Good times are back again – if you live off investment income

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As the FT notes this morning:

Investors received a record quarterly payout from UK companies in the three months to June as the gross dividends they paid rose to £25.3bn in the period.

The total was £1.4bn more than the previous record in the third quarter of last year, according to the quarterly dividend study by Capita Registrars. There were two quarters in 2012 in which total dividend payments surpassed £23bn, but otherwise the very large payments occurred before the credit crunch.

Wages have fallen by an average of 9% since the crash of 2008.

Taxes on ordinary people have also risen since 2008 - largely due to VAT rises and fiscal drag on middle incomes. Big business has seen its tax cut from 28% to 20% (soon) over the same period.

And now we're seeing business returns are rising significantly. There's no coincidence in that outcome. George is delivering growth just where he intended it.

And that's the message Labour has to push this week.

But I'm not optimistic. Saying that the small signs of growth in the UK economy are only for the benefit of the best off should not be hard when it is so obviously true. I just hope the message doesn't get lost in the telling.


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