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AN ALTERNATIVE BUDGET proposed by Social Justice Ireland (SJI) has put forward ideas for the implementation of taxes on text messages and junk food which will go towards achieving a €3.5 billion adjustment next year.
SJI says that the current approach to resolving Ireland’s deficit issues is protecting the rich at the expense of the rest of the population and proposes to take €3.5 billion out of the economy – as the government is proposing to do – through increasing taxes and reducing revenue by a ratio of 2:1.
The government proposes to reduce expenditure by €2.25 billion while raising revenue through taxation measures amounting to €1.25 billion in December’s budget.
Alternatively, SJI says that it would eliminate the household charge and introduced a site value tax which would be based on the value of the site that a property is built on as opposed to the property itself which would raise €500 million.
The Universal Social Charge (USC) would be extended to tax three per cent of all incomes over €10,000 and a levy of 2.5 per cent would be introduced on all corporate profits next year, yielding €750 million.
The tax break on pension contributions would be standard-rated to yield income of €700 million.
A two per cent tax on salt, alcohol, sugar and trans fats would yield €15 million while a tax of one third of a one cent on each text message sent through mobile phones would yield €40 million in revenue, according to SJI.
Expenditure cuts will be targeted through an income contingent loan scheme for third level students, existing proposed health sector savings, and pay bill savings achieved through the Croke Park Agreement.
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A tax on press releases by interest groups in this country would raise billions.
Or on reports commissioned by Ministers [come back Martin].
Wait , how about a 100% tax on politicians expenses. Now that’s an idea. Plus an admin charge.
Great idea taxing the junk food my wife might actually stick to a diet for a change!!
Hw about a 100% tax on politicians expenses
I second that……
No sugar for you tonight Ken.
Thanks for worrying Joe but I don’t need sugar, I got my honey!
hey Ken, I would love to see you saying that to her face lol
Everyone makes fun of my McDonald’s salt stash in the car. Who’s laughing now?!!! #SaltTax
Is it just me or is mcdonalds salt tastier than normal salt?
Lol, comment of the week, brilliant! ;-)
@Creamy, its the msg in the food that makes ANYTHING tastier
Haha I thought I was the only one who did that.
Would SJI just butt out ,please? I have never heard such rubbish. Biting lower incomes with increased USC? Are they mad? Stick to religion ! You are better at that than economics , and that is not saying much.
Tax on SMS? Ridicolous idea, just switch to Web text or Instant Messaging to get around it!
The number of text messages sent per year is increasing despite the recent popularity of alternatives. I don’t think it’s a terrible idea for a tax tbh.
We already pay tax on SMS. It’s called VAT.
@mart_n. The reason SMS usage has remained so high is that the majority of mobile users have free texts or have a payment plan which gives them so many hundred free sms per month, the instant they’re is a charge associated with SMS, mobile users will switch to free alternatives like BBM, IM, email
Technically you don’t pay tax on text messages. You pay it for the overall product/service. That’s like saying you don’t need a TV license because you payed VAT on the TV itself.
The amount of moaning that goes on here about regressive taxation etc, and when some new ideas for a minimal and progressive tax are floated they are immediately shot down. What do people want?!
@mart_m. If you’re Bill Pay subscriber you pay percentage VAT on all your service usage SMS/VOICE/DATA
Well mart, my bill shows the SMS price ex vat and the price inc vat. I also pay vat on the phone calls, data plan and usage plan. If you have a PAYG phone and send an SMS then the price deducted from your credit is inc vat.
A tax on sugar/fat food would be a great move, though it would have to work hand in hand with govt initiatives to lower the retail price of healthy options for people.
Who decides what is junk food though? McDonalds in moderation is fine – plus McDs are one of the biggest buyers of Irish beef in Europe. Also, in Ireland, it doesn’t have the additives that have given it a bad name in the US. So-called Low-Fat processed foods are are full of chemicals with little or no nutritional value!
Give me a Big Mac any day – at least it is real food.
Gerri, when McDonalds say their burgers are 100% Irish beef they mean that the beef is 100% Irish not that the burger is 100% beef. Plenty of crappy additives go into McDonalds’ burgers.
McDonalds is not nutritious on any planet. Food should be assessed for its chemical content, nutritional content, fat content, sugar content and overall effect on your health and tax graded as such. Then tax breaks should be given to producers of non refined or low refined healthy produce to ensure affordability.
Sorry Barry and Diarmaid, that is not actually true. Mc Donalds stopped using the ‘pink slime’ some time ago. There was a recent study in Ireland on the contents of burgers and McDs were found to contain just beef and seasoning (mainly salt). Sorry I can’t remember who carried it out but it was reported on radio. There was a dietitian who said that as the burger in the bun had protein, fat and carbohydrate, it was actually quite a balanced meal. There was no evidence of chemicals or nasty additives.
OMG you heard it on the radio so it must be true! Not even the best burgers on the market can be 100% beef. You need to add breadcrumbs or other agent to dry the beef or it’ll fall apart when cooking. especially if it has been frozen as freezing mince turns it to slush. Egg whites are often used as a binding agent. So IG McDonald’s burgers are actually 100% beef then they must have cattle that produce beef unlike any other cattle in the world. And if you actually try a McDonalds burger without any sauces etc you’ll notice they actually don’t taste like beef and have a texture like tofu.
There has been a wealth of studies done that show McDonald’s is not in any way healthy. Just Google it. Unless the reason you are being so defensive is because you work for them?
Gerri, I don’t know if you work for McD’s or what but I too heard that interview, to the best of my recollection it was on the Moncrieff show on Newstalk. That woman was comparing the burger to a low nutrition snack, she wasn’t comparing it to a healthy food. In any event I never argued against the meat in a burger, I do think when you factor in all the other ingredients in a Big Mac for example, that’s when it starts being unhealthy on top of what other food items are cooked in. No one ever walks into McDonalds and buys a beef burger with no bun, sauce, sides or drink, well I’ve never seen it anyway. Suggesting McDonalds is nutritious is frankly ludicrous, perhaps we should talk to a few cardiologists to get their thoughts?
Now Barry, there is no need to be patronising. No, I do not work for McDonalds. I make my own burgers all the time and you don’t need to add breadcrumbs or egg white to them. I also keep mince in the freezer and it does not turn to slush! Actually breadcrumbs and egg whites are not chemicals additives so I wouldn’t actually have a problem with them.
Diarmaid, it was a programme on RTÉ – nearly sure it was Pat Kenny. But that is not important. I agree the sauces and drinks are definitely not healthy but my original point was: who decides what is junk food for the benefit of this tax? McDs is the usual suspect but in fact other so-called healthy foods are worse offenders. Look at the ingredients list on a packet of cereal. Sugar is usually very high up that list.
@ Barry. McD’s use a good brand of beef burger. its actually one of the more expensive brands. wether its 100% irish or not, is debatable but it is 100% BEEF
Are you sure it was on RTE? I thought I heard it on Newstalk. In any event, I couldn’t agree with you more, 99% of cereals are total crap, you’d be better off eating the box for nutrition than the cereal in it. I am not trying to single out McD’s for unfair treatment. 90% of the stuff in your local supermarket is muck. Therein lies the problem and why I believe this is necessary, if that makes sense? Kids should be eating porridge, veg, unrefined meat etc not cheese strings, coco pops and chicken nuggets. If financial restraints have to be introduced to discourage so be it!
Diarmaid, now we are singing from the same hymn sheet!
Lou, you are 100% right about the beef content and in addition, 1 in every 4 McD’s burgers sold in Europe is made from Irish beef. McDs are actually important for the Irish economy – I know that’s totally off topic but interesting, I think!
Good points Gerry, McD’s beef is of quite a high quality, is sourced in ireland and if its advertised as 100% beef, it cannot be anything else. its actually the sauces, buns and cheese that raise the fat and sugar contents. A fat tax will not affect McD’s, or any other fat food providers. It’s the customer that always pays. Incidentally, nobody ever mentions BK when talking about unhealthy foods. A double standard?
This then begs the question how do you introduce a fat tax into a market which is heavily distorted by consumer marketing? Only last week was the revelation of the Tesco “Low Fat” yogurt. Low in fat yes, but the calorie count was huge!
Gavin you have answered your own question there. The whole point is to make the customer pay, a tax should be a disincentive to purchase, therefore less business for the business leading to them having to produce healthier food products. I don’t believe it should stop at fat content, as you’re bang on with your other point. The tax should take in a wider spectrum of health effects.
Exactly !!! Always !always !the sweet things are cheaper then the healthy option , notice when the new school term starts for instance all the shops and supermarkets pack the shelves near the tills with 3 for 2 offers on chocolate bars or crisps.
The best part is, you’ll be putting in corrupt politicians to make health decisions and then wonder why the childhood obesity rates are rising.
Good intentions and flawed logic, the left at its finest.
Oh god Michael, can we just have one grown up debate where a political ideology isn’t the focus of the argument and rather the problem of childhood obesity etc is!? Nice sweeping generalisation there too assuming you know my political leanings, btw, you’re utterly wrong in those assumptions too.
Here comes the dramatics. I’m merely alerting you to what will happen. We as a people want cheap food, and then child obesity gets worse. How many ways do you want your cake?
I honestly don’t care about your political leanings, I’m just telling you like it is.
Also interesting to note that you don’t disagree with the logic either
Dramatics? What are you on about? Of course I disagree with you, you’re talking out your hat.
So basically screw everybody that’s not on welfare!!! F##k me why didn’t we think of it sooner #Idiots
…but a tax on junk food, alcohol, sugar etc…will that not effect the “vulnerable” more…
“effect” should read affect
Good point.
John a third of a cent will hardly make anybody think twice about sending a text.
How can you charge a third of a cent? Last I checked the lowest acceptable denomination is a cent and that’s not even accepted in some EU countries.
NIall, If the average texter sends about 30 texts a day it amounts to about 36euro a year. How do you propose the Operators charge for this? Add it on top of the monthly bill? And what about that the majority of Irish mobile subscribers are pre-pay with no contract, How do you propose to charge these? Also we’re already paying VAT on our Mobile phone bills, its a double tax!
Eh jason, I dont know what back youre from from or the people thumbed your comment but I see it every day. Look at any petrol station or any currency exchange. Just beause you physically have it in your hand doesnt mean you dont deal in fractions of cents all the time.
That many mistakes in that comment Im not going to even bother correcting it.
Just stop paying unsecured bonds and we wouldn’t need to be picking on the vulnerable at all.
What about Free Txts ? No thanks i paid enough Tax & don’t i pay vat on my phone bill ?.. & poor people eat more Junk food than rich ppl so aren’t we going to hurt the poorest via this mad plan ? I wish these bunch of freeloaders like the SJI who have never created a real job or started a real business that created wealth, would go away back to what ever they came from…
Poor people eat more junk food? A few carrots and small bag of baby potatoes are half the price of a box of Birds Eye refined reformed crap filled chicken nuggets. I really can’t see your point! Good healthy food, like Veg and Fruit are far far cheaper than muck in the freezer section.
Ps. I agree with all your other points.
Peter, you’re not even comparing like with like; you’re comparing a ‘meat’ with a vegetable and a carb. And you’re comparing a name brand with an own brand.
A better comparison would be, can you buy 500g of lidl chicken nuggets for cheaper than 500g of lean chicken? No.
Can you buy 1kg of tesco own brand frozen chips for the same prize as 1kg of potatoes? You sure can’t.
Do the poor eat more junk food? Absolutely, they do, because they have to to make ends meet.
What is the obsession with people proposing text taxes?
Aside from the fact that it wouldn’t actually raise that much money, it’s hardly social justice, when the heaviest users of texts are teenagers who don’t generally have all that much money.
Then you hit the technical difficulties. What if someone uses BBM, iPhone Messages or just plain old email off their phone? Same communication but taxed in a different way?
And while texts are hardly cutting edge any more, there isn’t a great history of us when it comes to taxing new technologies. We taxed credit cards, hit usage and developed a much more cash dependent society. The consequence fewer traceable (i.e. taxable transactions), never mind a situation where a minister had to suggest taxing ATM withdrawals to discourage us from carrying cash to stop robberies…
Surely the tax would be on mobile operators? It’d be up to them whether or not they pass the cost on to consumers.
Excellent,so we are going to be taxed on something we are already been overcharged for.Genius!!!
Tax on junk food, do it now and save the HSE billions more in the future.
Yes, just like the extortionate tax on alcohol has done wonders for the HSEs finances
If a tax stopped people eating junk food I would be very surprised. The best way of saving billions is education about nutrition and how to cook it.
Send the refugees an foreign nationals who claim social welfare home for a start.. There is obviously no need for them to be here. See how much that saves. That would be a start. In my area alone there is full hotel full of them with free bus 4times a day into the town, going back to there hotel with bags of beer. Send them home.
Then try other options after that.
Take those deserving
Tax the Germans
Tax chippers who use cheap oil
Tax undersized Tesco toasters
Tax prawn crackers
Tax alco pops
Tax houses names ending with ‘Villa’
Tax goods from sweat shops
Tax late night burger (not kebab) joints
Tax neighbours who dump in my skip
seriously do we not pay enough taxes??? cut their own wages and put them on social welfare or show them what real work is won’t be long putting the country back on track
Cutting child welfare is a good idea. If its only kept for those who actually need it then that’s a more equitable solution.
I agree some benifets are given to the well off that don’t need it. it’s never progressed instead the poor take the hit and Irish children go to bed hungry.
I believe there is one already. “Value Added Tax” they call it. It’s 23%.
But why deal with the headline grabbing suggestion of tax on texts which is unsubstantial when they make suggestions for serious adjustments? Why not talk about their suggestion to private sector profits more seriously?
Nah, just go for the cheapest headline, why not!
my thoughts exactly, Robert.
They could say they’ll increase corporation taxes by 2.5%, but no : there has to be a “levy of 2.5 per cent on all corporate profits”, just to show how nasty corporate profits are.
Punitive taxation is for moralising nanny-staters, not economists.
Oh ffs! For a start if you did a study you’d see that the demographic of people eating the shitty food are rarely the wealthy high earners & that’s a fact. That said I don’t think taxing it is any harm but you’re not hitting the wealthy.
Secondly, if I have to hand over any more USC I will honestly scream!
Thirdly, the majority of people who have a semi decent price plan on their phones don’t get charged for their text messages so don’t even know how many they send or see it on their bills. I’m sorry for being petty but like who even knows how many messages they send? All the work Europe did to reduce our roaming rates & these want to tax our texts. You’re being stupid.
And do not even start me on an increase of 2.5% on CT, do you like having a private sector? Yeah? Well do you fancy still having it in a years time???!!!
Honestly, I’m just not able for these lot!
I’m sorry for being a grump but honestly some people.
Potential future taxes our desperate government is going to implement:
1. Dropping your library book back late tax at a rate of 5 cent per day;
2. Charging familes who’s kids avail of lollipop men/women at 2 euro per kid per week;
3. Bicycle tax (seriously, this one IS a potential);
4. Taxing emails (another one not to write off!!);
5. Church tax with a 5 cent cover charge;
6. Flying a kite tax (You may need to register your kite and have aeronautical insurance);
7. Coin operated traffic lights (Your money or your life);
Why not add a fart tax.. Or maybe thats a renewable.
@Joe
Yeah I thought of that one Joe, but that would involve metering people’s arses and it would take a couple of years to roll out those meters which would cost the government more in the long run so it would be a no go.
It’ll never happen. The god botherers had their day in the sun. Social justice director Sean Healy seems to have dropped the Fr bit since he left cori. (Can you drop a title?) The religious association is a big negative these days Is anyone working for them that Isnt devout catholic?and I’m not against devotees I just always question their motives.
this country is truly screwed cut cut cut and hand billions to the bankers and penny’s to the poor.
How about a higher vat rate on food over a certain salt/fat/sugar content and a lower one on fresh food…
Texting tax… I wonder what idiot was paid a 4 figure consultant fee for that moronic idea
He went to college, educated by teachers in the Dail and has an Art Degree in the Dept. of finance!
There are a lot less wealthy left than these interest groups think. Even a Hollande style tax for the uber rich would not come close to plugging the gap. Ironically I think that a tax on salt, sugar and transfats would worst effect the poorest members of society.
Taxing junk food is a great idea, it will spur people to eat healthier which will benefit everyone in the long run.
Also healthy foods should be subsidised or cheaper.
Text tax is also a good idea. It’s such a small amount that people won’t notice and maybe if they tax texts then perhaps they won’t cut the children’s allowance
Really? The high tax on cigarettes does not deter people from smoking.
So can you qualify what “Junk Food” is? Do you think these companies will stay in business if you raise their prices? Are you going to contribute to their social welfare?
Both ideas are horrible. Children’s allowance only drives up the cost of school products and uniforms.
More good intentions and less logic.
Give me social justice Ireland over greedy corporations any day
How about some concrete proposals? How are these corporations “greedy”? It’s us that give them our money by supplying the goods and services we use every day.
They should tax the pensions of all the ministers and ex Taoiseach under the pension age…. Imagine what that would bring in…
This one is the way to go. How can these parasites get paid for years for a job they stopped doing (as if they did the job well in the first place). Let them have the same pension rules as the ordinary man.
Next it will be tax on doing a dump! This country is beyond a joke.
that’s called a water charge, best option is to collect rainwater in buckets to flush the toilet….
And soon they will have a tax on e- mail I suppose . This is unreal.
A tax on financial transactions is the obvious answer.
So in addition to the charge the bank makes each time they allow me access my own money, I have to pay tax on it as well? I already paid income tax on it!!!
Do you realise what this would do to the liquidity and financial markets? Or how many people you’ve just unemployed with this tax?
And kiss goodbye to all the IFSC jobs when they are relocated to a country without the transaction tax.
i do agree with taxing junk food. people just eat WAY too much and it is the cause of so many health problems. We tax ciggies and booze for the same reasons, so, why not?
why no tax everything until we are all poor while them %#&*@ at the top get 5k a month for travel kip of a country its gone
Raise the USC!!!!!
C’mon to f::k. Are they serious. So once more those of us working are to be targeted.
Last I checked I paid over 4k in USC last year. And what did it do, paid AIB unsecured bonds today. You can’t get any more from this stone. Property tax and water charges next year. Where’s my social justice. I’m willing enough to pay towards services in this country once I can see it spread more evenly.
Do I have a medical card. No.
Do I get mortgage subsidy. No.
Do I receive rent allowance. No.
Free child care. No.
Single parent allowance. No. And I don’t want them.
Ah the list is endless.
Of course I’m opening myself up to an onslaught of abuse, but I have been a net contributor to this state, never took one cent in welfare. Their are many people who are recently unemployed and I do certainly believe they should receive help, but their are also those that feel a sense of entitlement who have scrounged their whole lives. They deserve zero in my opinion.
Place red thumb here..
I don’t agree with taxing everything but this tax is the lesser of two evils. I’d rather a tax on junk food than child benefit slashed. i get ur point on the fat cats at the top but it’ll take a revolution before they cut their own money!
boildyeggs.
You’ve displayed the sentiment of the silent majority. I couldn’t agree more.
A Tax on toilet paper, maybe?
I just use my payslip.
Too much detail, post it to your local TD afterwards?
Can’t afford the stamp! :)
Irish people will just accept it like they accept everything else. Pathetic compliant race of people. Wake up.
Send the unemployed back to their own Countries. We haven’t enough for our own Ppl and tax the fat cats at the top who ruined our Ireland for the working Man..
Tax the working man again!! Great idea
Taxing employment in a recession never works.
Paying over 160 TD’s €100,000 + and that again in expenses, this and funding another unnecessary layer of bureaucracy that are local councillors is ridiculous. A country our size should have no more than 80 in total and even that’s too much.
Why are we taking about taxes that only generate 10 to 50 Million. The top rate pension break will generate €700 million. But those in power wont bring it in as it hurts their own pocket.
This one just brings forward tax revenue from future pensions into current current tax revenue and will also have the effect of leaving mire people reliant on the state pension in future, putting more strain on the government finances.
A ratio of 2:1 would do terrible damage to this economy. Our main problem is spending.
the more we tax the more the government grows, and starts telling the fattys to go on diets because they are costing them a fortune. Social welfare is a ponsy scheme waved infront of the poor in order to buy the vote … the government over spends and puts more people into poverty
Dont mean to to be negative here,but did anyone see the” ERSI REPORT ON BREASTFEEDING”….
What kinda bull do we get.Why cant it be ….ERSI REPORT ON GOVERNMENT NEGOIATIONS WITH EUROPE ON OUR BANK DEPTH……..and before someone comes on and says the ERSI are not affiliated with government…who cares….where are our lobby group OH YEAH..its the government….and how do you contact them….PRESS 1…..
Revolution. Enough is enough. I’m sick of paying the debts of others. I had no mortgage, but my tax went up. I had no car loan, but my tax went up. I didn’t even have a credit card, but my tax went up. Break the banks. They can pay. Break the wealthy, they can pay. Kill all politicians. THEY WILL PAY!
Stop talking about tax first and most important austerity start at the top or at least it should…. show by example
Close the Dail bar no more free or near free booze
remove politicians transport make them pay like everyone else
Who else gets a pension after 4 years really who
Make their wages pay performance if they down perform they don’t get a raise ( incompetence should not be rewarded )
austerity for politicians reduce the cost of staying in the capital ( living in apartments make them share a house like everyone else who can’t afford their own home )
Last but not least make them show their expenses and accountable for money spent they claim as expenses ( non profit and community schemes have been shut down because of a lack in funding and they had to show how every penny was spent )
A tax on text messages is a tax on children and teenagers. Fine Gael will love this idea as they are the tax children party from the 1980′s.
Enda Kenny and Co. will send us back there. ?750k expenses in August when they were on holidays, shame on the political class, all of them except for the two who claimed no expenses have any right to lecture the people of Ireland. If they really cared about Ireland they would not claim expenses during the months they do not sit. I would like to know what every single cent of those expenses went and I also want to know if there are receipts for every single cent. Politicians should be asking for our forgiveness for allowing the country to go bankrupt than claiming such huge expenses and then telling us that services have to be cut, we have to work longer for less and we’ve to get used to the new reality. A reality that seems not to apply to them.
Is this the new politics promised to us by Mr. Kenny and Fine Gael. If so it I wonder can it be considered a type of fraud on the Irish People, after all we were asked to sign the contract for a better Ireland in 2007. Fine Gael therefore believe that election promises are a form of contract with the people. Honest politics costs nothing! But honest and politics don’t seem to go together in Ireland.
Instead of taxing text message, tax political expenses, introduce a new 49% tax rate for those who earn over ?85k but spend less than 100 days in work.
A wealth tax of 5 percent on the wealthiest 5 percent in the country would raise 10bn..according to the credit suisse wealth databook….. but no, lets punish the poor, what are they going to do about it this isnt greece after all
have your say