to succeed and if they do they shouldn't be penalised by these huge taxes."
3) Anyone who earns a hundred and fifty grand a year or more thinks "It's not fair! I've worked hard for this lifestyle, I deserve it and if those lazy people at the bottom of the heap are critical of me, well they should pull their fingers out and work harder."
4) Anyone who doesn't exactly earn a hundred and fifty grand a year, but who just happens to have it because their family is very, very rich, thinks "I've no idea who Gordon Brown is and now I'm going out to talk to the horses. Yah!"
If you have any doubt about which category fits you, here's something that might help you to make up your mind.
Remember Tracey Emin? Heroine of the Britart movement, she of the perennially sulky expression? - No?
Well, she's the one who exhibited her unmade bed to show us that, according to the picture of it that I've linked to, "she's as insecure and imperfect as the rest of the world".
D'you know what, Tracey? I don't care! From time to time she produces some adolescent-type badly-written diary saying what a bad time she had as a teenager - -as opposed to every other teenager who had the best time of their lives. Stunningly ground-breaking, eh?
Quite why she's so famous - or so rich - I don't really know. My rough test for Art, even if I don't like it, is "put it in a field and see if it still looks like Art". Does the unmade bed? - - Er - - no.
If Gordon Brown brings in this new tax rate, she says, Ms Emin's seriously considering leaving Britain.
So, whatever you think about the new tax rate, it's not all bad then.
The result of all this was a lifelong (well, so far) lack of interest in party politics.
But I thought I'd better explain to a waiting world all about Gordon Brown's proposed tax rise for the rich.
From next April anyone earning over £150,000 a year will have to pay 50% tax.
There are four views on this and here's what they are:
1) Anyone who earns less than this, and knows they're never going to earn as much as this, thinks "Rich bastards! Seventy-five grand a year's plenty to live on and they probably got it by crooked means anyway. Excellent! Let them make a proper contribution to everything."
2) Anyone who earns less than this, but hopes they might one day get to a hundred and fifty grand a year or even more, thinks "Those people got there by their own hard work! Everyone has the opportunity to succeed and if they do they shouldn't be penalised by these huge taxes."
3) Anyone who earns a hundred and fifty grand a year or more thinks "It's not fair! I've worked hard for this lifestyle, I deserve it and if those lazy people at the bottom of the heap are critical of me, well they should pull their fingers out and work harder."
4) Anyone who doesn't exactly earn a hundred and fifty grand a year, but who just happens to have it because their family is very, very rich, thinks "I've no idea who Gordon Brown is and now I'm going out to talk to the horses. Yah!"
If you have any doubt about which category fits you, here's something that might help you to make up your mind.
Remember Tracey Emin? Heroine of the Britart movement, she of the perennially sulky expression? - No?
Well, she's the one who exhibited her unmade bed to show us that, according to the picture of it that I've linked to, "she's as insecure and imperfect as the rest of the world".
D'you know what, Tracey? I don't care! From time to time she produces some adolescent-type badly-written diary saying what a bad time she had as a teenager - -as opposed to every other teenager who had the best time of their lives. Stunningly ground-breaking, eh?
Quite why she's so famous - or so rich - I don't really know. My rough test for Art, even if I don't like it, is "put it in a field and see if it still looks like Art". Does the unmade bed? - - Er - - no.
If Gordon Brown brings in this new tax rate, she says, Ms Emin's seriously considering leaving Britain.
So, whatever you think about the new tax rate, it's not all bad then.
posted by Daphne at 5:57 pm
4 Comments:
That last bit actually made me laugh out loud :D
So who would miss her? The taxman and the pretencious!Art is not an never has been an unmade bed even though it would be nice sometimes to think so when time's pressing.Glad to get that off my chest,thank you for your blog,great refreshment!
Pretencious doesn't look right,correct me someone!
Kim - thank you! Glad you enjoyed my little rant.
Goosebreeder - thank you for coming back to my blog and I hope all's well in your distant (from here) part of the world! The spelling is "pretentious" since you asked - but spelling mistakes don't matter - comments do, thank you!
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