Philanthropists will give less to charity if tax relief is limited to £50,000, squeal the rich donors and grateful recipients. Well, they could always consider giving away their own money rather than handing over taxpayers’ cash.
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BBC television bosses may be annoyed that the Grand National and Derby are moving to Channel 4, but hold on, these are both publicly-owned media groups. Why were they competing against each other in the first place?
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A mathematician will say there is no loss if a pint mug of beer is poured into another pint glass. A realist will point to the puddle on the floor and the part-full glass. George Osborne may find that his budget is not as fiscally neutral as he hopes.
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The small firms’ complaint is not that loans are expensive but that they’re not available. Under credit-easing, those businesses will still be refused but the ones that are currently lucky will in future pay less.
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Freezing the minimum wage for young people is the right decision. It is better to have a badly-paid job than no job at all.
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The government’s new scheme to help first-time buyers is ideal for people who want to overpay for a property and then pay too much for their mortgage as well. You’d have to be desperate to use it.
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With two out of three credit-rating agencies now threatening to cut Britain’s AAA ranking, we might have to wait a few more years for George Osborne’s 100-year bonds.
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George Osborne should curtail pension tax reliefs, despite the superannuation industry getting its retaliation in first. Any tax increase will cause squeals, but of all the chancellor’s options, taxing pensions is easiest and could even win votes.
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Congratulations to Volkswagen for solving the problem of gender equality among company directors. The carmakers’ chairman wants to put his wife on the board. If every male director did that, women would soon have equal representation.
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Is there a giant magnet in Arthur’s Seat that attracts banks to Edinburgh? Unruffled that it has had to rescue Scotland’s biggest banks, the Westminster government has chosen the country’s capital as headquarters for the state’s new Green Investment Bank.
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