and property is greatly undertaxed compared with other countries.
This simply is not true.
Property tax as a percentage of total tax collected by the country.
The UK collects 11.9% of total tax revenue from taxes on property. This is the highest in the OECD and some twice the OECD average of 5.8%.
It might be that we tax property badly, that we don’t tax really expensive property enough, all sorts of things might be wrong with the system. But it simply isn’t true that we tax property lightly compared with other countries. Quite the opposite.
True, we don’t have capital gains on first houses, we don’t tax imputed rents for owner occupiers. But we do get over £25 billion each in domestic and business rates (except for one spot in Norfolk) and yes, those are taxes on property.
It’s also fun to see Ritchie’s figures mangled even more than he himself manages:
while some £25bn is evaded and £70bn avoided.
Other way around…..
6 responses so far ↓
1 Shinsei67 // Nov 30, 2011 at 10:21 am
Surely council tax is a tax on residence rather than a tax on property.
You pay council tax whether you rent or own.
I’m sure Polly means that the ownership of property is undertaxed. As a landlord you don’t pay council tax.
2 Grumpy Old Man // Nov 30, 2011 at 11:09 am
Explains why Polly has so much property overseas though.
3 Johnathan Pearce // Nov 30, 2011 at 11:54 am
I wonder how much she pays on that Tuscany villa.
4 Matthew // Nov 30, 2011 at 2:23 pm
You’ve made this point at least three times and each times the commenters have disagreed with you, partly for the reasons in comment 1.
It would be nice if you or Polly would show any sign of learning new things.
5 Mr Potarto // Nov 30, 2011 at 5:04 pm
Tim is using the OECD definition of property tax. You may disagree with their definition, but you can hardly complain he’s being contrary by using OECD statistics.
6 Matthew // Dec 1, 2011 at 11:28 am
I’m not complaining he’s being contrary, I’m complaining that the data does not show what he wants it to show.
Leave a Comment