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ENDA KENNY HAS said the government will cut the 7 per cent rate of Universal Social Charge (USC) on all those earning less than €70,000 per year in the Budget later this year.
In his speech on the Spring Statement in the Dáil this morning, the Taoiseach outlined plans for the “phased abolition” of the hated Universal Social Charge and said it was intended to have a total of 500,000 low-income workers out of the USC tax net after Budget 2016.
He said that “consistent with the Statement of Government Priorities agreed last July, we will cut the 7 per cent rate of USC on all those earning less than €70,000 per year”.
Finance Minister Michael Noonan indicated yesterday that the government will have up to €750 million available to cut taxes in the October Budget, with a variety of measures in the areas of USC and income tax likely to be deployed.
The 7 per cent USC rate is current levied on the portion of income from €17,576.01 to €70,044.
The government says the benefit of any cut would be capped at €70,000. This means that a person who earns €100,000 would get the same financial benefit as a person earning €70,000. This is aimed at ensuring high earners do not disproportionately benefit from tax cuts.
While the Taoiseach was not specific about how much exactly the 7 per cent USC rate would be cut, a 1 per cent cut to 6 per cent would cost the exchequer €269 million in 2016 and €370m in a full year.
Here’s an approximate estimate of how much a 1 per cent cut would benefit people at various income levels, courtesy of the Department of Finance:
If the government were to cut it by two per cent, from 7 per cent to 5 per cent, it would cost the exchequer €540 million in 2016 and €740m in a full year.
Here’s how it would benefit people are various income levels:
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It should be a crime to deep fake someone without their consent.
@Jimmy Savage: Agreed, but when it happens to Martin, who in fairness went to the high court, he was derided.
And Google, etc, aren’t doing anything to prevent this, I’ve seen Anne Doyle, The girl from TV3 ,I’ve reported each one, the last one was ” Google couldn’t find the ad that I reported ” eventhough it still appears .
@Jimmy Savage: It is though. The Online Safety Act now makes it a criminal offence to share, or threaten to share, a manufactured or ‘deepfake’ intimate image or video of another person without his or her consent.
@Jimmy Savage: Sure, but over and over we see those social media companies not care a single whit once they make their profits. Any fines are are a rounding error.
I’m fine with labelled satire or parody or some stuff that is actually fun (things like Sassy Justice or ‘if My name is.. was written in 2021′.
There’s so much more that is just not okay at all that propagates on those platforms… faked political or Hollywood starlets…
Then you have the circular activity of bots responding to each other driving up engagement on those platforms, which is profit that they seem value more that any form of ethics.
@Jack Hayes: Explain why it continues then?
@ben wu: Absolutely and they don’t care . They have enabled suicide, self harm , allowed lies to seem acceptable they really are what the world needs to be angry at…..
@Paul O’Mahoney: There was more press coverage over here about something odd looking about a photo of Kate Middleton’s wrist in a family photo, than there has been about those issues…
@ben wu: Was there?
@Jack Hayes: no actually, it is a crime to share or threaten to share an intimate image shared with you. Nothing about manufactured or deepfake
@DerekF: Even if it was as he said then there would be nothing against sharing a non-intimate deepfake where the purpose is to deceive others.
@Paul O’Mahoney: Explain to you why people still do illegal things or how people get away with doing illegal things? You must be new to this world.
It was a paid advert so Facebook must know who paid for it. That person should be prosecuted!
Why is this not happening?
@Steve O’Hara-Smith: Most are ex our Jurisdiction, and are probably not real entities
There is some awful muck on Facebook…. Full Stop.
@james rowan: Still not as bad as all the nazi propaganda on X.
@james rowan: Hence FaceMuck
Very believable, apart from the American twang abd the way she pronounces Turbidy …
Thought it was a genuine SF broadcast. Fits well with their actual,financial policy.
@Alan: Yeah me too
Soon the default belief will be if it’s on the Internet it’s fake, hallucination, or just plain lies and propaganda.
Aka “I gave them all the tools but they could not use them.”
@smatrix mantra: I disagree with that , the Internet was launched for good intentions, and a reasonable return by investing is fine, but the way a minority has essentially monopolised its content is the problem.
All those software engineers, etc, could have equally written code that was of use to the world’s problems, but that didn’t happen .
I’m using it now to share thoughts, most don’t
@Paul O’Mahoney: Every leap in technology can be used as a tool or a weapon, unfortunately most of the time it’s both but weapons seem to have more impact globally.
Reality is merely an illusion, albeit a very persistent one. Albert Einstein.
That’s plain fake , not exactly deep fake
So sort it you legislators. It might cost a few thousand jobs. But what is the price of political stability?
Dennis O’Brien will take these charlatans to China Town. They are going down now.
Delete your Facebook account and other social media crap.
You will live happier
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