A tax rate too far?

For the first time (on this blog), I'm going to get a little controversial. Hear me out; debate with me if you wish!


In a time of public spending cuts affecting our health service (I recently went to a private hospital for the first time in my memory because of an NHS wait to figure out the cause of some deafness), our social services and our entire public sector, the discussion of the abolition of the fifty-pence tax rate is frankly enough to [finally] drive me crazy.
I'm not an economist by any stretch of the imagination, but in such conditions as we witness and live in now, the abolition of an entire tax bracket for those people with enough money to pay some extra tax to help keep funding the services on which so many depend seems insane. After all, we live in a society where the better-off assist the less well-off, and any change in that towards a self-centred "I earnt this, this is mine and mine only" is saddening to me. After all, a society which I describe above is the only way a society can progress, and is certainly something to which, if we are not currently attaining it, we ought to be aiming.


I'm aware, and I think this point should be made, that the fifty-pence tax bracket is enforced on any income earned over £150,000, and only on earnings over that. Now, I'm a student, so clearly I have never had income of any such figure before and that may well skew my perspective, but it seems like a lot to live off, and also a fair amount for businesses. This is not a statement of, "rich people can afford to pay tax and therefore they should always fund everybody else", because I believe that people should be able to build themselves up (and then continue to help others up after them) and I am aware that fifty pence in the pound is a lot of tax, but when we're cutting everything else, it seems a foolish time to cut tax as well!


Maybe another objection of mine is the image of the Conservatives being the ones to cut such a rate, as well as public spending. Their 'new Conservative' image, or even 'compassionate conservatism', appears to me to be fading more and more quickly. I feel like the Liberal Democrat wing of the Coalition is fading with it, if it were ever strong enough for my liking to start with. The compromises they brought to the table have sadly not been exactly obvious to the public at large, but that is a discussion for another time...


Chris Huhne talks of a possible Liberal Democrat rebellion over any such move on tax rates, which, should it happen, be a welcome sign. If the government can honestly release any figures and any evidence to convince me to the contrary, I welcome it. However, I am skeptical. This is not to say that the tax rate should never be adjusted, amended, or abolished, but now is not right.


As always, I welcome your thoughts and opinions.


"I left Gage Whitney making $400,000 a year, which means I paid twenty-seven times the national average in income tax. I paid my fair share, and the fair share of twenty-six other people. And I'm happy to because that's the only way it's gonna work, and it's in my best interest that everybody be able to go to schools and drive on roads" -- Sam Seaborn, The West Wing.