Seems Dally was bang on the money...

...feel dirty now.

If there ever comes time you need a little advice on reaching mid-life, childless, but wishing to be a more rounded individual, then I'm here to help?

Well, it doesn't take much to find out what some people are really like does it.

I'd love to know what Standee's version of survival of the fittest is, because in the truest sense of the term most of the people he thinks are unworthy of help or even survival would give him a damn good kicking.

Then eaten him

So you believe that I, through no longer striving for monetary wealth, am unambitious and miserable ?

I used to think like you, I was in a fortunate position to control my own income and other than my clients was beholden to no-one, I too thought that anyone who didn't want to earn the loads of cash that I was earning was somehow stupid and couldn't possibly be happy.

With age comes wisdom, I am not living in poverty, my income is above average, my house is in one of the more expensive areas of this city so its a bit hypocritic of me to say that money no longer interests me, but having been on the treadmill and now got off it and lost all of my paper wealth (it was never materially there), I now see that none of it was even remotely as important as I thought it was.

One day you too may be enlightened.



PS - here's the good bit, last Sunday I sat in a beachfront restaurant in the most expensive resort on The Algarve and I spent £50 on a sunday lunch which for me is outrageous - it was worth it though to see the faces of the extremeley wealthy turn up with their families without an appointment to be turned away hungry - there was me stuffing my face with clams and steak and there were the multi-millionaires and their spoiled brats stood with long faces on the pavement, hungry, and probably a little jealous too.

I'd bet he was a difficult toddler.

Who paid for your education?

Have you always paid for all your own medical needs?

Did you pay for the roads that you drive on everyday?

You really are totally deluded about this. Society punishes people like Carr not because he is successful but because he avoids paying tax.

Society punishes people who it sees as greedy, not successful.

If Carr made three times as much as he did but didn't enter into tax avoidance schemes I think you would find no one would bat an eye.

One of the UK's most successful businessmen in recent years was the chap who founded Phones4u, John Caudwell. He began with £1350 and 26 Motorola mobile phones to sell. When sold up a few years back he was worth about a billion and a half. He stated no one ever needs more than £10m to fund an extremely comfortable lifestyle and so set about given the rest of his fortune to charity.

When he ran the company it remained private and the staff were awarded with high wages and good conditions. It made a few million a year profit which no doubt could have been much higher had he adopted the usual stock-market induced mantra of cutting staff costs and driving wages down. He chose not to do that and was content to be merely very well off rather than the next Philip Green.

Why would anyone be jealous of Caudwell? But people are furious with Philip Green because if his legal tax avoidance.

You need to understand the difference between the two types of people described here.

It appears I've been sent a very angry pm for using someones first name. To the relevant poster, I sincerely apologise, Martin.

I am certainly envious of him, I've seen him on TV and he seems like a very well rounded bloke apparently without the religious guilt that haunts a lot of people who suddenly want to give away their fortune under some belief that they can buy favours with a God - he just seems to be a caring person who knows when he is well off and then wants to help others.

Godwins law, lock the thread!

I too lived similarly, I held senior management posts in companies and then worked for myself, often earning £500 per day as a consultant. When I decided to scale back, the worst part was convincing HMC&E (as was) that I was dev-VATing because I was no longer earning above the VAT threshold and didn't need all the aggro that went with it.

I'd spent more than enough time in airports, on aeroplanes and in other countries (business and pleasure), to last anyone more than one lifetime. I was ready to kick back and do just a little more than was required to get by. When I was a guest at Emma's brother's wedding, I sat next to her uncle who heads up the CPS for West Yorkshire. He & his wife were great people and when they asked me what I did, I replied "get pi[is[/ised and go fishing". His wife then asked what I did to be able to afford it and my reply was "just enough to get pi[is[/ised and go fishing". She then turned to her husband and asked him why he couldn't get a job like mine.

It's great knowing that my choice of holiday destination (South Devon) takes me less time to get there than I would require for checking in at an airport. I eat well, I dress in designer and Savile Row bespoke clothes, all bought from charity shops and bootsales.

Would I go back to what I was doing before? Would I bollox

You know, I'm now adicted to charity shop shopping, mainly for "casual" shirts, last sunday I sat in that millionaires restaurant in a baggy cotton shift that looked just like the ones that all the millionaires around me were wearing - except that mine had cost me £3 in a British Heart Foundation shop in Otley, its my favourite shirt now.

I blame you.

Anyway, back on topic(ish)

[iFrankie Boyle ‏@frankieboyle

If you're rich, don't look at it as tax avoidance, look at it as a Childrens hospital buying you a pool table[/i