Comment by nly
4 days ago
Still blows my mind that Americans have to do this.
In the UK almost nobody needs to "file their takes" and if you do you just do it online without the need for software.
4 days ago
Still blows my mind that Americans have to do this.
In the UK almost nobody needs to "file their takes" and if you do you just do it online without the need for software.
A lot of people in the UK file their taxes (~12 million, roughly 35% of employed adults, not taking into account those unemployed with assets and pensions), but the self assessment is straightforward and very easy to use.
But do they have to?
In my country income taxes are automatically deducted. If you've got a single job and don't own large amounts of properties there's a decent chance your tax bill is exactly €0 and that there's no requirement for you to file.
In the UK tax on interest earned on plain savings accounts isn't deducted at source - so if you have a rainy day pot chances are you're required to register for self assessment and pay tax on it (particularly now that interest rates are higher and it's relatively easy to go above the tax free threshold, which has been frozen for a long time).
If you have investments outside of an ISA (tax free investment wrapper) then same story - you need to report disposals and dividends for tax purposes.
That's before we get into side hustles/self employment and investment properties, etc.
1 reply →
No, you don't have to. If you are employed through a company, stay below £100K income and don't have other income then (generally) you don't need to do a tax return - it's all handled automatically through pay as you earn payroll. However, as shown, a lot of people are self employed, want to claim deductions, have some side income etc. However, for those that do need to, it is really straightforward.
Would you prefer to pay $100 for software, or a 50% marginal tax on a meager £100K?
Depends on what I get for it and it is close to NYC and San Francisco it the 100 to 200k range. I do agree though that it is too high.
Maybe its because in the UK, you are basically just giving all of your money to the government so there is nothing to work out.
Until you have to deal with bed and breakfast rules for RSUs. Good luck getting free software to understand that. There are a couple of open source attempts but they are skeleton at best.