Ireland the land of taxes and endless "fees"

Nighttime22

Why is it in this country we seem to be paying high tax and a never ending list of "fee's", and yet never seem to have anything of value to show for it?

Our wages are taxed, We have to pay road tax, we have to pay a toll to use the road then, the gov have an extortionate rate of tax on fuel and the list goes on and on.... every single thing in this country is taxed, if they could gauge how many breaths of air a person took per day im sure they d try tax that too. If a person wants to set up a business there are fee's and taxes and endless bullshit and hoops deliberately designed to syphon money its actually crazy when you stand back and have a look at all the bullshit fee's and taxes there are.

And yet some how we are still nearly a quarter of a trillion euro in debt.

And **** all to show for it bar an extortionate cost of living and a **** healthcare system.

xxxxxxl

Golden circles, Handshakes, Jobs for the boys and Girls. Golden parachutes, Contracts for those in the know it's simple when you think about it.

road_high

I often think about this too and my conclusion is that we have a massively expensive and inefficient public service coupled with an eye wateringly large welfare state. Somehow this has to be paid for

xxxxxxl

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119913902#Comment_119913902

I understand people have a gripe with SW but JSA is just a small part of it. Pensions is the biggest.

road_high

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119913927#Comment_119913927

I know but there’s so many ancillary “benefits”. It’s out of control- they even advertise them on the radio now. The size of the state seems unprecedented now at any time I’ve been alive (I’m pushing 40). Of course the likes of me is still “entitled” to sweet FA

kirk.

It's mad handing out 400 for fuel allowance and 600 for electricity

There's so many annoying taxes and charges for everything

Not to mention the creeping regulation that's going on all the time

There's a subset then of the population who contribute nothing and get away with absolutely everything

xxxxxxl

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119913929#Comment_119913929

I would just cut it to one payment everything included benchmarked stuff like that. Also done on a county basis. Someone in Tip does not need the same supports as Dublin for example.

Peregrinus

While we fondly think of ourselves as a heavily-taxed country, actually, this isn't true, and hasn't been for a long time. By comparison with other European countries, we're about mid-range. Comparing tax as a percentage of GDP (or, in Ireland case, as a percentage of GNI*, since out GDP figures are atypical) we are well behind France, Denmark, Sweden, Greece, the Netherlands, Germany, Portugal, Spain, the UK and many other European countries. We're ahead of countries like Georgia, Romania, Albania, Kosovo and Russia. If you are dissatisfied with the quality of our public services well, perhaps this has something to do with that.

We think of ourselves as a high-tax country partly because we used to be, and partly because we still have a heavy concentration on personal income tax and expenditure taxes. Our overall tax take is low because we have low corporation tax, capital taxes, wealth taxes and property taxes, and very low social insurance taxes.

Strumms

It’s not going to get any better with the attitudes in government across all political spectra.

183 million was spent on direct provision alone in 2020…

not acceptable when back in June, there were 1500 people waiting to get funding for homecare packages. Lives and that of family in limbo having paid taxes here all their lives.. people being ‘staged’ taking up hospital beds because they don’t have funding for their homecare, people can’t get hospitalised for treatment because of this… waiting lists expanding and peoples wellbeing suffering.

a very vicious circle.

i don’t mind paying high taxes IF the key services and more besides are efficiently delivered.

• public transport
• healthcare, initial and rehabilitative, inpatient and outpatient.
• Enough gardai
• quality roads

Etc…

xxxxxxl

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119913995#Comment_119913995

This is an issue the wrong hot button issues got far to much attention. Bread and butter running the country does not seem to be their game now. I just find it odd having live here over 20 years. Irish people take a very very long time to get livid about something. In private it's completely different I mean more in a group sense. Anyone able to explain that to me ?

joeguevara

We’ll all tax expenditure is public. And Social Protection, Health, education and justice ate up about 80%. With social protection and health being about 50 billion.

dotsman

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119913927#Comment_119913927

Not only is quite a lot of that pension spending on people who didn't contribute in a meaningful way (or even at all), but it is dwarfed by the huge spending on all "social" spending. Comparing it to JSA is like comparing apples to bananas.

joeguevara

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119913995#Comment_119913995

Our tax take is 90 billion. 188 million while seems big is only 10 times more than the Popes visit to Ireland

xxxxxxl

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119914001#Comment_119914001

Oh I know but side issue is either let people die or fund a small section of people that don't pay income tax. I would start with stuff like NGO funding give Asylum seekers nothing they get food and board. If they drink and smoke that's their problem. If they want to make a call use the one in the centre. There are tones of saving to be had but zero apatite to change it. Anyone rocking up pregnant for example should be raked over the coals and explain why they did not go to the first country they could get to. That's child endangerment in my eyes.

joeguevara

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119914003#Comment_119914003

So asylum seekers get about €38 a week or €29 if a child to cover all essential items- what would you cut?

xxxxxxl

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119914013#Comment_119914013

They get everything they need in the centre. Unless you are saying they don't supply soap water and a whole other host of stuff. What esential items are not already being supplied by the centre or an NGO.

joeguevara

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119914030#Comment_119914030

All toiletries, toilet paper, sanitary towels, clothes, phone calls and local travel if they are going to work which can only happen if they haven’t got a first instance recommendation on their international protection application after 6 months.

Buster197456

Poorly run public service has to be paid for. What seems to be creeping in is levies and fees for nearly everything. A fat tax is next on the agenda. Takeaway tax is a definite. The minimum pricing was a disgrace. Publicans got that in. It seems they will tax anything to take the joy out of people's lives. We have such a poorly run public service. I know of people allegedly doing 20 hour weeks and getting paid for the full amount for the last ten years. And i don't think that's uncommon.

The money pit that is the health service has to be paid for. Also pension's for the public service. The whole public service needs a total revamp. People working in it are on the gravy train and it's paid for by every increasing taxes and levies/fees. Surely people not performing or incapable of doing their job should be held accountable. We are going to see increases in every tax over the years as levies from petrol cigs etc decrease. They will have to find the money for the wastage elsewhere.

The government just seem to use the blanket approach for everything. Like children's allowance that needs to be means tested. The blanket energy handout. Wastage go's on and on. The children's hospital. Any contract that seems to be handed out seems to overrun and go over budget.

The gravy train and wastage will never end and people will continue to pay high taxes and fees to fund it. Ireland will never change. It's to hard to change it and the political will is not there.

mmrs

We don't pay road tax in Ireland.

We do pay a lot, a wide base of taxes is a more stable, consistent source of income to the state. We definitely do not pay as much as a lot of our neighbours.

We also have a smaller gap between our poor and our rich than a lot of our neighbours due to a good social welfare system.

Things aren't brilliant but they aren't awful either. Just look at the UK. I'd personally prefer our system to theirs.

As someone who works you can feel like you're paying all this for nothing but someday your life might take an unexpected direction - you might loose your job or need to care for someone- and you might then find yourself benefitting from our wide and generous social welfare system. Then you might feel differently. It's there to protect us in case we need it but consider yourself fortunate if you don't ever need to.

Thelonious Monk

There's no road tax and MUP isn't a tax either

zell12

It is what we want!

We elect these politicians in one of the fairest voting systems on the planet. Michael Lowry, Bertie Ahern, Ray Burke were all re-elected by us.

Having said that, we should have higher direct taxes and lower indirect taxes, oh and water charges like 'normal' countries

blanch152

https://data.oecd.org/tax/tax-revenue.htm

We are not a highly taxed country, that is simply untrue.

cagefactor

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119914995#Comment_119914995

https://www.pressreader.com/ireland/the-irish-mail-on-sunday/20220605/281612424041626 (hardly the bastion of honest this paper but just one example of many who say the oecd figures are misleading)

The charts here don't show the stealth taxes we pay. The ones that annoy me the most :

In Denmark/Sweden - students do not pay fee's. In Denmark, students even get an allowance from the govt of more than 1k a month.

Child Care - about 140€ a month in Sweden (regardless of how many kids) and state takes care of it, x 8-12 times that cost in Ireland per kid sometimes (another mortgage)

VRT on vehicles - all cars are more expensive than in Europe, and we even calculate VAT on top of VRT. The price differences can bet 20%, as a result we often get much cheaper versions with all sorts of things removed from the cars by the manufacturers to bring the prices down. If we ever have a united ireland that one has to go.

Capital Gains at 33%. - 4th highest in Europe I think. Denmark is 10% more but its an outlier, most countries are 10-20%.

Most expensive country in the EU to buy tobacco and alcohol.

Tickets for events like concerts/cinema can be double the price of same events in Europe. (not a tax but still annoys me)

Our VAT rate is upper tier, higher than Austria, Germany, Belgium, Spain, UK, Italy, Netherlands and others but behind Sweden/Denmark (25ish).

steddyeddy

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119913978#Comment_119913978

That's very true P but I live in Germany and we get far more value for money here than I ever did in Ireland.

ELM327

My issue is not so much that we pay a lot of personal tax (which we do). However, the problem is value for money. We have to pay for everything on top of paying taxes. We spend a high amount per capita on the HSE yet unless you have the golden ticket (medical card) you are charged too. We pay social welfare for life. Even if the base rate isnt that high, it's the add ons. Someone in my extended family is on social welfare and with all the benefits and allowances I worked out for her that she'd need a job paying 45k approx just to break even, taking fuel allowance, rent allowance/hap, medical card etc.

Padraig Mor

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119913996#Comment_119913996

Exactly. Here in Cork the Council have no problem wasting money on 'robot trees' and rainbow crossings - yet many footpaths are covered with wet leaves, a serious slip hazard. Cut the PR **** lads, and sweep up the leaves - that's your job!

Ham_Sandwich

goverment should be doing more for people less taxes and less charges remember the council used to do the bins they should go back to that

tinytobe

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/2058273068/ireland-the-land-of-taxes-and-endless-fees

It's why Ireland is called the rip off republic.

If there is a system where one can pay money for something, but get absolutely nothing in return, I am sure, this can work only in Ireland.

Regarding taxes, it's a bit similar to the US, one has to pay taxes and never ever get's anything in return.

You'd have to move to Germany or France or one of the Scandinavian countries, where you pay taxes, often a high amount of it, but you do get something in return, - better health care, better child care, better public transport for instance.

shesty

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119914054#Comment_119914054

The thing is though, that I did lose my job for a year, back about 10 years ago due to the recession. I spent 12 months solid job hunting before I found another.

We had insurance to pay our mortgage, so I had to produce evidence for the insurance company every month of job hunting, and the responses that I got and a form stamped by social welfare.

Social welfare paid me 12 months of payments and then on month 11, the letter came - you've exhausted your 12 months, now we are going to means test you and probably move you to a lower payment.

I am not at all a fan of SW payments for life, but that letter irritated me. I am degree educated, I had bills, I've paid tax and I was busting my a$$ to find a job. And I was sharing queues at the welfare office with people who were either migrants/refugees here, loudly arguing their entitlement to every payment under the sun, and quite a number of Irish people at the same thing. I got 12 months and that was it, I was entitled to nothing else, despite having paid tax into the system that I suspect many of these people never did. I'd be lying if I said I didn't find it quite annoying at the time.

It's the concept of "not raising" taxes but paying on the double and triple through charges, levies and on the spot fees that is most frustrating. AS someone else cited, the motor tax/road situation. And the Health service - funded by my taxes. Yet I pay for health insurance, because the taxpayer funded system can barely meet the needs to the country, and it shares its doctors with the "private" system. AND I pay 60eur per visit to see my GP, or 200eur per visit to see the consultant, despite having private insurance. Remind me why I have to do that, and it doesn't matter that "you can claim it back". Fact is, I have to have 200eur cash to hand, if I need to see a specialist for something. The same specialist paid by my tax on the other 2 days of the week that they work publicly, and paid by my insurance when needed. The whole thing is utterly ridiculous.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119913957#Comment_119913957

Then a teacher, nurse and Garda in Tipp doesn't need the same salary as their colleague in Dublin.

Wanderer78

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/2058273068/ireland-the-land-of-taxes-and-endless-fees

...again, public debt is just the public entity of the money supply, as opposed to the private sector money supply, i.e. the credit supply, being in debt isnt always a bad thing, it just depends what that money is used for, unfortunately a significant amount of debt, in both the public and private domains, has been used to (re)inflate the value of pre existing assets, rather than using it in creating new assets, such as new properties. its always important to also remember, a significant amount of our public debt was in fact used to bail out the financial system, and it worked, but in the mean time, we fcuked over many in the process, in particular none asset owners, i.e. the young, so, go us! this form of debt is sometimes called 'odious debt', i.e. it actually wasnt used to benefit most, and imho, should be written off!

tinytobe

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119915707#Comment_119915707

The problem is that a welfare state and unlimited immigration of refugees into the country doesn't work.

It's always handled under the guise of being the rich and developed country, being humane and Christian, but if this was all the case we'd have to accept the whole of Africa and large portions of Asia, and we all know that this is impossible to handle.

However this problem is not exclusive to Ireland, it's happening in Germany as well.

But Germany still seems to give better value for money, whether it's taxes or fees or other excuses to ask for extra money. France and various Scandinavian countries are mostly similar in this matter.

I think in Ireland the problem is still that the government is massively in debt, and taxpayers are just servicing that debt with the interest on it, but not getting anything. It's the debt incurred during the financial crisis, and bailout of banks etc...

So, I am inclined to think it's not refugees and excessive social payments to whomever, but more part of a home made financial structural problem going back to the financial crisis.

Luxembourgo

An addiction by politicians, driven by the media that throwing more money at a problem is always the best thing to do

Wanderer78

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119916197#Comment_119916197

an addiction to the wrong type of political ideologies thats clearly seriously fcuking things up, ideologies that keep throwing money at (re)inflating the value of assets, rather than trying to actually create new ones, amongst other things....

Marty Bird

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119913927#Comment_119913927

This is it. The last time I looked the public service pension liabilities were €150 billion and some.

NSAman

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119914995#Comment_119914995

I pay approx 32% in tax on wages. Tax in Ireland would be 50+%

i pay 9% sales tax (vat is 23%)

yes I pay property tax but that is a choice (size and cost of property) and an expense for many which is deductible.

now add in the motor costs my vehicle would be 3k+ per year in Ireland 150 here. The VRT alone would be tens of thousands in tax in Ireland not to mention the 23% they charge in VAT on safety “extras”.

add in the tax on practically everything else and tell me ireland isn’t a high tax place?

Wanderer78

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119916249#Comment_119916249

no theres, no conclusive evidence to support Ireland is a high tax state, compared to comparable oecd nations

NSAman

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119916262#Comment_119916262

Tell that to my wallet 😀

tinytobe

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119916249#Comment_119916249

Ireland is high on taxation, but only corporation tax has been historically low. Thus people tend to think in general terms that Ireland is a low tax haven, but it isn't.

ELM327

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119915772#Comment_119915772

This is true and exists elsewhere in the world. Different salaries based on location. Look at London vs rest of UK.

Wanderer78

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119916487#Comment_119916487

property prices are heavily influenced in major cities such as london due to speculation

Nighttime22

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119913978#Comment_119913978

I see this response alot and I don't think it tells the full story.

Just because we are taxed less than the scandanavian countries doesn't mean our tax isn't outrageously high when you factor in what we get in return.

Then you have all these stealth taxes and sly fees attached to nearly everything here. The gov here is an absolute leech and they get away with it.

Our healthcare system is subpar in comparison to the other countries you mentioned to try and spin it like we aren't highly taxed, our transport infrastructure is no where near good enough, we have a massive housing crisis ect ect.

Imo Ireland is by far one of the worst when all things are taken into consideration.

Sure you can cherry pick statistics and split facts to try and paint a prettier picture but the reality on the ground for a large portion of the population isn't pretty they have a cost of living that is strangling them.

Basic things like raising a family and having a average place to live are in actual fact an absolute pipe dream for alot of the population.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119916487#Comment_119916487

I'm all for it. However the unions wouldn't go for it, and if they did Dublin salaries would be increased rather than country salaries decreasing, so the net spend would go up.

tinytobe

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119916519#Comment_119916519

I think the housing crisis makes Ireland pretty much unattractive. This simply produces a brain drain effect on the country as well, which is only natural in circumstances like this.

American multinationals are still lured to Ireland with lower corporation taxes, but I am sure, they know by now that finding the right candidates to fill their jobs isn't that easy due to the high cost of everything.

Wanderer78

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119916582#Comment_119916582

housing is completely fcuking things up, theres no question intel did not go with galway for further expansion due to it!

blanch152

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119916249#Comment_119916249

In what country do you pay 32% tax in wages? Thailand?

tinytobe

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119916588#Comment_119916588

A couple of years ago or even every now and then Microsoft Ireland in Dublin is on some international hiring spree for their inside sales and support roles. Mainly they target individuals with foreign language skills and any kind of degree. In the end, they send some of them home, fired them, put them on some "do not rehire list" just because they were discontent with the housing situation in Dublin.

Intel, another example, they apparently want to invest in Magdeburg Germany for some new kind of chip production and research site.

The problem is, Ireland is getting unattractive, with this housing crisis. And then there is the attitude problem in Dublin against high rise construction. Buildings never getting built, or never approved because they are to high, and normal office blocks calling themselves high rise, but are in realty a tree stump.

And then Dublin airport, which isn't connected by any rail service to Dublin, - another rarity in any European city.

Eircom_Sucks

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/2058273068/ireland-the-land-of-taxes-and-endless-fees

Don't get me started

single parents should get Fook all ( and i'm a single parent of 2 )

why should they get most if not all their house paid for ? if you knew you'd get sweet fa off the government you'd think twice about having a kid unless you could afford one

why are the longterm spongers left alone and newly unemployed hounded to get a job ?

in australia if you unemployed for 2 months ,you get help for 2 months then nothing

no accountability on the waste of money , or for anything for that matter

complete reform is needed

Wanderer78

some interesting graphs, some out of date data though

we re definitely getting fcuked in regards returns, our critical social systems are fcuked!

Strumms

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119916262#Comment_119916262

It’s lower then some places like Denmark… but they have in Denmark public services you can only dream about.

Denmark :

• one of the highest performing public healthcare systems, in the world.
• on average the second highest waged country in the world so take home pay is still $$$$$$$
• State of the art, efficient, multifaceted public transport system….. City Metro, s-trains, intercity trains, buses, water buses, which can all be accessed with the same ticket. 1944 kilometres of railway line in Ireland. Denmark has 2633 kilometres of railway line. Yet Ireland is 1.6 times larger then Denmark. Yet Denmark has a 35% greater rail coverage.

we just don’t get anywhere near bang for our buck here. Citizens might see a great tax take but investing in tangible improvements and additions to public services…. Still waiting for our out of date metro 🙄

ELM327

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119916617#Comment_119916617

Probably in the US. However people need to understand tax. A lot of people come out and say that they pay 52 percent tax when they don't. I'm assuming the poster is talking about the peak tax rate (ie 52% for Ireland) and is combining state and federal income taxes. A lot of states in the US particularly the midwest , the deep south and Vegas area have little to no state income tax. The peak rate could be lower than here but what's relevant is the actual percentage of cash / earned income that goes out to the taxation pot.

As an example:

I had a good year last year, just into six figures and my overall tax payment as a percentage of earned income was approx 34 percent. Now I make some pension contributions and pay BIK for a couple of things and everyone;s situation is different. But to pay 52% of your income in tax you'd need to be at or close to 500k.