What does simplifying National Insurance mean in practice?

KEY POINTS

• The raising of the upper earnings limit will raise more than £5bn from National Insurance contributions by 2021.
• Some measures were not costed in the autumn statement.
• Class 1 simplification has been dropped.
• Class 2 abolition in 2018 will disadvantage some minorities.
• Class 3 rules are to be re-written to bring in some short-term benefit cover.
• Evidently ‘simplification’ has been re-defined.

Okay chaps so here’s the plan: we fix National Insurance contribution rates for five years then we expand the base fragment the published information and no one will ever notice the NIC take. Or am I being cynical?

Nobody understands National Insurance contributions (NICs). This is supported by soundings by the Office of Tax Simplification (OTS) among...