How do you feel about the amount you get paid?

This respondent’s most recent full-time job was working for a hedge fund; he earned 20 times the UK median income and was in the top 0.1%:



To be honest, I have mixed feelings about my earnings. On the one hand it was far too much: I don’t think in general it’s healthy for society to have that kind of income differential. On the other hand, it enabled me to save enough money to stop working at a relatively young age (although only because we maintained a relatively modest lifestyle). If the system is at fault but you end up benefiting from it, what should you do? Hand back your pay-cheque and ask for a smaller one? Give all your money to charity? Should you feel guilty if you win the lottery? Because, in a sense, that’s what we’ve done.

City law firm partner specialising in international tax; annual income around £350k:

Objectively, I’m paid a ludicrously high amount of money. I’m not super-smart and while I work hard, it’s not off-the-scale (plus some of that ‘working hard’ involves eating in expensive restaurants) ... Ultimately, I was just lucky to be slightly smarter than average in subjects that enabled me to go to law school, have supportive (but not well-off) parents who instilled in my brothers and me a love of learning – and I guess I didn’t take the path of least resistance when I could have done. Being white and male probably helped too (I didn’t go to private school).

Partner in a financial consultancy firm; around £250k per annum:

I would hate to be thought of as rich. Of course I am compared to many, but in London, money doesn’t go that far. I have a huge mortgage, no pension and have never flown business class – not even when on business. I don’t spend all my money: as a small business owner, I am always nervous that it might all be over tomorrow. After working for myself for many years, I worry that I am unemployable by anyone else.

Director of a corporate finance firm; earns about £160k per year:



I dislike the impression that everyone within the 1% bracket (which in terms of earnings is extremely broad) is a tax-evader, is hiding assets somewhere, has inherited wealth, and cares nothing for the rest of society. Some of us do care, do try to give back in terms of time and expertise (I am an unpaid trustee of a national children’s charity), don’t take significant steps to reduce our tax bills, hang out with normal people in normal jobs – and even vote Labour.

Works for FTSE 250 engineering company; more than £300k pa:

Compared to the rest of society (both UK and globally), I feel embarrassed by how much I earn – it is far more than anyone actually needs. However, compared to those in the financial and professional services markets, I feel undervalued. For investment bankers, private equity partners and hedge fund managers to work on a percentage of investment value is completely screwing the whole pay-scale system, and is vastly overvaluing their contribution. There is a lot more luck, chance and effort on the part of other people (eg those working in the businesses they invest in) involved in their success than they are prepared to admit.



Internal audit director; between £150k and £200k per year:



I think a key issue here is age. An individual retiring today on £70k may well live in a house they fully own worth £1 million that they purchased 25 years ago. Their final salary pension fund might pay £40k a year for the rest of their life. For a 40-year-old today to purchase a similar house and retire on a similar sum, the required income is far higher. But I fear the government would rather tax a 40-year-old banker earning through her wits than a pensioner who was born at the right time.

Former director of recruitment company; income £150-300k pa:



Articles which focus on the 1% inevitably direct scorn on that group (sometimes fairly). But the difference between the 1% and the 0.1% is so great as to make them incomparable. Having said that, I have two fundamental concerns with the 1%. Firstly, though I am a meritocrat and don’t believe in equality, I believe strongly that there should be equality of opportunity – yet in my experience, privately educated individuals seem to dominate this group. Secondly, the 1% cannot live in independent isolation indefinitely and, sooner or later, what is bad for society will be bad for them. Perhaps nurses, bin men, teachers, hedge fund managers and private equity partners should all take a six-month sabbatical, and let’s see who we miss most.

Financial trading manager, £2-3 million pa:

What really makes people unhappy is being paid ‘less than last year’, no matter how well the company did or didn’t do. This leads to tears in the office. A lot of time is devoted by staff to shoring up their position relating to end-of-year bonuses – and complaining they need more. Much of this is ignored by management, but people do it anyway.



Do you think you pay the right amount of tax?

Works in City of London; annual income somewhere over £200,000:

I think I should be taxed much more – maybe there are lots of other well-paid people who feel the same? Highly paid people will regularly trot out the line that higher taxes lead to a lower tax-take due to evasion, but I think we all have a moral obligation to pay more in taxes when we are earning so much. What particularly aggravates me is heads of business getting massive bonuses for poor performance. I thought Jeremy Corbyn’s idea to have a multiple between the lowest and highest earners in a company made a lot of sense – but turkeys are not going to vote for Christmas.

Partner in a major US law firm; generally earns between £500k and £600k pa:

In the current economic climate, I should probably pay more tax. I’d be willing to pay more, too – up to a point. For income tax, anything over 50% – where the government takes more than I keep – becomes frustrating. It’s no surprise that studies in the US and the UK show this is where tax receipts begin to fall, as people begin to think more creatively about mitigating tax.



Head of engineering, but income also comes from rental property; cleared over £200k in last 12 months:

In terms of fairness, I should most certainly pay more. I’d happily pay more tax to fund education and healthcare. But in reality, I would worry that if I did pay more, much of it would funnel back out to private consultants and military contractors.



Data scientist; between £150k and £200k a year:



I pay what I am legally obliged, so it is the right amount. We live in a democracy, and we have the system which our political mechanism produces. I don’t enjoy paying taxes, but I understand that they are part of the social contract. I don’t like the implicit tone in this context that ‘rich’ people should pay more based on a notion of social justice. It implies poorer people are victims, and the rich are oppressors, which I believe is untrue and an unhelpful narrative. More should be done helping people understand the benefits of the social contract, as opposed to creating divides amongst people based on income.

Partner in a major acccounting/consultancy firm; circa £700k pa:

The conversation about inequality usually moves on to taxation, but this is nonsense. We already pay considerably more tax on our earnings because tax is applied as a percentage: the more you earn, the more you pay. In one year I paid more than £1million to the HMRC; I can assure you when you pay that much, you find yourself looking closely at what you’re getting for the money (police, NHS, bin collections etc). I often wonder how many low earners would feel so generous (in calling for higher taxes) if it were their money being collected.



Marketing consultant; £180-250k per year:

My question is not so much about how much tax I’m paying, as how little others who earn multiples of what I earn are paying. I’ve never sought to benefit from taxation avoidance ‘schemes’, and wouldn’t do so. To people who claim such schemes are just common sense, I say that everyone benefits from a stable and fair society, so rigging it in your favour is ultimately against your own interests.

What changes would you make to the current tax system?

Works in investment management; £200-800k:



To my mind, when the HMRC gets more of what I am paid than I do (including my employer’s NI contributions), there is a problem. But there is one area where I would support an increase in tax: the policies pursued by governments (Labour, coalition and Conservative) and the Bank of England since 2008 (ie. deficits, bank bailouts, virtually-zero interest rates and quantitative easing) have created a massive windfall gain for those of us with assets. House prices have rocketed, share prices are up, and don’t forget the value of all those final salary pensions that have exploded upwards. For those without assets, there has been no gain; just the socialisation of debt as the government borrows more and more. There is a very strong case for a ONE-OFF windfall tax on those gains: say, 10% of all wealth over £25,000. (It also needs to cover trusts so that Dave and George, among others, pay their fair share.)



Sales director; £175k-£225k:



I feel I should pay more tax than I do, but I worry about the focus on income vs assets. Income is how people who grew up working class (like me) become more wealthy; assets are how the rich stay rich - it’s the heart of social mobility. I could pay more tax on what I earn, and if that’s spent on healthcare, education, social services etc, then great. But it’s going to do very little to address the inequality in Britain because the wealthiest people make their money through investing their existing wealth vs their income. If the Labour leadership wants to make everyone to pay what they can afford, they should be looking at capital gains, dividend and inheritance tax.

Training consultant to the investment banking industry; £150,000 a year:

Those with conservative politics will say they they have paid their income tax, so shouldn’t be taxed again when they pass wealth they hold on to their children. I think this is fundamentally wrong, and death taxes should be close to 100%. It’s wrong that dynasties can grow over generations. The gap between rich and poor is growing at an alarming rate, and it is a moral imperative that we distribute wealth more fairly, while still allowing society’s most talented, hard working and useful people to enjoy the benefits of their work in their own lifetimes.

Corporate lawyer; low- to mid-£300k:



I don’t think I pay enough. In both England and Australia, as my income has risen over the last 20 years, it feels like the top marginal tax rates and capital gains tax rates have been constantly moving in the other direction. It’s like getting two pay rises at once. Capital gains tax in particular is an outrage. Also, I am technically a non-dom, although I have never claimed any benefits as a result. I don’t understand why this designation even exists. I live here, I vote here, I use our services and I became a citizen long ago, yet if I wanted to I could keep money offshore and legally avoid tax on it. This is ridiculous.

Works in financial technology; about £180k:

There is too much conflation of income inequality and wealth inequality. The top 1% of income earners and the top 1% of wealthy people are likely two entirely different groups of people. There is too much policy focus on the former and virtually none on the latter. In the UK, if you have a lot of wealth, and very little income, you will pay hardly any tax. (When I lived in the US, everyone paid about 3% of their assessed real property value to the state annually, yet no one even talks about a land value tax in the UK.) The only real wealth tax in the UK is the inheritance tax, and that can be easily swerved.

Works for engineering company; more than £300k:



I used to live in mainland Europe, and paid 55% as a top rate on all earnings above €35k. Because everybody was doing it I didn’t resent it, and it meant public services ran well, and the public environment was safer, cleaner and more pleasant. I think we should see tax rates increase more in line with earnings, and even get to 75-80% at the highest end. We should do this deliberately to stop greedy/purely money-motivated people getting to the top of our businesses and organisations. We need to stop having a society that is so myopically dominated by the pursuit of wealth – it is bad for our mental health.

Do you worry about what you earn in relation to, say, doctors or teachers?

IT manager; around £190k:



Yes – the market system is failing: we cannot attract doctors, teachers and nurses into the roles we need, and I think a contributing factor to this (other than the strain of the jobs themselves) is that we cannot compensate them comparably to other professions in the private sector. While I have paid plenty of tax to fund such professions, I do not think that matches the contribution I might have made to society if I was working in one of those sectors directly. If less money was on offer in finance, there would be many more technologists, biologists, physicists and mathematicians working in other sectors.

Data scientist; between £150 and £200k a year:



No. They choose their professions, I choose mine. They choose to be partly rewarded by social plaudits, kudos and goodwill as part of their pay package. Should they get paid more? Not in our ever-increasingly free-market framework. If we were more socialist then they would do, but we are not.

Works in investment management; when full-time, anywhere in the £200-800k range:



No, I don’t – certainly not when you look what it would really cost to buy their pension benefits. A £50k pension (not typical, but not uncommon for senior doctors and teachers), fully inflation-proofed, with spouse’s benefits taken at age 55, is ‘officially’ only worth £1,000,000 – ie the new lifetime limit. Yet the Money Advice Service website’s annuity quote tool says £1,000,000 would only buy a similar pension of just over £18k. So that £50k pension would actually cost me about £2.75m to buy. The income gap isn’t as big as it looks – particularly after tax and pension benefits are taken into account.

Head of engineering; over £200k:

Absolutely: their work is far more important than mine. I find it mindblowing that doctors and teachers are so underpaid, and it honestly surprises me that I don’t see more visceral anger over it. There’s certainly no direct link between hard work and pay, otherwise teachers and nurses would be billionaires and inheritance would count for nothing. But I also don’t feel like I can do a lot to fix it when a lot of poorer people are voting and acting directly, provably, against their own financial interests.

Internal audit director; income between £150k and £200k per year:

Yes – and I don’t really understand why medicine is a popular career choice. Being a GP in particular strikes me as a gruelling and lonely occupation, overburdened with administration and the threat of complaints. One of the massive advantages of doing a job which sounds boring and involves numbers is that employers go out of their way to make it appealing – both in terms of the work and the pay.

Does the wealth of the ‘super-rich’ motivate you to work harder?

Sales director for a start-up in London; £175k-£225k:

Yes, but I think it’s important to define ‘super-rich’. For me, the super-rich are those who have enough assets to not need to work to support themselves and their families. ‘Wealth’ is absolutely not income, it’s assets, which I think is such an important distinction which has been missed by the Labour leadership. There is a tier of society that’s becoming a new aristocracy, where inherited wealth means people grow up with the best education, best healthcare, best chance to get the best jobs etc, because their family is wealthy enough to pay for these things.

Financial trading manager, £2-3 million:

It’s almost totally irrelevant to me. I know there are super-rich people (clients, not bankers); my children mix with theirs at school (private day school in London). I was very worried about this, but thank my luck that my own children see their displays of wealth (expensive watches at school, private-jet holidays) as a bit silly – although they would still go on the holidays.

Barrister earning around £150k per year:

The problem is that the top 1% includes people like me, who work very hard and are relatively well paid but are absolutely not ‘rich’, and also those with vast wealth. The NHS in our area is horrendously overstretched and our local schools are poor, so by the time you pay for multiple sets of school fees for your children and private healthcare, plus you are taxed at the top rate, you are contributing a lot to the public purse but taking very little out of it. Instead of treating people in that position with hostility and lumping them in with the ‘rich’, it would be refreshing to have it acknowledged that people like us are paying for public services that we don’t use, but that a lot of other people are totally dependent on.

Are you a member of the 1%? If you’d like to be interviewed about your views on income, wealth and inequality, email us at inequality.project@theguardian.com