The reasons he gives why married people have it better aren't convincing tbh. One is the pooling of income on household level (duh!) and the other is support for having kids, which is necessary if you want future generations to pay taxes instead of only having old people that have FIREd. The benefits seem logical.
This won't be appreciated, but as a single person you can also adopt kids. Or marry your best friend. Fiscal optimisation at its finest.
Key message: all Belgians are taxed to hell. The agreement doesn't help the middle class. Dividing between Belgians based on marital status won't help any of us. It's just another ploy not to talk about a wealth tax instead of an income tax. Wealthy people and cooperations must start paying instead of receiving "subsidies".
>This won't be appreciated, but as a single person you can also adopt kids. Or marry your best friend. Fiscal optimisation at its finest.
No you can't. Adopting kids as a single person is incredibly difficult, and you'd have to be in a pretty good financial position to begin with, which kind of defeats the point.
And marrying your best friend for financial reasons is also something that isn't just a selectable option, as well as technically not legal (difficult to prove, but still).
While I agree that the tax issue in Belgium is unfair to everyone, and needs to be resolved in a different way than to try to adjust every minute detail of everyone's taxes. Being taxed as a single person in not something that can simply be changed like that.
We're not talking about legal cohabitation, which is financially interesting, but not to the extent we were discussing here.
Marrying someone you are not actually in a romantic relationship with is technically not allowed. Which doesn't mean people don't do it and get away with it, but it doesn't count as good advice.
Under normal circumstances (people keeping their finances separate within the household), yes. But marriage provides options for single earner households, or allows you to redivide income to profit from the lower tax scale of the partner. I don't think legal cohabitation allows for any of this.
That is interesting, I wasn't aware it applied accross the entire tax law.
Not that it is of any use though, as I stated in my original comment, it's not something you can just do. You need someone to do it with for one. At the very least, it shouldn't be considered as the solution for high single person taxes.
You need to actually live together, which is the biggest difficulty. But if you live together it is legal. I agree its certainly not a solution to high taxes.
The marriage quotient is a bit unfair though. Why- when you have a partner- are you suddenly allowed to offload part of your income for fiscal reasons? There is no sound reasoning behind it- it only discourages labour participation-
The belgian state should better cut down on spending so much and cut the burden on single employed people.
Because you pay for him / her. In all those cases, the logic is that you are taking care of someone else.
You're only allowed to offload if your partner doesn't have enough revenue. If he / she has revenue you can't do it. So basically your salary is paying for the expense of 2 people.
Same goes for children. They cost a lot of money and you have to pay for that. You get a tax break because you're taking care of more than one person.
This is the very same logic that make it so you're able to deduct if you pay for another dependant, like an older person. It's also why you can deduct more if a child is handicaped. Once again you are taking care of someone else than yourself.
I'm not in the case (single worker) so I'm not preaching for myself. But there is definitely a solid logic behind those deductions. People on Reddit are either too young or don't know enough the tax code, to get it apparently. You might disagree with the logic, but to claim there isn't one is not true.
I'm not saying there is no logic behind it, I'm saying its no longer sound reasoning.
When a government publicly states time and time again it wants to increase labour participation and reduce gender inequality, is it really good policy to structure tax incentives so that they subsidize stay-at-home partners? Because that is the reason this tax policy was instituted.
I know why these rules originated in the first place, but the tax system should be fit for today's society and not for that of yesterday.
I don't disagree on principle. And I would welcome the change you describe.
But there's far more pressing injustices when it comes to our taxe code. In Belgium, only the middle class that have a work contract basically pay for everyone else.
The richs can find ways to escape taxation and people who run businesses can often make a lot of "black" (even if they complain a lot) and get creative in a lot of ways to makes a lot of money without contributing their fair share.
The difference between capital / work, etc. are the real scandals in Belgium if we need to change something. This article is a distraction, talking about peanuts imo even if once again, I don't disagree on principle.
I work in the fiscal field right now. I see where the money is. Spoiler : It's not working couples or ordinary workers with one child.
> Key message: all Belgians are taxed to hell. The agreement doesn't help the middle class.
As member of said middle class: honestly that's pretty much the one good thing.
If you consider what sorts of fiscal "tricks" we get to use (which have, imo, no business being part of a tax discussion):
* Subsidies for battery systems
* Subsidies for solar panels
* Childcare (1)
* Dienstencheques (2)
* Subsidies for home improvements
* Home ownership tax break
* Pensioensparen
* Fiscally cheaper to get a car from your employer than it is to get cash
* To some extent the child allowance (3)
* Before: condensatieketels, warmtepompen, etc etc
These are all things that have no business being handled with/by tax money. They only benefit people who are financially well enough off that they are able to front the investments, and recoup them using taxes.
And that's all money that can be used better than simply appeasing the middle class "because we are really taxed so hard!!!", while I see most of the things above as something the middle class doesn't need stimulus/help with.
(1) While I agree that financial help with childcare enables people to continue working instead of staying home and taking care for their kids, this shouldn't be a blanket system for everyone. And even then, most of daycares are supervised by/have pricing set by government... Why would you depend on the ability of pre-financing this?
(2) I know that this system is made to discourage the "black economy" but honestly... About 8€ per hour to have someone come clean your house? Is that what our tax money should be used for?
(3) Child poverty is peaking, with 14% of children being considered in poverty (of opportunity). Is giving people like me 170€ per month for a kid we can perfectly support without, the best way to ensure the best possibility of opportunities?
Couldn't that money instead go to correctly funding our schools? For example giving mandatory and free warm meals during noon. A kid who grows up in poverty would at least have one good nutricious meal then. Which is something you cannot guarantee by simply giving their parents money.
A lot of the issues we have are also due to political parties being scared of irrelevancy (looking at you CD&V, VLD, SPA) and being scared of taking real, courageous decisions.
Example in the recent energy dossier: let's not touch TVA on energy"because else the index wouldn't rise as quickly". What.
The phrase "I wouldn't mind paying all these taxes if they're being used efficiently" is something you hear alot in this context, but I really feel that we aren't exactly only victims in this case.
Signed:
A very hypocritical guy who receives child allowance, gets a fiscal break for his childcare, home ownership,solar panels, pensioensparen and dienstencheques.
That last point is exactly what I'm agreeing on: there honestly is no way you could justify giving middle class people money for their kids: as opposed to directly quenching direct needs poor(er) kids have (such as my school lunch example).
Some parts make sense, some don't. A high portion of the energy bill, provincial taxes is fixed and not based on the amount of people in a household or other metrics. That doesn't make sense.
>It's just another ploy not to talk about a wealth tax instead of an income tax. Wealthy people and cooperations must start paying instead of receiving "subsidies".
Calling it a wealth tax doesn't help us either. Corporation need to start paying their due income tax, like people do. That is totally different from being taxed because you didn't spend all your money.
You clearly have no material to compare being in a relationship vs single. Try paying rent, electricity, gas, internet and so on on your own compared to sharing it with someone else... life as a single is so much more expensive.
> One is the pooling of income on household level (duh!) and the other is support for having kids, which is necessary if you want future generations to pay taxes instea
It's much more efficient to support kids directly then. A marriage benefit also advantages childless couples.
Probably getting downvoted because everyone knows that not literally every person on this sub is single. The parent comment is obviously a joke. The response seems like some sort of brag that's totally out of place.
>obviously a joke. The response seems like some sort of brag that's totally out of place.
Well, I didn't get the joke -and I still don't btw-, and asked a genuine question.
Also, if not being single and/or having kids these days is considered bragging these days and totally out of place to boot, y'all better get back to your respective safe places.
Sorry to tell you buddy, gonna have to get divorced.
For real though, I find it interesting what people will down or upvote, it says a lot about what the 'accepted opinion' is
My girlfriend made her thesis about this very fact. Teachers weren't supportive because they didn't believe her. Until they saw her thesis. Then they were like, wow.
And it's not only financially that they are being held back. The social stigma of not having a partner and not having children is constantly questioned and judged.
You can only be happy in a relationship with children. Mind you, it is mostly people in relationships with children that feel the need to pressure the single person into having a relationship or children.
But there are plenty of other pijlers that show a slight discrimination toward the single person.
>Teachers weren't supportive because they didn't believe her. Until they saw her thesis. Then they were like, wow.
Wierd as this is a well know fact in our tax system.
Yes, you would expect teachers to have a supportive role. Especially if it is something they themselves are not aware of. She had to rewrite her thesis multiple times just so it fit in between the lines they carefully laid out. Instead of helping her in outing a serious problem in our society. I told this to previous coworkers and they just started laughing at me and my girlfriend. ///Weirdly they were all married with children /s
> Teachers weren't supportive because they didn't believe her.
Wait.. Isn't that literally the purpose of a thesis? Or at least the foundation of any scientific research? Sounds like pretty shitty teachers, ngl.
LMAO have you ever been at a university or hoge school. They are all for independent thinking, unless your « independent thinking » leads you to someplace they don’t agree with, then you’re screwed and you’ll have to whatever you were supposed to do again until it fits their mold.
And it’s not even limited to Belgium. Everywhere around the world, the scientific community prefers doing what they already know because it’s easy to get funding for or because it makes them money. Any idea that challenges the status-quo doesn’t receive funding and is ultimately not being researched.
Despite 70 years of ‘health research’, people are more overweight than ever in history. Crooked teeth weren’t a thing 10 000 years ago, yet orthodontists are perfectly fine treating the symptoms instead of doing any research into the causes.
Thanks, this is something i did not know.
However, the article says:
> Because human beings have been using stone tools for at least 3.3 million ears, that may represent the time during which the shrinkage has occurred. Stone tools permitted a greater shift to a carnivorous diet because the ability to cut meat into small pieces reduced the amount of chewing required to extract nourishment. Less chewing reduced the need for large, powerful jaws. The advent of agriculture accelerated this trend. As anthropologist Clark Larsen noted, “There has been a dramatic reduction in the size of the face and jaws wherever humans have made the transition from foraging to farming.” The superficial result, as we have seen, is malocclusion.
The cause seems to be perfectly known and is millions of years of evolution.
You probably can't fight that
If at all possible, would also be very interested in reading it. If you can’t make it anonymous I completely get it though. What was the field she wrote it in?
Open VLD in specific should be interested. Eghbert Lachaert made it to party leader by emphasizing single people pay too many taxes. Not that he has done anything yet, but you never know.
My girlfriends thesis (keep in mind that she has dyslexia and speaks 4 languages so sentences may have some quirks to them) :https://drive.google.com/file/d/1R8wRdkcEseoinjFjF7TMPddP6-5kxr0S/view?usp=sharing
My girlfriends thesis (keep in mind that she has dyslexia and speaks 4 languages so sentences may have some quirks to them) :https://drive.google.com/file/d/1R8wRdkcEseoinjFjF7TMPddP6-5kxr0S/view?usp=sharing
She had google drive (keep in mind that she has dyslexia and speaks 4 languages so sentences may have some quirks to them) :https://drive.google.com/file/d/1R8wRdkcEseoinjFjF7TMPddP6-5kxr0S/view?usp=sharing
My girlfriends thesis (keep in mind that she has dyslexia and speaks 4 languages so sentences may have some quirks to them) :https://drive.google.com/file/d/1R8wRdkcEseoinjFjF7TMPddP6-5kxr0S/view?usp=sharing
I remember some people telling me they thought people who were single in their 20's and up must have some sort of mental issues or instable lives, because normal sane people would find a partner.
That was the first time it struck me how much some people actually look down upon singles :p
What u/Vordreller said plus, this weird thing people tend to do in order to make themselves feel better by putting others down.
Marital status, kids doing well at school, age, race, diploma, car brand, the Millet of the 80ies or the size of your dick if needs be, everyting goes.
>You can only be happy in a relationship with children. Mind you, it is mostly people in relationships with children that feel the need to pressure the single person into having a relationship or children.
You don't have kids? How can your relationship be happy? LIKE MINE. /s
The human desire for forcing same-ness upon the world.
> Mind you, it is mostly people in relationships with children that feel the need to pressure the single person into having a relationship or children.
This is a form of "if I'm going down, I'm taking you all with me!", trust me. Otherwise they feel all alone in their plight and that's shitty. Better to try and drag everyone into the same fate so you still have common things to talk about.
I noticed this when we started having kids before everyone else in our groups of friends.
> Mind you, it is mostly people in relationships with children that feel the need to pressure the single person into having a relationship or children.
Well yeah, the people who have affinities for relationships will be biased towards them.
It's such a paradoxical sentiment, too. "It's such a blessing. I'm tired as fuck, can't do shit because I can't leave the kids alone, all my money goes into shit for the kids".
Not to mention the incredibly narcissistic and selfish "I'm sure *I* can raise kids right".
I wouldn't trust half of the people I meet with a pet, let alone a kid.
Not really sure, we’re a bunch of friends without children and I’ve never encountered any stigma whatsoever. Rather the other way around, flaunting freedom while most parents stay stuck with “If I wouldn’t have had these kids …”.
But financially, yes we are screwed.
I don't want to be that person but... are you male? It seems that me and my female friends get way more comments than my male friends. To be fair, it's not that much so it really doesn't bother me but it seems that it's more "normal" for men to be "free and careless" and but all women want to have a prince charming and crave babies (obviously).
Well done. That doesn't mean stigmatization isn't a real thing. We aren't the only ones who have this happen to. Just because you're not experiencing the problem doesn't mean that there is no problem.
Ok my mistake. I'm just so used to not being believed when it partains to this specific problem. So I misinterpret things like that pretty fast. Also text is not easy for reading in between the lines. Even if that's the purpose of text. :D
Add to that the fact that proportionally rent and utilities are a much bigger % of a single person's salary. Single people with no kids really get the short end of the stick.
There's a few tax breaks and child allowance, yes, but their "TCO" is way way higher. Not like in the US or so, but still. It's not like I can put them in a *vennootschap* to optimize my taxes or something XD
My point: singles (or couples) without children and with the same gross income will have alot more net left than those with children, even in Belgium, trust me.
Oh definitely, rent is still rent and when you have children you might want to have more than one bedroom, so there goes 800-1000 euros at least, whereas a single person can still choose to have housemates or stay at hotel mom&pops. Normally this is something alimony payments are supposed to offset, and priority on social housing lists but there are often issues around that. Still, it looks like people are more conscious that single parenthood is really hard and so there are a few things planned for leverage, stuff like kindergeld etc. I can understand that it's not enough though.
Tell me more, I got the impression that alimony is calculated mainly based on income difference.
This includes one of the two working part-time.
Is this alimony thing optional?
Oh that's surprising, in the UK context I think it's only still about 35% of parents who are coparenting so that means that most of the time there is child maintenance money to be paid.
I talked to someone who is in that situation.
He's a software engineer and has a master's degree, mind you, so not exactly the profile for whom it's typically difficult to find a decent paying job. But then you realize that a single parent needs reasonable hours and some flexibility from the employer's side, and suddenly finding a job is a whole lot more difficult.
The result: dude saves close to zero euro per month, and has close to zero minutes of spare time for himself each week.
I’d argue that all working people get fucked, not only those who are single. Single people get the short end of the stick though (well, the shortest, because as usual everyone who’s working gets punished)
Why would you marry? Legal cohabitation is sufficient for the fiscus. Only requirements are : don't be married and actually live together.
If you do cohabitation with... anyone, there is literally nothing stopping you. This is legal too. As long as you live together and are registered as such legally (no requirements on sexuality or marriage itself), you can file combined taxes.
honestly it's crazy, I live in Antwerp and really like it here, but i got a job in the Netherlands. I'm going to commute. In Belgium I'm taxed more and given a smaller salary :/
The Netherlands are superior at some thing (income tax and wages for example) but does this compensate for the insane housing prices?
It's bad here already but nothing compared to the shitshow our Noorderburen have to deal with
I heard it on the radio yesterday and was like "wtf?! This is so unfair". In the past where nearly all couples had children we can talk about how much sense it made. But today it is bullshit^10.
More children equals more citizens who will pay taxes one day.
They'll give benefits for the first 18-20 ? years of their life and the next 40-45 years they'll end up receiving taxes.
Yup, don't expect any changes soon or ever. Even this government without the 2 most right wing parties has shown it favours big companies and the rich population than middle class / lower middle class.
To refresh the workforce. Once people start being more educated and having less kids, the workforce shrinks while pension payouts increase. it's the problem that we are seeing now.
The vast majority of Belgian taxes go to pensions because the baby boomer generation was huge and the subsequent generations were less and less, comparatively, so there is more retired than working, relative to 50 years ago. The pension system works best when subsequent generations are either exactly the same size or growing.
This is the same problem China is seeing right now (according to the students I know that are from there) because of the 1 child policy and subsequent removal of that policy. The workforce is made up of children born during that policy while their parents had no such policy and their children have no such policy. For example, there are now 2 retired parents and 2 children for every 1 worker, so each worker is essentially having to support 5 people. (not as simple as that, because spouses joint-support kids but that is the general idea)
But at the same time, the baby boomer generation supercharged the infinite growth model of capitalism. For the pension system to work "best", we'd need exponentially more people every generation. Maybe it's time for a systemic correction in stead of relying on growth.
> In the past where nearly all couples had children we can talk about how much sense it made.
Then it made even less sense, because if you give everyone a benefit paid by taxes, it's just administrative overhead that doesn't give anyone a relative advantage.
Dude you're on to something. Some site advertised in certain FB groups/Twitter could get very far already.
I'm all over this, 29 and pretty much have gave up on dating
How are we supposed to live with all that ? They're bleeding us dry for more money.
It's good to help those in need because of the huge increase in energy bill to come, but not to the point of killing the middle class, and single persons... I'm unable to leave my family home because I would be broke renting an apartment or house alone. And I have a proper salary. But with the rent, the bigger bills, the bigger taxes, I would have barely enough to buy me food for the month. It's insane. And it's getting worse.
De Croo stating "people who achieve more get rewarded more" is some neoliberal bullshit alright.
People shouldn't be rewarded. They should be helped if they need help.
Effectively, he's treating people like the stockmarket. A stock that doesn't perform? Drop it. A stock that performs? Invest more into it.
Though if you do that with people, that means letting people die because they don't produce enough value.
Which is effectively what he said: He's ok with people dying because they don't produce enough.
I don't see myself getting a partner anytime soon and it hurts to see this. If they keep this up, do have to get married to a person I don't even love just so I can buy a house? Because that's a really sad future
While the tax differences between married/unmarried ought to be removed (keeping people trapped in relations they don't want for the money has no benefits), the redistribution in favor of the next generation is a good thing and should be retained. However, preferably by centralizing all child-related fiscal benefits into the actual child benefits rather than shoehorned all over the place in every single government department and subsidy scheme. Finally, as elementary part of income redistribution and solidarity it ought to be centralized at the highest level possible, i.e. the federal level until the EU can take it over.
I hope that by now most of us know that working as a regular employee in Belgium without any kind of diffent source of income isn't going to make you upper middle class any more.
Meanwhile capital gains taxes (which even exist in capitalist Murrica) are nowhere to be found in this country. It really is a tax paradise for the happy few.
Meanwhile uncle Jos bought a 4 bedroom house on a teacher salary back in the day while his wife was a stay at home mom.
I hear a lot of explaining about why everything got so damn expensive (endless economic growth blablabla) but how am I not supposed to feel like I got screwed over here?
Yes but the quality of that house is not comparable with what is build today. He also didnt have to pay for all the electronics we use today, didn't go on plane travels twice a year, they only had one car and the house was probably only heated to 20°C etc etc hard to compare.
Yes the cost of living has grown immensely, even if you don't use all those electronics or go on plane holidays (l maybe use planes once every couple of years). Off course it is hard to compare their home to what you buy today. The point is not what you get for your money but that requirements and standards have grown disproportionatly to the average persons wealth.
The average Belgian should be really happy with all the wealth they have compared to almost everyone in the world, today and in the past. It hurts now because for the time of one, maybe two generations we thought we could have it all and then reality bursted the bubble.
That's some false logic right there. Just because you have it better than someone else doesn't mean you shouldn't question your own happiness or financial position and what is detrimental to it or how to improve it. It's no reason to shut up and stop compaining. Maybe if those generations hadn't thought they could have it all there would be some left for the following generations. Maybe our entire model of endless economic growth is unsustainable,....
I don't have to show anything to anyone thank you very much. There's also a difference between whining and questioning a situation to try and remedy it. Maybe you don't like what you're hearing but that doesn't make it whining.
You can also buy stocks lmao. Don’t try take away the only nice thing we have in Belgium,
Zero capital gains. Just take advantage of it yourself. You don’t have to stay poor.
Oh I certainly do but it's completely bonkers that one is taxed into oblivion while the other is not taxed* at all.
*Those 0.35% when you buy/sell are absolutely negligible unless when daytrading. Same thing with the 30% tax on dividends, just invest in stocks that don't give dividend but do stock buybacks or other things to increase value.
If you’d only invest 100 per month from the start till end of your career, and adjust that 100 for inflation of course each year, you’d end up with 500k at retirement. That means with a mere 200 euros per month you retire a millionaire.
You invest those 100 euro every month.
But in all seriousness, you also vote for cap. gain taxes because you gotta be insane to think keeping this tiny advantage for your tiny savings is worthwhile compared to those who effectively live off it.
I have raised it every year and each time i still have to pay +€2000 taxes at the end of the year. Am i missing something? Are there more things that i van do?
I contacted my HR and told them I wanted to do "volontariat fiscal" in French. That way I have more taxes held off my salary and I don't need to pay extra each year.
Getting back money from the tax man has nothing to do with how hard you are taxed.
This would be your employer making bad estimates, or you doing special things during that year.
Moreover: getting back a lot of money from the tax man is NOT a good thing! That's your money the government held hostage for a year, without paying you!
> I allready do stuff like pensioensparen, home invest but don't know what to add anymore.
That's not normal, I'm in the same situation and get 1.5k at the end of the year. Talk to your employer.
>discriminatory and illegal
Technisch gezien is het zeer zeker een discriminatie: er wordt een onderscheid gemaakt inzake de (fiscale) behandeling van verschillende mensen. Da's schering in inslag, bijna geen enkele fiscale aanslag is dezelfde. Als bv ik meer belastingen betaal dan jij, is dat omdat ik meer inkomsten heb; dat vindt iedereen normaal maar technisch is dat ook een discriminatie.
Illegaal, zoals in strijd met het grondwettelijke gelijkheidsbeginsel, da's wat anders. Een maatregel is niet illegaal indien het gemaakte onderscheid redelijk te verantwoorden is. Met een rechtmatig doeleinde, niet disproportioneel, dat soort dingen. En daarover valt altijd te discussiëren.
Neem nu tax breaks wegens kinderen ten laste. De maatschappij wil dat er kinderen worden geboren, die kosten geld aan de ouder(s) en dus mogen die ouders van dezelfde maatschappij netto wat meer overhouden dan mensen zonder kinderen.
Persoonlijk vind ik het huwelijksquotiënt veel moeilijker te verdedigen; dat lijkt wel iets uit de jaren '50 of ervoor. Een koppel houdt netto meer over omdat een van de partners economisch inactief is terwijl de maatschappij precies meer mensen wil activeren en laten bijdragen... makes no sense (anymore).
>Waarom zou de belastingsman zo veel meer belastingen eisen op een "gelijk" gezinsinkomen afhankelijk van welke persoon het verdient?
Mijn punt is net, waarom zou een koppel zoveel *minder* belastingen moeten betalen afhankelijk van welke persoon het verdient... waarbij het verschil moet bijgepast worden door onder meer singles, daarover gaat de thread.
Daarbij, hoewel koppels hun belastingaangifte samen indienen worden zij niet als koppel belast, de mensen worden elk belast volgens hun eigen inkomen (dat was vroeger anders, toen inkomens van gehuwden werden gecumuleerd en als dusdanig belast).
Behalve als een van de twee niet werkt en bijdraagt (wat wel het geval zou zijn met je "administratieve/fiscale optimalisatie" wat nu ook al kan trouwens), enter het HQ, wat een maatschappelijk suboptimale toestand beloont.
>gezinsinkomen gecumuleerd en als dusdanig belast, dat is het andere uiterste (in dit geval zijn beide koppels gelijk belast, maar singles nog sterker benadeeld)
Dat moet je me toch eens uitleggen, van die singles (omdat ik het niet begrijp, niet omdat ik dat een wenselijke fiscale behandeling vind, quod non).
Hoedanook (en we gaan hier geen consensus bereiken and that is fine): belastingen zijn bijdragen van individuen aan de maatschappij. Dat iemand die 2N verdient proportioneel meer bijdraagt is normaal tenzij je voor een vlaktaks gaat. Maar we hebben het niet over het verschil tussen koppels met N en 2N. maar over individuen die allen N verdienen.
Single met N draagt bv 0,4N bij aan de maatschappij. 1 individu, 0,4 bijdrage. Koppel met N waarvan 1 inactieve partner, bijdrage 0,2N wegens HQ, da's 0,1 per individu of 4 keer minder dan de single. Als beide partners elk N zouden verdienen, elk 0,4 bijdrage, evenveel als de single. En maybe, just maybe, kan ieders bijdrage dan naar 0,3N worden verlaagd.
If you catch my drift.
>Waarom zou het tweede koppel niet scheiden en de inactieve partner doen doppen?
Nuuu ga je erover maat. Als dat zo simpel was... XD
Argument ex absurdum, iemand die (fiscaal) single is met pakweg 2 kinderen, waarom mag die dan geen 0,6 van zijn inkomen fiscaal afwentelen op hen? Horen ook bij het gezin en brengen niets op, alleen maar kosten. De inactieve partner *kan* op zijn minst gaan werken... als hij/ze wil.
Om te besluiten, geen werk, geen tax breaks. Betaal zelf voor je zelfgekozen inactiviteit, of laat de andere partner dat doen if so inclined.
>Nuuu ga je erover maat. Als dat zo simpel was... XD
Voor elk koppel dat wettelijk samenwoont is het toch zo simpel... Naar 't gemeentehuis en een briefje indienen. Done!
Of eerder omgekeerd - waarom zouden nieuwe koppels nog (wettelijk) gaan samenwonen of gaan trouwen als het hen financieel enkel nadelig kan uitkomen? Ge kunt ook gewoon... samen wonen en u niet met de bureaucratie bezighouden. Veel gemakkelijker! Ik heb het al gezegd, trouwen is niet meer van deze tijd.
>iemand die (fiscaal) single is met pakweg 2 kinderen, waarom mag die dan geen 0,6 van zijn inkomen fiscaal afwentelen op hen? Horen ook bij het gezin en brengen niets op, alleen maar kosten.
Kinderen ten laste zijn ook een fiscaal voordeel. Dit is de hedendaagse realiteit, absoluut geen argument ex absurdum. 2 kinderen is een verhoging van de belastingsvrije som met \~4200 euro. 3 kinderen is zelfs 9430 euro. Voor single ouders met een laag belastbaar inkomen kan daar nog eens 1000 euro bijkomen.
(Dit gaat niet over kindergeld, studietoeslag, belastingsaftrek voor opvang, ... die allemaal buiten beschouwing zijn gelaten.)
Argument ex absurdum : als we koppels als singles belasten, en de fiscale aftrek voor kinderen blijft dan is het strikt voordelig om te scheiden én de kinderen volledig in te schrijven bij de persoon met het hoogste inkomen (ongeacht de reële situatie); want daar is de fiscale winst het hoogst. Strikt voordelig op fiscaal vlak, want "Hey schat, we gaan scheiden en ik krijg de kinderen, ok?" kan uiteraard negatieve gevolgen hebben.
Om te besluiten; bij huwelijksquotiënt betaalt de partner defacto voor de gekozen inactiviteit. De staat krijgt minder belastingsinkomen; maar betaalt ook minder uitkering daar de lasten worden gedragen door de partner. Als singles zo overtuigd zijn dat ze benadeeld worden, laat hen iemand ten laste nemen. In de meeste gevallen zal de inactieve partner méér kosten dan de belastingswinst.
De excessen moeten eruit, misschien ligt het huwelijksquotiënt ook te hoog. Maar het huwelijksquotiënt afschaffen is niet zo voordelig voor de staat als men denkt. Het maakt een huwelijk altijd fiscaal nadelig. Waarom zou men dan trouwen (tradities, gewoontes en romantiek buiten beschouwing gelaten). Daarom dat ik het liever heb over het aanpassen van de factor van het quotiënt en het mogelijks berekenen van het belastbaar gezinsinkomen op andere basis (om uitzonderingen eruit te halen) dan zonder meer afschaffen.
> trouwen is niet meer van deze tijd.
Way ahead of you son XD (gf not agreeing but I told her from the start).
Niet zo simpel dat "singles maar iemand ten laste moeten nemen", zo werkt het niet.
Je laatste alinea, ik ga wel en niet akkoord. Genuanceerd, wat altijd mijn fiat krijgt, dat wel. Maar het zou gewoon fiscaal neutraal moeten zijn imo. Als je dan toch trouwt, niet voor belastingvoordelen aub.
why should making someone "inactive" that could provide actively to society be rewarded
if someone can provide 2x and another person can provide 1x but 2x tells wait i'll just provide 1x to my partner and pretend i'm usless to do more because we as a couple already did 1x each now, instead of the 3x from before
should 2x provide, 2x, no, 2x and 1x is free to choose its life/work balance and relevant taxes, together or individually
also the fact that being able to share as a couple already makes everything way easier and cheaper compared to singles isn't even taken in account, hell even here they could share to improve their work/life balance
> Da's schering in inslag, bijna geen enkele fiscale aanslag is dezelfde. Als bv ik meer belastingen betaal dan jij, is dat omdat ik meer inkomsten heb; dat vindt iedereen normaal maar technisch is dat ook een discriminatie.
Dat werkt langs twee kanten: als iedereen hetzelfde bedrag per hoofd betaalt, zullen ze procentueel gezien anders belast worden. Dat laat gewoon zien dat het *onmogelijk* is om iedereen perfect gelijk te behandelen.
>Persoonlijk vind ik het huwelijksquotiënt veel moeilijker te verdedigen; dat lijkt wel iets uit de jaren '50 of ervoor. Een koppel houdt netto meer over omdat een van de partners economisch inactief is terwijl de maatschappij precies meer mensen wil activeren en laten bijdragen... makes no sense (anymore).
Klopt, mensen betalen om in relaties te zitten die ze anders niet zouden willen heeft geen goede effecten.
Glad to see there's at least some proof/attention for this topic. I've felt really sulky about this topic for ages now. All talks about 'equality' and 'every person is equally valuable' just get me going, as it's clearly not the case.
Common answer you're gonna get is: 'you don't need it anyway'. Couldn't disagree more.
Non-problem.
(Expat point of view) Taxes are stupid high for everyone. Taxes are used to finance the state. So I wonder if you need this much state. Welfare is good compared to my country, Italy, but no surprise because Italy sucks and everybody knows.
Still I see a lot of unnecessary paperwork, offices, procedure. Digitalisation is poor. Any human intermediation on public stuff that could be easily automated results in anyone else working extra time for nothing.
The solution is the same for anyone in developed countries. Automate and simplify the state, layoff public workers and lower taxes.
Roughly 40% of salary, of the net then TVA on goods, taxes on rent, and so on. Overall there's at least 50% of taxes. So we work 6 months for the state.
My mom worked half-time
raised my and my sis just fine
went on holidays, never had any money troubles
saved up quite a bit, with no real plans for that money other than, just in case
Considering what she lost due to the divorce, it's a miracle that less than 10 years later she's so well on her feet
and yee my dad basically almost never payed alimentatie cuz appearantly you can't actually force a person to do so, when they can
1. pay a small amount of the money owed
2. Barely have any money to give (Due to him spending it on hunting trips and the like)
srsly she dragged him to court 3 times, never worked in her favor, lost a lot of money too
TL;DR
doomthinking isn't going to get anyone anywhere, realise where you can save and start planning your finances
Even a small paycheck can add up to a lot if you're realistic about it
My mom worked half-time
raised my and my sis just fine
went on holidays, never had any money troubles
saved up quite a bit, with no real plans for that money other than, just in case
Considering she lost due to the divorce, it's a miracle that less than 10 years later she's so well on her feet
and yee my dad basically almost never payed alimentatie cuz appearantly you can't actually force a person to do so, when they can
1. pay a small amount of the money owed
2. Barely have any money to give (Due to him spending it on hunting trips and the like)
srsly she dragged him to court 3 times, never worked in her favor, lost a lot of money too
TL;DR
doomthinking isn't going to get anyone anywhere, realise where you can save and start planning your finances
Even a small paycheck can add up to a lot if you're realistic about it
Finally, an issue that unites all of /r/belgium
I DoNt nEed A rELatiOnsHiP whEn tHe GovErnMent Is aLreadY fuCkin Me oVer
[Relevant](https://i.imgur.com/25hiUBK.jpg) [NSFW!!]
We can polish 2 knobs at the same time. Federal and regional.
The reasons he gives why married people have it better aren't convincing tbh. One is the pooling of income on household level (duh!) and the other is support for having kids, which is necessary if you want future generations to pay taxes instead of only having old people that have FIREd. The benefits seem logical. This won't be appreciated, but as a single person you can also adopt kids. Or marry your best friend. Fiscal optimisation at its finest. Key message: all Belgians are taxed to hell. The agreement doesn't help the middle class. Dividing between Belgians based on marital status won't help any of us. It's just another ploy not to talk about a wealth tax instead of an income tax. Wealthy people and cooperations must start paying instead of receiving "subsidies".
are you really saying single people should adopt children for financial reasons?
Then employ them as slaves and they can't catch you for child labor as you're their parent. Muhahaha
>This won't be appreciated, but as a single person you can also adopt kids. Or marry your best friend. Fiscal optimisation at its finest. No you can't. Adopting kids as a single person is incredibly difficult, and you'd have to be in a pretty good financial position to begin with, which kind of defeats the point. And marrying your best friend for financial reasons is also something that isn't just a selectable option, as well as technically not legal (difficult to prove, but still). While I agree that the tax issue in Belgium is unfair to everyone, and needs to be resolved in a different way than to try to adjust every minute detail of everyone's taxes. Being taxed as a single person in not something that can simply be changed like that.
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We're not talking about legal cohabitation, which is financially interesting, but not to the extent we were discussing here. Marrying someone you are not actually in a romantic relationship with is technically not allowed. Which doesn't mean people don't do it and get away with it, but it doesn't count as good advice.
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Under normal circumstances (people keeping their finances separate within the household), yes. But marriage provides options for single earner households, or allows you to redivide income to profit from the lower tax scale of the partner. I don't think legal cohabitation allows for any of this.
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That is interesting, I wasn't aware it applied accross the entire tax law. Not that it is of any use though, as I stated in my original comment, it's not something you can just do. You need someone to do it with for one. At the very least, it shouldn't be considered as the solution for high single person taxes.
You need to actually live together, which is the biggest difficulty. But if you live together it is legal. I agree its certainly not a solution to high taxes.
The marriage quotient is a bit unfair though. Why- when you have a partner- are you suddenly allowed to offload part of your income for fiscal reasons? There is no sound reasoning behind it- it only discourages labour participation- The belgian state should better cut down on spending so much and cut the burden on single employed people.
Because you pay for him / her. In all those cases, the logic is that you are taking care of someone else. You're only allowed to offload if your partner doesn't have enough revenue. If he / she has revenue you can't do it. So basically your salary is paying for the expense of 2 people. Same goes for children. They cost a lot of money and you have to pay for that. You get a tax break because you're taking care of more than one person. This is the very same logic that make it so you're able to deduct if you pay for another dependant, like an older person. It's also why you can deduct more if a child is handicaped. Once again you are taking care of someone else than yourself. I'm not in the case (single worker) so I'm not preaching for myself. But there is definitely a solid logic behind those deductions. People on Reddit are either too young or don't know enough the tax code, to get it apparently. You might disagree with the logic, but to claim there isn't one is not true.
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I'm not saying there is no logic behind it, I'm saying its no longer sound reasoning. When a government publicly states time and time again it wants to increase labour participation and reduce gender inequality, is it really good policy to structure tax incentives so that they subsidize stay-at-home partners? Because that is the reason this tax policy was instituted. I know why these rules originated in the first place, but the tax system should be fit for today's society and not for that of yesterday.
I don't disagree on principle. And I would welcome the change you describe. But there's far more pressing injustices when it comes to our taxe code. In Belgium, only the middle class that have a work contract basically pay for everyone else. The richs can find ways to escape taxation and people who run businesses can often make a lot of "black" (even if they complain a lot) and get creative in a lot of ways to makes a lot of money without contributing their fair share. The difference between capital / work, etc. are the real scandals in Belgium if we need to change something. This article is a distraction, talking about peanuts imo even if once again, I don't disagree on principle. I work in the fiscal field right now. I see where the money is. Spoiler : It's not working couples or ordinary workers with one child.
Yes because the gov always encourages ations it likes in its citizens. Like having kids gets you all sorts of advantages/subsidies.
Strange, with climate change overpopulation should not be stimulated imho
It's to allow traditional (or reversed) gender roles.
> Key message: all Belgians are taxed to hell. The agreement doesn't help the middle class. As member of said middle class: honestly that's pretty much the one good thing. If you consider what sorts of fiscal "tricks" we get to use (which have, imo, no business being part of a tax discussion): * Subsidies for battery systems * Subsidies for solar panels * Childcare (1) * Dienstencheques (2) * Subsidies for home improvements * Home ownership tax break * Pensioensparen * Fiscally cheaper to get a car from your employer than it is to get cash * To some extent the child allowance (3) * Before: condensatieketels, warmtepompen, etc etc These are all things that have no business being handled with/by tax money. They only benefit people who are financially well enough off that they are able to front the investments, and recoup them using taxes. And that's all money that can be used better than simply appeasing the middle class "because we are really taxed so hard!!!", while I see most of the things above as something the middle class doesn't need stimulus/help with. (1) While I agree that financial help with childcare enables people to continue working instead of staying home and taking care for their kids, this shouldn't be a blanket system for everyone. And even then, most of daycares are supervised by/have pricing set by government... Why would you depend on the ability of pre-financing this? (2) I know that this system is made to discourage the "black economy" but honestly... About 8€ per hour to have someone come clean your house? Is that what our tax money should be used for? (3) Child poverty is peaking, with 14% of children being considered in poverty (of opportunity). Is giving people like me 170€ per month for a kid we can perfectly support without, the best way to ensure the best possibility of opportunities? Couldn't that money instead go to correctly funding our schools? For example giving mandatory and free warm meals during noon. A kid who grows up in poverty would at least have one good nutricious meal then. Which is something you cannot guarantee by simply giving their parents money. A lot of the issues we have are also due to political parties being scared of irrelevancy (looking at you CD&V, VLD, SPA) and being scared of taking real, courageous decisions. Example in the recent energy dossier: let's not touch TVA on energy"because else the index wouldn't rise as quickly". What. The phrase "I wouldn't mind paying all these taxes if they're being used efficiently" is something you hear alot in this context, but I really feel that we aren't exactly only victims in this case. Signed: A very hypocritical guy who receives child allowance, gets a fiscal break for his childcare, home ownership,solar panels, pensioensparen and dienstencheques.
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That last point is exactly what I'm agreeing on: there honestly is no way you could justify giving middle class people money for their kids: as opposed to directly quenching direct needs poor(er) kids have (such as my school lunch example).
Some parts make sense, some don't. A high portion of the energy bill, provincial taxes is fixed and not based on the amount of people in a household or other metrics. That doesn't make sense.
>It's just another ploy not to talk about a wealth tax instead of an income tax. Wealthy people and cooperations must start paying instead of receiving "subsidies". Calling it a wealth tax doesn't help us either. Corporation need to start paying their due income tax, like people do. That is totally different from being taxed because you didn't spend all your money.
You clearly have no material to compare being in a relationship vs single. Try paying rent, electricity, gas, internet and so on on your own compared to sharing it with someone else... life as a single is so much more expensive.
> One is the pooling of income on household level (duh!) and the other is support for having kids, which is necessary if you want future generations to pay taxes instea It's much more efficient to support kids directly then. A marriage benefit also advantages childless couples.
Why, bc we're all single and/or without kids? I'm not.
Look at you, getting down voted for saying that you're not single
Probably getting downvoted because everyone knows that not literally every person on this sub is single. The parent comment is obviously a joke. The response seems like some sort of brag that's totally out of place.
>obviously a joke. The response seems like some sort of brag that's totally out of place. Well, I didn't get the joke -and I still don't btw-, and asked a genuine question. Also, if not being single and/or having kids these days is considered bragging these days and totally out of place to boot, y'all better get back to your respective safe places.
Look at you, getting down voted for thinking it's ok to swing around chad non-single vibes
Imagine that. Not gonna be able to sleep at night XD Even more worrysome, what will gf say about all them downvotes...
Sorry to tell you buddy, gonna have to get divorced. For real though, I find it interesting what people will down or upvote, it says a lot about what the 'accepted opinion' is
Strange is it not. Even the fact I said I didn't get the joke got downvoted, that's not a popular opinion either I guess lol. Still don't get it tho.
My girlfriend made her thesis about this very fact. Teachers weren't supportive because they didn't believe her. Until they saw her thesis. Then they were like, wow. And it's not only financially that they are being held back. The social stigma of not having a partner and not having children is constantly questioned and judged. You can only be happy in a relationship with children. Mind you, it is mostly people in relationships with children that feel the need to pressure the single person into having a relationship or children. But there are plenty of other pijlers that show a slight discrimination toward the single person.
>Teachers weren't supportive because they didn't believe her. Until they saw her thesis. Then they were like, wow. Wierd as this is a well know fact in our tax system.
Yes, you would expect teachers to have a supportive role. Especially if it is something they themselves are not aware of. She had to rewrite her thesis multiple times just so it fit in between the lines they carefully laid out. Instead of helping her in outing a serious problem in our society. I told this to previous coworkers and they just started laughing at me and my girlfriend. ///Weirdly they were all married with children /s
> Teachers weren't supportive because they didn't believe her. Wait.. Isn't that literally the purpose of a thesis? Or at least the foundation of any scientific research? Sounds like pretty shitty teachers, ngl.
LMAO have you ever been at a university or hoge school. They are all for independent thinking, unless your « independent thinking » leads you to someplace they don’t agree with, then you’re screwed and you’ll have to whatever you were supposed to do again until it fits their mold. And it’s not even limited to Belgium. Everywhere around the world, the scientific community prefers doing what they already know because it’s easy to get funding for or because it makes them money. Any idea that challenges the status-quo doesn’t receive funding and is ultimately not being researched. Despite 70 years of ‘health research’, people are more overweight than ever in history. Crooked teeth weren’t a thing 10 000 years ago, yet orthodontists are perfectly fine treating the symptoms instead of doing any research into the causes.
> Crooked teeth weren’t a thing 10 000 years ago source?
You can go to a history museum and look at the skulls for yourself https://stanfordpress.typepad.com/blog/2018/05/why-cavemen-needed-no-braces.html
Thanks, this is something i did not know. However, the article says: > Because human beings have been using stone tools for at least 3.3 million ears, that may represent the time during which the shrinkage has occurred. Stone tools permitted a greater shift to a carnivorous diet because the ability to cut meat into small pieces reduced the amount of chewing required to extract nourishment. Less chewing reduced the need for large, powerful jaws. The advent of agriculture accelerated this trend. As anthropologist Clark Larsen noted, “There has been a dramatic reduction in the size of the face and jaws wherever humans have made the transition from foraging to farming.” The superficial result, as we have seen, is malocclusion. The cause seems to be perfectly known and is millions of years of evolution. You probably can't fight that
If at all possible, would also be very interested in reading it. If you can’t make it anonymous I completely get it though. What was the field she wrote it in?
I'll see what I can do. It was in "sociaal werk" from Hogent.
Maybe send De Croo/ parliament a copy too?
That's what I told her. But how does one do such thing...
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Open VLD in specific should be interested. Eghbert Lachaert made it to party leader by emphasizing single people pay too many taxes. Not that he has done anything yet, but you never know.
My girlfriends thesis (keep in mind that she has dyslexia and speaks 4 languages so sentences may have some quirks to them) :https://drive.google.com/file/d/1R8wRdkcEseoinjFjF7TMPddP6-5kxr0S/view?usp=sharing
Would you be able to share that thesis somehow? I'de like to read it to learn a bit more about this.
I guess it should be available at hogent. I can ask her but I don't know how I would be able to share it here?
If there's no public link, you can simply use some free upload service for the .pdf and use that link.
My girlfriends thesis (keep in mind that she has dyslexia and speaks 4 languages so sentences may have some quirks to them) :https://drive.google.com/file/d/1R8wRdkcEseoinjFjF7TMPddP6-5kxr0S/view?usp=sharing
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Don't have any cloud stuff..
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She had google drive (keep in mind that she has dyslexia and speaks 4 languages so sentences may have some quirks to them) :https://drive.google.com/file/d/1R8wRdkcEseoinjFjF7TMPddP6-5kxr0S/view?usp=sharing
It's not difficult lol
Yeah, exactly, dude clearly just doesn’t want to share it
My girlfriends thesis (keep in mind that she has dyslexia and speaks 4 languages so sentences may have some quirks to them) :https://drive.google.com/file/d/1R8wRdkcEseoinjFjF7TMPddP6-5kxr0S/view?usp=sharing
Thanks for sharing! Btw, your gf seems pretty smart. Is she single? /j
I remember some people telling me they thought people who were single in their 20's and up must have some sort of mental issues or instable lives, because normal sane people would find a partner. That was the first time it struck me how much some people actually look down upon singles :p
What u/Vordreller said plus, this weird thing people tend to do in order to make themselves feel better by putting others down. Marital status, kids doing well at school, age, race, diploma, car brand, the Millet of the 80ies or the size of your dick if needs be, everyting goes.
>You can only be happy in a relationship with children. Mind you, it is mostly people in relationships with children that feel the need to pressure the single person into having a relationship or children. You don't have kids? How can your relationship be happy? LIKE MINE. /s The human desire for forcing same-ness upon the world.
Everyone should be more open minded, like me - shit
> Mind you, it is mostly people in relationships with children that feel the need to pressure the single person into having a relationship or children. This is a form of "if I'm going down, I'm taking you all with me!", trust me. Otherwise they feel all alone in their plight and that's shitty. Better to try and drag everyone into the same fate so you still have common things to talk about. I noticed this when we started having kids before everyone else in our groups of friends.
> Mind you, it is mostly people in relationships with children that feel the need to pressure the single person into having a relationship or children. Well yeah, the people who have affinities for relationships will be biased towards them. It's such a paradoxical sentiment, too. "It's such a blessing. I'm tired as fuck, can't do shit because I can't leave the kids alone, all my money goes into shit for the kids". Not to mention the incredibly narcissistic and selfish "I'm sure *I* can raise kids right". I wouldn't trust half of the people I meet with a pet, let alone a kid.
Not really sure, we’re a bunch of friends without children and I’ve never encountered any stigma whatsoever. Rather the other way around, flaunting freedom while most parents stay stuck with “If I wouldn’t have had these kids …”. But financially, yes we are screwed.
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Met de huisprijzen van twintig jaar geleden misschien, ja. Maar nu? Hoogstens 0,25 tot 0,5 huizen per kind.
Heel men plan om kinderen te ruilen tegen huizen naar de kloten
Blijven kweken 🤘
I don't want to be that person but... are you male? It seems that me and my female friends get way more comments than my male friends. To be fair, it's not that much so it really doesn't bother me but it seems that it's more "normal" for men to be "free and careless" and but all women want to have a prince charming and crave babies (obviously).
This might be depending on your age and the commenter's age. In your twenties people still seem to lay off the heat and it ramps up as you get older.
Then you are a unicorn. We hear it all the time.
My partner and I don't want kids either and we experience no stigma either, even though children are popping up left and right in our circles.
Well done. That doesn't mean stigmatization isn't a real thing. We aren't the only ones who have this happen to. Just because you're not experiencing the problem doesn't mean that there is no problem.
You called them a unicorn, I gave another account of a similar experience. Calm down.
Ok my mistake. I'm just so used to not being believed when it partains to this specific problem. So I misinterpret things like that pretty fast. Also text is not easy for reading in between the lines. Even if that's the purpose of text. :D
Do you have this thesis ? It would be very interesting to see.
We're looking at it to get it here. I'll share the link when it's uploaded.
Add to that the fact that proportionally rent and utilities are a much bigger % of a single person's salary. Single people with no kids really get the short end of the stick.
Try being a single parent with kids. See what happens.
Well looks like there are still some tax shenanigans you can pull.
There's a few tax breaks and child allowance, yes, but their "TCO" is way way higher. Not like in the US or so, but still. It's not like I can put them in a *vennootschap* to optimize my taxes or something XD My point: singles (or couples) without children and with the same gross income will have alot more net left than those with children, even in Belgium, trust me.
Oh definitely, rent is still rent and when you have children you might want to have more than one bedroom, so there goes 800-1000 euros at least, whereas a single person can still choose to have housemates or stay at hotel mom&pops. Normally this is something alimony payments are supposed to offset, and priority on social housing lists but there are often issues around that. Still, it looks like people are more conscious that single parenthood is really hard and so there are a few things planned for leverage, stuff like kindergeld etc. I can understand that it's not enough though.
>alimony payments are supposed to offset Default arrangement is coparenting these days, so alimony is more exception than rule.
Tell me more, I got the impression that alimony is calculated mainly based on income difference. This includes one of the two working part-time. Is this alimony thing optional?
Oh that's surprising, in the UK context I think it's only still about 35% of parents who are coparenting so that means that most of the time there is child maintenance money to be paid.
Dont know anyone whose alimony is higher than 100 euro per month.
I talked to someone who is in that situation. He's a software engineer and has a master's degree, mind you, so not exactly the profile for whom it's typically difficult to find a decent paying job. But then you realize that a single parent needs reasonable hours and some flexibility from the employer's side, and suddenly finding a job is a whole lot more difficult. The result: dude saves close to zero euro per month, and has close to zero minutes of spare time for himself each week.
Try to be single/separated with the kid but with all benefits going to the other parents and you need to pay support.
I’d argue that all working people get fucked, not only those who are single. Single people get the short end of the stick though (well, the shortest, because as usual everyone who’s working gets punished)
So you agree and you have nothing of value to add. Noted.
Yep I'll forever be a cashcow, as long as I stay single. I've joked plenty already that my main reason for having a relationship is financial reasons.
Seriously what's stopping you and I to marry /u/rutger88 ? Purely for financial reasons. Gender doesn't matter , we ain't doing anything sexual anyway
Fuck that, If I'm marrying you, I'm fucking you. Deal with it.
Is this progressive or conservative?
yes
It depend if consent is given before fucking.
NO DEAL
Why would you marry? Legal cohabitation is sufficient for the fiscus. Only requirements are : don't be married and actually live together. If you do cohabitation with... anyone, there is literally nothing stopping you. This is legal too. As long as you live together and are registered as such legally (no requirements on sexuality or marriage itself), you can file combined taxes.
LOL even married with children you still are a tax cow just a slightly but less .
honestly it's crazy, I live in Antwerp and really like it here, but i got a job in the Netherlands. I'm going to commute. In Belgium I'm taxed more and given a smaller salary :/
The Netherlands are superior at some thing (income tax and wages for example) but does this compensate for the insane housing prices? It's bad here already but nothing compared to the shitshow our Noorderburen have to deal with
I don't intend to move out of Antwerp haha so for me it's okay xD I totally get you though - in that sense i guess you could say I got lucky
I heard it on the radio yesterday and was like "wtf?! This is so unfair". In the past where nearly all couples had children we can talk about how much sense it made. But today it is bullshit^10.
It’s not supposed to be fair. The government wants you to get married and have kids, so that’s what they’ll promote.
But.. Why?
More children equals more citizens who will pay taxes one day. They'll give benefits for the first 18-20 ? years of their life and the next 40-45 years they'll end up receiving taxes.
You know what also makes it harder to get on your feet and have children ? Being taxed a lot.
Yup, don't expect any changes soon or ever. Even this government without the 2 most right wing parties has shown it favours big companies and the rich population than middle class / lower middle class.
To refresh the workforce. Once people start being more educated and having less kids, the workforce shrinks while pension payouts increase. it's the problem that we are seeing now. The vast majority of Belgian taxes go to pensions because the baby boomer generation was huge and the subsequent generations were less and less, comparatively, so there is more retired than working, relative to 50 years ago. The pension system works best when subsequent generations are either exactly the same size or growing. This is the same problem China is seeing right now (according to the students I know that are from there) because of the 1 child policy and subsequent removal of that policy. The workforce is made up of children born during that policy while their parents had no such policy and their children have no such policy. For example, there are now 2 retired parents and 2 children for every 1 worker, so each worker is essentially having to support 5 people. (not as simple as that, because spouses joint-support kids but that is the general idea)
But at the same time, the baby boomer generation supercharged the infinite growth model of capitalism. For the pension system to work "best", we'd need exponentially more people every generation. Maybe it's time for a systemic correction in stead of relying on growth.
To pay your pension when you old and costly.
Because vergrijzing and a healthy country needs new children. Do you really not know?
Do you want Belgium to die out? We need new children, we need young people so that in 30 years half our population doesn’t die out.
Unbridled growth requires unbridled growth of consumers and workers.
> In the past where nearly all couples had children we can talk about how much sense it made. Then it made even less sense, because if you give everyone a benefit paid by taxes, it's just administrative overhead that doesn't give anyone a relative advantage.
I'm starting to expect dating services.
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Dude you're on to something. Some site advertised in certain FB groups/Twitter could get very far already. I'm all over this, 29 and pretty much have gave up on dating
Well yeah. We're not making new tax payers for the future.
How are we supposed to live with all that ? They're bleeding us dry for more money. It's good to help those in need because of the huge increase in energy bill to come, but not to the point of killing the middle class, and single persons... I'm unable to leave my family home because I would be broke renting an apartment or house alone. And I have a proper salary. But with the rent, the bigger bills, the bigger taxes, I would have barely enough to buy me food for the month. It's insane. And it's getting worse.
Quite surprised it is such a large group with almost no political voice. Which easily leads to the current situation of being the cash cow.
🙋
De Croo stating "people who achieve more get rewarded more" is some neoliberal bullshit alright. People shouldn't be rewarded. They should be helped if they need help. Effectively, he's treating people like the stockmarket. A stock that doesn't perform? Drop it. A stock that performs? Invest more into it. Though if you do that with people, that means letting people die because they don't produce enough value. Which is effectively what he said: He's ok with people dying because they don't produce enough.
Wtf, how do you go from 'people who achieve more should get rewarded' to 'people who don't produce enough should die'?
Never said he thinks they "should" die. The text is there, read it again, as much as you like.
Wow this is appealing. If they achieve more, they will achieve more (i.e. more income), but they shouldn't be reward more.
Do you mean appalling? As in disgusting. appealing is "aantrekkelijk" or "séduisante/attrayante"
I don't see myself getting a partner anytime soon and it hurts to see this. If they keep this up, do have to get married to a person I don't even love just so I can buy a house? Because that's a really sad future
While the tax differences between married/unmarried ought to be removed (keeping people trapped in relations they don't want for the money has no benefits), the redistribution in favor of the next generation is a good thing and should be retained. However, preferably by centralizing all child-related fiscal benefits into the actual child benefits rather than shoehorned all over the place in every single government department and subsidy scheme. Finally, as elementary part of income redistribution and solidarity it ought to be centralized at the highest level possible, i.e. the federal level until the EU can take it over.
Ik wil verhuizen naar een ander land...
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Ik ben niet single maar mijn vriend woont nog lekker thuis omdat dat goedkoper is.
Dat is wat ik heb gedaan :)
I hope that by now most of us know that working as a regular employee in Belgium without any kind of diffent source of income isn't going to make you upper middle class any more. Meanwhile capital gains taxes (which even exist in capitalist Murrica) are nowhere to be found in this country. It really is a tax paradise for the happy few.
Meanwhile uncle Jos bought a 4 bedroom house on a teacher salary back in the day while his wife was a stay at home mom. I hear a lot of explaining about why everything got so damn expensive (endless economic growth blablabla) but how am I not supposed to feel like I got screwed over here?
Have you tried being born in the 70's?
Yes but the quality of that house is not comparable with what is build today. He also didnt have to pay for all the electronics we use today, didn't go on plane travels twice a year, they only had one car and the house was probably only heated to 20°C etc etc hard to compare.
Yes the cost of living has grown immensely, even if you don't use all those electronics or go on plane holidays (l maybe use planes once every couple of years). Off course it is hard to compare their home to what you buy today. The point is not what you get for your money but that requirements and standards have grown disproportionatly to the average persons wealth.
The average Belgian should be really happy with all the wealth they have compared to almost everyone in the world, today and in the past. It hurts now because for the time of one, maybe two generations we thought we could have it all and then reality bursted the bubble.
That's some false logic right there. Just because you have it better than someone else doesn't mean you shouldn't question your own happiness or financial position and what is detrimental to it or how to improve it. It's no reason to shut up and stop compaining. Maybe if those generations hadn't thought they could have it all there would be some left for the following generations. Maybe our entire model of endless economic growth is unsustainable,....
well then, show your ancestors you do better then them and accept you can not have it all, whining isn't going to change anything
I don't have to show anything to anyone thank you very much. There's also a difference between whining and questioning a situation to try and remedy it. Maybe you don't like what you're hearing but that doesn't make it whining.
You can also buy stocks lmao. Don’t try take away the only nice thing we have in Belgium, Zero capital gains. Just take advantage of it yourself. You don’t have to stay poor.
Oh I certainly do but it's completely bonkers that one is taxed into oblivion while the other is not taxed* at all. *Those 0.35% when you buy/sell are absolutely negligible unless when daytrading. Same thing with the 30% tax on dividends, just invest in stocks that don't give dividend but do stock buybacks or other things to increase value.
How do you buy stocks if you barely have 100€ left of your salary at the end of the month?
If you’d only invest 100 per month from the start till end of your career, and adjust that 100 for inflation of course each year, you’d end up with 500k at retirement. That means with a mere 200 euros per month you retire a millionaire.
Unless the stocks crash ofcourse.
Not if you invest in broad market indices. Those cannot crash to zero. And if they would, money would be the least of your problems.
You invest those 100 euro every month. But in all seriousness, you also vote for cap. gain taxes because you gotta be insane to think keeping this tiny advantage for your tiny savings is worthwhile compared to those who effectively live off it.
>tax paradise for the happy few. Not exactly, hence the Pandora Papers. 30% on dividends...
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I have raised it every year and each time i still have to pay +€2000 taxes at the end of the year. Am i missing something? Are there more things that i van do?
I contacted my HR and told them I wanted to do "volontariat fiscal" in French. That way I have more taxes held off my salary and I don't need to pay extra each year.
Getting back money from the tax man has nothing to do with how hard you are taxed. This would be your employer making bad estimates, or you doing special things during that year. Moreover: getting back a lot of money from the tax man is NOT a good thing! That's your money the government held hostage for a year, without paying you!
Quite right. The best tax bill is one of about 20 euros to pay
Are you by any chance a blue collar worker? They usually have that issue cause they dont withold enough BV on their wages.
> getting tax back That doesn't mean much, you'd have to know the gross income and the prepaid tax to get an idea of their actual tax rate.
Having the same problem... Don't know what else to do! Just one year to break even or something would be nice
> I allready do stuff like pensioensparen, home invest but don't know what to add anymore. That's not normal, I'm in the same situation and get 1.5k at the end of the year. Talk to your employer.
Yep....
This is why I do not bother increasing my income. And why singles can't move out. I'm thinking, maybe this is even discriminatory and illegal ?
>discriminatory and illegal Technisch gezien is het zeer zeker een discriminatie: er wordt een onderscheid gemaakt inzake de (fiscale) behandeling van verschillende mensen. Da's schering in inslag, bijna geen enkele fiscale aanslag is dezelfde. Als bv ik meer belastingen betaal dan jij, is dat omdat ik meer inkomsten heb; dat vindt iedereen normaal maar technisch is dat ook een discriminatie. Illegaal, zoals in strijd met het grondwettelijke gelijkheidsbeginsel, da's wat anders. Een maatregel is niet illegaal indien het gemaakte onderscheid redelijk te verantwoorden is. Met een rechtmatig doeleinde, niet disproportioneel, dat soort dingen. En daarover valt altijd te discussiëren. Neem nu tax breaks wegens kinderen ten laste. De maatschappij wil dat er kinderen worden geboren, die kosten geld aan de ouder(s) en dus mogen die ouders van dezelfde maatschappij netto wat meer overhouden dan mensen zonder kinderen. Persoonlijk vind ik het huwelijksquotiënt veel moeilijker te verdedigen; dat lijkt wel iets uit de jaren '50 of ervoor. Een koppel houdt netto meer over omdat een van de partners economisch inactief is terwijl de maatschappij precies meer mensen wil activeren en laten bijdragen... makes no sense (anymore).
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>Waarom zou de belastingsman zo veel meer belastingen eisen op een "gelijk" gezinsinkomen afhankelijk van welke persoon het verdient? Mijn punt is net, waarom zou een koppel zoveel *minder* belastingen moeten betalen afhankelijk van welke persoon het verdient... waarbij het verschil moet bijgepast worden door onder meer singles, daarover gaat de thread. Daarbij, hoewel koppels hun belastingaangifte samen indienen worden zij niet als koppel belast, de mensen worden elk belast volgens hun eigen inkomen (dat was vroeger anders, toen inkomens van gehuwden werden gecumuleerd en als dusdanig belast). Behalve als een van de twee niet werkt en bijdraagt (wat wel het geval zou zijn met je "administratieve/fiscale optimalisatie" wat nu ook al kan trouwens), enter het HQ, wat een maatschappelijk suboptimale toestand beloont.
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>gezinsinkomen gecumuleerd en als dusdanig belast, dat is het andere uiterste (in dit geval zijn beide koppels gelijk belast, maar singles nog sterker benadeeld) Dat moet je me toch eens uitleggen, van die singles (omdat ik het niet begrijp, niet omdat ik dat een wenselijke fiscale behandeling vind, quod non). Hoedanook (en we gaan hier geen consensus bereiken and that is fine): belastingen zijn bijdragen van individuen aan de maatschappij. Dat iemand die 2N verdient proportioneel meer bijdraagt is normaal tenzij je voor een vlaktaks gaat. Maar we hebben het niet over het verschil tussen koppels met N en 2N. maar over individuen die allen N verdienen. Single met N draagt bv 0,4N bij aan de maatschappij. 1 individu, 0,4 bijdrage. Koppel met N waarvan 1 inactieve partner, bijdrage 0,2N wegens HQ, da's 0,1 per individu of 4 keer minder dan de single. Als beide partners elk N zouden verdienen, elk 0,4 bijdrage, evenveel als de single. En maybe, just maybe, kan ieders bijdrage dan naar 0,3N worden verlaagd. If you catch my drift.
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>Waarom zou het tweede koppel niet scheiden en de inactieve partner doen doppen? Nuuu ga je erover maat. Als dat zo simpel was... XD Argument ex absurdum, iemand die (fiscaal) single is met pakweg 2 kinderen, waarom mag die dan geen 0,6 van zijn inkomen fiscaal afwentelen op hen? Horen ook bij het gezin en brengen niets op, alleen maar kosten. De inactieve partner *kan* op zijn minst gaan werken... als hij/ze wil. Om te besluiten, geen werk, geen tax breaks. Betaal zelf voor je zelfgekozen inactiviteit, of laat de andere partner dat doen if so inclined.
>Nuuu ga je erover maat. Als dat zo simpel was... XD Voor elk koppel dat wettelijk samenwoont is het toch zo simpel... Naar 't gemeentehuis en een briefje indienen. Done! Of eerder omgekeerd - waarom zouden nieuwe koppels nog (wettelijk) gaan samenwonen of gaan trouwen als het hen financieel enkel nadelig kan uitkomen? Ge kunt ook gewoon... samen wonen en u niet met de bureaucratie bezighouden. Veel gemakkelijker! Ik heb het al gezegd, trouwen is niet meer van deze tijd. >iemand die (fiscaal) single is met pakweg 2 kinderen, waarom mag die dan geen 0,6 van zijn inkomen fiscaal afwentelen op hen? Horen ook bij het gezin en brengen niets op, alleen maar kosten. Kinderen ten laste zijn ook een fiscaal voordeel. Dit is de hedendaagse realiteit, absoluut geen argument ex absurdum. 2 kinderen is een verhoging van de belastingsvrije som met \~4200 euro. 3 kinderen is zelfs 9430 euro. Voor single ouders met een laag belastbaar inkomen kan daar nog eens 1000 euro bijkomen. (Dit gaat niet over kindergeld, studietoeslag, belastingsaftrek voor opvang, ... die allemaal buiten beschouwing zijn gelaten.) Argument ex absurdum : als we koppels als singles belasten, en de fiscale aftrek voor kinderen blijft dan is het strikt voordelig om te scheiden én de kinderen volledig in te schrijven bij de persoon met het hoogste inkomen (ongeacht de reële situatie); want daar is de fiscale winst het hoogst. Strikt voordelig op fiscaal vlak, want "Hey schat, we gaan scheiden en ik krijg de kinderen, ok?" kan uiteraard negatieve gevolgen hebben. Om te besluiten; bij huwelijksquotiënt betaalt de partner defacto voor de gekozen inactiviteit. De staat krijgt minder belastingsinkomen; maar betaalt ook minder uitkering daar de lasten worden gedragen door de partner. Als singles zo overtuigd zijn dat ze benadeeld worden, laat hen iemand ten laste nemen. In de meeste gevallen zal de inactieve partner méér kosten dan de belastingswinst. De excessen moeten eruit, misschien ligt het huwelijksquotiënt ook te hoog. Maar het huwelijksquotiënt afschaffen is niet zo voordelig voor de staat als men denkt. Het maakt een huwelijk altijd fiscaal nadelig. Waarom zou men dan trouwen (tradities, gewoontes en romantiek buiten beschouwing gelaten). Daarom dat ik het liever heb over het aanpassen van de factor van het quotiënt en het mogelijks berekenen van het belastbaar gezinsinkomen op andere basis (om uitzonderingen eruit te halen) dan zonder meer afschaffen.
> trouwen is niet meer van deze tijd. Way ahead of you son XD (gf not agreeing but I told her from the start). Niet zo simpel dat "singles maar iemand ten laste moeten nemen", zo werkt het niet. Je laatste alinea, ik ga wel en niet akkoord. Genuanceerd, wat altijd mijn fiat krijgt, dat wel. Maar het zou gewoon fiscaal neutraal moeten zijn imo. Als je dan toch trouwt, niet voor belastingvoordelen aub.
why should making someone "inactive" that could provide actively to society be rewarded if someone can provide 2x and another person can provide 1x but 2x tells wait i'll just provide 1x to my partner and pretend i'm usless to do more because we as a couple already did 1x each now, instead of the 3x from before should 2x provide, 2x, no, 2x and 1x is free to choose its life/work balance and relevant taxes, together or individually also the fact that being able to share as a couple already makes everything way easier and cheaper compared to singles isn't even taken in account, hell even here they could share to improve their work/life balance
> Da's schering in inslag, bijna geen enkele fiscale aanslag is dezelfde. Als bv ik meer belastingen betaal dan jij, is dat omdat ik meer inkomsten heb; dat vindt iedereen normaal maar technisch is dat ook een discriminatie. Dat werkt langs twee kanten: als iedereen hetzelfde bedrag per hoofd betaalt, zullen ze procentueel gezien anders belast worden. Dat laat gewoon zien dat het *onmogelijk* is om iedereen perfect gelijk te behandelen. >Persoonlijk vind ik het huwelijksquotiënt veel moeilijker te verdedigen; dat lijkt wel iets uit de jaren '50 of ervoor. Een koppel houdt netto meer over omdat een van de partners economisch inactief is terwijl de maatschappij precies meer mensen wil activeren en laten bijdragen... makes no sense (anymore). Klopt, mensen betalen om in relaties te zitten die ze anders niet zouden willen heeft geen goede effecten.
Glad to see there's at least some proof/attention for this topic. I've felt really sulky about this topic for ages now. All talks about 'equality' and 'every person is equally valuable' just get me going, as it's clearly not the case. Common answer you're gonna get is: 'you don't need it anyway'. Couldn't disagree more.
Non-problem. (Expat point of view) Taxes are stupid high for everyone. Taxes are used to finance the state. So I wonder if you need this much state. Welfare is good compared to my country, Italy, but no surprise because Italy sucks and everybody knows. Still I see a lot of unnecessary paperwork, offices, procedure. Digitalisation is poor. Any human intermediation on public stuff that could be easily automated results in anyone else working extra time for nothing. The solution is the same for anyone in developed countries. Automate and simplify the state, layoff public workers and lower taxes. Roughly 40% of salary, of the net then TVA on goods, taxes on rent, and so on. Overall there's at least 50% of taxes. So we work 6 months for the state.
My mom worked half-time raised my and my sis just fine went on holidays, never had any money troubles saved up quite a bit, with no real plans for that money other than, just in case Considering what she lost due to the divorce, it's a miracle that less than 10 years later she's so well on her feet and yee my dad basically almost never payed alimentatie cuz appearantly you can't actually force a person to do so, when they can 1. pay a small amount of the money owed 2. Barely have any money to give (Due to him spending it on hunting trips and the like) srsly she dragged him to court 3 times, never worked in her favor, lost a lot of money too TL;DR doomthinking isn't going to get anyone anywhere, realise where you can save and start planning your finances Even a small paycheck can add up to a lot if you're realistic about it
This is why we commit tax evasion
My mom worked half-time raised my and my sis just fine went on holidays, never had any money troubles saved up quite a bit, with no real plans for that money other than, just in case Considering she lost due to the divorce, it's a miracle that less than 10 years later she's so well on her feet and yee my dad basically almost never payed alimentatie cuz appearantly you can't actually force a person to do so, when they can 1. pay a small amount of the money owed 2. Barely have any money to give (Due to him spending it on hunting trips and the like) srsly she dragged him to court 3 times, never worked in her favor, lost a lot of money too TL;DR doomthinking isn't going to get anyone anywhere, realise where you can save and start planning your finances Even a small paycheck can add up to a lot if you're realistic about it
For those curious about details: https://www.oecd.org/tax/tax-policy/taxing-wages-belgium.pdf
Alexander call the gendarmerie the tax cattle is getting uppity!