To keep Avant happy I'll ignore the Balls comment except to laugh at the idea of him being credible. Osborne is pretty poor but Balls is no alternative.

Trouble with slashing taxes is that it doesn't put net money into the economy, at least not in any quantity.

Tax cuts (except possibly VAT) go mostly to the already well off. They're not spent on goods and services where they might do some good but go into 'savings'.

Depends what you cut. VAT and fuel duty are probably the two most regressive taxes we have. They harm middle and lower earners the most and actively take money out of the economy. Cutting those does make a difference to the lower paid where as the rich would see no real difference to their personal income - though a richer populace may mean their businesses sell more goods, which is also good.

If by halving the cost of petrol it meant people went to a restaurant one more time a month or even just bought a toaster with their windfall then that makes a difference in the economic chain if everybody is doing it. Afterall the person selling toasters then has more money to spend on what he/she wants etc etc etc

Furthermore, in the present climate large tax cuts would need to be balanced by cuts in government spending. That means more of the same austerity medecine that's not working at the moment.

Well there needs to be spending cuts whether you keep taxes high or reduce them, the current policy is balancing books with cuts and tax rises won't work and never has worked. I would support an aggressive cuts program if it was compensated with tax cuts to give the economy a fighting chance of circulating some money, generating some employment and growing something.

Nothing is perfect but what do you suggest? Tax even more and choke off growth even harder? Or do you support Balls' plan to borrow even more, spend even more and default on our loans quicker?

Perhaps those countries have politicians and civil servants who can be trusted to manage the publics money in the publics interest. I don't believe the UK has that.

In this country we have expensive fuel with a useless bus service, as well as useless and overpriced trains. Hospitals vary depending on where you are and inferstructure is poor due to never being invested in, so with all that in mind you need a car in Britain maybe more than in those countries. In Britain we have the expensive fuel but none of those lovely things you mention to compensate.

When you buy a car over here you're levied VAT, a 'first year rate' on car tax if you're buying a 'polluting' car and a first registration fee. So you're wrong. The Treasury gets over £50billion a year from the motorist in direct taxation alone and it's too much.

.I would think a few nightclass lessons in economics wiuld help you understand the differences in the way counties are run

Please stop patronising me, you risk threads being closed because I will throw incredibly aggressive abuse at you as I do with anybody who dares to patronise me from upon their high horse. You're the one who believes BMW would stop selling cars in Britain if we left the EU so clearly whatever education institution you attended practices indoctrination, rather than education.

Except very high taxation which is spent on infrastructure the UK is a low tax country and has no money for the said infrastructure projects.

Errr.. I assume you live in a parallel universe.

2012 figures show Germany's tax take as a % of GDP is 40.6% and the UK's 39.0%.

Hardly a huge difference.

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Edited by madf on 25/02/2013 at 06:38

So if we could have knocked 10p off a litre of petrol then we could have been spared the problems that will follow the lower credit rating and the pound going further down the toilet.

I never said that. I said fuel (and general energy price) is a contributant, I never said cause. The credit crisis was built on a house of soggy cards and was always going to happen, politicians have done a good job convincing you it's all the Americans fault but that's not the case.

I'm saying we'll never get anywhere if nobody has money to spend. Surely you're not arguing raising fuel tax even further will help? Transport is a massive cost burden for most people and hoarding all money purely to fill the petrol tank quite obviously leads to a reduction in spending, business revenue, jobs and tax revenue. The days of people being able to spend money they haven't got to artificially hold the economy up are gone, we need to help them release money they have got instead.

Cutting fuel tax isn't the solution but it's a start.

Why aren't Osborne and Carney up to speed on this?

Well Osborne is a moron and Carney isn't BoE Governor yet.