But Froch isn't being asked to pay 50% on what he earns.BIGMARK wrote:b oxingscene report:
WBC super middleweight champ Carl Froch is considering a possible move to Spain. Froch is upset with the high amount of tax he is required to pay, 50% on his earnings in the ring. Other fighters, like David Haye, have already left the UK. Haye resides in Cyprus. Froch says that he discussed the subject of leaving with Haye.
"I think it is a real shame that I am even thinking of moving abroad when I finish, because I love my country as much as any person. I wear the Union Jack on my shorts and it is there for a reason and I love my home city Nottingham. I don't want to leave England but I feel I might be forced to do so because 50 per cent tax is just so outrageous. You can't ask anyone to pay 50 per cent of what they earn on taxes, much of which is used just to prop up people who can't be bothered to work or who are fiddling the system," Froch told Daily Mail.
"I have seriously thought about moving to Marbella in Spain and retiring there when I finish. Boxing is a very short career so you have to make some money while you can. Why should I give half of that to a government that just throws a lot of it away when I am the one in the ring? I am paying for MPs to spend it on cleaning their moats and buying duck houses. I can't see a strong positive future by staying in this country. I've spoken to Nigel Benn about it and he lives over in Majorca and I've been learning Spanish for three years."
Froch says that he expects to land a unification bout with Lucian Bute in September. He says the fight might take place in Nottingham on either September 5 or 12.
The 50% tax is a marginal rate, and is only paid on whatever he earns over a certain amount, not the whole lot. Further, because Britain has a tax system that levies taxes on items we buy -- often through methods such as VAT -- (indirect taxes) as well as income tax (direct), his total effective rate of tax as a percentage of his income is probably lower than people who earn significantly less.
I do believe that income taxes shouldn't be raised where possible and, ideally, they should be reduced, because I hate the idea of the state taking what you earn. However, there are two other factors -- beyond the fact he probably pays a smaller portion of his wages in total tax than lower paid people -- which mitigate this.
First, under normal circumstances, I certainly wouldn't back a fifty percent top tax rate. However, the UK government has to show the bond market that it has some fiscal credibility in terms of its future ability to pay back the mountains of debt it is accumulating in order to mitigate the effects of the current global financial crisis. If it doesn't, we'll probably face a depression, as the bond markets will run scared of British debt, precipitating a currency crisis and stopping any recovery dead with higher interest rates and devastating cuts in public spending. I do hope that Carl wouldn’t choose that rather than paying a few extra quid in taxes.
Second, I would also argue that we must have some form of progressive taxing, whereby the rich are levied at higher rates. Here in Russia there is a flat rate of income tax at only 13%. Sounds good, but then if you saw the state of the medical system here -- where the government allocates around USD7 bn to our USD250 bn -- and the general infrastructure, such as roads, etc, you would perhaps think again. One also has to wonder about the fairness of Roman Abramovich paying the same rate of Russian tax as a street cleaner.
It's all well and good for Carl to try to pay the popular card with the MPs' expenses claims, but while the public is rightly outraged about that, it's a very tiny fraction of our budget. The rest goes on services of which you, I and Carl have enjoyed the benefits for all our lives. When I lived in Britain, I was pretty happy to be able to wake up in the morning and take my morning crap on a flushing toilet, rather then having to sit on a bed pan and chuck it out onto the street as I would have had to have done 300 years ago. I'm pretty pleased with the fact I could run the tap and drink a glass of cool water, rather than having to lug big five litre bottles back from the supermarket as I do here in Russia. We travel on roads and rail; Carl can add up all the money he earns, as well as work out what percentage of that he’ll pay in tax, and probably learned to do so in a tax-funded school. He has probably taken advantage of a whole range of other services, like medical care, before his talent as a boxer made him rich; and his current wealth is protected from theft by a legal system which has police and courts paid for out of taxes. Certainly the tooth fairy didn’t build our great sewerage systems, water pipes, national grid, roads, schools, fire stations, courts, hospitals or jails.
So perhaps rather than crying about how he pays far too much tax (because, you know, the rich just have nobody to stand up for their rights, and need Carl), he could stick around and use his profile to engage the public politically to change the system and have the country run more efficiently? After all, taking advantage of publicly funded amenities and services, and then buggering off at the first sign of trouble, sounds a little like Carl is saying “I’m alright, Jack”.
DD 
), i'll give them parts a miss when i holiday. 