The data is for up to 30-year-olds.



So you consider that an average UK house price of £242,415 (to last October – and flats are slightly higher at £250,101) and an average UK income of £26,000 have nothing to do with it?

And do you consider £250K for a one-bed flat in a not-particularly-genteel area of a city to be 'a good thing'?

To remind people: it used to be considered sensible that nobody paid more than three times their household income on a mortgage. So for that £250K for a one-bed flat, a sensible mortgage would require a household income of £83,333.

:2h91ap7l

That is a kind of Peter Mendleson view of being comfortable with some people being excessively wealthy despite not being so oneself.

There are two problems with this. First of all we aren't discussing the last 30 years but what has happened since 2008 and from them till now living standards have declined. The fact they may have declined from a high point doesn't mean it is right that your and my living standards take a hit while the 1% are unaffected and are in fact becoming even wealthier.

However, your and my position is I am guessing still pretty comfortable. The ones really taking the hit are the working poor of this country and no doubt others who in the UK are going to see more cuts to what benefits they are entitled to while at the same time there is enough cash hidden away in tax havens to make Osborne's £12bn seem like chicken feed.

The other problem with this situation is the concentration of wealth also concentrates the power. You might be comfortable with Bill Gates helping run the world but I certainly do not want a bunch of plutocrats subverting national governments and I do believe we are entering a phase of history (if we are not there already) where we face this possibility. Concentrating wealth and power leaves to self serving interests doing just that.

:2h91ap7l

How on earth have you swallowed this propaganda? Most people who claim benefits work. Benefit fraud is a tiny fraction of what the majority perceive it to be. It is a huge amount [i:2h91ap7lless[/i

And perhaps it would go down if we didn't subsidise the likes if Virgin Trains to run the West Coat main line when the publicly run East Coast is proving the most efficient of the lot and delivering more revenue to the government?

You really need to do some research into just how much benefit fraud costs and if you did I can't see how you would not conclude the government is spending far too much effort for far too little return when there are bigger fish to fry elsewhere.

Completely agree with this – including (for the sake of clarification) your comments on SMEs.

Just to add, really, if there are billions or trillions of dollars sitting in tax havens, those are doing nothing to boost any economy, be it local or national.

And I think that we're already in the realms of supra-national corporatocracies, which exist over and above any nation state and have no loyalty to any nation state, irrespective of where such companies first emerged.

And that is completely anti-democratic in any sense that most people here would consider the concept of democracy.

The problem is whilst we continue to consume their products this will always be the case. Apple is one of the worst for hoarding money, yet that has not stopped you buying their products - you have reasons that you can justify.

You cannot have it both ways, you cannot be so principled until it impacts you and then when it does your principles go out of the window.

As much as you want equality - that will never happen, we are not equal and we do not value all skills similarly. I find it slightly mad that soccer players can earn 200k a week for what is entertainment, that is what society value them at. There will always be outrageously wealthy people either through graft e.g. Gates/Ellison etc or through inherited wealth e.g. Duke of Westminster.

As I said the genuinely unemployable should be looked after by society as a whole. I am not sure my wife's niece with three children to three different fathers is quite the same.

The difference is one is legal one and if you live in a democracy then you have to go by the will of the majority. Tax avoidance will always happen - has always happened - until every country has exactly the same tax rules, we all know that will never happen. The tax laws in this country are set by a freely elected government in power by the rules set in place for that election - a democracy. The majority of these hoarders do employ millions of people world wide so are contributing in some way.

Benefits are much higher now than they were fifteen years ago so it has trickled down to them - there has to be a balance whereby those in work are significantly better off to create the incentive to work. I am not convinced the differential at the lower end is significant enough to create the incentive and that is wrong.

The fact the Saudi prince $10bn or $100bn who cares it doesn't impact me, benefit scroungers do so yes it frustrates me.

If you had a huge business generating huge amounts of operating capital what are you going do - you are going to store in the most efficient place until you need that money - the prudent amongst us do it with our savings so why would companies not do the same. There are very few companies that were trading 70 years ago that are still trading now - Boston Matrix idea - businesses have a life span having a treasury helps to prolong that life span.

I agree about Virgin - perhaps if the civil service had done their job correct Virgin would have been long gone?

This private education that your parents paid for, did it include basic English language by any chance?

Because if it did, they were robbed

Do you really think Oxfam would publish a report at Davos claiming what they do if someone at the back of the class could simply raise their hand and suggest it is just a coincidence the money is held in a tax haven because they also have "strong banking and accounting systems in place"?

Do you really not think they did some research before they made this claim?

I mentioned the gap between the elite and the rest and why this is a bad thing it has become so large. The Oxfam report was specifically about the fact (and the effects of) a mere 85 people have so much wealth and with respect to tax havens that companies and individuals have $18.5tn stashed away.

Sure soccer players get obscene amounts of money but even they aren't in this list or who the report is directed toward.

My point is that as Mintball mentioned while this wealth is sat there doing nothing the poor and disabled suffer in this country and elsewhere and we have Osborne saying it is this section of society he is gunning for post 2015.



It's not the same but it is no justification for what is happening to genuinely vulnerable people. It is the excuse all right.



But you object to the level of benefits people legally receive as according to you it does not incentivise enough. You disagree with something set by a freely elected government in power yet are saying because tax havens exist for the same reason that is just tough luck?

You can't have it both ways.

You are also reiterating the trickle down mantra once again. They contribute in some way so it is OK they hoard $18.5tn in a tax haven. Why is that acceptable when it could be so much better employed in the economy?

Why are they hoarding it? To what purpose?

As to the fact these places exist being due to laws set by government you do realise that part of the problem is attempts by government to change these laws are met with huge resistance that people who might be set to lose their housing benefit or facing the bedroom tax simply cannot muster against the same governments?

The attempts to get tax laws changed to make International companies like Amazon liable for tax on earnings here have been going on for years for example but face a huge amount of corporate lobbying against it. This does not seem particularly democratic to me.



There is a difference between incentivising people to work as a principle and how you go about it. A living wage would incentivise a lot more people if you think the differential is the issue. What this has to do with the overall point though I am not sure.



Benefit scroungers impact you far less than the "Tax Gap" does. According to HMRC that was £35bn in 2011-12. In contrast the government puts benefit fraud at $1.5bn.

Why are you so disproportionately annoyed at those committing benefit fraud compared to those who give us a £35bn tax gap?



They aren't using it. That is the point. They are hoarding it. If they didn't we'd all be be better off. I really do not think we are talking about sensible amounts of cash reserves.

Is this you?



Because you're trying to move the goalposts – and not for the first time.

Just as you have also, in this thread, dodged questions and points – yet again – by just launching into one of your usual bits of spiel about 'well, we can't all be equal'.

Most here have not and do not talk of 'equal' in the way you're using it. They talk of 'fairness', which you consistently avoid. If you don't believe in fairness, perhaps you should just come straight out and admit it.

As for "principles': are you still the same person who whinges about 'benefits scroungers', citing a relative of yours as being one – who you have allowed to continue to be a 'scrounger' because you haven't actually reported them?

What have I said about fairness - life is not fair, there will always be people better off than others either through ability, graft or inheritance. Again you struggle with reading. We do not live in a eutopia nor will we ever as much as you may want. No shifting of goalposts straight answer as I gave in the previous post how much clearer can I make it.

I see you conveniently overlooked to address your issues with Apple - one of the world's largest hoarders!! in an attempt at deflection - very typical of your style on here, you never answer a direct question when it comes to your behaviour? You are a hypocrite of the worst kind, high up the food chain spouting about how unfair everything is yet your own behaviour compounds issues you claim to care so much about.

On my in laws, the law dealt with two of them, the drug dealer and his wife - so what would be the point of me reporting what had already been legally ruled on? As far as I am aware it is not illegal to have numerous children by multiple fathers - that doesn't stop it being frustrating and if the benefits were not available I would suspect the use of contraception might be more widespread amongst young single mothers.

Very little. Which is rather the point.

Indeed, you said: "As much as you want equality - that will never happen, we are not equal and we do not value all skills similarly."



It's 'utopia'.

And so you see no reason to work to change that? You have no problem with your fellow citizens needing to use foodbanks, for instance?

Are you familiar with the word: 'ethics'? You seem to struggle with the understanding that 'equal' and 'fair' are not synonyms.

What philosophical argument can you give for not thinking that greater fairness would be A Good Thing for all?



You constantly 'deflect' – your introduction of the subject was just such an example.

They're you're "issues".

Mind, it's hilarious and utterly illogical. Apple are the industry standard, as I have previously explained, so in your little world, I should refuse to use the industry standard and find some computer that is über ethical (it probably doesn't exist) and probably lose work in the process, possibly to the extent of then needing to apply for benefits – which would please you no end, because then you could whinge about that.

I live in the world as it exists: 'the real world', so to speak. I do what I can to be as ethical as possible and, for want of a better phrase, to promote ethical issues.

There's very little suggestion from you that you consider ethics to be remotely of any importance other, of course, than when it's those nasty 'scroungers'.



You waited for the police to act?

Tut tut.

There's plenty of research out there suggesting that lack of opportunity and poverty are two factors in increased childbirth. Perhaps there's a reason that the well-to-do and those with good educations and with careers rarely have large numbers of children?

Perhaps, in a 'fairer' model of society, fewer people would be so inclined to have so many children.

That, and proper sex education and, one would hope, a decline in the sort of religiously-inspred attitudes that laud large families and damn contraception, abortion and, often, much in the way of the sort of opportunities for women mentioned fleetingly above.

OK BP in 2012 they had residual cash after tax of 19bn this included invested 23bn in capital projects - what do you think they should do with that money? When they have given all this money away how do they fund another Gulf of Mexico clean up. They pay huge dividends too which benefits loads of ordinary people through pension funds

These big companies generate huge sums of cash just through their ordinary activities Apple had 147bn of cash and that is after they paid $9bn in taxation.

These companies have to put the monies somewhere and like you with you ISA or share save scheme they are looking for the most tax efficient way of storing these monies

On the difference between benefits and working, I have consistently said remove employers NI from all low earners - say anyone earning <17k and pay it to directly to the employee. Even the government has woken up to the ideal it is the net that matters not the gross.

I've had a read of the article, and it isn't clear on how it measures "wealth"
Reading the thread, it seems we're assuming it's cash.
I'm not sure that's really the case though, and any measure of wealth would usually include assets. So if, for example, Bill Gates spend $10b on a yacht, he's still classed as having that $10b as part of his measure of wealth, but you would also think in spending that $10b it has also "trickled down" to the yacht maker, their workers and suppliers and their staff etc.

Why don't you understand the difference between how much a company generates, where it keeps it and what it does with it compared to what Oxfam is complaining about?

The Oxfam report does not adopt the naive position you want to imply.

Of course large corporations generate large amounts of cash. It is what they do with it and where they keep it for tax purposes that is the issue.

As to Apple they have been criticized by numerous economists and analysts for sitting on the cash. They even had one large investor insisting they did a share buy-back so his investment would increase in value.

However, the fact Apple have a large cash reserve and this is frowned upon by many who are fully paid up members of to the capitalist system only lends weight to what Oxfam are saying. It certainly doesn't detract from it and your argument we should all stop using Apple products is pretty childish (mind you I personally only own one Apple product, an Apple TV and that will be being replaced by a non-Apple product soon).



You are deflecting the issue again and that idea won't work anyway as explained previously.

Why have you not answered the question as to why you are more bothered about £1.5bn of benefit fraud than a tax gap of £35bn?

I don't know how many yachts the owners of Wall Mart have but it has been well documented recently that their workers in the US have had to resort to food banks as has been their low pay. Given what the report says about half the worlds wealth being held by such a tiny minority, of which the Wall Mart owners are part, what more evidence do you need that their wealth isn't trickling down and the trickle down effect is a fantasy invented by the right to justify their continued control of and hoarding of Capital?

What do the owners of Wal-Mart do with the wealth they're hoarding? Is it cash stuffed in a mattress?

In [iThe Wal-Mart Effect[/i, Charles Fishman discovered – to his surprise – that five years after a new Wal-Mart tin box had landed in any area, local poverty levels had increased.

Pay their employees better – which will boost local and national economies as well.

And change a policy of driving down prices, year on year, with the concomitant effect of driving down quality of goods and/or driving companies out of business or abroad – which again will boost local economies as well as the national economy.

Deflection - coming from an expert here - not one word on BP and the trickle down benefit of the dividends and taxation they pay out!!

I asked you what these companies should do with these monies - not an answer

I asked you how these companies are supposed to pay for business disaster such as a Gulf of Mexico or a downturn in business if they haven't got these cash reserves - just like the banks didn't have sufficient reserves, simple we all suffer.

I answered your question about benefit fraud and tax avoidance about 4 post ago - you like Poloball must struggle with reading. Those who avoid tax do at least employ people and pay dividends so they do may a contribution to society as a whole, benefit fraud only takes from society as a whole - is that simple enough for you to understand?

On the minimum wage you said it would not bring the level up to the agreed living wage - that is not the same as saying give the lower paid a 14% salary increase would increase the incentive to work.

No it is your turn to answer some of the questions - start with the trickle down effect of Mr Gates boat - something you just dodged yet again.

Sal, talking of "deflection", why do you never answer any questions dealing with the ethics/philosophy of such issues?

You never, for instance, explain why you don't think that a fairer society would be a good thing and should be worked for. You simply dismiss the mere idea.

Or do you believe that it might be a good idea – but it isn't going to happen so why bother trying?

But behind your stated view of a fairer society as being simply a fact of life, there must be a philosophical basis for the apparently concomitant belief that there's no point trying; one that explains why it is not only impossible to change things, but why one should not try. What is it?

I am not saying if you feel strongly enough about something you should do what you can to change things. One thing you cannot change is human nature - communism/socialism failed because it tried to impose a system of supposed fairness/level playing field on human nature. You can slag capitalism off - its worst excesses are pretty horrible - but it values are embraced by human nature which craves the opportunity to leap frog fellow citizens at their expense. It would be great if we are born with same intellence, desire to get on, luck, stable upbringing etc. but that is not reality. Life is not fair, it never will be.

You hold much weight to food banks - so exactly how many people in this country are reliant on food banks and how much of their disposable income that they could be spending on food are they spending on things like cigarettes/drugs/gambling.

Are you seriously suggesting that if David Baldacci supplied an article to newspaper written in Word the paper would reject it? You are saying the product you type on is far more important than the words you type - that's an interesting point that has occured to a few of us



Pretty easy to convert Word into Pages/Quark etc. Where I work we print product, the Genesis of which is turning customer's artwork into plates - we can this artwork on a multitude of platforms many of which are not Apple related.

You are confirming that your principles are pretty flexible depending on how they impact you?

Would you agree standards of living are significantly higher than they were 40 years ago? So if that is the case your argument about poverty and increased numbers of single mothers doesn't stack up. Opportunities are there for anyone to progress and their are countless examples of kids from the "Streets" making a huge success of their life - it is about desire, ability and graft. You cannot say its all unfair because others are not prepared to grasp the opportunity.

Yes. You keep repeating this. You have also stated that someone who isn't poor themselves shouldn't campaign for a fairer society. Strangely, you've yet to answer, AFAIK, the question of whether that means that, in your opinion, only slaves should have campaigned against slavery.



I what?

Are you drunk so early in the day?



If you'd been paying any attention at all, this has been discussed, more than once, on here. It has been pointed out, for instance, that you cannot simply walk into a foodbank and grab what you fancy. Checks are done first to ensure that you are in such need.

Current figures are between 5-600,000. The prediction is for this to hit the million mark this year [url=http://news.sky.com/story/1185639/food-banks-will-help-one-million-in-2014Story – it's Sky News, so not something anyone could class as 'left-wing'[/url. And that's without mentioning the Red Cross food parcels and the Save the Children spending.

Trying to pretend that need is only a matter of spending on the 'right' things is nothing other than the same sort of sheer nastiness of the likes of the liar IDS and his cronies. I hadn't quite placed you in that bracket before. I hope it's mere delusion on the basis of propaganda.



Conflating Word and anything other than Apple is revealing. Personally, I would vastly prefer not to use Word, but again, it's industry standard, regardless of it being dross. So I use it because I have little realistic choice in terms of compatibility.

And I use it on Macs, because those are the industry standard. Perhaps I should try going into an office next time and refusing to use the computers that are there and telling them that I'll only use something that that they can find that probably doesn't even exist.

I can imagine that working well.



Quark is rather old hat these days. Priced themselves out of the market stupidly and generally replaced by Adobe InDesign – the new industry standard, although whether that will remain the case now they're trying to up charges by only making upgrades available as downloads remains to be seen. Personally, in my work, I use InDesign for page make-up, plus Illustrator, PhotoShop and LightRoom for graphics and photographic work.

I suspect that you didn't think that I did anything other than write, did you?



At least I have some.

According to a brief 2012 report in the Observer, "ethi-tech ... has yet to get going". [url=http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2012/oct/07/lucy-siegle-laptop-ipad-miningStory[/url

So perhaps I should jack in my work altogether and find another job. One that doesn't use any tech at all. Obviously. Although given that the highest level of tech we used when I started in journalism was typewriters, one can hardly predict what job will be a nice, safe, tech-free zone in a short time in the future, can one?

I await with interest your response on ethics. And no, I don't mean a county to the east of London.



So, let's try this old one again: there are as many jobs available as there are people of working age, are there? And those jobs pay a living wage and are full time, are they?

Why do you ask? They are mega-rich and make themselves richer by regular share buy backs (as opposed to using this cash to invest in the business) while we see reports of their employees resorting to food banks and suffering from low pay. You don't see anything the slightest bit wrong with this situation?

Your inability to understand the problem is duly noted. Any fool can cherry pick what they believe to be a company they believe to operating in a way consistent with what is deemed good business practice.

The Oxfam report is not about such companies. So you bringing up BP or any other company that is not the object of Oxfam's report is irrelevant, IS deflection and DOES NOT counter the argument.

I have no idea if BP indulge in the practices Oxfam highlight or not. I doubt you know the answer to that question either which is another reason this line of argument is just stupid.

However for the sake of argument lets suppose BP hoard money in tax havens and sit on a cash mountain while at the same time turn a profit and pay dividends. You seem to be suggesting that because they do the latter the former is OK.

If so why can't you see the utter stupidity of that position?



You did and it was and remains a stupid question. Companies like BP do not run on the basis that they expect to be so incompetent they are going to have to stash away enough cash to cover disasters of this magnitude. And guess what? They don't do it.

You are suggesting BP expected eventually pollute the Gulf of Mexico or similar at some stage so thought they had better stash enough cash for when they did.

That is a completely ludicrous suggestion.



No you didn't. I asked you why you are more concerned about $1.5bn of benefit fraud compared to the $35bn tax gap. The fact you think "Those who avoid tax do at least employ people and pay dividends so they do may a contribution to society" just hows your ignorance of what the "Tac Gap" is. FYI it includes illegal non-payment of tax.

You know how much of the tax gap is down to the hard work of all those helping people avoid tax? £4bn.

The break down is here:

[urlhttp://www.hmrc.gov.uk/statistics/tax-gaps/mtg-2013.pdf[/url

The rest of it is tax the government is due but has not been paid including £5.1bn down to illegal evasion.

So lets take out the tax avoided thus removing your rather weak argument those facilitating the avoiding contribute, that leaves us with £31bn of unpaid tax v £1.5bn of benefit fraud.

So come on, now you know the tax gap is not all down to avoidance and includes a figure of £5.1bn of tax evasion, answer the question as to why you are so obsessed with benefit fraud in comparison?



Mr Gates is a philanthropist, as is John Caldwell who I also mentioned. The fact these people exist and behave as they do does not in any way counter the Oxfam report. It isn't about them and why on earth you seem to think Bill Gates philanthropy means all the super rich behave in this way when Oxfam are telling you they don't I have no idea.

Bill Gates is one of the very people mentioned in the Oxfam report - If I am not mistaken he is one of the 10 richest people in the world so easily qualifies in their 85. Is that beyond your comprehension. Oxfam can't have it all ways - they can't say having all this wealth in a few hands is an issue but ignore that some these people are making a positive contribution to society by using this wealth in a suitable manner. Did Oxfam calculate how much these individuals contributed to society through donation? It is typical of this type of report it is not balanced it is so one-sided - but typical of the kind of report you jump on!!

if non payment of tax is illegal then it needs sorting out and the perpetrators brought to book. Included in the 31bn will be significant losses from business failure - not sure what you do about that? It will also include individuals not declaring excise duty on imported goods again hardly a big business issue. There will also be the interpretation of the law and its ambiguous nature of it. There will be genuine mistakes - tax law is very complicated and we see disputes all the time. Make the laws simpler and more water tight and collect what is legally due and sue anyone who doesn't comply.

If I could legally avoid paying tax I would and I do - I have an ISA and I partake in a share save scheme at work both give me tax benefits and I suspect if you were honest so do you. So comparing legal avoidance to what amounts to theft isn't apples and apples.

Oil exploration is dangerous do you honestly think BP don't have a disaster recovery plan and the funds available to deal with it - are you really that naive? Years ago I worked for BOC in the gas manufacturing business and they had a sizeable disaster fund to cover such an emergency. The other point I raised was about business performance fluctuation and the need to have funds to support a downturn in the short term - something you overlooked. I am sure you have savings so why shouldn't big business. Businesses are also looking for acquisition opportunities you need availability of cash especially in today's market to do this.

I asked and I still haven't had a response what are these companies supposed to do with huge amounts of cash they generate through trading?