Fiscal Facts contains facts and figures about UK taxes, benefits, the public finances and trends in inequality and poverty.

• The tax and benefit tables give current and historical rates and thresholds for the main direct and indirect taxes, as well as benefit rates, numbers of claimants and expenditure levels. Two briefing notes describe the UK tax and benefit systems respectively.
• We give public finance information for the UK and some comparative figures for OECD countries. Briefing notes in this section survey public spending in the UK and local government spending. A new note in September 2009 looks at possible areas for spending cuts.
• Figures relating to various measures of inequality and poverty in the UK over time. These are accompanied by briefing notes about aspects of poverty, inequality and well-being.

This table shows tax measures introduced in each Budget and PBR (since 1979).

This work is funded by the ESRC Centre for the Microeconomic Analysis of Public Policy at IFS. Any comments on these pages should be directed to the contacts named on the right.