http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-29983051

More free childcare and tax relief for poor families, says CBI in annual conference.

In other words 'please use more taxpayer's money to subsidise our crap poverty level wages while we continue to give ourselves 20% pay rises every year'

In two words, ---- Off.

I see we were both thinking much the same thing.

more affordable childcare is required in this country though

True, true. Childcare is ludicrously expensive, to the point where a friend of mine used to work and her entire wage paid for the childcare for her child while she did so. I could never understand why she bothered. But just getting the taxpayer to pay for it is the worst of all solutions - it would cause a situation similar to the one we've seen in rental accommodation, where price inflation is caused by the fact nobody is directly responsible for questioning the price of the bill being paid. Some degree of price regulation is a better solution and paying people a decent wage so they can afford to pay for it themselves is an even better one than that.

There are things we as a community/nation/state (call it what you will) should provide for every child in the country, IMO. Education, shelter, medical care. Child care in the traditional sense (i.e. looking after the child day to day especially at pre school age) is the responsibility of the parents, not the state.
I

In France, state schools take kids from 2, from 8.30pm to 5.30pm, for free, apart from food cost.

It is similar in Germany. The Kindergarten looks after the kids until the evening and there are Kinderhörts for school children up to 16.

Fine, how do you think the CBI will be with us having French/German levels of taxation?

I'd pay less tax in France than I do here. It's a myth that tax in the UK is so much lower.


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i believe that the level of business/company/corporation tax is higher in France and Germany then the UK ...

Interesting......
from http://www.french-property.com/guides/france/finance-taxation/taxation/calculation-tax-liability/rates/

There are six tax rates and bands, as follows:

Income Share Tax Rate
Up to €6,011 0%
Between €6,012 - €11,991 5.5%
Between €11,992 - €26,631 14%
Between €26,632 - €71,397 30%
Between €71,398 - €151,200 41%
Above €151,200 45%

but you need to add in social security

Table: Employer and Employee Social Security Rates
Charge Employer Employee
Family Benefits 5.40% 0%
Health/Sickness 13.10% 0.75%
Social Charges (CSG/CRDS etc) 0% 8.0%
Accident at Work 3% 0%
Unemployment Benefit 4.40% 2.40%
Main Pension 9.90% 6.75%
Complementary Pension 16.45% 11%
Total (say) 52% 29%


so to me at a quick glance they seem slightly higher

And this link http://britishexpats.com/forum/france-7 ... uk-695300/

"You can earn 26,000 Euro in France and only be taxed at 14%, then you add your 8% social security contribution and that's only a tax rate of 22%. Earning a similar amount in the UK you'd be taxed at 30-31%. "

Main difference is lack of couple allowance here.
Also you can offset a lot of costs against tax, Even money to fund adult kids.

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All tax regimes are relatively complex and there will be places where regime X will cost you less than Regime Y and vice versa. It would be more indicative perhaps to find out what the national average income is and then figure the tax paid on that - that would give us the tax paid by 'the average family' assuming both adults earn that and there are say two children per family. That's a 'back of a beer mat' calculation relevant to the discussion at hand.

I'd do it, but it's late. Maybe tomorrow .

I get money back for my commute to work, for example, on my tax rebate, along with a lump sum for "office material", I can claim the VAT back for labour on renovations and extensions to the house.

In general, with tax and social security, pension etc. you reckon to pay around 33% in Germany in my earnings bracket (slightly above national average) per month, that excludes the above annual rebate on my tax return.

Even if we do not have absolute values, for someone on typical wage, there is very little difference between tax in UK and France. I still just don't get where all the money goes here, maybe we need a graph showing country expenditure? I'd much prefer a country that spends on childcare than supporting the financial sector :s


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One of the girls at work is in her 20s. She has stopped working because the income she gets from part time work is more than the childcare costs. She's actually better off on benefits than working.