I used to work as a doctor in A&E, and still am a doctor. I'm on the email list for locums for a couple of departments I worked in in the past. I get weekly emails asking for, and sometimes pleading for people to cover shifts as an 'emergency locum'. These are sometimes for sick leave or sometimes just cause they're chronically short staffed. They pay what I would consider a more than decent wage at £40 per hour. The problem is that after getting taxed at 40% and paying national insurance, that figure in more than halved. I do the odd shift now and then, but I would do more if I didn't get taxed on it. Considering usually I'm having to give up a weekend day or night to work these shifts, they are considerably inconvenient. Note that the pay rate is the same regardless of the day or time of day, even Christmas day. This is a purely hypothetical question, but I wanted to gauge public opinion (of people who like ducatis obviously): For last minute shifts that would otherwise be unfilled and create a situation where a supposedly critical service is endangered... do you think the government should use tax breaks as an incentive to get people to work them? I understand that the real issue is far deeper and the only sustainable solution is to prevent these situations from arising, but I can say that it is not happening yet. And these are two very different departments, one in a district general hospital in Abergavenny, and one in a large University hospital in Bristol, so I do think the problem is widespread. Any thoughts?
thing is, your not a charity you shouldn't have to work more than you have to unless you want to. if your free time is worth more than £40 per hour take it. one life and all that.
Yes, I have to say that I have always taken a very dim view of being taxed on work that I undertake in my free time. If I decide to give up my weekends or evenings to do extra work, and having already paid tax on my 40 hour a week job, I don't really see why I should make additional contributions to society. i can see that the problem would be the opening of a zillion loopholes if "extra work" went untaxed. Suddenly people would have very low-paying full time jobs and weekend work that made them a mint. But if you could overcome this problem, yes, I don't think that additional work should be taxed at all.
Not sure about this. It would be nice not to be taxed for sure, there are plenty of people I know who pretty much have to work 7 days a week just to keep their heads above water, and it would certainly benefit them. But then that lost revenue would have to be recouped elsewhere. It's where that worries me.
I also pay tax at the 40% rate for most of my income, or at least I have had to save at that rate to pay on my return. It's just how life is. I don't think tax breaks should be used as an incentive, instead tax revenue could be better spent to employ more doctors.
You may end up with doctors taking time off so their mates can go tax free, and then them reciprocating. Sort of happens here in NZ, Doctors get paid more to work outside their Health Board area, so they do no extra work in their area, instead they go outside it, and the Doctors from outside cover this area.
It's not like the rest of us though, is it. If you earn over the 40% threshold the guvmint screw your balls to a plank with tax. Why should the lower paid get better tax breaks just cos they weren't listening in class? How about this then, any overtime or extra curricular work should be taxed at the base rate regardless of income.
A load of people working 5 days a week start working 6 - just = more unemployment Like the idea though
But you only need a certain amount to live a comfortable life, anything over that is just for luxuries, so why not pay more tax?
If £40 per hour is insufficient to incentivise the OP or people like him, and if the services required are of critical importance, then he should be offered £50 per hour, or £60, or whatever it takes. Making certain categories of income exempt from Income Tax is complicated, expensive to administer, and susceptible to cheating, plus it still costs just as much. Making ISAs tax exempt is quite confusing enough.
So does that view also include those with learning disabilities who arent perhaps as academic as you and hence dont have the same doors of opportunity opening. Not everyone was born to be a doctor or architect. Society needs nursrey nurses and road sweepers just as much as scientists and consultants. Perhaps reconsider how you put that ??
Everybody needs to pay their share of tax. If you earn more then you pay more. I am in the bracket that pays more and I do so on the understanding that I am helping make a fair and modern society.
Like the OP, I feel I pay more than enough tax. I'm at the point where unless it's a decent amount, I take my overtime in time off. In fact I've booked Good Friday off work to go to the Horsham Piazza, because I'd only end up giving HMG a large chunk of my overtime anyway. As for those on less income, the less able or bone idle, don't they get enough additional income in the form of tax credits etc? So why because I work hard should I pay for others to have an easy life, but earn too much to claim back any of what I pay in..?
I see your point. But when our society is fuelled by greed and corporate pick pocketing. The less well off probably would be living in shanti towns if these systems werent in place to offer assistance. Dont confuse my point of view with the bone idle dont want to work crew. They can rot
But you dont pay for the bone idle or the lower paid. You pay for the police and hospitals, for schools and defence. The social welfare bill is probably a small amount of your overall tax contribution. So as a higher earner you pay a high share for the services which we all benefit from. The idea that all your tax money funds the unemployed and benefit recipients is one that has been planted in your mind by the media. Edit: 17p from every tax pound was spent on welfare in the 2013 budget. The remaining 83p in every tax pound was spent on things which all members of society benefits from. http://www.ukpublicspending.co.uk/budget_pie_ukgs.php So, in fact, your tax pays for things for you. Whether it is a policeman to respond should YOU need him, or surgeon to fix YOU up should YOU need him. It pays for the the schools YOUR kids go to and the roads YOU ride YOUR bike on. This anger towards the unemployed really bugs me because the opinions people spout when they talk about social welfare are based on media bile and uneducated nonsense.
The pie is really interesting. A pity they chose to present it in slightly varying shades of orange (Why, Mr Anderson, why?) It is true (apparently) that only 17% goes to welfare, but then 18% goes on health and a miserable 13% on eduction. Now, suppose you had a greater share of your budget invested in education (assuming you got value for money for it), would you not find you had lower unemployment, a greater standard of living, and lower health costs? I can't help feeling you might. So you'd recoup your higher spending in education and create a wealthier happier society. You will have noticed that transport is only 3%. Not great on capital infrastructure investment, eh?
Its a fucking scandal that genuinely selfless people like the OP give up slices of their lives for the greater good and very little in return, especially when our car and bike dealers want about three times the rate for plugging a machine into another machine. Pete got it right - the only way to counteract this cock-eyed imbalance is to increase the hourly rates, not rewrite the nation's tax system
Personally I think if you have paid tax on your 40 hours then anything over that should be yours . I think this as I too know a lot of people who work 65 to 70 hours a week to earn a living . These people have worked 25 to 30 hours of time that, if they were on a reasonable hourly rate , could have been spent fulfilling their own needs . People should be treat the same so therefore if a government employee only pays tax on a 35+ hourly week and has a good take home pay why should a private sector worker have to pay tax on hours he , or she , is working whilst said government worker has his , or her , feet up.
Nations like South Korea and Singapore chose to spend a lot more than 13% on education back in the sixties and seventies, so they gradually built up a population of scientists, mathematicians, engineers, linguists, etc. China did it in the nineties. That is the way for a poor country without oil to transform into a rich country. Other nations like Afghanistan and Yemen chose to spend a lot less than 13% on education. That is the way for a poor country to stay dirt-poor and ignorant.
