Anyone else think this isnt nearly enough??

DeVore

I dont want people to suffer, but this strikes me as an election-focused budget compared to what is needed.

We made this mistake before, not cutting enough and now we are in this situation with the budget deficit.... imho, this budget is the same, not enough when we needed to be putting our house in order.

This seems like more postponed pain.... I hope I'm wrong.

DeV.

Alter-Ego

I had a feeling of "whats the catch" while watching Lenihan. It all seems a bit tame IMO.

BoB_BoT

honestly, no. Especially to the high earners, oh no, the taoiseach will only be on 200k and change. 250k cap for public servants, feck me, how can you live on that :rolleyes:

(I know not everyone is on that, but it should have been half that cap for public representatives).

AnneFrank

DeVore wrote: »

I dont want people to suffer, but this strikes me as an election-focused budget compared to what is needed.

We made this mistake before, not cutting enough and now we are in this situation with the budget deficit.... imho, this budget is the same, not enough when we needed to be putting our house in order.

This seems like more postponed pain.... I hope I'm wrong.

DeV.

you cant get blood from a stone dev,perhaps you can afford to pay more,I cant

RedXIV

Ah there could have been alot more done in fairness. I know alot of people are on the breadline but there's alot more that could have been done.

amacca

will it bring in the ~6Billion euro of savings in 2011 or over a longer period op?

just watching and tend to agree with op but I'm sure there are plenty of measures whose "sting in the tail" may only be realized later


still though, looks to me like they are angling for a rip roaring time in opposition when next govt has to shaft oaps/ps etc they will enjoy a rise in popularity.

best of both worlds - we made the hard choices - we protected the vulnerable etc etc now fg/lab are showing their true colours, re-elect ff - we would never do something like this...we never did etc etc

Jimmy Bottlehead

RedXIV wrote: »

Ah there could have been alot more done in fairness. I know alot of people are on the breadline but there's alot more that could have been done.

I'll second this. I've been on the dole and I'm currently in a job (which I'm lucky to have and grateful for) that doesn't pay amazing money, but nothing about today makes me worry about how I'll pay bills etc. I know I can still live comfortably.

I think that people are seeing it as bad mainly because Fianna Fail are at the head of it, instead of it being horrifically bad. That being said, Fianna Fail are a ****ing DISGRACE for what they've done to this country the past 15 years or so.

johnnyskeleton

I haven't seen any costings for the measures, but it seems to me that the adjustments are in the region of about €3bn, not €6bn.

Roughly 800m from basic SW, 700 from CB and other measures.

Unclear what measures in PS will be, but can't imagine more than 1bn.

Taxes also not clear, but if we take a 10% increase in income tax and small increases in PRSI (everything else seems more or less the same) and the excise increases being revenue neutral (people will travel less with more expensive petrol) then that's an extra 1bn.

So about 3.5bn, but with the increased spending on jobs programme and administration of the new schemes, brings it down to closer to 3.5bn.

That's not counting the effects of these measures on people's behaviours.

DeVore

AnneFrank wrote: »

you cant get blood from a stone dev,perhaps you can afford to pay more,I cant

I've a mortage and I earn about minimum wage (why is it everyone thinks I'm a freakin millionaire! )

I'm not looking to get cut more, I dont want more pain for me or for anyone but in such situations its good to look at the whole span of the event.... this may seem like a reasonable budget but it could easily be a lot of pain "in the post".

DeV.

Sleepy

A few things strike me whilst lookinig at the summary of Budgetary Measures here: http://www.budget.gov.ie/budgets/2011/Documents/Summary%20of%20Measures%20Combined.pdf

1. It's an utter disgrace that pensions weren't touched for the second year in a row whilst all other social welfare was cut.

2. The Social Welface cuts should have been higher and more refined (e.g. dropping levels of dole after every 12 months on welfare etc.)

3. Not nearly enough was done on PS Pensions and the PS Income Levies should have been increased.

4. The amount of the savings to be found from "Administrative efficiencies" in virtually every department is worrying. Have these been identified or is this just a euphemism for 'Misc to be figured out by the next government if they have the balls to stand up to the unions'.

5. Increasing petrol & diesel makes us even less competitive.

6. When virtually every private sector worker is on a pay freeze, why the hell didn't he elect to freeze increments in PS?

amacca

Alter-Ego wrote: »

I had a feeling of "whats the catch" while watching Lenihan.

indeed...a familiar feeling when watching any finance minister deliver a budget


pity more people weren't thinking that when mccreevy/aherne et al were delivering budgets

verbosity

BoB_BoT wrote: »

honestly, no. Especially to the high earners, oh no, the taoiseach will only be on 200k and change. 250k cap for public servants, feck me, how can you live on that :rolleyes:

(I know not everyone is on that, but it should have been half that cap for public representatives).

How are we supposed to attract the best people to run our public sector as public servants if the prices aren't at least someway comparable to the private sector? If we reduce the price cap drastically then we can't compete.

DeVore

Johnny, I agree, I cant see how this even approaches 6Bn of revenue even going by their figures...


DeV.

johnnyskeleton

DeVore wrote: »

I've a mortage and I earn about minimum wage (why is it everyone thinks I'm a freakin millionaire! )

Because boards.ie is taking over the world. There's profit in that there world domination.

Cavehill Red

This is the IMF's budget.

I'd like an Irish budget, please.

Did it not cut enough? Depends on the timescale in which you wish to balance the budget. Depends on how many kids you want to see cold and hungry. How many more you wish to see emigrate, quit college, lose their jobs.

I think this is a budget to hammer the poor and once again let the rich off scott free. And when the likes of Michael Noonan agrees with that assessment, it's frankly not up for argument anymore.

danbohan

AnneFrank wrote: »

you cant get blood from a stone dev,perhaps you can afford to pay more,I cant

ogh you can and you will , this is the first course

TouchingVirus

€2.12bn reduction estimates in expenditure in the Summary of Measures. Going on his 1/3rd from tax increases and 2/3rds from expenditure it appears that you're right, 3.5bn or so max savings.

What happened to the rest of the €6bn. I don't think it's enough tbh, but we'll see it how the rest of this goes.

buck65

Does it really matter if it's 3b or 6b when the banks can lose that much in a quarter? This is an exercise in futility, the Bond markets haven't much confidence in our budget or our politicians to get us out of this mess. Things are going to get much worse with our finances, we are talking about a billion here and there when the problem is going to be nearer 100billion to sort. Torch the bondholders.

lightspeed

i kind of felt the same but im still confused a bit as just now i heard something how middle tax earners will have their rates increased. Im on Gross €20,000 a year so is there more tax for me ? How much?
How much is this new "Universal Social Fund"?
Are student fees increasing? Im in evening college studying for a degree so will i likelly be affected even though i already pay?
Considering the interest of 5,7% on 80 billion to the IMF if im not mistaken on them figures i have my doubts that this budget is nearly tough enough.
I know its hard for people im 23 and having to pay most of the mortgage on my family home and other bills as well as college fees but if its not enough now all it means is bigger cuts down the line.
Just a final point id like to add did anybody notice the banner advert on the botom right of this thread for an MBNA credit card to help with the "Budget" ??
Somethings just dont change , that speaks for itself as to why ireland is in the mess it is in.

Buford T Justice

DeVore wrote: »

Johnny, I agree, I cant see how this even approaches 6Bn of revenue even going by their figures...


DeV.

Leinehan has proven time and again that he's useless with figures, so this is no different imo.

Sleepy

DeVore wrote: »

I've a mortage and I earn about minimum wage (why is it everyone thinks I'm a freakin millionaire! )

Probably because of you having mentioned you "paper millionaire" status in this post

That and since Boards.ie is priceless, your percentage of infinity must make you infinitely rich!

BoB_BoT

BoB_BoT wrote: »

honestly, no. Especially to the high earners, oh no, the taoiseach will only be on 200k and change. 250k cap for public servants, feck me, how can you live on that :rolleyes:

(I know not everyone is on that, but it should have been half that cap for public representatives).

verbosity wrote: »

How are we supposed to attract the best people to run our public sector as public servants if the prices aren't at least someway comparable to the private sector? If we reduce the price cap drastically then we can't compete.

Well if we're attracting the cream of the crop at the moment, it must be a pretty ****ty crop.

danbohan

Cavehill Red wrote: »

This is the IMF's budget.

I'd like an Irish budget, please.

Did it not cut enough? Depends on the timescale in which you wish to balance the budget. Depends on how many kids you want to see cold and hungry. How many more you wish to see emigrate, quit college, lose their jobs.

I think this is a budget to hammer the poor and once again let the rich off scott free. And when the likes of Michael Noonan agrees with that assessment, it's frankly not up for argument anymore.

you mean you would like a budget like 2006 or 2006 ? , sorry change of circumstances old chap . still one highest sw rates in europe , still one highest min wage, we getting towards an average taxed economy not a high tax one yet but we will be , this budget should be a lot tougher but they just kick it down the road so other lot will have to do it

Cavehill Red

BoB_BoT wrote: »

Well if we're attracting the cream of the crop at the moment, it must be a pretty ****ty crop.

Cream rises, but **** floats.

We've been unable to differentiate between the two.

wonderfulname

lightspeed wrote: »

i kind of felt the same but im still confused a bit as just now i heard something how middle tax earners will have their rates increased. Im on Gross €20,000 a year so is there more tax for me ? How much?
How much is this new "Universal Social Fund"?
Are student fees increasing? Im in evening college studying for a degree so will i likelly be affected even though i already pay?
Considering the interest of 5,7% on 80 billion to the IMF if im not mistaken on them figures i have my doubts that this budget is nearly tough enough.
I know its hard for people im 23 and having to pay most of the mortgage on my family home and other bills as well as college fees but if its not enough now all it means is bigger cuts down the line.
Just a final point id like to add did anybody notice the banner advert on the botom right of this thread for an MBNA credit card to help with the "Budget" ??
Somethings just dont change , that speaks for itself as to why ireland is in the mess it is in.

Look here, there's a good summary of the major left out changes half way down.

Reg fees are up 500e.

I.S.T.

It's just the same old trick, spread rumours of severe cuts to media, then announce the budget with not so severe cuts, people breath a sigh of relief.

Same thing happened with the interest rate on the IMF/EU bail out, weekend papers were full of talk of 6.7% rate, Sunday night rate of 5.7% is announced. people breath a sigh of relief instead of being furious.

sink

The only impact on me personally that I can see is a lowering of my tax credits by 10%, not sure by how much that is going to affect my take home pay but it won't be too much and also Peterol up by 4c, which won't greatly effect me as I commute by public transport. I'm already paying the lower income tax rate, I'm not in receipt of any state benefits, nor do I avail of any tax relief schemes. Income tax, VAT and VRT remain the same, which covers most of what I give to the government. I was expecting a lot worse tbh.

johnnyskeleton

DeVore wrote: »

Johnny, I agree, I cant see how this even approaches 6Bn of revenue even going by their figures...


DeV.

Cross posted from tpp:

mikewest wrote:

I haven't had a chance to go through it properly yet but on first glance these numbers don't add up to 6 bn. Most thing I notice is 10% off tax bands and credits which will hit middle income workers very hard

Roughly 2.2bn cuts in expenditure, about 1.5bn from Social and Family affairs i.e. SW and CB cuts. Rest seems to be generalised fluff.

857m from decrease in credits and bands.

A laughable 420m from this new solidiarity crap (although it might not come in until 2012). For 2011, PRSI to increase by 150m. He's mad if he thinks self employed will stick around to pay an additional 50m i.e. same rate PRSI as employees.

About 100m from mickey mouse tax increases and removal of tax breaks.

Another 100m from excise increase on petrol/diesel

20m from increased DIRT (yeah right)

Stamp duty down 36m

Roughtly 3.4bn in cuts for 2011. For full year (i.e. including changes to PRSI/Levys/Solidarity bull****) would perhaps get it up to 4bn.

This budget is a lie.

http://www.budget.gov.ie/budgets/2011/Documents/Summary%20of%20Measures%20Combined.pdf

Cavehill Red

danbohan wrote: »

you mean you would like a budget like 2006 or 2006 ? , sorry change of circumstances old chap . still one highest sw rates in europe , still one highest min wage, we getting towards an average taxed economy not a high tax one yet but we will be , this budget should be a lot tougher but they just kick it down the road so other lot will have to do it

Straw man. :rolleyes:
I didn't mention 2006. Deal with what I said. This budget targets the low paid, targets parents, targets students and targets the unemployed. It targets the poor basically. Even Michael Noonan, Ireland's Thatcher, agrees. The rich got off Scott free.
4% off the public sector pension? A few quid off Taoiseach's wages? It's p1ss in the wind. The public sector pensions should have been radically overhauled, limited to over 65s only and slashed in half. A supertax should have been introduced and stringent double-reporting methods of taxation to insure that the likes of Bono who live here and trade off their Irishness pay their tax here. The US has such a system these many years. You don't pay, you lose your passport and right to reside.

PeakOutput

DeVore wrote: »

I dont want people to suffer, but this strikes me as an election-focused budget compared to what is needed.

We made this mistake before, not cutting enough and now we are in this situation with the budget deficit.... imho, this budget is the same, not enough when we needed to be putting our house in order.

This seems like more postponed pain.... I hope I'm wrong.

DeV.

did he say at the start that he wasnt going threw the cuts that were already released in the 4year plan but that they are included in the budget?

wonderfulname

sink wrote: »

The only impact on me personally that I can see is a lowering of my tax credits by 10%, not sure by how much that is going to affect my take home pay but it won't be too much and also Peterol up by 4c, which won't greatly effect me as I commute by public transport. I'm already paying the lower income tax rate, I'm not in receipt of any state benefits, nor do I avail of any tax relief schemes. Income tax, VAT and VRT remain the same, which covers most of what I give to the government. I was expecting a lot worse tbh.

Universal Social Charge
Also Dublin Bus likes raising fares and blaming fuel.
There's probably a few other sneaky changes that will affect you slightly.

PeakOutput

Cavehill Red wrote: »

I think this is a budget to hammer the poor and once again let the rich off scott free. And when the likes of Michael Noonan agrees with that assessment, it's frankly not up for argument anymore.

eh im afraid it is you clearly werent listening

higher income earners are now paying around 61% of their income in tax SIXTY ONE CENT OUT OF EVERY EURO EARNED

Ickle Magoo

I'm surprised that it wasn't worse, much worse.

I think they are trying to ensure that when they hand over the books that their replacements will have to make the hard and unpopular decisions that need to be made, just...ugh...at the cowardliness of it all.

I.S.T.

PeakOutput wrote: »

eh im afraid it is you clearly werent listening

higher income earners are now paying around 61% of their income in tax SIXTY ONE CENT OUT OF EVERY EURO EARNED

High income earners are not the rich, let's not kid ourselves. They are the middle class, being squeezed more and more. The rich are the type who hide behind loopholes left right and centre to get away with paying tax.

Cavehill Red

PeakOutput wrote: »

eh im afraid it is you clearly werent listening

higher income earners are now paying around 61% of their income in tax SIXTY ONE CENT OUT OF EVERY EURO EARNED

Oh, I was listening alright. 61% of 200 grand is not enough. Except the rich earning that are paying half nothing in tax. We need a supertax and a wealth tax. You don't balance the budget targetting the low wage earners and the unemployed.

dvpower

PeakOutput wrote: »

eh im afraid it is you clearly werent listening

higher income earners are now paying around 61% of their income in tax SIXTY ONE CENT OUT OF EVERY EURO EARNED

How is that?
PRSI: 4%
USC: 7%
Income Tax: 41%

I make that 52%

PeakOutput

dvpower wrote: »

How is that?
PRSI: 4%
USC: 7%
Income Tax: 41%

I make that 52%

you havnt added in the levies and other taxes / tax increases

edit; in fact you did exactly what lenihan did which was mention 52% and immediately all the economists said that figure is pure propaganda and the figure with everything included is around 61%

dvpower

PeakOutput wrote: »

you havnt added in the levies and other taxes / tax increases

Levies are replaced by the USC.
What 'other' tax increases?

johnnyskeleton

Cavehill Red wrote: »

Oh, I was listening alright. 61% of 200 grand is not enough. Except the rich earning that are paying half nothing in tax. We need a supertax and a wealth tax. You don't balance the budget targetting the low wage earners and the unemployed.

Actually you do because while they do not earn as much, there's a lot more of them. €10 from a million people makes more sense than €1m from 10 people, because those 10 people will just leave.

PeakOutput

IrishSpeedTraps wrote: »

High income earners are not the rich, let's not kid ourselves.

thats true

They are the middle class, being squeezed more and more. The rich are the type who hide behind loopholes left right and centre to get away with paying tax.

these loophole dodgers are few and far between there is not enough of them to make any difference

loopholes should be closed no question, corporation tax is not a loophole though and should not be touched

blastman

sink wrote: »

The only impact on me personally that I can see is a lowering of my tax credits by 10%, not sure by how much that is going to affect my take home pay but it won't be too much and also Peterol up by 4c, which won't greatly effect me as I commute by public transport. I'm already paying the lower income tax rate, I'm not in receipt of any state benefits, nor do I avail of any tax relief schemes. Income tax, VAT and VRT remain the same, which covers most of what I give to the government. I was expecting a lot worse tbh.

So will you vote of FF in early 2011, then?

That's the impression I'm getting, this is a frantic attempt not to get wiped out completely at the next poll by being a bit less swingeing than people were expecting.

KindOfIrish

I've just been watching RTE. The Dail is empty. Where all these feckers. They receive huge salaries for nothing. I would like time check cards to be introduced in all goverment depatrments.

Sleepy

johnnyskeleton wrote: »

Cross posted from tpp:



Roughly 2.2bn cuts in expenditure, about 1.5bn from Social and Family affairs i.e. SW and CB cuts. Rest seems to be generalised fluff.

857m from decrease in credits and bands.

A laughable 420m from this new solidiarity crap (although it might not come in until 2012). For 2011, PRSI to increase by 150m. He's mad if he thinks self employed will stick around to pay an additional 50m i.e. same rate PRSI as employees.

About 100m from mickey mouse tax increases and removal of tax breaks.

Another 100m from excise increase on petrol/diesel

20m from increased DIRT (yeah right)

Stamp duty down 36m

Roughtly 3.4bn in cuts for 2011. For full year (i.e. including changes to PRSI/Levys/Solidarity bull****) would perhaps get it up to 4bn.

This budget is a lie.

http://www.budget.gov.ie/budgets/2011/Documents/Summary%20of%20Measures%20Combined.pdf

According to Ronan Lyons on Twitter, two billion of the cuts in this budget are from Capital Expenditure. 2 + 3.7 + fluff = 6 in FF land.

Rodin

Cavehill Red wrote: »

This is the IMF's budget.

I'd like an Irish budget, please.

Did it not cut enough? Depends on the timescale in which you wish to balance the budget. Depends on how many kids you want to see cold and hungry. How many more you wish to see emigrate, quit college, lose their jobs.

I think this is a budget to hammer the poor and once again let the rich off scott free. And when the likes of Michael Noonan agrees with that assessment, it's frankly not up for argument anymore.

There is no financial reason why children should go hungry in this country

Cavehill Red

johnnyskeleton wrote: »

Actually you do because while they do not earn as much, there's a lot more of them. €10 from a million people makes more sense than €1m from 10 people, because those 10 people will just leave.

Yeah, we keep hearing this BS about how we can't tax rich people or regulate them because otherwise they'll leave. The US has no problem taxing people wherever they live.

danbohan

Cavehill Red wrote: »

Straw man. :rolleyes:
I didn't mention 2006. Deal with what I said. This budget targets the low paid, targets parents, targets students and targets the unemployed. It targets the poor basically. Even Michael Noonan, Ireland's Thatcher, agrees. The rich got off Scott free.
4% off the public sector pension? A few quid off Taoiseach's wages? It's p1ss in the wind. The public sector pensions should have been radically overhauled, limited to over 65s only and slashed in half. A supertax should have been introduced and stringent double-reporting methods of taxation to insure that the likes of Bono who live here and trade off their Irishness pay their tax here. The US has such a system these many years. You don't pay, you lose your passport and right to reside.

you said you wanted an irish budget , 2006 etc seems to be the type of budget that irish people think they are entitled too
am sure you will be very happy next year when brother noonan stands up and delivers the budget . the unemployed are after this on 175 per week ? they are on 75 per week in uk , time to get real , yes its not ideal budget , the fact that public sector has been left untouched is a nonsense but they will fall on their own sword anyway by not implementing croke park

PeakOutput

Cavehill Red wrote: »

Oh, I was listening alright. 61% of 200 grand is not enough. Except the rich earning that are paying half nothing in tax.

what are you talking about? anyone who is earning 200K is paying arounf 122K of that to the exchequer from now on and before was paying around 100k. these are paye employees and have NO LOOPHOLES TO AVAIL OFF

they are not the super rich

they would not be the ones included IF a supertax / wealth tax was introduced so i really have no idea what your talking about

We need a supertax and a wealth tax. You don't balance the budget targetting the low wage earners and the unemployed.

you are clearly jumping feet first into the typical tabloid / taxi driver politics / people who generally have no idea. you should probably do a bit of research yourself

Padkir

KindOfIrish wrote: »

I've just been watching RTE. The Dail is empty. Where all these feckers. They receive huge salaries for nothing. I would like time check cards to be introduced in all goverment depatrments.

It's after half 5, 95% of workers are on their way home by now.

cson

PeakOutput wrote: »

eh im afraid it is you clearly werent listening

higher income earners are now paying around 61% of their income in tax SIXTY ONE CENT OUT OF EVERY EURO EARNED

Can you provide a source for the 61%? A breakdown please.

dvpower wrote: »

How is that?
PRSI: 4%
USC: 7%
Income Tax: 41%

I make that 52%

Flawed immediately because the USC and PRSI charges are on total income. Thus if we have a €200,000 earner his effective tax rate would be;

36,400 @ 20% = 7,280
163,600 @ 41% = 67,076

200,000 @ 7% = 14,000
200,000 @ 4% = 8,000

Total tax = 96,356
Less Credits (3,300) - Presuming single PAYE worker.

96,056/200,000 = 47% effective tax rate.

Cavehill Red

PeakOutput wrote: »

what are you talking about? anyone who is earning 200K is paying arounf 122K of that to the exchequer from now on and before was paying around 100k. these are paye employees and have NO LOOPHOLES TO AVAIL OFF

More manure. RTE just priced in the cost of this budget to a couple on 250K at 3 grand. Get over yourself. Your numbers are nonsense.

PeakOutput wrote: »

they are not the super rich

Four times the average wage isn't rich? Maybe not to you. You can bet they look rich to the rest of us.

PeakOutput wrote: »

they would not be the ones included IF a supertax / wealth tax was introduced so i really have no idea what your talking about
you are clearly jumping feet first into the typical tabloid / taxi driver politics / people who generally have no idea. you should probably do a bit of research yourself

ROFL. I've probably done more fiscal research this past month than you've done your entire life.

PeakOutput

Cavehill Red wrote: »

Yeah, we keep hearing this BS about how we can't tax rich people or regulate them because otherwise they'll leave. The US has no problem taxing people wherever they live.

that is true and it is an option, however, there are a huge number of american citizens all over the world who are filthy rich. there are very very few irish citizens around the world who are filthy rich so the tax received from them would be nominal

Levies are replaced by the USC.
What 'other' tax increases?

ill have to wait for them to bring it up again to get you exactly what they were including but they were including all the taxes an individual pays iirc like vat and everything else etc