Re: No More Arguments: Austerity is Working! : Wed Mar 19, 2014 10:38 pm  

Don't know what went wrong there!

Re: No More Arguments: Austerity is Working! : Thu Mar 20, 2014 9:23 am  

'They'? Really?

Whippet and flat cap tax-cuts for everyone, huzzah.

[DaveO]

Re: No More Arguments: Austerity is Working! : Thu Mar 20, 2014 10:10 am  

'They'? Really?

Well exactly. Snapps gaff Along with Gove being consigned to the "naughty step" for pointing out the old Etonian clique in government has just shown Milliband was right to say the budget was for the privileged, by the privileged.

We've had the caravans and pasties budget; this time it's beer and bingo. What's next? Cutting tax on flat caps and whippets? Got to appeal to the north with cheaper bingo and and a penny off a pint!

Meanwhile Tarquin and Jemima can pocket £2K tax relief for their £10K a year nanny and can stash up to £15K a year in savings tax free.

Re: No More Arguments: Austerity is Working! : Thu Mar 20, 2014 10:27 am  

DaveO wrote:

Well exactly. Snapps gaff Along with Gove being consigned to the "naughty step" for pointing out the old Etonian clique in government has just shown Milliband was right to say the budget was for the privileged, by the privileged.

We've had the caravans and pasties budget; this time it's beer and bingo. What's next? Cutting tax on flat caps and whippets? Got to appeal to the north with cheaper bingo and and a penny off a pint!

Meanwhile Tarquin and Jemima can pocket £2K tax relief for their £10K a year nanny and can stash up to £15K a year in savings tax free.

But it wasn't for the privileged, I benefitted from it and I'm far from privileged.
Tarquin and Jemima? FFS, remove that bag of McCains from your shoulder.

Re: No More Arguments: Austerity is Working! : Thu Mar 20, 2014 10:41 am  

BobbyD wrote:

... FFS, remove that bag of McCains from your shoulder.

So Gove was wrong, eh?

[DaveO]

Re: No More Arguments: Austerity is Working! : Thu Mar 20, 2014 11:15 am  

BobbyD wrote:

But it wasn't for the privileged, I benefitted from it and I'm far from privileged.
Tarquin and Jemima? FFS, remove that bag of McCains from your shoulder.

Of course it was for privileged. Only the privileged can afford to shove £15K into an ISA or will have built enough up in a pension to make it worthwhile to withdraw it.

How did you benefit? Are you about to start shovelling £15K a year into an ISA (despite the fact interest rates remain a pittance)?

Do you have child care costs of £10K so you can get a £2K of tax relief on those?

Are you 55 or older and have enough money in your pension pot to withdraw it and invest in a buy to let?

Or are you suggesting you are better off because of the changes to the personal income tax allowance having completely forgotten about the fact it is just not going to make up for the rise in energy prices you have already experienced or the fact you will continue to pay VAT at 20%?

In short, why are you so easily fooled?

Re: No More Arguments: Austerity is Working! : Thu Mar 20, 2014 11:17 am  

DaveO wrote:

How did you benefit? Are you about to start shovelling £15K a year into an ISA (despite the fact interest rates remain a pittance)?

The ISAs issue is hilarious. As you rightly point out, interest rates are such that's it's absolutely no better than simply keeping the money in your current account.

I had two: the first was a basic one, which then proceeded to sit around, with money in, for some years with interest rates meaning that it was growing barely at all. To clarify, this was a four-figure sum, not peanuts.

The second one had a percentage of the money that was to be invested, by the bank in question (the Halifax) in medium-risk ventures.

That went pear-shaped and has taken something like six years to even recover the initial amount.

I'd have been better keeping cash under the mattress.

The former has been closed and the money invested in our home – it'll be more use like that. I'm preparing to do the same with the latter, before finances go tîts up again.

[DaveO]

Re: No More Arguments: Austerity is Working! : Thu Mar 20, 2014 11:40 am  

Mintball wrote:

The ISAs issue is hilarious. As you rightly point out, interest rates are such that's it's absolutely no better than simply keeping the money in your current account.

I had two: the first was a basic one, which then proceeded to sit around, with money in, for some years with interest rates meaning that it was growing barely at all. To clarify, this was a four-figure sum, not peanuts.

The second one had a percentage of the money that was to be invested, by the bank in question (the Halifax) in medium-risk ventures.

That went pear-shaped and has taken something like six years to even recover the initial amount.

When I took my interest-only mortgage out I was assured if I invested £x a month in an index-tracking ISA the "miracle of compound interest" would ensure it would pay the mortgage off and then some because despite the usual warning of "investments can go down as well as up" the stock market has never failed to yield an average growth over such a long period that a mortgage runs for of well over 7%. Apparently.

Doesn't look like it is going to pan out that way. However I was lucky in that as my cash ISA interest rates went down there were still some long term fixed rate deals around so I transferred the ISA into one paying 4.1% fixed for five years. Regardless of what happens to interest rates and provided the stock market doesn't crash the two ISA'a together should pay the mortgage off. This is mostly luck rather than judgement though.

With ISA rates as they are I certainly would not be sticking £15K in one even if I had the cash to do so.

Re: No More Arguments: Austerity is Working! : Thu Mar 20, 2014 11:42 am  

Mintball wrote:

I'd have been better keeping cash under the mattress.

That reminds me of when I had several thousands of pound notes under my mattress back in the 80
's when I was in my twenties.
Looking back it seemed to give the bed extra bounceability when I used to drag young ladies back to my boudoir.
I haven't even got a fiver to stick under these days.

Re: No More Arguments: Austerity is Working! : Thu Mar 20, 2014 11:51 am  

DaveO wrote:

When I took my interest-only mortgage out I was assured if I invested £x a month in an index-tracking ISA the "miracle of compound interest" would ensure it would pay the mortgage off and then some because despite the usual warning of "investments can go down as well as up" the stock market has never failed to yield an average growth over such a long period that a mortgage runs for of well over 7%. Apparently.

Doesn't look like it is going to pan out that way. However I was lucky in that as my cash ISA interest rates went down there were still some long term fixed rate deals around so I transferred the ISA into one paying 4.1% fixed for five years. Regardless of what happens to interest rates and provided the stock market doesn't crash the two ISA'a together should pay the mortgage off. This is mostly luck rather than judgement though.

With ISA rates as they are I certainly would not be sticking £15K in one even if I had the cash to do so.

We've been trying to find accounts that pay a reasonable rate of interest and using those instead. And then you have to look around and shift stuff again, because the good rates are only for a limited time.

But I detest this entire thing about being expected to become an expert yourself – and certainly not being able to simply trust those working in banks to be genuinely helpful.

You try to be sensible/responsible, but things are stacked to work against you.