I sent my last invoice for this tax year in January. I haven't done the calculations yet, and there was a hefty whack of expenditure for that big project, but any more income risks skirting the edge of the 40% tax bracket this year. I refuse to work for half pay. Less than half, once you add in NI and all the other sneaky taxes. I'll take on more work but there'll be no more invoicing before April.
I don't need all that much money really. I have no interest in big cars or yachts or mansions or huge plasma TVs and am not in the least interested in keeping up with the debt-laden neighbours. My only debt is my mortgage and if I ever had a half-decent win on the lottery, that would be paid off just before I descended into an alcohol-fuelled coma while kippering myself with fine Virgina smoke.
Next year I'll have to cut back more. Those small-business-friendly Torydems have decided to lower the threshold at which they can make me work for peanuts and I refuse to comply. There has only ever been one year in which I paid tax at 40%, and that was the year I was made redundant. Never again. This small business will contribute less to the economy next year. I will also spend less. It won't help the Government one bit and that is just fine with me. They hate smokers. They hate drinkers too. They really can't expect any other reaction.
Scottish Parliament elections are coming up. I'll be campaigning against all the main parties. It's only fair. They spend most of their time campaigning against me. I will definitely vote even though whoever I choose will stand no chance of winning. I might be the only one who votes for them. So why bother?
My vote will cut the winner's vote share by one. It might even cut their majority by one. A small and insignificant protest if I'm the only one doing it but then, I might not be. Not if I can get word around. Oh, I am under no illusions. I don't expect the SNP to lose here, I don't expect anyone but the Triad (which in Scotland is SNP, Labour and Lib Dem because the Tories have pretty much given up here) to send a drone to Holyrood but I am going to vote anyway. It's the only recourse available. They listen to nothing else.
Labour hold the estates of Aberdeen, a wonderful irony because they hold parts like Northfield and Tillydrone which are shellsuit and Burberry zones. Here's a tribute to the inclusiveness of Labour voters. In Tillydrone (I'm not making that name up) last year, a Polish man was attacked. He had a pool cue/broom handle (reports are unclear) rammed up his backside to the extent that X-rays showed the tip of it in his chest. Homophobic or racist or both? No idea, the story just faded away after a few days, because for Tillydrone that wasn't big news. Besides, Polish folk are white and there was no indication the victim was gay. If he had been, there would have been far more coverage. As far as I know he survived. As far as I know, the homogenous shellsuit men have not been caught, but then even if they were, they'd probably get an ASBO.
Labour couldn't let their voters go to prison because once in there, they couldn't vote Labour. Once the EU win the prisoners' votes 'debate', there's no more reason for anyone, not even Labour, to keep them free any more. The chavs can vote from the stripey hole, and will probably be compelled to do so.
There are a lot of Poles here. Supermarkets stock Polish food. I don't mind at all because I like to sample a wide range of foods, and Polish bus drivers laugh at snow. You have to get to work when there's two feet of snow? Make sure the bus driver is Polish. Two feet is just a sprinkling to these guys.
Labour's support comes from those who don't know what the word means. People who work vote anything but Labour. Anyone trying to improve their lives by voting socialist should be sectioned unless they plan to improve it at someone else's expense. Then they should be shot.
Aside from politics, I'm still waiting for the crocus pentacle to rise in my lawn. No sign yet although the lawn is showing signs of - putting it mildly - distress from the severe temperatures of global warming. I'll likely be in the queue for grass seed later this year. No sign even of the snowdrops so far. I think I'm going to have a wrecked garden again.
Well, back to that zombie tale. I'll put up a few snippets as it goes.
18 comments:
Your snowdrops will come through. Mine haven't either but they were very late last year too. There's time yet.
" No sign even of the snowdrops so far."
Maybe someone's nicked 'em?
My snowdrops are up and showing white, about a week to the first one opening at a guess, but I'm in Yorkshire.
No sign of the crocuses yet though.
I'll tell you when and if they appear.
Aren't you supposed to be a fortnight later, being further North?
We could have a crocus sighting chain, beginning in Cornwall.
Rose
Snowdrops in Suffolk first sighted Saturday 22nd Jan in bloom! And we had 4 weeks of subzero temperatures in December.
A solitary crocus in Devon, the rest are not playing.
I sympathise having worked for myself for 20 odd years before retiring early because I didn't see the point in working for Gordon. Ironically, most of my work for for the government!
I had a limited company which was fine until Gordon decided to change the rules so that I would be taxed as if I was an employee whilst still paying corporation tax and employers NI. This was outrageous, so I retired.
What I don't understand is why corporation tax is now a single rate of 28%. This means small companies pay 8% more than they used to and large companies pay 12% less. This makes no sense.
So, I guess you are paying tax under schedule D. Best of luck mate!
(I can't make sense of it all - and I qualifed as an accountant back in 1977. Mind you, things were a lot simpler then!)
Are there no brown envelope payments in your line of work, you no the 'off balance sheet' payments our rulers are so enamoured of?
Giving up my limited company this year and returning to being self employed and paid in cash, brown envelopes and kind in whatever combination suits my customers.
That should be know, obviously!
Leegy, we are reaping enormous benefits of having a Polish community here in South London.
Tyskie, Zubr or Lech - six cans for a fiver. Same price as the 'brewed-under-licence-in-the-uk' Eurofizz that the kids drink, only it actually tastes of something.
And as for the sausages in the Polish deli...
Not a bit of it Halal either. marvellous.
Dioclese,
What I don't understand is why corporation tax is now a single rate of 28%. This means small companies pay 8% more than they used to and large companies pay 12% less. This makes no sense.
Unless, of course, you are a bunch of politicians receiving some very nice "benefits" c/o a lot of very big companies. Then, suddenly, it all starts to make perfect sense!
Like you I always vote, even if it means defacing the voting paper with "none of you is worthy of my vote", or perhaps worded a bit more strongly. Usually though, there's some local single issue guy or lady who I feel is worth supporting. My granny was a suffragette and my mum always insisted that I vote, so this way I can relax in the knowledge that they won't be frowning at me from on high. The mainstream parties can take a running jump.
Ah, so touch without authorisation in triplicate is now illegal in the controlled zones. It's for the cheeeeeldren, to borrow your most appropriate and well-aimed phrase
A
@Dioclese - ah, the joys of IR35, I assume?
There are ways & means around that nonsense, thankfully.
Also, according to the horse's mouth, 28% corp tax (27% for year commencing 1st April 2011) only applies if your company has profits (not revenue) of over 300K per year...under that, the rate is 21% (20% from 01/04/2011)...
Yup it's 21% for small businesses.
You may do well to look at going ltd. Anything that would normally take you over the 40% rate can be left in the company as reserves, so you'll just pay 21% on the profit & it can sit there for a rainy day.
Pay a small wage and take the rest im dividends, and you'll find you are paying virtually no NI either.
SR - I just hope we don't get a warm spell followed by another serious frost. That won't do my fruit trees any favours.
JuliaM - I read about that. Valuable snowdrops was something I'd never thought about. Mine are plain garden-centre cheapies though.
Rose - yes, plants are always late here. I've never yet seen a daffodil in time for St. David's Day.
Dioclese - I operate as a sole trader, which is simpler. No corporation tax or VAT to mess with, just the annual tax form.
William - nope, the nature of the work (meddling with dangerous bacteria) means the only ones who'd pay cash are ones I'd rather not get involved with. It's all cheques and bank transfers.
Billy - I have yet to try the Polish beers. I notice there are some around here, just haven't got around to them yet.
Regarding the dropping of the 40% tax boundary: don't forget they have also upped the 0%mpersonal allowance so you might be able to pay a little 40% and break even with this year.
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