Macintosh UK Tax Freedom Day Clock
Mac Widget Released
John Gaver
February 23, 2009
Today, ActionAmerica.org released a version of it's popular Tax Freedom Day Clock in the form of a Macintosh Dashboard Widget, designed to be used by United Kingdom taxpayers.
The UK Tax Freedom Day means the same thing to British taxpayers, that the US Tax Freedom Day means to US taxpayers, in that it is the day on which average British taxpayers have finally worked long enough to pay their taxes for that year. The UK Tax Freedom Clock Widget 2.0 (2008) counts the time till or since UK Tax Freedom Day. (The "2008" in the version number represents the tax year of the information on the back side of the widget. Each year's date, used in the widget's calculation, is updated automatically, from the web.)
The date for each year's UK Tax Freedom Day is calculated by the Adam Smith Institute, using government supplied data. They have only recently begun to publish enough data for us to calculate the exact time of UK Tax Freedom, as we do with US Tax Freedom Day. This allows us to have the widget count down to the exact time of Tax Freedom, rather than just to midnight of UK Tax Freedom Day, as it did in the past.
Like the UK Tax Freedom Day Clock that appears just above the title of this article, the UK Tax Freedom Clock Widget counts down to UK Tax Freedom Day, in months, days, hours, minutes and seconds. After UK Tax Freedom Day passes, the widget counts how long Brits have been working for themselves, since that time.
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Snapshot of the UK Tax Freedom Day Clock Widget Click image to download v2.0 (2008). |
The front side of the widget is designed to take up very little screen real estate, while displaying the time till or since UK Tax Freedom, of the most recent year. The reverse side of the widget expands slightly, to display a scrollable description of the widget and the source of the calculations that went into the widget. The back side also contains links to pages containing more such data. To save CPU cycles, the widget observes the standard of going idle, when Dashboard is closed.
There was no version 1 of this widget. It begins with version 2.0, in order to remain consistent with the US Tax Freedom Clock Widget v2.0, from which this widget was drawn. Version 2.0 of both Tax Freedom Clock Widgets, added functionality to each widget that will allow it to update each year's Tax Freedom Day from the internet. This will eliminate the need to download a new version of the widget each year.
The widget reads the most recent UK Tax Freedom Day from the internet, only when the widget starts up or when the Dashboard opens. So, if the Tax Freedom Day Clock is displaying, when the new Tax Freedom Day is posted, the widget will not be updated with the new Tax Freedom Day, until the next time you open the Dashboard.
As noted above, it is not necessary to download the latest widget each year.
For more information on Tax Freedom Day, see our article, The Tax Freedom Day Clock 2009.
For more information on how punitive taxes adversely affect us all, see our very popular annual article, The Economy Bomb - Ticking Down Faster. Although that article was written with US taxpayers in mind, most of it applies to UK taxpayers, as well. In fact, since British taxpayers suffer under much more punitive taxes than even US taxpayers, some of that article applies more to UK taxpayers than US taxpayers.
Installation: Mac OS X 10.4 Tiger or later is required. If you’re using Safari, click the download link. When the widget download is complete, show Dashboard, click the Plus sign to display the Widget Bar and click the widget’s icon in the Widget Bar to open it. If you’re using a browser other than Safari, click the download link. When the widget download is complete, unarchive it and place it in /Library/Widgets/ in your home folder, show Dashboard, click the Plus sign to display the Widget Bar and click the widget’s icon in the Widget Bar to open it.
Copyright 2019 John Gaver
All rights reserved
See related articles and supporting documents:
1986-2008 IRS Collections Data by Income Category
Obama agenda drives record expatriation
Tick - Tick - Tick / The Economy Bomb
Tax Freedom Day Builds Case for FairTax
US Tax Freedom Day Clock Web Widget
UK Tax Freedom Day Clock Web Widget
US Tax Freedom Day Clock
US Tax Freedom Day Clock Widget (for Mac)
UK Tax Freedom Day Clock Widget (for Mac)
The Privacy Factor
More Attacks on the Wealthy
US Taxpatriates List
2000 Statistical Yearbook of the Immigration & Naturalization Service (6.2mb PDF)
2003 World Wealth Report (Press Release)
American Citizens Residing Abroad (US Bureau of Consular Affairs)
Health Insurance Portability & Accountability Act of 1996 (26 USC 877(a)(1))
Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act of 1996 (8 USC 1182(a)(10)(E))
Heroes Earnings Assistance & Relief Tax Act (Public Law 110-245) (8 USC 1182(a)(10)(E))
The Economic Impact of Replacing Federal Income Taxes
with a Sales Tax (CATO)
Fair Tax Act of 2011 (H.R. 25)
Americans for Fair Taxation
National Retail Sales Tax Alliance
Recommended Books:
The Rich Don't Pay Tax …Or Do They?
The Fair Tax Book
Fair Tax: The Truth
How to Hide Your A$$et$ and Disappear
Escape From America
See Expatriate sites:
The Sovereign Society
Escape Artist
Expat World
Second Passports
Contact your Congressman here.
