so because I worked up to having my children and my husband worked 14 hr days and we paid taxes etc we should not be allowed child benefit or a pension??? but if i go on benefits from when i leave school(if i even bother going to school) or i arrive in this country uninvited i am entitled to claim benefits paid for by the taxes taken from people who worked all their lives in this country??? b*llsh*t
I agree re the child benefit and pensions. My husband an I have worked hard all our lives to make a good standad of living before we even thought about having a child. I've also chosen to only have one child so I know i can afford to support him fully without any handouts. We've paid in much more than we've even taken out of the system so why the hell shouldn't we get back even a tiny amount? I mean, child benefit and the state pension are hardly enough to keep you in the life of luxury.
Living costs in this country are ridiculous as well. If it was possible to reduce them by say 25% then the level of pensions and benefits could also be reduced by 25% saving around £40 Billion P/A.
How..?
The largest single cost is housing, so really house prices need to be allowed to fall back to a sensible level and also more social housing needs to be built so rents aren't being kept artificially high by Housing Benefits subsidised private tenants.
Council Tax could be cut by reducing excessive maintenance like cutting grass/weed spraying every 6 months instead of 3 months.
Food costs could be reduced by creating large communal allotments where those out of work etc and volunteers could grow cheap food for local consumption, sold by local not for profit Co-Op type shops.
why the hell shouldn't we get back even a tiny amount? I mean, child benefit and the state pension are hardly enough to keep you in the life of luxury.
No-one has suggested that you shouldn't get child benefit and a state pension.
As far as I can see, the only income figure mentioned so far is £150,000. Is your wage/pension that much a year? If it is, then you don't need a state pension on top of it, or child benefit.
Living costs in this country are ridiculous as well. If it was possible to reduce them by say 25% then the level of pensions and benefits could also be reduced by 25%.
Housing costs are the problem - an average house costs six times average wages. How is that sustainable when banks only afford to grant 3 times salary mortgages.
I agree re the child benefit and pensions. My husband an I have worked hard all our lives to make a good standad of living before we even thought about having a child. I've also chosen to only have one child so I know i can afford to support him fully without any handouts. We've paid in much more than we've even taken out of the system so why the hell shouldn't we get back even a tiny amount? I mean, child benefit and the state pension are hardly enough to keep you in the life of luxury.
It comes back to the benefits problem. Taxes are very high to pay for the huge benefits culture we have in the UK. ^ Million odd are dependent for all their income on benefits. Less then a Million of them should be on benefits. It typically costs £30,000 to keep each of them on benefits.
Workout how many people on an average wage is it going to keep each of them. You are probably looking at about 8 tax payers to pay to keep one person on benefits.
I think Child Benefit should only be paid for 1 year. That provides some additional money to cover the costs when a child is born after that it should be up to the parents to provide for the child.
As for Pensions the real problem is the goverment have not properly funded them and what money has been paid in is often used for other purposes.
We should have a proper state pension scheme which is also simple to understand. It should say pay 50% of someone Basic Salary. It could be funded by the goverment putiing in 5%, companies putting in 5% and the employee putting in 5%. There could be an option to pay in more to take it up to two thirds
At the moment we have the situation where people no longer save for pensions. This has occured since Browns infamous raid on them. So we have more people dependent on the unfunded goverment scheme which is intended to only provide a very basic pension which provides for no luxaries at all.
Housing costs are the problem - an average house costs six times average wages. How is that sustainable when banks only afford to grant 3 times salary mortgages.
The governement seems to love high house prices though. I think average prices need to drop below £150,000 and stay there for a good few years.
I also think buy to let and second home ownership needs to be curbed and more social housing needs to be built to drive down rents.
The obsession with having purer and purer sea water needs to end so water rates can be reduced. We need more home/community power generation so electric bills can be reduced and the TV licence fee needs to be halved so the BBC just sticks to its core tasks of News and other public service broadcasting.
Housing costs are the problem - an average house costs six times average wages. How is that sustainable when banks only afford to grant 3 times salary mortgages.
You sure about that? I thought the big idea was that we'd just be able to sell our £1.5 million two-bed flats in 20 years time :eek:
Less then a Million of them should be on benefits. It typically costs £30,000 to keep each of them on benefits.
What complete and utter rubbish. Like most of your posts it's made up unsupported twaddle which is completely biased against anyone below pension age. :rolleyes:
A few examples:
A typical person on JSA in an average priced 1 bedroomed flat gets:
£60 JSA + £75 HB + 15 CTB = £7800 P/A
A typical person on Incapacity Benefit gets:
£105 IB + £65 HB (they don't get all their rent paid) + £12 CTB (they pay some council tax) = £9464 P/A
The only people that get more than that are the severely disabled and people with kids and many will get substantially less.
^ But what you are saying there does not support what you are apparently suggesting - that people are content to fester on the dole. I am sure some are, but there are loads of people out there who are very keen to work, but the system makes it impossible. Personally, I don't think the problem is that benefits are too high. Reducing benefits will only cause misery. The problem is that rents (and property prices) are too high - the result, in my opinion, of inequality in society.
To get back on-topic, the solution to the problem is to raise income tax, not reduce benefits...
If you raise income tax then the incentive to work will be even less as net income will be even lower.
Benefits must be reduced to make it more attractive to work than not. When this is suggested the outcry is that "I cannot afford the rent", food etc. when really it means I won't be able to afford my flat screen telly of designer clothes or the latest mobile phone. All the while people can have all these "luxuries" and not need to work then the problem will continue.
The whole benefits system is a complete shambles. Some people milk it to the hilt and can live quite happily without ever having to work. Some struggle to keep their heads above water. The system is so complicated that there are apparently large numbers of people who are not claiming their full entitlement.
The difference between benefit payments and wages is so low as to make it impossible for some people to come off benefits. This isn't a new problem as I can remember 40 years ago someone in the local DSS refusing a job on shifts at Michelin which was one of the highest paid jobs around because he worked out that by the time he had factored in his busfares, dinner money etc he would only be £1 per week better off. That problem will never go away because people will always look at the difference between the wage they will be getting and what they will lose in benefits. Nowadays the gap is even harder to justify when you include things like housing/eyetests/dentist/prescriptions/utility/rates etc some of which are either subsidised or free when you are on benefits.
Raising the minimum wage will only hit the biggest tax payers again plus it will put retail/service prices up too.
There is no quick solution to the mess we are in imo.
Housing prices are out of control
Rents are out of control
Immigration is out of control
Law and order is out of control
Benefits are out of control
Our supposed leaders are out of control
Sorry I give up on this thread. It's raising my blood pressure.
I also think it does come down to educating people to think that being in work and earning your own money is a way of improving yourself. Ok, it may seem hard to start on a low salary and be no better off than on benefits but your money will get better and your life chances are improved by working.
Tbh, I was bought up with that mentality and it's totally beyond my understanding how people are happy not to work. If I lost my job tomorrow, I wouldn't stop until I found another one, even if it was lower paid to tide me over. I honestly hope I go to my grave never having settled for being on benefits.
The solution is the reduce the cost of living, then you can reduce welfare payments and state pensions in line and also enable us to become more competitive with places like China by making lower wages more viable, particularly in the public sector..
As already mentioned it needs to start with the government pursuing policies that result in cheaper housing, cheaper home grown food, cheaper council tax and cheaper power and water bills.
The solution is the reduce the cost of living, then you can reduce welfare payments and state pensions in line and also enable us to become more competitive with places like China by making lower wages more viable, particularly in the public sector..
As already mentioned it needs to start with the government pursuing policies that result in cheaper housing, cheaper home grown food, cheaper council tax and cheaper power and water bills.
Discourage buy to let and second home ownership in order to drive down house prices. Build more social housing to drive down rents, reduce targets for water companies to reduce water bills. Community allotments for cheap home grown food manned by the unemployed and volunteers, community electricity generation to drive down electricity bills.
Discourage buy to let and second home ownership in order to drive down house prices. Build more social housing to drive down rents, reduce targets for water companies to reduce water bills. Community allotments for cheap home grown food manned by the unemployed and volunteers, community electricity generation to drive down electricity bills.
etc..
But those policies don't suit the old or middle aged who vote - so that won't happen.
Labour didn't build more social housing - the Tories certainly won't. So its more cons like shared ownership - all the disadvantage of owning but few of the benefits.
I also think it does come down to educating people to think that being in work and earning your own money is a way of improving yourself. Ok, it may seem hard to start on a low salary and be no better off than on benefits but your money will get better and your life chances are improved by working.
Tbh, I was bought up with that mentality and it's totally beyond my understanding how people are happy not to work. If I lost my job tomorrow, I wouldn't stop until I found another one, even if it was lower paid to tide me over. I honestly hope I go to my grave never having settled for being on benefits.
I think that's the heart of the situation in many ways as there seems to be a hardcore groupe of people that are quite content to never get very far in life.
As long as they can watch the latest reality freak show on a giant plasma screen and they get enough in benefits to pay for their sky subscription and internet connection, then they seem pretty happy.
The problem with the benefits system is that it is hopes people will be reasonable and not take the mick too much.
It needs a radical overhaul such as only paying child benefit for the first two children. If people want a larger family, then that's a decision they have taken themselves and have to pay for it themselves.
The same goes for housing. People having more children to get a bigger council house shouldn't be entitled to a bigger house. The Government need to realise that some people do use children as currency and as a method of getting more money out of the system.
They should also stop giving benefits to foreigners until they apply for British Citizenship.
Benefits should also be seen as short term where possible and no one should be on benefits for life (unless it is for a disability that will sadly never change).
Benefits should also take into consideration their NI contribtution record (or their parents if they're still young).
If you've not paid in, then you can't get anything out.
A lot of those that have not paid in seem to get the most out.
The whole benefits system needs a shake up, but people need protecting all the same. A very tough task considering the mess we are in at the moment. It's not Joe Bloggs signing on that's sucking up the money, it's the professional scroungers and low lifes that don't want to work but want all the benefits. The council house, housing benefit etc. They are the people that need tagetting. The Giro drops were landlords get money for people that don't exist.
I could go on and on and on.
But you have to question how much money we are spending in total, and how many are genuine cases. I am not saying that everyone who claims benefits are fraudsters, they're not. But a lot of claims are fraudulent and that needs sorting out.
I think that's the heart of the situation in many ways as there seems to be a hardcore groupe of people that are quite content to never get very far in life.
As long as they can watch the latest reality freak show on a giant plasma screen and they get enough in benefits to pay for their sky subscription and internet connection, then they seem pretty happy.
The problem with the benefits system is that it is hopes people will be reasonable and not take the mick too much.
It needs a radical overhaul such as only paying child benefit for the first two children. If people want a larger family, then that's a decision they have taken themselves and have to pay for it themselves.
The same goes for housing. People having more children to get a bigger council house shouldn't be entitled to a bigger house. The Government need to realise that some people do use children as currency and as a method of getting more money out of the system.
They should also stop giving benefits to foreigners until they apply for British Citizenship.
Benefits should also be seen as short term where possible and no one should be on benefits for life (unless it is for a disability that will sadly never change).
Benefits should also take into consideration their NI contribtution record (or their parents if they're still young).
If you've not paid in, then you can't get anything out.
A lot of those that have not paid in seem to get the most out.
I think that's the heart of the situation in many ways as there seems to be a hardcore groupe of people that are quite content to never get very far in life.
As long as they can watch the latest reality freak show on a giant plasma screen and they get enough in benefits to pay for their sky subscription and internet connection, then they seem pretty happy.
The problem with the benefits system is that it is hopes people will be reasonable and not take the mick too much.
It needs a radical overhaul such as only paying child benefit for the first two children. If people want a larger family, then that's a decision they have taken themselves and have to pay for it themselves.
The same goes for housing. People having more children to get a bigger council house shouldn't be entitled to a bigger house. The Government need to realise that some people do use children as currency and as a method of getting more money out of the system.
They should also stop giving benefits to foreigners until they apply for British Citizenship.
Benefits should also be seen as short term where possible and no one should be on benefits for life (unless it is for a disability that will sadly never change).
Benefits should also take into consideration their NI contribtution record (or their parents if they're still young).
If you've not paid in, then you can't get anything out.
A lot of those that have not paid in seem to get the most out.
What complete and utter rubbish. Like most of your posts it's made up unsupported twaddle which is completely biased against anyone below pension age. :rolleyes:
A few examples:
A typical person on JSA in an average priced 1 bedroomed flat gets:
£60 JSA + £75 HB + 15 CTB = £7800 P/A
A typical person on Incapacity Benefit gets:
£105 IB + £65 HB (they don't get all their rent paid) + £12 CTB (they pay some council tax) = £9464 P/A
The only people that get more than that are the severely disabled and people with kids and many will get substantially less.
You fail to add in al the costs of the vast army of people employed to pay out benefits.
I can't remember where I saw it by one statistic showed that the net increase in immigrants working in the UK was the same as the net increase in private sector jobs.
Or to put it another way every new job was filled by immigrants.
It might be that the 80% figure refers to all jobs created not the net change in jobs, or includes the public sector jobs
The whole benefits system is a complete shambles. Some people milk it to the hilt and can live quite happily without ever having to work. Some struggle to keep their heads above water. The system is so complicated that there are apparently large numbers of people who are not claiming their full entitlement.
The difference between benefit payments and wages is so low as to make it impossible for some people to come off benefits. This isn't a new problem as I can remember 40 years ago someone in the local DSS refusing a job on shifts at Michelin which was one of the highest paid jobs around because he worked out that by the time he had factored in his busfares, dinner money etc he would only be £1 per week better off. That problem will never go away because people will always look at the difference between the wage they will be getting and what they will lose in benefits. Nowadays the gap is even harder to justify when you include things like housing/eyetests/dentist/prescriptions/utility/rates etc some of which are either subsidised or free when you are on benefits.
Raising the minimum wage will only hit the biggest tax payers again plus it will put retail/service prices up too.
There is no quick solution to the mess we are in imo.
Housing prices are out of control
Rents are out of control
Immigration is out of control
Law and order is out of control
Benefits are out of control
Our supposed leaders are out of control
Sorry I give up on this thread. It's raising my blood pressure.
The Benefits system has turned into a very ugly creature indeed. It treats the benefits Scroungers very well whilst letting down the people it was intended to help
Ditto there is just so much pie in the sky economics being stated on this thread. None of it has been thought through and they are being justified by spouting complete nonsense, with nothing to ack it up.
Ditto there is just so much pie in the sky economics being stated on this thread. None of it has been thought through and they are being justified by spouting complete nonsense, with nothing to ack it up.
and what do you have to back up your claim that they are talking 'complete nonsense'..
seriously, what would you have done to solve the problem?
Comments
We could save quite a lot of money by raising the state retirement pension age to 70. It makes perfect sense.
I agree re the child benefit and pensions. My husband an I have worked hard all our lives to make a good standad of living before we even thought about having a child. I've also chosen to only have one child so I know i can afford to support him fully without any handouts. We've paid in much more than we've even taken out of the system so why the hell shouldn't we get back even a tiny amount? I mean, child benefit and the state pension are hardly enough to keep you in the life of luxury.
How..?
The largest single cost is housing, so really house prices need to be allowed to fall back to a sensible level and also more social housing needs to be built so rents aren't being kept artificially high by Housing Benefits subsidised private tenants.
Council Tax could be cut by reducing excessive maintenance like cutting grass/weed spraying every 6 months instead of 3 months.
Food costs could be reduced by creating large communal allotments where those out of work etc and volunteers could grow cheap food for local consumption, sold by local not for profit Co-Op type shops.
As far as I can see, the only income figure mentioned so far is £150,000. Is your wage/pension that much a year? If it is, then you don't need a state pension on top of it, or child benefit.
Housing costs are the problem - an average house costs six times average wages. How is that sustainable when banks only afford to grant 3 times salary mortgages.
It comes back to the benefits problem. Taxes are very high to pay for the huge benefits culture we have in the UK. ^ Million odd are dependent for all their income on benefits. Less then a Million of them should be on benefits. It typically costs £30,000 to keep each of them on benefits.
Workout how many people on an average wage is it going to keep each of them. You are probably looking at about 8 tax payers to pay to keep one person on benefits.
I think Child Benefit should only be paid for 1 year. That provides some additional money to cover the costs when a child is born after that it should be up to the parents to provide for the child.
As for Pensions the real problem is the goverment have not properly funded them and what money has been paid in is often used for other purposes.
We should have a proper state pension scheme which is also simple to understand. It should say pay 50% of someone Basic Salary. It could be funded by the goverment putiing in 5%, companies putting in 5% and the employee putting in 5%. There could be an option to pay in more to take it up to two thirds
At the moment we have the situation where people no longer save for pensions. This has occured since Browns infamous raid on them. So we have more people dependent on the unfunded goverment scheme which is intended to only provide a very basic pension which provides for no luxaries at all.
The governement seems to love high house prices though. I think average prices need to drop below £150,000 and stay there for a good few years.
I also think buy to let and second home ownership needs to be curbed and more social housing needs to be built to drive down rents.
The obsession with having purer and purer sea water needs to end so water rates can be reduced. We need more home/community power generation so electric bills can be reduced and the TV licence fee needs to be halved so the BBC just sticks to its core tasks of News and other public service broadcasting.
You sure about that? I thought the big idea was that we'd just be able to sell our £1.5 million two-bed flats in 20 years time :eek:
What complete and utter rubbish. Like most of your posts it's made up unsupported twaddle which is completely biased against anyone below pension age. :rolleyes:
A few examples:
A typical person on JSA in an average priced 1 bedroomed flat gets:
£60 JSA + £75 HB + 15 CTB = £7800 P/A
A typical person on Incapacity Benefit gets:
£105 IB + £65 HB (they don't get all their rent paid) + £12 CTB (they pay some council tax) = £9464 P/A
The only people that get more than that are the severely disabled and people with kids and many will get substantially less.
If you raise income tax then the incentive to work will be even less as net income will be even lower.
Benefits must be reduced to make it more attractive to work than not. When this is suggested the outcry is that "I cannot afford the rent", food etc. when really it means I won't be able to afford my flat screen telly of designer clothes or the latest mobile phone. All the while people can have all these "luxuries" and not need to work then the problem will continue.
The difference between benefit payments and wages is so low as to make it impossible for some people to come off benefits. This isn't a new problem as I can remember 40 years ago someone in the local DSS refusing a job on shifts at Michelin which was one of the highest paid jobs around because he worked out that by the time he had factored in his busfares, dinner money etc he would only be £1 per week better off. That problem will never go away because people will always look at the difference between the wage they will be getting and what they will lose in benefits. Nowadays the gap is even harder to justify when you include things like housing/eyetests/dentist/prescriptions/utility/rates etc some of which are either subsidised or free when you are on benefits.
Raising the minimum wage will only hit the biggest tax payers again plus it will put retail/service prices up too.
There is no quick solution to the mess we are in imo.
Housing prices are out of control
Rents are out of control
Immigration is out of control
Law and order is out of control
Benefits are out of control
Our supposed leaders are out of control
Sorry I give up on this thread. It's raising my blood pressure.
Tbh, I was bought up with that mentality and it's totally beyond my understanding how people are happy not to work. If I lost my job tomorrow, I wouldn't stop until I found another one, even if it was lower paid to tide me over. I honestly hope I go to my grave never having settled for being on benefits.
As already mentioned it needs to start with the government pursuing policies that result in cheaper housing, cheaper home grown food, cheaper council tax and cheaper power and water bills.
Such as? How do you expect to achieve that.
Discourage buy to let and second home ownership in order to drive down house prices. Build more social housing to drive down rents, reduce targets for water companies to reduce water bills. Community allotments for cheap home grown food manned by the unemployed and volunteers, community electricity generation to drive down electricity bills.
etc..
But those policies don't suit the old or middle aged who vote - so that won't happen.
Labour didn't build more social housing - the Tories certainly won't. So its more cons like shared ownership - all the disadvantage of owning but few of the benefits.
I think that's the heart of the situation in many ways as there seems to be a hardcore groupe of people that are quite content to never get very far in life.
As long as they can watch the latest reality freak show on a giant plasma screen and they get enough in benefits to pay for their sky subscription and internet connection, then they seem pretty happy.
The problem with the benefits system is that it is hopes people will be reasonable and not take the mick too much.
It needs a radical overhaul such as only paying child benefit for the first two children. If people want a larger family, then that's a decision they have taken themselves and have to pay for it themselves.
The same goes for housing. People having more children to get a bigger council house shouldn't be entitled to a bigger house. The Government need to realise that some people do use children as currency and as a method of getting more money out of the system.
They should also stop giving benefits to foreigners until they apply for British Citizenship.
Benefits should also be seen as short term where possible and no one should be on benefits for life (unless it is for a disability that will sadly never change).
Benefits should also take into consideration their NI contribtution record (or their parents if they're still young).
If you've not paid in, then you can't get anything out.
A lot of those that have not paid in seem to get the most out.
I could go on and on and on.
But you have to question how much money we are spending in total, and how many are genuine cases. I am not saying that everyone who claims benefits are fraudsters, they're not. But a lot of claims are fraudulent and that needs sorting out.
Very good post.
Excellent post and I completely agree.
You fail to add in al the costs of the vast army of people employed to pay out benefits.
Or to put it another way every new job was filled by immigrants.
It might be that the 80% figure refers to all jobs created not the net change in jobs, or includes the public sector jobs
The Benefits system has turned into a very ugly creature indeed. It treats the benefits Scroungers very well whilst letting down the people it was intended to help
Ditto there is just so much pie in the sky economics being stated on this thread. None of it has been thought through and they are being justified by spouting complete nonsense, with nothing to ack it up.
and what do you have to back up your claim that they are talking 'complete nonsense'..
seriously, what would you have done to solve the problem?