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Updated 6.15 pm
FINANCE MINISTER MICHAEL Noonan has finally confirmed what’s being done to change income tax rates for hard-pressed middle-earners.
The higher rate of income tax is to be cut from 41% to 40%.
Changes to both the Universal Social Charge rates and their income bands will also mean tax relief.
The changes reduce the 52% top marginal rate of tax (when income tax, PRSI and USC are combined).
At present, the USC is a direct taxation payment taken off a worker’s pay packet if they earn over €10,000 a year. The charge is levied at three separate rates:
The entry point at on that bottom rate is now to be raised to €12,000 taking an estimated 80,000 workers out of the payment bracket altogether according to Finance Minister Michael Noonan.
In essence, it means that anyone earning below €12,000 will not be subject to USC.
The bands will also be changed so that the higher rates kick in at higher levels, reducing peoples’ tax burdens.
The entry rate for the second rate of USC is to be increased from €10,036 to €12,000, the upper ceiling on this band will be €16,000.
It means that, for anyone who earns over €12,000, the higher rate of USC will now be on income over €12,000 and not €10,036 as it is presently.
The rates themselves are also set to change:
A fourth rate of USC is now to be added at 8% on earners above €70,000.
Minister Noonan also announced that self-employed income in excess of €100,000 is to be subjected to a USC rate of 11%.
Informing the Dáil of the tax changes today, Finance Minister Michael Noonan said that people earning the minimum wage will now face a maximum USC rate of 3.5%.
For a couple earning €50,000 each it will mean an additional €100 each in their pockets per month, he said.
“These changes enhance the progressivity of our income tax system with the top 1% of income earners now paying 21% of all income tax and USC collected. In contrast, the bottom 76% of income earners will pay 20% of the total,” Noonan told deputies.
Income tax reduction = job creation?
The cut to the higher rate of income tax had been well flagged in advance of today’s budget speech and been partly touted as a way of counteracting the phasing out of the ‘double Irish’ tax incentive for multinationals.
Analysts had speculated that the decision to cut the top rate of tax was also taken as a way of stimulating job growth by encouraging multinational companies to base themselves here with the lure of lower taxes for executives.
Noonan told the Dáil that that these tax changes will make work attractive and estimated that they would directly boost employment by 15,000 by 2018.
- With reporting from Daragh Brophy
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Once should be put on first plane out of country once finished his time
@KevinMunster: Racist because he wants a thug deported. Are you for real
@KevinMunster: What is racist about deporting the bad bollix.
@Celtic_Horizon: should be thrown out of the plane over the Atlantic you mean ,but dont let the bleeding heart nut jobs know
@Ciaran Kehoe: Racist are you fu€k!ng kidding me. Your talking to irish man born in uk who has lived in usa. And believe me I have gotten more greaf from my own kin than I did from brits or yanks. But lets be clear I believe that anyone that isn’t irish causing trouble should be kicked out as I do any Irish living in other countries, if they are booted out should be sent home although if there plane found it’s plane landed in Siberia it wouldn’t be worst thing to happen. Toss pot
@Celtic_Horizon: sorry aimed at KevinMunster
Who could have predicted a man with multiple previous convictions in multiple different countries would commit crime in our country? Keep that door open! #criminalswelcome
Nothing works better than a ‘warning shot’ straight into the mush.
@Paul Culligan: You honestly couldnt make it up, think of the amount of money this investiagation cost the state after a shaky garda with a gun!
@Paul Culligan: He probably sang like a canary after that.
Freedom of movement seems to have as many minuses as advantages..hard to believe criminal gangs can move about Europe so freely
@Kieran OKeeffe: freedom of movement ensures the easy Islamisation ,whatever percentage of Muslims involved ,of the west. Don’t believe me ? Check out western Europe today and the census
@ Kieran this has f*ck all to do with Islam! Gee you must see Islam in everything, this article is about ram raiders… Did you need read the article?
Stop hyping up the threat of Islamic extremism, it’s all hype and the media are just as much to blame for hyping it up and the extremists themselves
With several prior convictions for theft in Holland and Norway, how or why was he ever allowed into Ireland? Seriously searching for an answer to this simple question.
How about a worldwide rule that criminals are not allowed to travel?
It would help to stop people making the choice to become a criminal.
@Scundered: He wouldn’t get into Australia or Canada anyway based on the border security shows I’ve seen.
Likewise he probably wouldn’t get into the uk once they brexit and start to pull up the plank..
How do you weigh a car with a concrete block? :/
5 year jail sentence, out in 3 for good behaviour. More nonsense from Tom O’Donnell, another joke of a judge.
Euthanasia is the answer to this guy!
I didn’t know trannies and cross dressers were so desperate to get their fix.
GET RID OF HIM
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