Why do British people hate success (wealth) so much....?

It's not hating wealth to give somebody else a chance. If the government needs more revenue, and has to tax more, you tax those that have more, not people struggling as it is. Only a right wing idiot would dress it up as hating wealth. Miliband is right to propose a mansion tax. We cannot be held to ransom by the wealthy. If they leave, don't let the door hit your arse on the way out...

All this talk of a mansion tax has got me thinking.

Is it really fair to have a tax raid on the rich every time we want to fund some pointless public spending program?

The top 25% of earners in the country already pay 90% of the income tax. Any more taxes is simply ludicrous.

To be honest, I think middle and low earners like to say they are "squeezed", but the reality is much different. Some of those people have never had it so good.

What we really need is less government and less attacks on wealth. The 3 main parties are totally out of touch with whats needed, and just pander to the idiots (the electorate) with cheap one liners to maintain their career in politics.

If we carry on like this, we will end up like socialist France. And surely the fate that greeted Greece will be awaiting us.

The successful middle classes in the UK are just looked on as being a cash cow by the government, it allows them to pay for their ego driven schemes and pointless wars. Inheritance tax is already in place to stop huge wealth accumulation over generations. Taxing wealth earned with income which has already been taxed is disgusting, its theft plain and simple. It probably wont even earn much, but socialists love taxes like this as it buys them more votes from the jealous.

You're acting like all they've done to tackle the debt is bother the rich :/ what about the cuts to housing benefit, council tax benefit, lowering housing benefit if you have more rooms than people, the tripling of university fees, getting rid of EMA and adult learning grant.

There's nothing wrong with expecting the rich to contribute as well.

I'm not sure most people who call themselves both successful and middle class also own a 2 milliion quid house, that is a lot, in some parts of the country it's actually quite difficult to find houses for sale at that price sometimes.


To OP, I hope to earn 150k one day, given where I live odds are I won't have a house worth 2 million, but I accept once I get there I will have more than enough money to be able to afford the tax pretty comfortably and am happy to pay it, it's my duty as a citizen. In fact I fully intend to spend my money on significantly more frivolous things as well

did you miss the part which said they pay 90% of all income tax?

So you happy to pay tax on something you already paid tax on before, just so joe bloggs can get a packet of lambett?

Isn't that more a reflection of how low everyone else is earning?

You suggested that we lower taxes for the rich, how do we recuperate that loss of money to fund the public services?

If they leave (like they are in france) then we wont have anyone to fund what we already have.

Only a left wing bigot wont be able to see the deep flaws in their vapid arguments.

I'm not sure most people who call themselves both successful and middle class also own a 2 milliion quid house, that is a lot, in some parts of the country it's actually quite difficult to find houses for sale at that price sometimes.


To OP, I hope to earn 150k one day, given where I live odds are I won't have a house worth 2 million, but I accept once I get there I will have more than enough money to be able to afford the tax pretty comfortably and am happy to pay it, it's my duty as a citizen. In fact I fully intend to spend my money on significantly more frivolous things as well

If they leave (like they are in france) then we wont have anyone to fund what we already have.

Only a left wing bigot wont be able to see the deep flaws in their vapid arguments.

Just because you own a 2 mill house does not mean you have 20k a year sitting around to pay to live in your own house. Council tax already taxes wealth.

Hi sir, see this house you own. You're going to have to pay us 1% of its value to be allowed to live in it, on top off the vast taxes you probably already pay. Oh here are your new neighbours, the durkdurks. Your'e helping to pay for their house because you know, make sure you welcome them to the neighbourhood.

Most rich people don't want to leave Britain - the UK (and especially London) remain a magnet for the foreign wealthy, regardless of changes in tax rates. This is due to the nice, peaceful, well organised atmosphere here compared to many other places, which is in turn maintained by policing, courts, government, etc, all paid for by taxes.

It is a complete myth that the rich are desperate to leave.

The vast majority of people in Britain buy houses with mortgages, the average mortgage is 3.5 times salary, but we'll be generous here as the income needed to purchase such a property will allow you to spend more than the average percentage on repayments so say you borrow 3.5 times household income. That still leaves an income of just 444k, you can probably find 20k from that.

If I own a 2 million quid home I think the odds that there are people living on housing allowance next door are slim, even the Mail has only managed to find that once.