Whatever the contents of today’s budget speech, don’t forget that a lot of changes announced by Philip Hammond’s predecessor at the Treasury are still due to take effect next month. Both the income tax personal allowance and the higher-rate threshold will rise as the government progresses towards getting these up to £12,500 and £50,000 respectively. Inheritance tax is being cut, benefitting the children of homeowners with estates worth between £650,000 and £2 million. The rate of corporation tax will be cut from 20p to 19p, although in revenue terms this is dwarfed by the new “apprenticeship levy”, which would be better described as a payroll tax on employers with annual pay bills of more than £3 million. Even more significant changes are afoot on the…

Source: The Times March 08, 2017 02:48 UTC