We already tax profits.
So this is just a “don’t tax our wealth” cry.
Green King’s (and the other large pubco chains) business model is to trap people who think “I could run a pub” and use up their 50k retirement fund to pay the GKs mortgage for them and force them to buy their product at grossly inflated wholesale prices until the go bankrupt or realise they’re in a trap and bail. Then they do it all again.
If anyone somehow manages to actually turn a profit, they find an excuse to evict the tenant and install a manager instead and extract anything of value before starting the cycle over again when it inevitably slides into unprofitability.
I wonder why Greene king want to tax profits? It’s because they don’t make any.
Nope, you chose to expand beyond what you can handle. Tax the wealth, if you can’t afford to run your pubs give them back to the people and pay less tax that way.
Right, and part of the problem is these hawks (the kind who own 2400 pubs) would then fly in with that much more VC$ and scoop up 5x that amount if something like this passed(which is of course why they’re the ones suggesting it). I’m all for the idea, but big companies don’t get little guy breaks for the 1-2 pub proprietor, they can play with the adults and take the loss with that kind of operation and revenue. If their business model is literally “we can’t turn a profit–we’ll make it up in volume” they have issues that shouldn’t necessitate corporate welfare.
Of course we can’t do anything about this in the short term, but long term we should be doing everything we can to fix property pricing. It’s such a stranglehold on both citizens and businesses.
People can’t afford to go out and spend because it’s all servicing a mortgage or rent, which goes to wealthy landlords or banks, rather than circulating locally/improving government tax intake.
Businesses have to hike prices to pay for exorbitant rent rates, which further reinforces people not being able to go out and spend.
The government spends several billion per year on housing benefits, which has went from a benefit to help the few who fell through the cracks and needed a bit of assistance, to huge numbers of people completely reliant on it else they can’t afford to house themselves. And who gets the money? That’s right. Landlords.
We obviously can’t snap our fingers and have more houses overnight, but I hope the upcoming planning reforms and mandatory building targets actually bear fruit.
I’m a home owner by the skin of my teeth (I worked 84 hour weeks, saved relentlessly - destroying my social life, and moved to the North East where housing is cheap), but I’m fine taking a hit in house value if it’s for the good of the nation. Fuck the people who pulled the ladders up after them.
Build more houses in the right place with the right infrastructure
Oh no, greene king making less money. What a shame.
Also all that is happening is they the covid tax discount they had is being reduced from 75% to 40%. Any impact of lockdown on people going out is long gone.
That and they charge £5.60 for a pint
Cheap beer you say? Where? Where? 😋
