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was it a slow news day yesterday?
The Inland Revenue has little or no chance of shutting them all down.
P.S. I used to pay 58% tax in the UK so I am not a big fan of the UK tax system.
GOOD LUCK to them all!
As one who pays all my taxes I am afraid that I cannot agree. Most of these people have other jobs and they can well afford to pay ther taxes, oh ... and I wish I had the problem of having to pay 58% tax ;)
Is the Isle of Wight offshore. Don't they have to pay tax there?
ROTFL!
Not quite. It is over the water, but it's not a tax haven! It is however a standard British joke about "going abroad" to the Isle of Wight.
Matt
Back to the main topic - Google (Adsense) forces webmasters to declare where tax will be paid, if not in the US. Does eBay do the same? Perhaps it should (if not).
58%? Holy cow!
searching led me to this:
Taxman by George Harrison
"Let me tell you how it will be;
There's one for you, nineteen for me.
'Cause I’m the taxman,
Yeah, I’m the taxman.
Should five per cent appear too small,
Be thankful I don't take it all.
'Cause I’m the taxman,
Yeah, I’m the taxman."
I used to pay 58% tax in the UK so I am not a big fan of the UK tax system.
The chances are that you paid much more but are unaware of how much you really contributed. Many taxes are carefully hidden... or not called taxes. If you operate as a company and you're a higher rate taxpayer you are likely paying about 90% of your earnings in tax. That's after "allowances". There are the obvious taxes: 19% Corporation Tax, 40% Income Tax (PAYE), 17.5% Value Added Tax (VAT), 23.8% National Insurance (ignore the name, it's a "tax") etc. There are also the business rates / stamp duty / Capital Gains/ DPR registration / congestion charge type of taxes. And all that excludes government imposed costs like the additional amounts you have to pay to your payroll company/accountant etc to negotiate the quagmire of regulations on your behalf - there are a lot of those. <snip>.
I wish I had the problem of having to pay 58% tax
The Inland Revenue (with new, improved VAT teeth) can and will track down ebay traders. They already require Paypal to notify them of anyone receiving more than £4,500 in a year. The pretext is tracing money laudering, the real reason is to improve revenue collection. And Paypal has no option but to play ball. If you've already received close to £4,500 be prepared for an email soon.
[edited by: lawman at 5:35 pm (utc) on Feb. 14, 2006]
[edit reason] No Requests For Sticky Please [/edit]
Left the UK and came to the US. Paid $50,000 dollars tax on one years income but that was only about 30% of my total income. I dont mind paying taxes, I just hope that people trying to make a buck off ebay dont get hammered by the Inland Revenue - who already get a big chunk of change from the little guy.
I just hope that people trying to make a buck off ebay dont get hammered by the Inland Revenue
They will get hammered as the pressure on HM Treasury to find more money increases. The ones who get away lightly are the ones with big donations to political parties, who have highly paid directorships for worn out politicians, companies financing lobbying firms etc. They have a variety of ways of either not paying... or paying and recovering it via preferential (and highly profitable) contracts.
I shudder to think what I really paid when you take into account VAT and all the things oddsodd mentioned.
<snip>
[edited by: lawman at 8:50 pm (utc) on Feb. 14, 2006]
Why do you presume ebays are tax-dodgers
The Inland Revenue believes that everybody is a tax dodger. :) You really are presumed guilty till you can prove your innocence.
But, let's face it, while there are several SMEs who declare their entire eBay turnover and profit there are a lot of part-timers who don't. Like market traders, like window cleaners, they are part of the "underground economy" and therefore prime targets.
The law locks up the man or woman
Who steals the goose from off the common
But leaves the greater villain loose
Who steals the common from the goose.
For US readers a "common" was an area of ground (rural areas) set aside for anyone to keep livestock.
Google (Adsense) forces webmasters to declare where tax will be paid, if not in the US.
Google are hardly likely to be as reticient about disclosing your details to your tax authority as they recently were about disclosing their search records/commercial secrets to every drive-by lawyer.
I just hope that people trying to make a buck off ebay dont get hammered by the Inland Revenue
Why ever not? Why should you support tax evasion just because they are doing it on ebay?
I don't make a lot of money but I pay my taxes and so should they. People making a living on eBay are not all "little guys". Some of them are BIG earners.
Is a flat tax on the cards?
[edited by: ronin at 8:22 pm (utc) on Feb. 15, 2006]
it will never happen--at least not in Europe. Think of how much more the poorer ones would have to pay to get the same revenues. I know a married couple in England who have legally separated in order to get more money from the state. There's absolutely nothing with them, and both are able to work.
Think of how much more the poorer ones would have to pay to get the same revenues.
Eh? Surely if everyone is paying 25% tax and keeping 75% earnings, everyone is keeping three quarters of what they earn?
>> I would be in favour of a flat tax.it will never happen--at least not in Europe.
Huh?
Flat tax revolution sweeping across Europe [washingtonpost.com]
well, across the smarter nations anyway!
Estonia was the first, adopting a 26 percent flat rate in 1994. Latvia and Lithuania followed in the mid-1990s, with 25 percent and 33 percent rates, respectively. Serbia was next; in 2003 it went with a 14 percent rate. Last year, it was Slovakia (19 percent) and Ukraine (13 percent). This year it's been Romania (16 percent) and Georgia, which boasts the lowest rate -- 12 percent.
And countries like Poland have joined them too.
