Tax freedom day slips into June as annual tax bill grows
Today marks “tax freedom day”, the day of the year when the average UK worker stops paying tax and starts earning for themselves.
The date, calculated by the Adam Smith Institute (ASI), falls four days later than in 2015 and has crept into the month of June for the first time in 15 years.
With tax receipts set to eat up 42.3 per cent of the UK’s net national income, UK citizens spend an average of 154 days every year at work just to pay their annual tax bill, the ASI worked out.
The free market think tank said the “tax burden is moving in the wrong direction” and called on the government to raise the national insurance threshold to help the lowest paid.
Read more: The business tax burden is on the up as well
“The Treasury hates Tax Freedom Day because they don’t want us to know how much tax we really pay. They conceal the tax burden with stealth taxes that we don’t even realise we’re paying.” said Eamonn Butler, director of the ASI.
“We work longer for the government than medieval serfs had to work for their Lords.”