To think the level of state involvement many posters expect is bonkers?

I assume you will decline your state pension then? It'd be pathetic to expect the state to nanny you.

There's no point discussing as your points are not in response to mine, you have fundamental misunderstandings of what the numbers you're quoting mean.

When wages are high enough to cover living costs, people in work didn't need top-up benefits.

Desperate people can't always afford morality.

YANBU

People seem to reject any notion of individual responsibility and want the State to nanny them.

It's pathetic b

No repeating it won’t change the figures. Have you looked?

‘The “net dependency ratio” is the highest on record.
It had been falling steadily since 2011, from 52.5% to 47.5% in 2019/20, but grew during the pandemic as the result of increased assistance.

And Civitas argues the long-term trend is “clearly” upwards, with the 1977-2000 average of 41.2% significantly less than 2020/21’s figure of 54.2%.’

It may have gone down a bit post pandemic but we’re not back at the rate 40 years ago

Hahahaha 😂 this is the sort of thing they wheel the Tory out to say on Question Time!

Did you get a memo from CCHQ?

I repeat as I assume you didn't read it first time:

We have a low wage, high cost economy.
People didn't need much state support when we had a high wage, low cost economy.

Trussian economics abounds on this thread.

Plus: most of those in receipt of state support are pensioners getting state pension ONLY. Do you propose a cull at age 67 to get the numbers down?

Yes indeed, let's not forget to add to the size of the state all those off-balance sheet billions in PFI spending! And the student loan system. Even the OECD doesn't know how to compare our education spending to other countries because we do it in such a weird way.

The state is unquestionably bigger in monetary terms. The overall tax burden is at a 70 year high and they're not saving any of it, given the levels of debt.

What has changed is how it's spent. The three big ticket items are state pension (because there's the most over 65s there's ever been), the NHS (biggest budget ever although spread thinly because of population growth and a lot of sick people) and servicing the National Debt (still paying off the financial crisis).

Plus slow growth and high inflation makes all that feel worse.

It's perfectly possible to have a huge welfare state that still doesn't do the main things most people want.

It would not have been thought unreasonable even 10 years ago to have a road free of potholes, or to be able to see an NHS consultant about something serious within a few months, or for a child struggling at school to receive some one to one help!

@ Llamaramma -

“Extra funding gained by removing fiscally incompetent Tory government. “

And which fiscally prudent, all-providing party do you consider to be more economically responsible? The Conservative government has been an absolute shower, but in terms of fiscal responsibility, they are alas still more responsible than the alternatives. As an example, it’s been calculated that Labour ministers only paid £5 billion of the £65 billion "spent" on building more than 100 hospitals through PFI (Private Finance Initiative) between 1997 and 2010, leaving the rest as a bill to be picked up by the taxpayer.

Yes but your statement doesn’t seem to hold true in terms of state dependency rate

Going by ONS it’s high, around half of population

When did we have that figure previously?

@ChishiyaBat how on earth can you say that university is out of reach for young people today and that you and I at 44 and 63 respectively had easier access to HE? With all due respect, when I was 18, 3% of young people went to university (5% if the Polys were included). It was higher when you went. Today it is about 35% and young people have to stay in education beyond 16. Whilst student loans are an issue, how do you think society could fund 35% in HE without them and if there were no fees? I didn't go to university BTW and have never said I did so you have jumped to that assumption.

I don't know where you live where there is limited transport and no jobs but where I live, transport is good (notwithstanding the strikes) and it's talent that is hard to attract rather than jobs. My DS has just relocated to the north of England for his dream job and his wife has kept her London centric one because nowadays she can work remotely in her field, coming to London twice a month.

In response to another poster, who noted that the SEN children in her country get buses to school, my dd teaches in a specialist SEN school (LA funded) and most of the pupils are taxi'd to and from school. Many are from chaotic homes.

My children (29 and 26) had an excellent education, nits were dealt with (the nit nurse came into the DC's primary school and gave talks and bright yellow combs), good dental hygiene (not state provided), free eye tests at the optician, lunch at school - poor quality imo so they had packed which cost more at primary. Healthcare was poor 29 years ago to be fair and it was Blair, a Labour government, who allowed GPs (who are self employed to contract out of home visits). No other first world country follows the NHS model and they all have better systems with better outcomes and systems of social insurance.

So, who was responsible for the education of our DC, their health, happiness and nutrition? DH and I were. There has to be a safety net for those who are are vulnerable but the current sense of entitlement has gone too far and many need to be encouraged to take personal responsibility.

One thing that would be a help is the ability of the able, where there is work available, to refuse to work more than 16 hours a week, otherwise their benefit will be cut. That is immoral and reprehensible, particularly where they have school aged children and could easily work 24/25 hpw without incurring childcare costs. Nobody who is capable should be allowed to refuse to work at the expense of the state.

Smaller in terms of what support an individual or family can receive from the state.

We have a low wage, high cost economy. People didn't need much state support when we had a high wage, low cost economy.

Trussian economics abounds on this thread.

However there is a medical issue sometimes with SEN and that involves low muscle tone. So many kids with neuro issues have this and as a consequence have issue with bowel problems. They become constipated and then have faecal overflow. My son had this and would soil in junior school. He would sit in it for the whole day which was demeaning to him. The school would say that they had not noticed. He was completely potty trained and dry at 2.5 years but for this issue was on a selection of drugs eg sodium pifisulphate, eventually movicol and it was us having to regulate these meds like a chemistry experiment. He fluctuated from Winter to Summer as he was more constipated in warmer weather.

Many kids with low muscle tone have this issue.

Forty years ago he would have died from influenza as he could not swallow for a couple of years so maybe that is a direct cause of more work for schools. Babies that would have died now survive.

Yes, this is the sort of empty nonsense I mean. You haven't defined what you mean, it's just words.

Which year do you want to go back to?

If you think the WS is too BIG now, you can presumably identify the year when it was smaller?

Except you can't, because it is far smaller now than it used to be 40 years ago. There is far less support now.

Yep. No one wants any responsibility.

Basically they’re all children who haven’t grown into adults.

Its going to be the mother of all wake up calls when the state finally collapses and can’t do any of the things that are expected of it and these wimps need to fend for themselves.

You're making no sense, because the welfare state is much smaller than it was 40 years ago.

How are you defining this? Ie what metric says it’s smaller now

State dependency is high

In late 70s, a family could get a council house, get a dentist, see a doctor, get rent or mortgage paid, get unployment benefit, get good school meals, get free milk, see the nit nurse, watch state infomercials, go to uni free, go on training schemes, go to night classes free, go to a library, see a social worker for elderly relatives.

What is this smaller welfare state people are describing back then? I think a lot of people on this thread have taken mind-altering drugs.

The issue now is the three high costs of:
-Pensions (because people live longer)
-NHS (because people live longer plus medical advances)
-Housing costs (because HB goes to private landlords and house prices have risen so high)

Are people seriously saying they want to cut (as the very right of the Tory party advocate) rather than increase the economic health of the nation (as the whole centre of politics and pretty much every economist would suggest)?

This thread is mindblowingly wrong.

@qwertyqwertyqwertyqwerty
I want a welfare state that's able to be an emergency fall back for people not a day to day provision of everything they want, not need.
I absolutely want people who need support to get it but I also want z as n expectation that you need to work and parent your children and not leave everything to the state and teachers and social workers.
Someone said we need more social workers, nurses etc.
Maybe.
Or maybe we need people to be more responsible and independent and we need fewer of these professionals.

It feels like society is now just a big life support system for the terminally needy.

Please pick the year you want to go back to.

You're making no sense, because the welfare state is much smaller than it was 40 years ago.

Only those too stupid to understand inflation and house price rises would measure the welfare state in £££. And I'm sure you're not as silly as Liz Truss.

Well said. And I'm sorry you worry for your DGD.

You are correct we had far more welfare state support 40 years ago. Fewer rights in the workplace but there used to be loads more support.
We clearly need:
Social workers - more
District nurses - more
Health visitors - more
Doctors - more
Housing officers - more
Benefits advisors - more
Librarians - more
Teachers - more

This thread is very Liz Truss in tone. Reactionary people talking bollocks mostly. Just repeating failed policies because they heard someone say it.

When specifically do you want to go back to?

Because the welfare state, and the state itself, has been significantly dismantled over the last four decades. We have much less welfare state support now than in the early 80s.

Do you want to wind it considerably back to pre-WW2 levels, so before the NHS, before modern education, before housing etc? You want a society similar to that envisaged by the very right wing of the Conservative Party?

Or do you mean e.g. 1970s, where there was much more welfare state support than now?

Or do you not actually know, you're just repeatinv some nonsense about personal responsibility you heard Liz Truss say once?

What is wrong with teachers brushing their teeth? Surely everyone should ?

I think this is reflective of a wider trend / sentiment in society. Of course, we all pay taxes to support the most vulnerable and public services. But we've gone way too far. Surely personal responsibility isn't a bad thing!