Down at the Telegraph a couple of days ago I posted the following comment to a typical homey article:
"The UK's private landlords receive more in Housing Benefit than they pay in tax. It is the community, not the landlord that gives location its value. Average 2/3 of rent is location value.
So, not only do landlords NOT pay any net tax, they receive a £35bn per year de facto State subsidy on top."
To which I was treated to the following two replies. Firstly from Jill Harris-Kuhn:
"Total rubbish! Rent values have very little to do with location, and more to do with the size of accomodation - at least where I live in the Midlands. And yes, we pay tax according to what tax bracket our earnings fall under. Don't make stuff up!"
And then this corker from Paul Barrett:
"Another idiot who seems to think that tenants who pay for their accommodation needs via Govt provided welfare in the form of LHA is a subsidy to that LLl!!
Absolutely barking!!!!
So taking such an idiotic contention does the poster believe that a HB claimant who also receives JSA etc and then uses some of the money to buy food is giving the local supermarket a Govt subsidy!!!??"
Idiot posters like this really don't have a clue about how an economy works and how welfare supports those who need it to exist.
When such welfare is used to purchase relevant services such payments are NOT subsidies to the relevant merchant retailer!!
Without welfare being used to purchase services etc that the Welfare claimant requires would in mass starvation and homelessness.
I bet this idiot is a stupid Labour supporter!!"
The replies speak for themselves, but what's going on with all the "!!!!" and "??" ?
Wednesday, 11 February 2015
Exclamation marks inversely proportional to reason theorem.
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5 comments:
Probably because he can't be printed in GREEN INK!!!!!!!
Bj, you are doing God's work on all these forums, winding people up. Please never stop.
The first reply is factual bollocks. Funny how these people deny that 'location, location, location' exists when it suits them. That's their f-ing mantra in any other situation.
The second one buries himself in a bigger lie:
"So taking such an idiotic contention does the poster believe that a HB claimant who also receives JSA etc and then uses some of the money to buy food is giving the local supermarket a Govt subsidy"
Maybe, maybe not, but supermarkets and their employees pay a lot more in tax (PAYE, VAT, corp tax, business rates etc) than the small amounts which they undoubtedly receive from welfare claimants and state pensioners.
Therefore, supermarkets do not receive net subsidies, unlike 'private' landlords, which was your original point.
Bj, love it:
"Jill, what planet are you living on? Do yourself a favour and go onto Zoopla and compare the selling price or rental values of similar types of property across different parts of the Country.
A 3 bed semi is a good one. In Twickenham(london) it would be £3,500 pcm, £1,300pcm Solihull (Birmingham) in Yeadon(leeds) £750 pcm, Longlands (Middlesbrough) £495pcm.
This allows us to work out the site premium for each area... [etc]"
“Rent values have very little to do with location, and more to do with the size of accomodation - at least where I live in the Midlands.”
That’s a good one, rent values don’t vary with location if you don’t vary the location! She’s clearly never been to London.
People get confused because there is indeed a correlation with between house size and location value, because people who can afford expensive locations can also afford more house. But it’s a very weak correlation, because the country’s a big place, castles in Scotland etc.
It’s confusing to reuse the word subsidy. If HB is a “subsidy to landlords” then food stamps are a “subsidy to farmers, supermarkets etc” which sounds wrong. It’s only a “subsidy to farmers” if every unit of food is subsidised. If it’s just the units bought with food stamps, then it’s a “subsidy to the poor”.
The reason food stamps are a subsidy to the poor and not farmers is because the farmers have to give up food in exchange for the money, so it nets off. Whereas the poor get food stamps for nothing.
Similarly, the landlord gets the HB but they have to give up use of the house. The subsidised tenant gets the house for nothing.
It makes more sense to call absence of LVT a “subsidy”, because landlords *do* get that per unit of housing.
@JJ
Do food stamps push up the price that farmers/supermarkets can charge?
Not a subsidy to farmers/supermarkets then.
However, HB is a transfer payment from wealthier taxpayers who are more likely to be owner occupiers(majority), to poorer families who rent. So there are 5M recipients of HB (of which 40% of families in London claim it) that now have £10bn per year higher disposable income.
While this doesn't increase the overall level of UK aggregate land rent (£200bn), it will distort the very part of the housing sector most catered to by private landlords.
Or to put it another way, if we were all renting privately, then while HB might favour certain sectors, overall it would not "subsidise" landlords in general.
But, we don't all rent, and HB predominately goes to the poorest, who do tend to be more likely to rent.
So, yes, HB is a subsidy to private landlords.
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