Citizen's wage – a proposal

[littlebabyjesus]

A subject broached on many occasions on here. The following, it seems to me, would be the right way to implement it:


It is administered fully through the already existing income tax system. NI would be fully combined with income tax and personal allowances abolished.

So:

Let us say that the level agreed is £100 per week.

Let us also say that the new basic rate of tax (incorporating the now defunct NI) is 40%.


Someone earning nothing is paid by the tax office £100 per week

Someone earning £100 per week is paid by the tax office £60 per week

Earn £200 per week, and you are paid £20

Earn £250 per week, and you receive/pay nothing

Earn £400 per week, and you pay £60 in tax

Earn £800 per week, and you pay £220 in tax

At this point, the rate of tax increases to 60%, so

Earn £1,000 per week, and you pay £340 in tax

etc


A simple system. Easy and cheap to administer. 100% take-up. Never any marginal anomalies – even if you just take one day's work for £40, you'll be £24 better off than not taking it. Never regressive as the link to ability to pay is always there – in fact, as my illustration shows, it is very progressive.

Plus you get all the advantages of abolishing the dole and the billions it costs to administer, forcing employers to make employment more attractive, increased security, etc.


Objections?

 

[mentalchik]

Am i to assume you would be abolishing tax credits etc ?

If you did under your system i would be worse off than i am now !

 

[weepiper]

Am i to assume you would be abolishing tax credits etc ?

If you did under your system i would be worse off than i am now !

and me, considerably so.

 

[littlebabyjesus]

Why do you get tax credits? For children, I presume.

There would be a separate system of allowances for children – you could have a separate children's citizen's wage that would be added to yours, for instance.

I propose this as a replacement for the dole, not a replacement for incapacity benefit, child benefits or other allowances.

 

[mentalchik]

Why do you get tax credits? For children, I presume.

There would be a separate system of allowances for children – you could have a separate children's citizen's wage that would be added to yours, for instance.

I propose this as a replacement for the dole, not a replacement for incapacity benefit, child benefits or other allowances.

I get Child Tax Credit and Working Tax Credit (which is available to people on a low income)


The original idea was to top up low incomes to help people out of the benefit trap......

what has actually happened of course is it has allowed employers to pay less.......and trap people like me who now rely on it heavily !

 

[littlebabyjesus]

I think the child tax credits could be easily integrated into the system with a child wage – £50 per child, say (the figures are only illustrative!). Working tax credit shouldn't be needed as you will always be better off working. IB and other benefits could simply be allowances that are added to the basic citizen's wage, probably administered separately as they would need to be assessed.

The tricky bit for me is integrating housing benefit into the system. There would need to be some kind of new fair rent act, I think, to make it workable.

 

[weepiper]

I think the child tax credits could be easily integrated into the system with a child wage – £50 per child, say (the figures are only illustrative!). Working tax credit shouldn't be needed as you will always be better off working.

That would still leave me £120 a week less well off than I am now and would mean I couldn't afford childcare to work at all.

 

[littlebabyjesus]

That would still leave me £120 a week less well off than I am now and would mean I couldn't afford childcare to work at all.

Ok, childcare allowances too. It's not an exhaustive list. There would need to be other fairness measures, including fair rent legislation and heavily subsidised childcare.

This proposal doesn't preclude continuing with a system of tax credits, btw. I'd like to find a way to get rid of them, but I'm open to the idea that they are in fact a rather good way of doing things.

 

[bi0boy]

Why not simply give £100 to each child too, paid to the parents until they are 16.

 

[littlebabyjesus]

Why not simply give £100 to each child too, paid to the parents until they are 16.

I'm genuinely trying to come up with a system that could be sold to people. I agree that £100 for each child too is a good idea, it would be crucified by the Daily Mail tendency as a green light to teenage girls getting pregnant for the money.

Maybe eventually, once the thing is up and running, and the culture has changed. There's a huge hurdle to cross persuading people to abandon the idea of forcing others to work as it is. I think that objection could just be overcome by showing them how much cheaper this new system would be to run, and that in fact, they, too, would be better off under it.

 

[weepiper]

Why not simply give £100 to each child too, paid to the parents until they are 16.

that's a bit more like it.

 

[Maurice Picarda]

How would one qualify as an eligible citizen?

 

[littlebabyjesus]

Maybe...

I'd worry about overcoming the moral outrage on that, though.

 

[weepiper]

Maybe...

I'd worry about overcoming the moral outrage on that, though.

pfft. There's plenty of moral outrage about Child Tax Credits/Housing Benefit as a single parent already.

 

[littlebabyjesus]

How would one qualify as an eligible citizen?

That's a good question.

You would qualify for the cw in the same way that you qualify for getting the dole now.

You would have to have a separate tax system for non-citizens in which they are given a personal allowance equivalent to the citizen's wage. So, in my example, non-citizens would start to pay tax at £250 per week.

 

[DotCommunist]

I'd always envisaged it as a flat rate for all LBJ. Just to be workable and spare the anguished screams of 'COMMUNISM!one11!'

of course I do also envisage such a measure working in concert witha radical tax reform so that those 10%'ers pay for it. As they should given that they are in that bracket by inherited wealth or wealth stolen from the workers. And to those who wibble about rich people fleeing, fucking good. They can leave sans land and sans money held in UK banks. Fuckers stash a greater share of it offshore anyway to avoid paying thier dues. Ta ta, piss off elswhere where you can exploit some other well fed, educated and healthy proletariat. Fucking leeches

 

[spring-peeper]

Why not simply give £100 to each child too, paid to the parents until they are 16.

Each child receives the citizen's wage from the time they are born. Nice idea.

Would you be limiting the number of children per household? Because, if not, people will just keep having children to increase their family's income.

I had four children - that would give me £500 a week. Pity good wages for doing nothing.

erm - I hope you all have really good jobs - I have some friends with 8, 9 and in one case 13 children.

 

[littlebabyjesus]

pfft. There's plenty of moral outrage about Child Tax Credits/Housing Benefit as a single parent already.

Ok, well agreeing that in principle, children should receive cw too, we can say that the tax credit system might have to remain if you couldn't push it through.

 

[littlebabyjesus]

I'd always envisaged it as a flat rate for all LBJ.

That's exactly what my proposal is!

 

[spring-peeper]

I'd always envisaged it as a flat rate for all LBJ. Just to be workable and spare the anguished screams of 'COMMUNISM!one11!'

of course I do also envisage such a measure working in concert witha radical tax reform so that those 10%'ers pay for it. As they should given that they are in that bracket by inherited wealth or wealth stolen from the workers. And to those who wibble about rich people fleeing, fucking good. They can leave sans land and sans money held in UK banks. Fuckers stash a greater share of it offshore anyway to avoid paying thier dues. Ta ta, piss off elswhere where you can exploit some other well fed, educated and healthy proletariat. Fucking leeches

Did you know that we left the UK over 35 years ago and both my parents receive pension from the UK?

imo - that is one practice that should be stopped.

 

[Maurice Picarda]

It makes sense, but only in conjunction with a window tax.

 

[littlebabyjesus]

That's a good question.

You would qualify for the cw in the same way that you qualify for getting the dole now.

You would have to have a separate tax system for non-citizens in which they are given a personal allowance equivalent to the citizen's wage. So, in my example, non-citizens would start to pay tax at £250 per week.

I'm not comfortable with the idea of non-citizens not getting it, but this seems the least bad way to get around that. The one thing I would not want would be a tightening of immigration controls as a result of a new system. Of course, after being here for a certain length of time, people could then qualify for the cw.

 

[DotCommunist]

Each child receives the citizen's wage from the time they are born. Nice idea.

Would you be limiting the number of children per household? Because, if not, people will just keep having children to increase their family's income.

I had four children - that would give me £500 a week. Pity good wages for doing nothing.

erm - I hope you all have really good jobs - I have some friends with 8, 9 and in one case 13 children.

I imagine people would quite readily undergo the trauma and life threatening process of childbirth just to get a few extra quids. Yeah.

 

[littlebabyjesus]

I imagine people would quite readily undergo the trauma and life threatening process of childbirth just to get a few extra quids. Yeah.

This is a problem, though, not because she's right but because lots of people will say this. Practically speaking, I don't think you'd get through a full cw for children at first.

 

[weepiper]

yeah, sp, that's just a rehash of the 'teenage girls get pregnant just to get a council house' line.

 

[DotCommunist]

Did you know that we left the UK over 35 years ago and both my parents receive pension from the UK?

imo - that is one practice that should be stopped.

Did they live, work and pay NI in the UK? then that is their money. You don't quite get big state do you?

 

[spring-peeper]

I imagine people would quite readily undergo the trauma and life threatening process of childbirth just to get a few extra quids. Yeah.

I'd be tempted - you have kids, fancy a bit extra cash?

 

[Wolveryeti]

I personally would like to see it tested out. In particular I was impressed by the comparison in costs of a citizen's wage system versus the existing costs of the benefits system (of the order of a few tens of billions IIRC).

I think the main worry would be to do with inflation. There are lots of crap jobs which probably would not be done at existing wage levels if a citizen's wage prevailed, and there would be a lot more demand from people having more money in their pocket. That, to me, seems like a recipe for inflation.

 

[spring-peeper]

Did they live, work and pay NI in the UK? then that is their money. You don't quite get big state do you?

We live in Canada. My parents took all their money when they left. imo - my parents, aunts and uncles are ripping you off

What is "big state"?

 

[DotCommunist]

It would force employers to pay more, or the jobs would become p/t to deal with the new situation