- About $20k/y to provide health for a family, regardless of income. Median wage is barely double that amount. So most people in that situation forego health coverage (or pick the cheapest catastrophic-only coverage they can afford, and then are on the hook financially for any health issue).
- Still have 33% income tax
- Retirement: it's entirely up to you to save. Good luck! (rule of thumb is 15-20% of income)
- Child care: $12-24k/year/infant should your spouse have to work.
- College education: similar figures, maybe less with some assistance programs, maybe more if children go to prestigious schools. Or you can punt the bill to them and have them be on the hook for a loan.
- Oh, and nursing home for the elderly is about $30k/year so better get that retirement fund full of money. Though it's an undue burden to place on someone else, the traditional view is that having children can help reduce that cost.
In short, the US' system is not optimized for the median citizen ($59k in 2016), it's optimized for those who are in the 75th percentile or above.
UPTO 20% of what you SPEND. In the UK you pay 0% VAT toward most food and child stuff. Then 5% toward essential goods and services. THEN full VAT on the rest of the stuff.
But that doesn't equate to 20% of your remaining cash unless you are only buying pre-prepared foods and furniture with your salary, and spending every bit of it.
You don’t have to pay VAT if you don’t buy anything. You can just invest your money.
A new passport costs money. You need to pay for one if you want it. That shouldn’t be part of your income tax because nobody knows how often you will need one. Essentially those fees are on per person basis.
The NHS is very useable. I never used to pay for any private health insurance for about 5 years. It might not be convenient for you to wait but that’s your problem. That system works and saves lives... so it is usable.
I don’t even know what you mean by “lost”. Money doesn’t magically disappear. Maybe it’s a more complex system than you can imagine or haven’t thought about it hard enough.
Yeah this is just wrong. I have friends who have moved to the US, and said things like - "I wouldn't be as annoyed at how massively expensive health insurance here is, if you got any better service, but you don't"
Then there's VAT syphoning an extra 20% of the remaining cash.
Then there are hidden taxes charged throguh other fees being levied, even to access mandatory state services.
In the end you get healthcare, but in general the service is practically unusable and you end up having to pay for health insurance anyway.
And by the way, a large portion of your taxes is effectively "lost" between your wallet and the public services provided to the population.