Step line graph showing gross income versus marginal tax rate for the rest of the UK with child benefit in 2023-24: Marginal tax rates begin at 0% below the personal allowance threshold of around £12,570, then step up to 30%, before spiking to around 71% between £50,000 and £60,000 as child benefit is clawed back. Above £60,000 the rate drops back to 42%, rises to 62% between £100,000 and £125,140 due to the withdrawal of the personal allowance, and sits at 47% thereafter. Title: Gross income vs marginal tax rate, rUK and Scotland Logo: TAX POLICY ASSOCIATES Y-axis: Marginal Tax Rate (%) [ranging from 0 to 90 at intervals of 10] X-axis: Gross Income (£) [ranging from 0 to 160k at intervals of 20k] Legend: - rUK 2023-24 - rUK 2023-24 w/ child benefit [active line shown in chart] - rUK 2023-24 w/ child benefit and student loans - rUK 2024-25 - rUK 2024-25 w/ child benefit - rUK 2024-25 w/ child benefit and student loans - Scot 2023-24 - Scot 2023-24 w/ child benefit - Scot 2023-24 w/ child benefit and student loans - Scot 2024-25 - Scot 2024-25 w/ child benefit - Scot 2024-25 w/ child benefit and student loans Plotted data series (rUK 2023-24 w/ child benefit): - £0 to ~£12,570: 0% - ~£12,570 to £50,000: 30% - £50,000 to £60,000: ~71% (with a brief spike to ~59% at £50,000) - £60,000 to £100,000: 42% - £100,000 to ~£125,140: 62% - Above ~£125,140 to £160,000: 47%

Interactive marginal tax rate chart – June 2024

InfographicsMarginal Rates
10 March 2024

12 Comments

This interactive chart lets you see the current rUK and Scottish marginal tax rates for 2023/24 and 2024/25, with/without child benefit and student loans. You can turn on/off different years and options by clicking on the legend below the chart. Some of these charts won’t work well on mobile; you can see static versions here.

This interactive chart plots the same data, but gross income vs net income:

Finally, this chart again plots gross vs net income, but adds in the effect of the marriage allowance and a £20k childcare subsidy:

Methodology

The calculations are performed by the python script and rate data on our github here. The key assumptions/caveats are:

    • Income tax/NI as for tax year 2023/24 and 2024/25 in the UK and Scotland (but applying the September 2023 national insurance change as if it applied for the whole of 23/24)
    • One earner in a household, who is over 21 and not an apprentice, not a veteran, and under the state pension age
    • Ignores benefits aside from child benefit (although benefits are notorious for creating very high marginal rates – not, however, an area where I and our team have expertise). Child benefit assumes three children (you can freely change that in the code).
    • Doesn’t include tapering of pensions annual allowance (starting at £240k)

Do please send us any corrections, additions or comments.

Further reading

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The Scottish Budget was on 13 January 2026. The flagship policy is being widely reported as a cut in income tax for low earners,…
Line graph from the Tax Policy Associates tax calculator showing UK marginal tax rate against gross employment income for 2025-26: The marginal tax rate is 0% below the personal allowance (around £12,570), rising to 28% up to £50,270, then 42% up to £100,000. It spikes to 62% between £100,000 and £125,140 due to the withdrawal of the personal allowance, before falling back to 47% on income above £125,140. Tax calculator and marginal rates TAX POLICY ASSOCIATES Chart type: Marginal rate Tax rules for: 2025-26 UK [Flip] Compare against: None No. of children: 0 Childcare subsidy: £0 [ ] Student Loan [ ] Marriage Allowance Gross employment income vs marginal tax rate Y-axis: Marginal tax rate (0%, 10%, 20%, 30%, 40%, 50%, 60%, 70%, 80%, 90%) X-axis: Gross employment income (£0, £20k, £40k, £60k, £80k, £100k, £120k, £140k, £160k, £180k) Data series (Marginal tax rate by income band): £0 to ~£12,570: 0% ~£12,570 to ~£50,270: 28% ~£50,270 to £100,000: 42% £100,000 to ~£125,140: 62% ~£125,140 to £180,000+: 47% Your gross income (£) [e.g. 55,000] [Apply] [Employed]

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12 responses to “Interactive marginal tax rate chart – June 2024”

  1. MarvinParanoidAndroid avatar
    MarvinParanoidAndroid

    Would it be possible to show r/UK 2024/25 with just student loans, excluding child benefit. Birth rates among graduates are lower, and typically only give birth around 32/33 years old.

    I would also be curious to factor in student loan repayments for bachelors and masters loans.

    Reply
  2. Stephen Senn avatar
    Stephen Senn

    Interesting but the terminology is strange. Usually one talks of plotting Y (vertical axis) versus X (horizontal axis). However, your plot titles all seem to be the other way around.

    Also, I understand that the marginal rate of tax goes up and then eventually down but that the net income graph does so seems strange to me. Is there a bug in the program?

    Reply
  3. Matthew avatar
    Matthew

    I wrote a marginal rate graph/tax calculator here: https://marginalrates.uk/ I include Universal Credit, which has a big impact on the numbers (considering that you can be eligible for UC with incomes > £100k – there is no cap).

    Reply
  4. NomadicBacon avatar
    NomadicBacon

    I twigged the various problems with having children a few years ago. My wife and I had six – consciously. We’ve largely never received any benefits bar a short period of being out of work when I got working tax credit and child tax credit. We did for a time get child benefit for all of them. My conclusion is this country hates domestic born and raised hard working people who also want to raise children (guys, if you don’t know the maths, we need to have an 2.4 per family to sustain the population – so 3 should be the aspiration for all families). We twigged we couldn’t afford childcare, so my wife was a stay-at-home mum, but that comes at such a price. When I did the maths, the sweet spot for discretionary income and an easy life was for both parents to earn about £20k each, and then you got free prescriptions, childcare, school meals, gifted and talented programmes, dental care, discounted council tax and more. However if you are a working dad earning say £45k, you get higher rate taxes and super aggressive tapers. Another kick in the balls is the way student finance works and they get penalised at university – I can’t afford to give them money because there are so many – and the loans are paltry because I earn over £60k. I realise all of this has changed now, and my youngest is 17 and getting ready for university – but it would be really useful to include all of the benefits and tapers and show the discretionary income for married, living together and single parents and how the ages and educational stages play an effect. It’s felt like this country hates parents who are middle class and who will raise the next generation of net tax payers and is doing its very best to wipe out the middle classes and reward the feckless and forlorn. The chinese study of twins separated at birth where one child is sent to a completely different family or culture or country shows that nature is actually the strongest determinant of long term outcomes and you end up ultimately where you will end up. These policies may be why the national IQ score is actually falling, as it’s now too expensive for smart people to have the 3 children, and these graphs show why.

    Reply
  5. RL avatar
    RL

    Would be fantastic if we could enter how many children we’re claiming child benefit for… we have 5 kids so that is a considerable marginal tax rate over £60k this year !

    Reply
    1. Dan avatar
      Dan

      thanks – I’d love to improve the code to allow this sort of thing!

      Reply
  6. Ashley avatar
    Ashley

    Would be great if you could include with student loans without child benefit in the future

    Reply
  7. George avatar
    George

    thanks. Is there any easy way to see the breakdown of the numbers e.g. the 70% at 120K? I don’t get the child benefit bit. Cheers

    Reply
  8. Charles avatar
    Charles

    Why is student loans only ever an option in combination with child benefit? Could you add the option for student loans only, no kids? And how many kids is the ‘child benefit’ option assuming?

    Reply
  9. Tigs avatar
    Tigs

    Thanks Dan. I find the precision of the numbers shown on the gross vs net income charts a bit strange (thousands to five decimal places). It might be worth adding something like the following at the end of your go.Scatter() in row 210: , hovertemplate=’£%{y:,.0f}’

    Reply
    1. Dan avatar
      Dan

      great point – thank you! Have updated the charts and code.

      Reply
  10. matthew avatar
    matthew

    I would exclude the effect of the mandatory legal minimum pension contribution, which slightly reduces the marginal rates.

    I think the effect of withdrawal of benefits on marginal rates is more significant in aggregate and creates much stronger incentives not to work, or to pursue untaxed ‘side hustles’, rather than take on additional hours.

    Reply

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