Why are so many people against a tax they will never pay?

maddyone

Because many, many more ordinary people will be dragged into paying inheritance tax over the next few years due to the rise in house prices.

It is not the owners of the houses that will pay IHT. They will be dead and buried. It is their estate that will pay. They won't lose out and won't be around to see it.

Surely it is better that the living pay less income tax on their earnings, and pay IHT on assets that they've inherited and not earned?

Ilovecheese

I thought house prices had started to fall.

If someone bought a house twenty years ago, despite recent small falls in prices, the house would still rise in value substantially. Ordinary people who have little besides their house and some not very great savings, and who have worked all their lives and paid tax on everything they’ve earned are being pulled into paying inheritance tax. Particularly if those people live in the south.

Because ever since Thatcher, we've been told that taxation is bad and that we should keep more of our own money. We have also been led to believe that we can have Scandinavian-level services with US-level taxes. [hides-head-in-hands emoji]

Mainly because they are being conned by the very well off lobby that stands to gain massively from no IHT. It would be easy to adjust the threshold annually so that ordinary people with houses rising in value did not pay.

Perhaps some people are concerned about an unjust tax, even when it is unlikely to affect them.

I thought house prices had started to fall.

Because many, many more ordinary people will be dragged into paying inheritance tax over the next few years due to the rise in house prices.