Yes, yes, we know, paying tax is the price of partaking in civilisation. But that’s still a price, a cost. We think that people should see, up close and personal, the cost of that civilisation being built on their money. We are therefore against this:
Income tax will be automatically deducted from state pensions for millions of retirees under plans being considered by Labour, The Telegraph understands.
Not because the state pension should, or should not, be taxed. But because this is easy taxation. Some to many will not really even note it. Tax should be painful so that proper consideration be given to how much is being demanded.
The whole system of PAYE insulates the vast majority of the population against how far into their pockets government have got their hands. If everybody had to fill out a self-assessment form they would be horrified how much money is being sucked out of them – as I am every year when I do mine.
You see this evident when people are up in arms at council tax bills – because they get an actual BILL demanding money – yet are completely oblivious to the magnitude more money secretely being drained from their wages before they ever see them.
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In the US, of course the biggest (at least partly) hidden tax is made through payroll deductions. There, at least, the numbers are laid out if one cares to look.
I sometimes hear European visitors snarking about “not knowing the price” on retail purchases until checkout, because sales taxes (which are multiple and local) are explicitly added at that time. I like this.
In California, a major energy supplier once broke out all the taxes and fees on their retail billing statements, in an attempt to show that they were not the sole cause of high prices. The state made them stop. (This case is a bit more perverse, because the state’s Public Utilities Commission also regulates the notional “price” the supplier may charge.)
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