John Healey’s speech to the Labour Party conference(英国工党年度大会) in Liverpool on September 28th mentioned “hope” 21 times. Yet the main thing the chancellor(财政大臣) was hoping for went unsaid: to emerge unscathed(毫发无损地脱身) from the budget on October 28th. Rising debt costs have left the chancellor scrabbling(四处搜寻；挣扎) around for tax rises to fill a fiscal hole(填补财政缺口)—something he conspicuously(显眼地；刻意地) avoided discussing, mentioning tax not once. The Tories are already sharpening their attack lines: even before the budget, taxes are forecast to reach 38% of GDP(国内生产总值) by 2030, their highest share since the 1940s.
9月28日，约翰·希利在利物浦举行的工党大会上发表演讲，“希望”一词出现了21次。然而，这位财政大臣最期盼的事却只字未提：安然度过10月28日的预算案。不断上升的债务成本迫使财政大臣四处寻找增税空间，以填补财政缺口——而他显然刻意回避了这个问题，一次都没提“税”字。保守党已经在磨刀霍霍：即便预算案尚未出台，预测显示到2030年税收将占GDP的38%，为20世纪40年代以来的最高水平。
Yet rows(争吵；争论) over the right amount of taxation miss the bigger story. Although exact comparisons are hard, Britain’s overall tax levels are unexceptional(平平无奇的) by international standards. Its revenues as a percentage of GDP remain below average for the OECD(经济合作与发展组织), a club of mostly rich countries (see chart 1). What marks Britain apart is how bonkers(疯狂的；荒唐的) its tax system is. When a parent’s net income increases by £1 from £99,999 to £100,000, they can lose thousands of pounds of free child care in one fell swoop(一下子；一举). Gingerbread men with chocolate trousers incur(招致；承担) value-added tax (VAT) worth 20%, but no tax is charged on those with chocolate only for their eyes.
然而，关于税率高低的争论忽略了更重要的故事。尽管精确比较困难，但按国际标准衡量，英国的整体税负并不突出。其税收占GDP的比重仍低于经合组织（一个以富裕国家为主的俱乐部）的平均水平（见图1）。真正让英国与众不同的是其税收体系有多么荒唐。当一位家长的净收入从99,999英镑增加1英镑到100,000英镑时，他们可能一下子失去数千英镑的免费托儿服务。穿巧克力裤子的姜饼人要缴纳20%的增值税，而只在眼睛处有巧克力的姜饼人却免税。
These are not isolated examples. At the core of a good tax system is neutrality(中性；中立), the idea that taxes should be raised with minimal distortions(扭曲；失真) (such as not prioritising some forms of incomes over others). Yet from corporation tax to inheritance tax(遗产税), the British system violates this principle. To paraphrase Leo Tolstoy(套用托尔斯泰的话), every tax system is unhappy in its own way. But the Tax Foundation(美国税收政策智库), a think-tank, has compiled an index of tax competitiveness that ranks Britain 32nd out of 38 OECD countries.
这些并非孤例。良好税制的核心是中性原则，即征税应尽可能减少扭曲（例如不应偏袒某些收入形式）。然而，从公司税到遗产税，英国税制处处违背这一原则。套用列夫·托尔斯泰的话，每个税制都有各自的不幸。但智库“税收基金会”编制的一项税收竞争力指数显示，英国在38个经合组织国家中排名第32位。
Simplicity itself
简单至上