Not the whole story: But it seems unemployed people claiming they are self-employed may still be part of it. [Image: Ros Asquith in The Guardian]
Instead, Flip Chart Fairy Tales warns that a lot of people are staying in self-employment rather than becoming employees again or retiring.
This suggests that either they have not been able to reach their target in terms of pensions, or there are no jobs available for people of their particular expertise or experience. The latter seems likely to Yr Obdt Srvt, who is currently trying to make Vox Political a workable concern in order to make a buck or two.
FCFT warns that “this is old-timers seeing their business shrink, rather than newbies trying to find their feet, under-charging and messing things up”.
The figures also show an increase in the number of self-employed tax credit claimants, lending credence to Vox Political‘s long-held belief that Job Centre Plus advisors have been telling jobseekers to pretend they are self-employed in order to get them off the books – let’s not write off that idea too quickly.
And a steady rise in non-VAT-paying businesses not only tells us “a lot of low-profit and low-turnover businesses are hanging on in there, or a lot more of them have become low-profit and low-turnover businesses since 2008”, it tells us that George Osborne will have a nasty surprise in January, when their tax returns come in.
If they are not paying VAT, they are not clearing the earnings threshold that would make such payments necessary. This mitigates against their earnings having increased significantly since the disasters of 2008-2012, when self-employed earnings fell by £8 billion.
So it seems our dancing Chancellor (see yesterday’s post) will find that either the music stops or the tune will change significantly…
Less ‘Gold’ by Spandau Ballet; more ‘I Don’t Need This Pressure On’.
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