Majority of Brits support cutting or abolishing inheritance tax, new poll shows, as farming backlash grows

So the daft bastards want to pay more tax on the money they earn now, so the children of the wealthy can keep the whole of an unearned windfall on their parents’ death?

The public are far too easily lead on by the media.

Press still pushing for abolishing when only a small percentage of estates qualify.

Estates which are just over the threshold easily avoid the tax with basic planning. The only real beneficiaries are those with £10m+ who wish to entrench privilege and power.

Which would you rather pay – tax on your salary or pay tax when you die? How about reducing income tax before looking at privilege tax. How about taxing unearned income at a higher rate than earned income?

Dont really understand how inheritance tax is unfair, I should get freebies because my parents worked hard? You already “inherit” shit loads through a wealthy unbringing, health, housing etc. Its not even that difficult to avoid most of the tax.

People should be encouraged to spend money while they are alive, or pass on to others who will do so. Generational hoarding is bad for everyone.

typical british polling responses: “we want to have everything, right now, not pay for it, no compromises or workarounds, no backtracks, otherwise your utter failures and should be hung from the gibbet for failing so miserably”

and you wonder why nothing ever gets fucking done in this country, we spend so much time trying to appease the whiniest, most precious fucking people on whoever is the dissenting opinion, until 6 years have gone by and nothing has changed.

sometimes i think this war that is reportedly coming in the next years happens, so that the general public get a large dose of pragmatisicism, but lets face it, the funds will just go 20% to the politicians, 60% to london, and 15% for the south thats within holiday reach of london, without affecting any whinging whatsoever

Personally, I think farmers should get an inheritance tax break and here’s why –

Farms need a lot of assets to make a little income. It’s not like being a plumber where you can make £40,000 per year as one man with a van and tools that are valued at £40,000 or like owning a shop where you could make £40,000 in a year but only have stock and fittings worth £20,000 on hand. A farm would require assets of £2,000,000 to make £40,000 (because land, tractors, combine harvesters etc are very expensive). So, if a person owns a plumbing business or a shop or a farm then, when they die, they’re leaving their child the inheritance of “a business with the ability to pay out £40,000 per year if you run it yourself” – given that the money the child would receive from each of these three businesses is the same, I don’t think the farmer’s child should pay so much more.

Further, because the farmer’s child would need to sell parts of the farm to pay the inheritance tax off, that means the farm cannot function anymore. What use is a farm if you have the combine harvester but not the field, or have the field but not the combine harvester?

Within a generation, we’ll see farms in England (because this almost exclusively affects England) completely break down and food prices will surge too. We’ll have to import far more which is bad for the environment and bad for the economy – and gives us less control over animal welfare and food standards too.

The problem is that, because of this tax break on farms (which was in place for the legitimate reason I just outlined), many people (like Jeremy Clarkson and that bloke from JLS) bought farms purely to avoid inheritance tax. They put £2,000,000 into a farm, pop their clogs, and Jeremy Jr. pays no inheritance tax and sells the farm to someone else for the full £2,000,000. But, that could simply be resolved by making the inheritance tax due on sale of the farm. So, if a legitimate farmer bequeaths the farm to their child then they would get the tax break but if a celebrity tax-scheme farmer does the same then they wouldn’t get the tax break.

There was clearly a more appropriate way to tackle this loophole.

If there were ever a tax, or an economic policy, that highlighted the flaw in the electorates mindset; to make emotional arguments and be largely ignorant of the scope of a government mechanism it’s inheritance tax.

Tax the rich.
Tax wealth not work.
Incentivise productive Labour.
Close tax loopholes. These four things would poll with similar popularity. Yet they’re in direct conflict to the notion of abolition iht.

The only argument you hear is ‘I was taxed on my income’ is disgusting/theft if the government tax what I pass on. Neither of these valid contentions are relevant to the real world implications of iht in its current guise.

4% of estates pay inheritance tax, the vast majority on estates over £2m.

Really the options should be “Do you want to abolish inheritance tax and raise income tax?” Or “Raise inheritance tax and reduce income tax?”. I dont think anyone happily pays taxes but it’s a necessary evil to live a society. 

As a broke Millennial with a well off dad I wouldn’t say no.

Inheritance tax is one of those policies that makes logical sense in theory but in practice, only serves to maintain the barrier between the rich and the working class.

I think a lot of people will disagree with this because many wouldn’t class anyone with a £350k estate as working class. But I feel that has a lot to do with the false idea that we have a middle class and an upper middle class.

If you drop the labels, there is a class of people that are taxed 6 ways from Sunday and a class of people that aren’t. IHT is just another way for that to happen.

Don’t people realise this would quickly lead to the average person not having much they could even pass on?

The super rich would hoover up all the assets

Certainly should increase the threshold before inheritance tax is levied, its not the families fault that house prices are rising.

But in general, whilst some tax should be based on ability to pay, other taxes should be based on wealth that is not active in the economy.

I like that they say majority of Brits. When it’s just a few thousand that took the poll. That’s not a majority. That’s not even a fraction. It’s like 0.000001% of Brits. I completely back the inheritance tax because I’m not thick and understand it won’t affect a load of farmers. Those against the tax probably don’t actually read anything into it, they just believe the drivel that the wealthy spout.

More inheritance tax please, less PAYE.

Reward egging work not luck.

Majority of Brits probably don’t know you don’t get taxed on the first 325k you inherit.

You got to shake your head at the very people who complain that the country is going to shite like Clarkson always moaning but ask hi. To shave off some cash to help it support it is like asking them to burn it down.

I think inheritance tax to farmers should be abolished or reduced heavily. However, people who are not farmers but still own farmland do not get that benefit.

Idk what an effective way to differentiate between the two would be but yeah

But I bet those same people would also oppose the introduction of a different tax to replace it and also oppose any cuts.