The message 4867fc9d@qaanaaq
from Andy Hall contains these words:

Apologies for the delay but I have been away from home (looking at a
backhoe digger if you must know).

To someone on minimum wage, I expect that the national average wage
would seem high.

So it would but that isn't most people. Even to those on the median wage
the average (mean) wage would be something to aspire to.

OK, fine, but do people really spend their time looking at this? Do
they understand the difference between median and mean.

It is a pretty fair bet that the majority don't appreciate the
difference which may be why those on below average incomes become so
embittered about their lot particularly when they see groups with
industrial muscle but limited talents (such as the Shell tanker drivers
you mentioned earlier) getting a better income than a good many
graduates.

If you would only return to the real world you would find that the bulk
of the population can't afford the fees your sort of dentist charges. If
the NHS didn't provide a subsidised service the number of practicing
dentists would reduce substantially.

Sigh. This misses the point completely. If there were not the
unreasonable tax take to fund the NHS plus the fees (even so) to go to
an NHS dentist - still in the hundreds for many procedures, the
equation would be remarkably different .

No it is you who are missing the point. For better of for worse NHS
dentistry is a subsidised service that would be out of reach of the much
of the population if the subsidy was withdrawn even if they got a little
bit of largesse from the chancellor as he further lightens the tax load
on the rich.

If the NHS were removed from the equation and taxes reduced
accordingly, more money would be left to individuals to purchase their
own dental care

For some reason, people have an emotional attachment to this NHS scam.
The reality is that proper treatment is available privately for very
little difference in cost once the incompetent public sector is
excluded from the equation.

Now that Andy is complete and utter bull****. If the cost of private
dentistry really was very little different to the cost of NHS treatment
many more of us would take advantage of it.

Since when has dentistry been such an arduous discipline that the only
entrants are the cream of the cream? And I trust that you will remember
your words just above when you complain yet again about the income of
public servants.

It doesn't matter. The market determines the price. People are
willing to pay for private dentistry. That results in the income
level. Comparing with something else is a nonsense.

*Some* people are prepared to pay for private dentistry, the majority
are not. What you are advocating would lead to a sizeable proportion of
the population visiting dentists only as a last resort and then only for
extractions. And a mass emigration of dentists as the market for their
wares shrunk.

This takes us down the road of the 1970s with the idiot unions bitching
and moaning because their differentials relative to another totally
unrelated industry were being squeezed. It's utter crap and the
result has been the demise of all of it because the market won't
tolerate it.

There are two sides to any coin and the other side of that is an
incompetent and complacent management many of whom were leading lights
in the private sector.

Incomes of over £100,000 are probably
still the preserve of less than 1% of the adult population and over
£45,000 probably less than 10%. My starting figures for those
assumptions are that in 2001/02 the top 10% got £640 per week or better
and of those somewhat less than 3% got over £1000 per week.

You could well be right. It would be better to encourage more people
to stretch themselves and to achieve higher earning potential provided
that they are actually creating wealth and/or benefit to their
customers.

If everyone stretches themselves the competition just gets fiercer and
the pecking order and remuneration stays the same. Wealth is largely an
illusion, at least in terms of money.

So people shouldn't stretch themselves? That's a very sad indictment.

People in subordinate jobs tend to get stretched (or at least stressed)
these days by bosses who wouldn't dream of handing out such treatment
themselves.

Don't be coy. Which particular national or local government departments
did you have in mind either as essential to your well being or destined
for obliteration?

The list is very limited indeed. So far, I have written down the
armed forces, secret services and certain aspects of agriculture.
It gets difficult to go beyond there in terms of people who actually
produce something of benefit in the public sector.

You are still being coy but if you think that MAFF or its successor
DEFRA are worth admiration you have a very strange as well as a very
jaundiced view of public service.

Those things can easily be measured in the private sector but are
obfuscated in the public sector. If the jobs are superfluous then it
really doesn't matter how little the people are paid. It would be far
better to have a tip out and to pay better salaries to attract people
of ability from the private sector to sort out the mess.

There is not an unlimited pool of talent either inside public service or
outside. Where the private sector scores is that they don't have to
stick so rigidly to all those silly rules and regulations governments of
all persuasions so enjoy handing down.

Exactly, which is why the public sector attracts the jobsworths and
others unable to think for themselves.

For most of us career choices are made at too young an age to appreciate
fine distinctions and are often determined by what jobs are actually
available for the qualifications on offer.

The trouble would be with paying unemployment benefits because most
would not be empoyable in the real world.

Why not. There is laziness and incompetence aplenty in the private
sector, quite possibly more than there is in the public sector.

The figures don't suggest that.

Which figures would they be then?

while those he can empathise with deserve to join him
in the private sector with an income in the top 1%. He doesn't seem to
care a toss about the rest of the lower orders.

That's really missing the point. If your statement were true, I
would be proposing that there should be a massive reduction in tax for
me because I don't use services like state education and to a large
extent, state healthcare either.

Seems to me that is precisely what you have been whinging on about all
along. I don't suppose you could have been at all affluent back in the
late 70s when basic rate was at a peak of 33% and higher rates went up
to 83%, or 98% with the addition of investment income surcharge. You
would surely have died of a heart attack, private insurance not
withstanding.

That makes no sense. In fact the stealth taxes more than make up
for the apparent changes in income tax.

Stealth taxes hurt those on small incomes far more than those on large
incomes. The reason the rich are paying more tax now than in the past is
because they are now declaring much larger incomes which must be down in
part at least to a reversal of the quaint notion that taxation should be
progressive. Back in 1975/76 if your income had been £33500 (a very
comfortable one for those days) two thirds would have disappeared in
income tax alone. These days however many millions you declare the
proportion lost to income tax can not reach 40%. Meanwhile down at the
lower end of the income distribution council tax (for those who pay it)
will have more than doubled in real terms and for some of us it is a
bigger burden than income tax. And for those that indulge the greater
part of the price of alcohol, cigarettes and petrol is tax. The rich may
well spend a great deal more on booze than is necessary but the duty
doesn't go up even if the VAT does.


I could even justify it on the basis
that were I to be in the top 1% of earners, I would be paying way over
the national average as well.

You may still end up paying a smaller proportion of your income in tax
than do those on modest incomes. If you are genuinely self employed you
most probably will.

That would be very surprising. The amounts matter as well as the
proportions.

Yes, the rich should be paying a higher proportion of their income in
tax, not a lower one.

However, you will notice that I have not said that, nor have I proposed
an alteration of the tax regime beyond removal of benefit in kind tax
for health insurance premiums. I have agreed that there should be
a basic level healthcare insurance funded by taxation in which
(obviously) the higher earners will pay more than the lower earners.

I thought you were advocating education vouchers as well.

I am.

Both measures would have but one result, that those on low incomes foot
more of the bill and given ******* Brown's penchant for rewarding 'hard
working families' that means in effect the childless on low incomes.

Of course it doesn't. Payment on the way in remains on the same basis
as today - amount based on earnings.

Vouchers given to everybody irrespective of means. That alone amounts
to massive redistribution of wealth.

No it doesn't. In the final analysis it doesn't matter at all whether
the service you get is funded directly through taxation or via vouchers
that can only be used to buy a particular service.

Those individuals who wish to supplement the vouchers can do so, those
who don't wish to or can't still get what they do today. All that
changes is putting the customer in the driving seat, not the government.

No it doesn't. The state still has to run the schools for those who
cannot or will not afford to pay the extra to go private and it will no
longer have the money hived off to subsidise the private education of
the rich. Ergo someone has to make up the shortfall in state school
funding that you want to weasel your way out off. The same argument
applies to private medicine.

Therefore I do not feel that I can be reasonably criticised for not
"caring a toss about the lower orders". If people are making an
effort to support themselves to the maximum of their ability and are or
have given value to their customers, then it is quite right and
civilised for them to receive nett help, aid and assistance from those
more able to do so than themselves.

Which sentiments are totally at odds with the usual scorn you reserve
for public servants so I assume you are excluding them from any "nett
help, aid and assistance".

I did say "if they are making an effort to support themselves"

But that is just your paranoia taking over. Public servants are making
an effort to support themselves.

Sorry but it's a hard world. I haven't yet heard a justification for
most of the public sector.

That is because you are a smug self satisfied snob who is totally out of
touch with the vast majority of your fellow citizens. :-)

Pick a jobsworth and I will endeavour to justify his existance, even a
traffic warden.

What is not reasonable is for those who are in the 90% or even 99% of
wage earners to criticise the contribution of the top 10% or 1%.
For the most part, they are creating the work environment for the
others, and/or providing high value services to them in one form or
another.

Much is said about the glass ceiling in relation to minority groups in
business. Successful people will simply say that they didn't
realise that it was there.

Prejudice comes in many forms as your irrational hatred of the public
sector demonstrates but we have developed a very curious public
definition of equality in this country.

Employees should be judged on
their value to their employer, not on their sex or colour. Not employing
the most cost effective candidate doesn't really make sense except in
the PC world.

I completely agree. I don't have a hatred of the public sector. For
example, I think that there is value in having armed forces and
security services. Beyond that, the justification thins out rapidly.
You're right. People should be judged on their value to their
employer. Most of the civil service would be be hard pressed to
justify themselves to me (or you), their employer.

Think about the huge benefit to the economy if all of the hangers on
were gainfully employed. The trouble is that I suspect that most are
not capable of dealing with the world of hard knocks.

They probably get enough hard knocks for dealing with the likes of you.

Snip.

--
Roger Chapman