Cut the dole to cut higher tax rates

[Purple]

No, there would not be. You have already stated that they have paid for the state school service in their taxes. So the resources are there for them already, they choose not to use them (except for the subsidies they receive and participation in the state examinations).

Unless there are state schools sitting empty, with teachers but no students, to match the number of students in private schools, then those public schools are a subsidy on the state sector.
As you say, the parents have already paid for their children to be educated through their taxes. Because they send their kids to private schools they are not consuming those services. If someone pays my company for goods or services we do not have to provide that's a bonus.
The same goes for healthcare; people fund the states health service through their taxes but then buy that service from a private hospital. That is a saving to the state.

If there were no private schools tomorrow and the kids in those schools all want to state schools would the state have to provide more schools?

If there were no private hospitals or private beds in public hospitals and all those patients had to be looked after in the state funded facilities. That would add extra cost to the state system; private healthcare is a subsidy of the state system.

 

[TheBigShort]

I don't understand this to be honest. Teachers are paid during summer months, so why shouldn't they work? I can't see how it involves asking them for something for free. Of course the other option is to not pay them for the summer months.

For the same reason that every other employee doesn't work during their holidays but still get paid. Its called holiday pay.
Dont get me wrong, I think teacher holidays are too long. But thats the terms they have negotiated, if you want them to work additional hours, days, weeks, etc then expect to pay for it.
No different to any other employer wanting staff to work over and above what has already been agreed to.

 

[TheBigShort]

I get the feeling that a lot of people from the left have issues with private schools.

I have no issue with people wanting to pay over and above what they already pay through their taxes. That is there choice.

 

[TheBigShort]

A re-assessment of need should be done. Do you really think someone who gets a house early in life should have it for the next 50 - 60 years?

Re-assessments are fine.

 

[Purple]

Rates are too high at too low a level. Given the cost of living, headline VAT rate, stealth refuse, property, car taxes, I would disagree that taxes are too high at the highest levels (say top 20%). Remember, the top 20% will benefit also in take home pay with any increase of the tax band from €33,800.

If you agree that nobody should be paying marginal tax rates above 45% then you must agree that the current rates are too high. 52% for private sector earners and even high for state sector earners (when you include the pension levy tax).

By the way, they aren’t stealth taxes, it’s called broadening the tax base and reducing taxes on work. It’s what the World Bank, the OECD and just about everyone else says we should do.

There may be some scope for the lower rate to kick in at lower levels but in the round the yield will be small.

Not if it kicks in at €5000.

If benefits are to remain capped.

Agreed. If not then they should be proportional to what is paid in.

Dont agree entirely with this. Adjusted yes, but not abolished.

So you think that a temporary emergency tax should be kept in place forever?

Why 10% and not 9% or 11%. I agree in principle that a contribution should be made but it should be relative to services provided.

Agreed.

No real sense to this, flies in the face of what you want to achieve. If average industrial wage falls (or more likely a greater portion of low wage jobs are created then a greater portion of higher earners will get caught paying higher rates of tax - causing threads like this to opened, back to square one.

That’s why we have budgets. If we reduce the tax burden on hard work and achievement then we are more likely to get hard work and achievement.

I dont necessarily disagree with the sentiment but if you combine your 150% limit with this then in todays incomes then there will be a huge shortfall in taxes collected, even the low-income earners couldnt fill that void.

That’s why we should strive to get to the average level of efficiency in the OECD when it comes to value for money in the delivery of public services.

How do you reduce the costs in delivering services other than primarily through pay cuts and reduced numbers in the public service?

LEAN, Kaizen, and other process improvement tools can and should be used to improve processes and efficiency. Duplication of services, duplication of actions, inefficient use of capital resources and restrictive work practices all lead to massive waste. Gets GP’s providing the same level of service as they do in most other countries. Get nurses providing the same level of service as they do in other countries. All of these things will yield significant savings. Just look at the fiasco in Waterford where the consultants and local politicians wanted a second lab but if it simply opens from 8 to 6 instead of 9 to 5 the existing and future demand can be met. I can get an out-patient X-Ray appointment in private hospital between 7am and 10pm. Why can’t I get the same thing in a public hospital? Why is multi-million Euro equipment such as CT and CAT scanners not used 20 or 24 hours a day?

Average by EU standards fair enough. Average international standards, no way. Too many basket cases dragging that average down.

We are the basket cases dragging the average down.

See above re international standards.

As above.

Or decreasing to a minimum set level.

Agreed.

What happens after 5yrs? Evictions?

The possibility should certainly be there. A review and maybe a move to a smaller property. If you aren’t making the effort to fend for yourself then your fellow citizens shouldn’t have to keep paying your way.

Yep, no problem.

Good.

No problem with that but it will take time and investment, more money. Would you be prepared for the government to increase borrowing if an agreed program was established?

No, they could increase taxes or spend money saved elsewhere but we should be reducing borrowing, not increasing it.

 

[Purple]

I have no issue with people wanting to pay over and above what they already pay through their taxes. That is there choice.

OK, so you agree that they are subsidising the state system then; they are paying over and above what they have already paid for.

 

[TheBigShort]

Unless there are state schools sitting empty, with teachers

Well according to Firely, the state pays the salaries of teachers in private schools. So they do use the resources.

Because they send their kids to private schools they are not consuming those services

Paid teachers, state examinations. They do utilize the resources of the state.

The same goes for healthcare; people fund the states health service through their taxes but then buy that service from a private hospital. That is a saving to the state.

All these people pay for private health insurance. Are these the same people who pay too much taxes? And want tax breaks? How about stop paying private health insurance? Introduce a universal healthcare system, not for profit? High earners would save a packet on private healthcare, me included.

 

[Purple]

Well according to Firely, the state pays the salaries of teachers in private schools. So they do use the resources.

Paid teachers, state examinations. They do utilize the resources of the state.

Absolutely. The State pays a significant portion of the costs but the bit they don't pay; that's a subsidy.

All these people pay for private health insurance. Are these the same people who pay too much taxes? And want tax breaks? How about stop paying private health insurance? Introduce a universal healthcare system, not for profit? High earners would save a packet on private healthcare, me included.

That's a different point. The point here is that they are paying those high taxes to fund a healthcare system and then they are paying health insurance because the state is so bad at providing that healthcare system. Ergo they are paying for something they do not consume or do not fully consume and so are subsidising the public system they have already paid for.
The reason the state use to make these payments fully tax deductible is because they understood it was a subsidy.

 

[Firefly]

For the same reason that every other employee doesn't work during their holidays but still get paid. Its called holiday pay.
Dont get me wrong, I think teacher holidays are too long. But thats the terms they have negotiated, if you want them to work additional hours, days, weeks, etc then expect to pay for it.
No different to any other employer wanting staff to work over and above what has already been agreed to.

Based on this, teachers are extremely well paid. For them to work the same hours / days as everyone else, I'd imagine the average teacher would earn close to 100k.

Regarding the bit in bold, the opposite could also be argued, if the teachers want more pay then they should be expected to work additional hours, days, weeks etc.

 

[Firefly]

How about stop paying private health insurance? Introduce a universal healthcare system, not for profit?

I'm actually with you on that - I would like to see private healthcare banned and force everyone, rich & poor, government ministers up to and including the president himself to go through the same system. No queue jumping, no special treatment for anyone. THEN we would see immense pressure on the HSE, from the great and the good to clean up its act....if the President had to wait on a trolley like everyone else, it wouldn't take long for the HSE to get its house in order!!

 

[Purple]

I'm actually with you on that - I would like to see private healthcare banned and force everyone, rich & poor, government ministers up to and including the president himself to go through the same system. Not queue jumping, no special treatment. THEN we would see immense pressure on the HSE from the great and the good to clean up its act.

I'd like to see everyone with insurance and no public health system at all. The state should regulate (properly and with teeth) and no nurse or doctor or any other healthcare industry worker should be employed by the state.

 

[jjm]

Purple and i am not picking on you ,Can you explain who is going to shoulder the cost of paying off the people in the public health system,

 

[Purple]

Purple and i am not picking on you ,Can you explain who is going to shoulder the cost of paying off the people in the public health system,

about 3% of people retire or leave each year. There's no quick fix. Indeed there's no one fix. The solution is thousands of little things over 5-10 years.

 

[TheBigShort]

The point here is that they are paying those high taxes to fund a healthcare system and then they are paying health insurance because the state is so bad at providing that healthcare system.

Nobody is compelling anyone to pay private health insurance (albeit the new higher charges in lifetime community ratings are effectively a stick to beat people with).
Nobody is compelling anyone to send children to private schools. This is made out of choice, of free wiil.
Just because I choose to use a private car does it mean im subsiding public transport? This is a nonsense argument. The taxation system is there to provide the fabric of our society, social services, education, health services, transport etc...that would otherwise not be available to the population at large due to cost restrictions of funding private education, health, transport, housing etc.
It is impossible to gauge from one generation to the next, as to who could and could not afford such services out of their own pocket. In effect, without the use of public infrastructure - roads, legal system, planning, energy grid, education, etc it is unlikely any of the above would be available in any reasonable way for private consumption in the first place.
If people choose to pay privately for services that is there own business. But all it says to me is that there is income there to provide the adequate social services for the public at large, and as a consequence, tax cuts for such people, which inturn are expected to be provided by lower income earners (who cant afford private services) is a redundant arguement.
Btw the reason you can get a private appointment on request outside of a public waiting list is because private insurance helps you skip the que.

 

[Purple]

Just because I choose to use a private car does it mean im subsiding public transport?

If you buy a 10 journey ticket and only use 5 of them, choosing to drive the other 5 times then yes, you are subsidising thhe public transport system. That's the point about education and healthcare; people are already paying for services but choose to pay for them a second time privately because the State run services, in the case of healthcare anyway, are grossly inefficient.

You still have not answered my questions;
If there was no private education or private healthcare would the State have to provide additional services, i.e. would it cost the State more?
If the answer is yes then the private systems subsidise the public system.

Let's have a single tier healthcare system; let's make the public system run as well as the private system. It is bigger an has more economies of scale. It should be more efficient.

 

[Purple]

Btw the reason you can get a private appointment on request outside of a public waiting list is because private insurance helps you skip the que.

The queue in a private hospital? The one that starts at 7am and finished as 10pm? Where is that queue in the public system?

 

[Purple]

If people choose to pay privately for services that is there own business. But all it says to me is that there is income there to provide the adequate social services for the public at large, and as a consequence, tax cuts for such people, which inturn are expected to be provided by lower income earners (who cant afford private services) is a redundant arguement.

It tells me that the state forces people to pay for a service but then is so bad at providing that service that people are willing to pay a second time to buy it from people who are competent.

 

[jjm]

post 437 says it all, we had someone on here in reply to my post saying why would people on low income want the services of high earners

 

[Firefly]

If people choose to pay privately for services that is there own business. But all it says to me is that there is income there to provide the adequate social services for the public at large, and as a consequence, tax cuts for such people, which inturn are expected to be provided by lower income earners (who cant afford private services) is a redundant arguement.

That's not necessarily true. Sure, there are people with so much money that private healthcare and education is a drop in the ocean. For a lot of others (my own family included), "going private" involves making sacrifices that others do not make.

 

[Firefly]

It tells me that the state forces people to pay for a service but then is so bad at providing that service that people are willing to pay a second time to buy it from people who are competent.

THIS is why people take out private healthcare in this country.