Obama's statement "you didn't build that" was wrong on so many levels...Government makes nothing, produces no income, only takes from it's citizenry. Responsible, efficient and transparent government should be the way it works. Infrastructure is something "you built", because you paid for it, in taxes. Øbama will go down as one of the worst, a footnote of what not to do, how not to be a leader. Tragic, actually...

Here's a solution to the likes of Paphitis etc threating to leave the country. Let them.
Then publicise the fact naming and shaming them and all the companies they control. Organise a public boycott, watch the companies slip into Administration and then bought up by those willing to actually pay their fair share of tax for doing business in and making money out of the British public. Publicise the fact. End boycott.
British Public 1 Departing rats 0

I think what annoys me most of all, is this idea that they're all millionaires because they're all hard working geniuses, and no-one else helped.

I remember when the Republicans tried to desperately corrupt Obama's comment about 'you didn't do it all alone'. No-one did, anyone who's rich either inherited a fat load of cash, or a hefty set of connections, or they worked up the hard way, in which case there's going to be a few hundred others in their life who also worked very hard but don't have the millions, just the typical wage.

It's great when people work hard, be creative, and succeed, but don't pretend you got there alone, and don't begrudge helping others, it's like pulling the rope ladder up behind you.

Your assumption that all the wealthy have had everything handed to them on a plate is highly damaging to political debate. This is most obvious in the line "made by all of us buying their goods and services" is highly cynical and borders on just pure bitterness, completely ignoring the enterprise that this entrepreneur has shown. Similarly, you put 'education' in the good fortune section, completely ignoring the fact that the other students in his/her class will have received the SAME education, and this student just worked and achieved that little bit harder. You're also assuming that everyone wealthy is in business. Some GPs earn 160,000 a year (before tax), will they be vindicated as well! Also I'm sick of this apparent justification of taxing the rich whatever because "we pay for their roads which they use etc". Would it be right for me to say that taxes should be raised on the lowest bracket from 20% to 30% because top 1% pay 27% of income tax? No it wouldn't. This is a complete illusory justification for raising taxes. Before you ask, no I'm not a Tory. I believe that the rich should pay more (I would have kept 50p rate for remainder of parliament) and its not as simple to say 'you keep what you earn', as the wealthy do have a responsibility to the rest of the nation. But this article typifies the toxic assumption that every wealthy person has it handed to them on a plate. The mindset on the wealthy from the rest of us simply has to change, in particular the 'stop whining we will tax you what we want' argument. P.S just stacking your article with numbers as opposed to percentages, as well as working out average earnings across nation, does not make it anymore compelling or convincing as an argument.

The Roman Empire went down the plug hole because the wealthy - self-made or not - refused to pay tax. They expected the little man and women to pay for all the state services such as the army, the infrastructure and entertainment. By the Gods, what the Emperor had to pay(bribe) his Pretorians. Even then the High Command were not satisfied with their emoluments.
Gibbon's view and Boris's for that matter put the blame on that slave religion - Christianity. However, the Roman elite were pretty crafty and jumped onto the new bandwagon without any hesitation.
In any event the Byzantine Empire held on until the early middle-ages and this was nothing more than an offshoot of Ancient Rome.
Up until the wealthy found ways of avoiding taxation, hiding away on their estates, the Roman state employed very effective tax gatherers.
Of course in the empire there was a free movement of capital and labour. Well, slave labour had no say in the matter but their masters had.
Rome and its provinces acted like a magnet and foreign billionaires congregated in the capitol of the empire. Sort of non-doms you could say.
In today's UK we hear a lot about income tax and the high percentage of income tax paid by the rich taxpayer.
Have not been able to establish the VAT take in the UK, swindles by carousel apart, but understand that back-of-the-envelope calculation indicates that this indirect tax amounts to more than the sum of all income tax receipts.
Unearned income - where have we heard that before? You sit back in your mansion or play a round of golf and you pay the same as the fellow or woman sweating at work from nine to five, plus.

Plutocrat

Let's not forget the public grant or subsidy for the same people;
exampling the N/S FOI request regarding EU CAP payments - freedom of information request by the NS to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs found that claimants last year included the Duke of Westminster (net worth: £7.4bn), who was paid £748,716 for his ownership of Grosvenor Farms, the Duke of Buccleuch (£180m), who received £260,273, the Duke of Devonshire (£700m), who received £251,729, and the Duke of Atholl, who was paid £231,188 for his 145,000 acre Blair Castle Estate.

Even making adjustment £500,000 per year against a formerly tax credit or benefited uk lower waged, part-time or unemployed citizen is basically obscene.

Given that this coalition's council tax ending of subsidy means a shortfall in funding by LA's given the Coalition's 'ringfencing' of ALL pensioners and both Cameron and Osborn's own statistically recorded collection of full DWP benefits and entitlements for their immediate families then much of the same benefits because of the rich 6%'s austerity policy are now policy denied the poorest to assist the legal tax cuts of those same 6%.

Alex, do you have a source for your figures? - the link in the text is to a table which doesn't have the necessary information.

@ Alex Andreou

Regarding Theo Paphitis: have you ever watched Dragon's Den?

"He said it was the will to create things, to grow his companies, to employ people, to make his mark. Ten minutes later the panel was discussing the top rate of tax. He said that if personal tax was increased on those making more than a million, he would up and leave the UK."

What you have totally failed to realise, or simply ignored, is that when someone like Paphitis starts a business he *risks* money to do so. If that business fails for whatever reason then he loses money and can't get it back from HMRC. The profits from that business are the reward. If you overtax those profits then you are essentially removing a lot of that reward.

It's a fairly simple concept -- this risk/reward thing. If you overbalance it towards the risk side, by removing some of the rewards, simply put, less people are going to be willing to take the the risk. Whilst there might be some out there who do things purely for the public good, that is not a sustainable model given how many start-ups and businesses fail.

Isn't it strange that the people who 'earn' these vast amounts of money are not the ones who

a) mine or produce the raw materials, b) transport them, c) use equipment to transform them into goods, d) maintain that equipment, e) package the finished goods, f) transport the finished goods, g) sell the finished goods, h) draft the contracts , or actually perform the service customers pay for

nor do they have any responsibility for anything that causes a loss.

You've made a mistake with your tax calculations.

Someone on £1m will receive £498,536.64 after tax this year.

Not £665,000.