Dave, if you want Tracey to paint you, you’ll have to ditch the 50% tax rate

Anthony

I dunno, chaps. I'm not a fan of the 50% tax rate either. But I'm not sure the best way to make the argument against it is via the medium of Tracy Emin. I think most people "down the pub" probably view her wealth as no less well earned as that of the bankers (who, incidentally, have been heavily responsible for the current contemporary art bubble...).

Dirty Euro

Tracey Emin is talking rubbish there is no way she would stop painting just because they increase her taxes. This is rich people trying to brainwash middle class and working class people a load of right wing propaganda against the interests of working and middle class people. She has plenty of cash. I say make her pay more taxes to pay for better public services.
I know what is in my interest. Do not be conned by Emin.

Dirty Euro

You say "Emin is rich, hard working and not remotely responsible for the crisis, which originated in America, as well we know."
So I assume that is not true for the Unlike the working and middle class of this nation who are obviously totally responsible for the crisis and so should their public services cut the pay for Emin's lifestyle.
Emin gets paid a fortune for doing what, while people doing far more useful jobs get ziltch.
We should tax the rich more and punish the tax havens.

Chuck Unsworth

A nation mourns.

Fatbloke on tour

Ermin -- Another reason to vote labour.
They are starting to add up now.
I wonder when Scratchy will notice?

She is a horse, a complete waste of space who has generated considerable wealth through an ability to shock but no discernable talent.

I can safely predict dancing in the streets if she keeps her word and slings her hook.

Financial / economic ignoramus of the highest order.

If only Amy Winehouse would go with her.

Florence Nightingale

I remember Emin's 'Unmade Bed' and if that is a true example of her art then I doubt if she will be missed. Bon Voyage Tracy!

Tiberius

Rather like the Lisbon Treaty, many people feel they know the politics of the issue (in this case, 50% tax) better than the guy who actually has to execute them and take responsibility for them.

David, I guess Cameron could always travel to Tracy's new studio, wherever she decides to set it up.

EC

She said: "I’m very seriously considering leaving Britain; I’m simply not willing to pat tax at 50%."

That's the best argument yet for introducing a 50% rate!

Dirty Euro

Tories think rich people should not pay for your public services. Therefore people like me and you, would have no health, education, police, fire service, rubbish collection, army, road system. We would be slaves living in poverty, at mercy or criminals and ruin.
No one who earns under say 30,000 a year would survive cancer under the tory logic, they would have no serious pensions, they would die in poverty. Oh well maybe only artists have the empathy to want such misery for working and middle class people. How greedy of me to want people to have a good health service,(sob). How greedy of me, i feel so guilty. Maybe middle and working class people should jump off cliffs so rich people do not have to pay for out treatment, maybe we should pay conn artists for fake cancer cures, so they can buy more luxury yachts and posh flats. How greedy and envious I am I feel so guilty.

Draughtsman

The tax system should be about raising revenue for the exchequer not about punishing people of whose wealth some people may be envious.

Forget Tracy Emin. Like now, I was in engineering the last time people on higher earnings were taxed until the pips squeaked and it was not uncommon that contract engineers and designers would terminate their contracts as soon as they had earned an amount that would take them into the high tax bracket. They would then be off to dig the garden or play golf. It caused no end of problems to the projects on which we were working and probably cost the exchequer money in the long run. I am not talking about people with questionable talents, I mean men and women who have trained and worked hard to be successful in a valuable profession. I for one would not want to see a return to those daft days.

bill

Let me break it down for them: raise taxes, make people avoid them, get less tax; cut taxes, allow people to trade more, get more taxes. See Dubai (0%) and Hong Kong (15%) as examples. Hong Kong is still growing strong, and Dubai's problem is it grew too much. Not a likely problem we will have to deal with anytime soon thanks to the TAX BURDEN.

Alfred T Mahan

Goodbye, Tracy. Shut the door after you, will you?

Now, where were we? Oh yes...

Nicholas

"We would be slaves living in poverty, at mercy or criminals and ruin."

You mean like we are now with Brown and his gang of con artists and spongers running things?

Emin came to prominence in 1997 and I always considered her to be part of Blair's 'Cool Britannia' con. Ironic that she's jumping ship because of out of tune bandmaster Herr Honicker Braun and his East German Wannabes.

Andrew K

Dirty Euro, did you take your meds this morning?

Nicholas

Dirty Euro, although I promised myself not to respond to your inane drivel your latest rabid left-wing Little Labourer rant takes the biscuit (or should that be cake?).

You have a very polarised and odd outlook. I wonder just what you do for a living - if anything?

Nicholas

Thought I'd try serial heckling like the two rabid left-wing Little Labourers.

I quite like Tracy Emin in a kind of ashamed of myself, furtive way.

Emil

Oh dear Dirty Euro, and no doubt those nasty Tories want to eat our first born as well.

Tip for you though - after Brown's antics best not to mention pensions mate, all that gold might have been quite handy as well.

Draughtsman

Dirty Euro - you still haven't defined who you are talking about when you speak of 'rich people.' You mention 30K pa, are you implying that anyone earning more than that is rich?

THX1138

Didn't Phil Collins say the same thing but he's still here.

I quite like Tracy Emin though, I rather like "but is art" art.

Kevyn Bodman

A huge factor in Dubai's growth was the use of what is very close to slave labour of third world workers.
Quoting Dubai's tax rate is not relevant to the argument of this thread.

Fatbloke on tour

The dog that hasn't barked in this discussion, is where did Horse get her money from?

She should be a penniless artist working a in a cold draughty garret somewhere in the East London badlands dying of pneumonia.

I mean what kind of proper artist earns more than £150K per year? Art is at its best when it challenges the establishment not becomes part of that establishment.

However the main point is where did she get her money from?

Art "lovers" / collectors with more money than sense and need to follow the latest fad, that's who!

And who are they?

All the hedge fund granny sellers / city spivs / wideboys / drug dealers including big pharma execs / PR executives and last but not least ad men spending there ill gotten gains on stuff that their gardener will have read about in the Sun.

Consequently Horse has financial blood on her hands. She is spending the fruits of the establishment's organised theft from the working class.

It is not a 50% tax rate she should be worrying about it is a visit from SOCA's Asset Recovery team looking for the proceeds of crime.

Consently go!
Go in the name of decency, good manners and talent. Go!

mitch

good riddance to bad rubbish I say, if she is an artist then I'm the king of England.

Coeur de Lion

Back to discussing sensibly the 50% rate. Is there the machinery for comparing total tax take at higher levels before and after the 50% hike? If it drops (Laffer curve) then there we are, eh?

Hysteria

kevyn bodman - you make an interesting point but I think you are not quite correct. The 0 % tax in Dubai had a huge impact and pulled in many thousands of professional individuals and value creating companies.

The "slave labour" you refer to is pretty much confined to the actual building sites to support the boom.

There were a number of other sectors that had employment practices with which we would take issue, but you cannot dismiss the significance of a 0% rate as a stimulus to growth.

(And yes - I worked there 2003-2007 so I know something of what I speak)

Battle 2807

What Dirty Euro does not seem to understand is that however much HE would like to see her taxed, she is GOING TO LEAVE THE COUNTRY, so she wont pay any tax in Britain. Do you understand, DE?
You say things like "make her pay" but you CANT make her pay if she is not here, can you???
Is this so difficult to understand?

bill

Kevyn Bodman quote dubai's tax rate is relevant to this article as it is about tax rates. Ponder this, would all those people be in Dubai working if they had the UK's tax burden? Weather they should have to is an argument for another day, but the economy only grew out of the desert in the first place because of the pro-growth tax structure. Where it went from there is for another day like i said, but I stand by the tax argument I made.

Gary Williams

Emin is probably not a fraud, but her work is the product of neither intelligence nor talent. It's just a waste of space, but there's a lot of that about anyhow. Thank goodness Cameron is aiming to be Prime Minister, and not Prime Curator.

Wrt the 50% rate, a reasonable amount of work has been done on the effects of income and wealth disparities. Although it's nice when the pie gets bigger, and the smallest slice is larger than it was before, it appears that the dramatic expansion of the wealth gap in the last two decades has had malign effects that have outweighed the benefits of the enlargement of the smallest slice. That is to say, even if it were not to raise a single penny of incremental revenue, a 50% rate above some threshold (perhaps a higher one than has been mooted by Doofus) may not be a bad thing.

wrinkled weasel

"Painting"? Tracey Emin? (And by the way it's Tracey with an "E")

Tracey is just like anybody who has made a lot of dosh and does not believe somebody else should have it. As a vox pop, she is as good as the next member of the public, but as a painter? She might have managed an unmade bed with empty pill bottles and broken nokias by the bed.

Anne Wotana Kaye

Emin joins a list of people who I would like to see completely ignored by the media. Perhaps if they received no coverage they would just curl up and vanish. They include: Jordan, Amy Winehouse, Kaye Moss, Jonathan Ross, Lord Mandelson, and various other skimps and pringles.

General Zod

Most posters in the thread unfortunatley focus on the individual rather than what her example illustrates; that this tax will result in high earners putting their earnings beyond the reach of HMRC so that the overall tax take will reduce.

I am one of the unfortunate fortunates who is subject to the rate but whose job ties him to this country. Were that not the case, I'd be off like a shot.

Emil

Amazing how everyone's banging on about 50% when the most spiteful thing Darling did, i.e. removing the personal allowance for anyone on 100K, gets completely ignored.

Ah they can afford to pay more I hear the class warriors cry but 1) guess how many people's declared earnings are going to come in at around 99K, and 2) how long before these thresholds get lowered through fiscal drag or political posturing? As to Tracey, she's 100% right even if I, like many others, really couldn't care less whether she stays in UK or not, the point is that there will be thousands like here who won't be paying any form of tax in UK after next April, and guess what, the rest of us will have to make up the shortfall. And the ones who do stay will have less disposable income to spend on goods, restaurants etc, but don't worry Labour plan to be taking that money and paying people from those sectors not to work. Go figure.

Oliver Cromwell

Tracy Emin to stop painting if you raise her taxes?

Quickly, a new law that raises Tracy's taxes please!

Anonymous

I hope the hag disappears for good. But preferably not to France as I may well decide to retire there one day. I am sick and tired of seeing her ugly mug in private viewings/parties, etc. Why don't wonderful and SERIOUS artists/people like Sarah Lucas and Mat Collishaw get more recognition? Go, Tracey, go.