Monday, 30 September 2013

Life Copies Satire

From The Daily Mail:

As the Conservatives gear up for their conference in Manchester this week, Prime Minister David Cameron has given his party a boost by announcing a new tax break for married couples.

The £1,000 tax break is expected to be available to four million couples in the UK, and beats the £750 tax break promised in the Tories' General Election Manifesto of 2010, albeit is less than the £2,000 promised in 2007...Transferring £1,000 to a spouse will mean an extra £1,000 of their earnings is taken out of tax, which will work out at an extra £200-a-year.


From The Daily Mash:

THE prime minister's wife has halted divorce proceedings after realising she'd lose a sweet £200-a-year tax break...

She told friends: "I had the papers all filled out, and under grounds for divorce I'd written 'Husband is David fucking Cameron'. Clearly this was an absolutely watertight argument which no judge in the land could contest.

"But then I heard about this new tax break and whoa, £200 in ready cash in my back pocket just for staying hitched? And I get that every twelve months? Divorce over. Viscount Astor don't raise no fools."


From The Daily Mail:

The Duchess of York has fuelled speculation that she and Prince Andrew might remarry, admitting: 'He is still my handsome prince.'

The 53-year-old, whose 10-year marriage to the Prince, with whom she has two daughters, ended in divorce in 1996, refused to deny rumours that the pair might get back together.

Instead she said: "He'll always be my handsome prince. It's really lovely that we are still a family and the story has a happy ending all the time." 

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Assuming 4 million couples [according to the BBC] who are entitled to this additional allowance claim it, the net cost is £800m

The actual cost of persuading a few thousand people [most probably only hundreds] who otherwise wouldn't have got married to get hitched, or stay married as a result of this £200 a year bung is in the region of a hundred thousand quid [100K] per additional marriage.
[that's based on the implausibly highly figure of 8000 newly minted newly-weds and/or formerly miserable marrieds now to enjoy a fresh burst of marital bliss.]

Bayard said...

The state should get the f*ck out of marriage. End of.

Mark Wadsworth said...

PC, cost schmost.

It's all smoke and mirrors.

If you do mass redistribution from all 50 million adults to 8 million favoured adults, you have to hike the taxes on the 50 by £33 each to raise the money to give each member of a couple £100, so by and large each member of a married couple is a pissing stupid £67 better off.

B, yup.