Wife Swap

[petem]

Anyone see Wife Swap tonight? Am I the only one who thinks that £37,000 net pa from benefits alone is a lot of dosh?

<hr width=100% size=1><A target="_blank" HREF=http://www.FairlineOwnersClub.com>Fairline Owners Club</A>

 

[gonfishing]

Can i keep the one i've got and just have the money??? Flipping heck how do they manage that ???? and yes that is a lot of money !!!!

rgds
julian

<hr width=100% size=1>man made it ,man can repair it, i think??

 

[Jim_44]

No did not see it, but yes 37k from benfits seems vast to me.

Why should we, tax payers, being paying out that much to 1 family?



<hr width=100% size=1>

 

[[2068]]

True, but I wouldn't judge his swmbo as particularly seaworthy.

Nor would I accept 37k to find out, either.

dave.

<hr width=100% size=1>

 

[Brucey]

I fully agree, thought that I earned a reasonable wage and SWMBO works a bit part-time (and before she shouts looks after two kids 3 and 8) but don't get near that. SWMBO was watching and I got hooked did you see the house. They both do bugger all and have the latest TV , DVD, etc.

Think its unfair but would rather earn that money each month (cos I actually enjoy my job!) than be given it.

<hr width=100% size=1>

 

[Trazie]

Didnt see the programme.
It is for those reasons that we left the UK for pastures new, they are taking the proverbial.
From what i gather, some time wasters get 37k per annum for doing nowt.
Say no more!!!

<hr width=100% size=1>

 

[clyst]

With a bloody wife like that I'd jump ship and leave her with the 37K A bit of plastering in the kitchen wouldn't go amiss either !!(did you see the state of the hanging electrical plug sockets???) Real charmers the pair of them . Oh well must go have to be up early to earn them their benefit money!!

<hr width=100% size=1>

 

[nicho]

Sadly, only caught the last 10 minutes of it. If the rest was as entertaining, I missed a cracking programme! Wasn't she a horror!! God forbid I ever have to wake up next to something like that - definite time to top myself.

It is however truly outrageous that a pair like that can "earn" the equivalent of approaching £45K gross for doing bugger all. They probably got a new people carrier on the State too.

Crazy country we live in.....

<hr width=100% size=1>

 

[jhr]

Dons flak jacket

Indeed, and nearly as bad as:

- setting up a spurious "sole trader" company to get out of one's obligation to pay National Insurance (admittedly this loophole has now been closed), or

- establishing a company to buy a boat for personal use, structured so as to avoid paying VAT, or

- employing one's wife, at a salary of £18,000 per annum

etc, etc.

Not getting at anyone personally (OK, I am with the third example) but there are hundreds of ways of milking the state and we all pay for them in the end. Some of them are regarded as acceptable, usually when they are employed by the more prosperous amongst us, others are de facto evidence of sponging or fundamental dishonesty, usually in relation to people who are, let's say, in the lower socio-economic groups. Neither of them are necessarily admirable (though I suspect £37k per year to bring up 8 kids is not a penny too much - I wouldn't like to try it on much less).

I know that a lot of people on this forum work hard for their money and have sweated blood to get on the water - including me - but please let's be consistent in our condemnation!

PS If this all sounds a bit self righteous and PC; I'd better add that I wouldn't have her for £37 k either! )





<hr width=100% size=1>

 

[tcm]

Greed is Good

I hope we aren't seeing a load of leftism - these days comprising a political correctness, wooly thinking, and attempts to win arguments about quantitative issues such as tax levels with meaningless phrases such as "oh, come on!" and "let's be fair and reasonable". It certainly exists in the media, and traces of it in your post.

The tax laws are there to define and enforce the amount of tax you must pay. But it isn't a "duty" to pay as much tax as possible, nor are you a better person if you give the revenue too much, or if you hand over any spare cash to help them out.

If under certain cirumstances you need not pay tax, then these aren't "loopholes" - they are a set of cirumstances that you can place yourself in - as you can with applying for a highly paid job, or smartening your house up to sell.

As others have said the only "fair" amounts of tax are 0% or 100%.

If employing your wife or kids is done legally, and reduces your tax burden, then you may do so, and not feel "dodgy". Likewise, you might stop smoking or drive more slowly, and since the cost of these things are primarily "tax" then you are not dodging tax in so doing. You are not dodging or dodgy if you send your earnings twice round the planet and through several other tax systems - provided that it is legal.

Using inflammaatory or subjective words such as "spuriously" self-employed is not applicable. Nor is there an "obligation" or "duty" to take every opportunity to pay National Insurance.

So the next politician who is splashed all over the daily horror as "outrageously paying almost no tax yet worth £20million"should respond that they have earned all their money legally and maximised that figure as far as they can. They have also minimised their tax liability as far as they can, again whilst staying within the law. Now, - who would you like to be in charge of the public finances - the tax-saver, or some idiot whose grasp of financial matters is demonstrated by the fact that they managed to sell an islington house at the bottom of the market, and buy two flats at the top of the market, selecting a proven con-man as negotiator? Hm? Oh, and whilst you're about it - do you realise that those people in the newspaper industry just poke their noses into other people business, write it up, print it - and then sell the newspapers for loads and loads more than the overall cost of making them! The cheeky buggers!





<hr width=100% size=1>

 

[jhr]

Re: Greed is Good

Lefty? moi? I 'ad that Karl Marx in the back of me cab once.

OK, fair point, but I wasn't saying it was illegal to do any of these things, just that I think we have a skewed perception of what is, and what is not moral in situations like this. Yes, it's perfectly legal to avoid tax by using the rules to one's advantage but it's also perfectly legal to claim benefits so long as you don't do so fraudulently. If (as appears the case) this family qualify for £37k per year legitimately then all they are doing is availing themselves of an advantage, in the same way as somebody with a complicated tax avoidance scheme in place has done. That doesn't mean I have to admire either party.

I concede, however, that I am a bit puritanical (rather than lefty) about this and about paying taxes in general and I confidently expect to be in the minority on this one.

If the Rev. A Blair was in charge of public finances I would, indeed be perturbed but luckily the detail is attended to by that swarthy, saturnine, yet strangely competent Scot next door to him (though like most Scots, I bet he knows b*gg*r all about holding tanks).

<hr width=100% size=1>

 

[jhr]

Re: Greed is Good

Ooh, you cheated and changed your post while I wasn't looking.

I don't have a problem with selling the written word at a profit, particularly since I (peripherally) get my living as a consequence of such activities. Nor do I have a problem with capitalism - although I worked in the voluntary sector when I was younger, I have now worked in the private sector for 15 years and I am never going back!

I'm just a puritanical git about taxes.

)

<hr width=100% size=1>

 

[tcm]

Re: Greed is Good

It is your decision alone to make it into an issue of moral values. Neither the guys on massive benefits, nor those who avoid lots of tax, ask for admiration. And as for mortality - some (many?) might say it is immoral to spend loads of dosh on a boat when others are starving. It is difficutl to be "puritanical" about paying taxes when they are such a spectacularly complex and unpure set of varyingly unprincipled rules.

I fear that Mr Blair has worked his wonders on you. He is First Lord of the Treasury, and the person who has the power to fire the dour scot as and when he likes.

Agreed that none have any knowledge of holding tanks. In fact, not sure many of them can even drive a blimmin car. Very sad that none are in the least bit boaty. Margaret Becket has a caravan, but I understand that it is only a wheeze to save money on hairdo's - on a caravsn site she can reverse backwards through the plentiful hedges, see.

<hr width=100% size=1>

 

[hlb]

Re: Greed is Good

I think there is a big difference between people paying as little tax as possible legally. But go out to work, crimp and save, buy there own house, bring up kids, off there own backs. Teach them to go out to work and pay there taxes.

Unlike these folk that put zero into the system and take 38 grand a year out. Not only that but invent a whole new industry of bringing 8 children into the world just to feather there ever increasing nest. A feat that none of us working folk could accumplish with any hope of success.

<hr width=100% size=1> <font color=blue>No one can force me to come here.<font color=red> I'm a volunteer!!.<font color=blue>

Haydn

 

[tcm]

Re: Greed is Good

sorry bout that.

I wonder - how puritanical are you? I suppose that really, you are either puritanical or not. Like being "unique". But I mean, if the taxes went up would you be pleased? Or, would you be pleased if they went down? or are they exactly right, at this level now? If they changed, I wonder if there is a limit of tax at which you'd say, well, that seems very very low/high to me - perhaps too low/high.



<hr width=100% size=1>

 

[jhr]

Re: Greed is Good

No problem.

I'd love them to be as low as can be - every time I look at my end of year earnings statement, I spit feathers at the amount of tax and NI I have paid. I suppose that what makes me puritanical is the thought that I might be paying less if there weren't lots of people out there busily setting up tax schemes, claiming mega social security benefits etc and thus putting up the bill for everyone else. Now, you would (I'm guessing) say that I should do so as well, and more fool me for not doing it, and at least a part of me agrees. Also, it would be hypocritical of me not to say that I've benefitted from tax relief on mortgages and pension contributions.

However, when all's said and done, I have elected to live in what is still, nominally, a welfare state and I expect to pay for it - though I'm not so excited about the new, radical concept of paying for it but not getting anything back when I become decrepit. Still, I have, at least, spent three years spongeing off the state as a student, in the good old days when tuition fees were paid and (gasp!) you got a student grant so p'raps I'm just paying what I see as my debt to society. If I really wanted high taxes and a full-on welfare state, I guess I'd emigrate to Sweden.

I also agree that this is arguably pure humbug coming from a man who runs a petrol powered boat that does 3 mpg and a 3 litre car that doesn't do much better - but consistency was never one of my strong points!.

<hr width=100% size=1>

 

[sailbadthesinner]

Re: Wife Swap Why?

talk about gob of the north


the thing that i could not understand was why would to supposedly sane people ( the family with the husband who was wetter than a fish's wet bits) pt themselves up for this.

the whole thing is made up for confrontation. you know if you are a cooking shy wife on a middle income (altho combined 27K salary and they went on holiday 3 times a year. where? prestatyn?) that you are going to get the exact opposite. why would you open up to potentially looking a complete hampton on national tv??????do you think they thought it would raise their profile when they open their restaraunt???

the programme reminded me very much of my own posiiton
i am a big wet fish who cooks whereas my wife is a violent swearing harridan who regards all other women as after me.

<hr width=100% size=1><font color=red>if guinness is good for you. i must be very very good</font color=red>

 

[BarryH]

Re: Wife Swap Why?

So, you married a Pikey then, Ha! Nah only kidding, you didn't marry a Pikey, did you? The Pikey slob was insecure and out of her depth. The evidence was the child'ish mimicking and so forth.

Bloody hell you've got me at it now. What is this a boaters forum or a self help group for wannabe Social workers and budding tax dodging fiends!

<hr width=100% size=1>

 

[jhr]

Why?

There's a famous saying (?PT Barnum?) about nobody ever going broke as a result of underestimating public taste. I suspect the modern equivalent is that nobody will ever go broke underestimating the desperation of some people to get themselves on telly and enjoy 15 minutes of fame (Warhol) even if it's really 15 minutes of infamy.

As to your being pursued by hordes of lusting babes - I think we've seen conclusive proof already in the wedding photos?

<hr width=100% size=1>

 

[oldgit]

Re:aha but.

lets see any of you lot ,house,feed and clothe any of your kids on around 70 quid a week.About half a tank full of fuel for the average chelsea tractor./forums/images/icons/laugh.gif

<hr width=100% size=1>If it aint broke fix it till it is.