Just how rich someone on £150k pa is ...

Well, I've seen the threats about a brain drain and driving away the financially very successful. And it may be true. But apparently polls show that most Brits seem to support a 50p tax rate for earnings over 150k. And the reason we've heard the downsides first may not be hard to find: "Highly paid editors and proprietors do not much like the idea of being hit in the wallet, and will seek to convince readers that the move is a dangerous one. But there is also a more general failure on the part of the elite to grasp just how exceptionally rich someone on £150,000 - the new rate's threshold - really is."
Quite, and if you need more convincing, just look at the rest of the article. Remember the typical in UK is £16k. The real difficulty is that at 1%, the numbers earning £150k-plus are not great and the revenue is likely to be small (and perhaps shrinking if the 'brain drain' predictions are right). But let's recall that there is a moral case for progressive taxation. Part of that case is that it builds infrastructure that all benefit from, including the wealthy. Another part of the case is the research that shows more equal societies are happier. Another dimension is that by helping the poorer members of society there is a degree of enlightened self-interest for the rich: it helps reduce crime and envy on the one hand and to help make sure that the guilt/yuck factor of having to drive through squalor and deal with smelly people is reduced ;)
Budget 2009: Alistair Darling's 50p tax for high earners 'welcomed' | UK news | The Guardian: