I think its because I was buying a big value item that the tax rate slapped me around the face
Before I bought that and listening about how under invested our services are these days I was wondering why we couldnt all be taxed 1% more and that would solve a lot of the immediate cost crisis. Then seeing the 20% VAT I got to wondering what happened with the additional money they raised when they increased VAT by 2.5% ? It seems to have vanished down a black hole.
It's sad that the governments of all parties seem to be selling the silver to pay debts off, or selling industries to private companies, so there are less and less ways for the government to make money. It all seems to rest now on taxing us. It's no wonder our taxes are increasing, and will continue to do I think.
The government needs to start investing in some kind of profitable nationalisation, so they can make the products (creating jobs), and sell the products to make profit.
On an aside note, I wonder how BT would have progressed if it was still nationalised? There was obvious profit there because of the amount BT get (they are making so much profit they can afford to be buying tv sports rights). All that money could have been going back in to the country and taken the tax burden off us. Though on the flip side, I'm not sure if broadband would have progressed at the rate it is doing now, or better or worse.