Originally Posted by
Asturias56
"They all keep (net) taxes high" - TBH taxes in the UK have fallen dramatically since 1979 - that's the problem - the spending on pensions, the NHS, schools stays high but the money isn't there so we see the gradual collapse of infrastructure and services
Errrr, no. While the punitive rates of 80% plus on earnings above a certain level may have disappeared (and rightly so), the tax burden is about as high as it's ever been - and incidentally, the majority of income tax is supplied by something like 10% of the population.
When you talk about spending, spending (excluding defence) has generally risen above inflation. What it has not done is maintained ever increasing year on year real-term rises. So it's not that budgets are cut, it's that they don't rise in line with historical demand. The real issue is that demand for health and social care and pensions is essentially unconstrained - something than can never be met with realistic levels of taxation and also something that no polly will willingly admit, because it leads to a debate that the public in general won't like. ie If you want x, y, z services, you Joe Public (and not A.N Other aka "the rich") will have to pay for it. Or you constrain what is provided by the public purse - and that doesn't mean stop Johnny Foreigner from accessing those services, because that wouldn't dent the demand.