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Feb 3, 2022

Average household ‘will pay £1.1m in tax’

The average household will pay £1.1 million in direct and indirect taxes over a lifetime, new research suggests.

According to the Taxpayer's Alliance, a household that works for 40 years, retires for 15 and is on the average income of £60,194 would need 18 years to pay their lifetime tax bill.

The data collected from the Office for National Statistics comes as the UK faces the highest tax burden in 70 years and the poorest households already spend over 50% of their income on taxes.

Households in the bottom 20% by income, receiving an average salary of £19,171 in 2019/20, will pay £449,860 over a lifetime, while the top 20% will pay £2.6m.

The Taxpayer's Alliance called for "spending to be brought back under control as the country emerges from the pandemic" and for planned tax rises, such as the upcoming rise in National Insurance contributions, to be scrapped.

In a joint article for The Times, Prime Minister Boris Johnson and Chancellor Rishi Sunak described this period of high taxation as a "phase" to get through and argued that they "must go ahead with the health-and-social-care levy".

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