Reply to: If you won 1 million on the lottery, what would you spend it on?

[wantacontract]

retire..........

travel the world...

make sure i give all my money to charity when i do..

give only 10k to my heir!!!

They've got to earn it...

[SandyDown]

My wife sometimes enjoys this fantasy. Then she invites me to sit and dream with her and list objects or events that we would spend money on.

This was fun for a while. But I thought it got boring as we never play the lottery .

SO last time she asked me to enjoy this game with her I just told her that if I won the lottery for a good size prize I would simply vanish from her life. She would never see me again. This has disappointed her to the level that she has not asked me to this game since. Mission accomplished.

Just because she is not inviting you to play the fantasy does not mean she is not enjoying the fantasy with someone else

Bad move btw... Bad Move I tell ya

[Board Game Geek]

95 million ?

I have no idea.

Get a massive screen to play Warcraft on for me and for the missus. Her PC is in the bedroom, and mine is in the Lounge. We chat on TS.

Build Menemsha.

Buy load of music equipment to equip my own studio.

Write music when not playing WOW.

Travel the world on the QE2 State Apartments. With Laptops for WOW. Stop off at interesting places, coo at them, buy furniture for Menemsha, then scuttle back on board to play WOW.

Visit the places we want to see in Europe before we leave for good. Then head to NZ (Christchurch) to settle down.

Start a housing association for Maori's.

Spend the rest of our lives playing the successor to WOW and travelling the world (with laptops). Cars...pah. Get a chauffeur to drive so you can play on the lappie.

By all means, do the culture-vulture bit and moan appreciatively at things of art and culture. I really can appreciate the brushstrokes in a Mónet. With my entire soul and being. I can eulogise how good the work is until the cows come home. Then I can find something better in an instant. WOW is good, IMHO. But in a year or so, it will be cr@pper than the cr@ppest thing invented. Hence it get's the flush. Move on, consume, enjoy, move on, ad infiniteum. Life is too short.

[AtW]

And who is going to decide what things are a "benefit to society" and what things aren't?

Look, are you playing dumb here? Clearly if gambling win is taxed at 0%, but high income at 40% (plus employer NIC, employee NIC), then what kind of signal it sends?

Just how you guys have guts to argue for 0% tax on gambling wins when inheritance is a rip off? Why is it okay to pay 40% tax on something that belongs to your family which had already been taxed heavily?

The money will be spent and find its way back into the economy so everyone with a stake in that economy will benefit.

So then lets cut all taxes to zero, if this happens I will agree gambling should have 0% tax on it too. But in situation when lots of other things are taxed like heck, trying to get away with millions of lucky winnings tax-free is abhorent and what's worse is that people are given false hope they could win and change their life, WRONG, they should not NEED to win because most of them WON'T win it - that's why taxation should encourage things that are beneficial to society, for example low capital gains tax on long term business investments.

Footballers (with >£1 mln salary), gamblers etc should get 90% tax.

[Gonzo]

I state categorically that taxation should encourage development into good direction that benefits society long term.

And who is going to decide what things are a "benefit to society" and what things aren't?

What is the benefit to society when people win huge amounts of money tax free?

The money will be spent and find its way back into the economy so everyone with a stake in that economy will benefit.

[AtW]

Are you sure you're not still a commie AtW?

No. What taxes have got to do with communism? There are very few taxes under communism actually, something that you are probably not aware of?

Taxation as we know it is the invention of the West.

I state categorically that taxation should encourage development into good direction that benefits society long term. What is the benefit to society when people win huge amounts of money tax free? If you win a million in lottery be grateful that you are lucky to get 60% of it, I think 40% tax would be totally appropriate in this case.

Perhaps by introducing this tax it would be possible to reduce some of the taxes in general taxation, but in principle the message should be simple - you have to work hard to produce something of the benefit to society, and this can be encouraged by big payout with small tax, winning in a gamble is only giving people false hopes.

[Gonzo]

SO last time she asked me to enjoy this game with her I just told her that if I won the lottery for a good size prize I would simply vanish from her life. She would never see me again. This has disappointed her to the level that she has not asked me to this game since. Mission accomplished.

If I tried that line I can see that Mrs Gonzo would double her spend on tickets each week.

[Moscow Mule]

Tax the lucky - make everybody else a little bit happier!

Are you sure you're not still a commie AtW?

[NickFitz]

£1 million - pay off the house, buy another car (always wanted a Landrover defender), take some more time off, retrain in something I might enjoy, and take it a bit easier.

£95 million - give at least £50million away or setup The FaQQer Benevolent Trust or something to do it for me. Move, buy lots of houses and travel the world forever, wife and kids in tow.

I have a vision of you drinking champagne on the deck of your luxury yacht, while your wife and kids are towed behind on one of those barges they use to ship garbage out of Manhattan

[AtW]

There is no fair, there is no deserved.

Some things are more deserved than not: win in a lottery by definition is luck, and not the kind of luck that is deserved by hard work or something like that. Therefore having no tax on winnings of that kind while taxing like heck everything else is wrong, end of story.

[shoes]

You got me. I don't play lotteries and only know about £1 UK lottery by chance. Personally I'd say I'd be gutted to win a million because I would not have made it fair and square, so I am not playing lotteries - it would be a big spoiler if I won

No-one makes it 'fair and square'. If someone has a natural aptitude for business and making money then how is that 'fair'? They were born with a genetic make up that means they are motivated and happen to have the intellectual capacity to achieve what is required. Also their background and history has an inspiring affect in many cases. A lot of self made people had a parent die early on in their childhood, for example. That was not down to them, but it spurred them on to be succesful (in the common definition of success).

Starting out with some money in your pocket is a small part of the jigsaw. The fact that you Atw have spent 3 years on your scheme places you in the 'motivated' camp. This is because you are predisposed to be like this, most likely through a combination of your genetic make up and your childhood. Other people who don't share your genetic make up and childhood will be unsuccesful, technically through no fault of their own. Sure you work hard on it, which will make any success appear 'deserved' to you, but ask why you are doing it at all... it's because you simply couldn't not do it. You aren't built that way. You have no free will!

There is no fair, there is no deserved. There is only doing what you simply couldn't not do.

[Diver]

If you won 1 million on the lottery, what would you spend it on?

I'd put it with the others of course.

[hyperD]

Is it nice?

I've had my eye on it.

It has been on the market for yonks.

I think they are in trouble.

It was originally on for £2.3m

£650k off - now £1.65m

That's a whole detached house in Surrey.

I'll see if I can have a look tomorrow for you...

[dude69]

This house is virtually next door to my parents!! I've seen this!

Is it nice?

I've had my eye on it.

It has been on the market for yonks.

I think they are in trouble.

It was originally on for £2.3m

£650k off - now £1.65m

That's a whole detached house in Surrey.

[AtW]

Clever AtW you're absolutely right.

Also - tax posts on CUK! One penny a dozen