In the November budget, chancellor Rachel Reeves announced a mansion tax on properties worth £2m or more. And the Telegraph has been up in arms ever since in a sob story that, judging by Facebook comments, most people find utterly hilarious.

The mansion tax

From 2028, owners of properties valued between £2m and £2.5m will have to pay additional council tax of £2,500 per year. But there are different thresholds. Owners of properties valued at £5m plus will have to pay £7,500.

The policy is projected to rebalance the economy by £400m per year. This isn’t much, but demonstrates that Labour is feeling the pressure from the Greens.

The meltdown

The Telegraph‘s meltdown started two weeks ago, with the claim that the mansion tax had “ruined” a man’s retirement. And people on social media were quick to bring out a microscopic violin:

Has he considered cutting back on his coffees or cancelling his Netflix?

It looks like the patronising frugalness the rich demand of less well off people is being turned on its head. In a similar vein, a further person asked:

Maybe if he just works a little bit harder?

Meanwhile, another social media user pointed out:

Love that he is wearing an Aston Martin vest for his photo

Imagine selling various properties, along with owning a £2.5m home and thinking you’re hard done by. Well enter the subject of the Telegraph article:

I’ve got some money in savings, but I don’t have a big pension – I put all my money into property…. So I’ve been buying houses, working on them over a few years and selling them. Essentially, I’ve used my house as my pension.

My property was worth £3m, but it’s probably around £2.5m now. I think the value of my home has come down by 15pc in the last year and a half – since Labour took power. I already paid a significant amount of stamp duty when I bought it in 2016. And now I’m going to get caught up in the council tax surcharge.

Funny stuff. Another Telegraph piece has the title:

Asset-rich, cash-poor Britons trapped in Rachel Reeves’s mansion tax ‘nightmare’

Obviously it’s not the millions of people on low-paid work that’s the issue. It’s the “asset-rich” who have it hard. Fortunately, the Telegraph is here to save the day with a further piece, titled:

Five ways to avoid the mansion tax without selling up

Real solutions to housing

The actual solution to the housing crisis is to stop treating homes like assets altogether. Instead, housing should be treated as a necessity and delivered at cost price by the state for people to own their own homes. This would pop the housing bubble. The Greens have some policies in this direction, with their move towards banning landlords. But state-issued home ownership is a better approach than the state landlordism of council housing.

Labour’s mansion tax, meanwhile, is a welcome however-piecemeal-concession. And the corporate media reaction is hilarious.

Featured image via the Telegraph

By James Wright

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