Friend earns as much as me on benefits

Minimum wage is just that though. The low paid struggle because of housing and childcare costs. Governments can't tell business to pay more because property portfolios are people incomes now.

It makes no odds what the realistic salary is, if benefits are there to also give people a "realistic" amount to live on does it?
If people on benefits don't get a decent standard if living then the complaints about child poverty, freezing pensioners and broken Britain get thrown about.

She might be entitled to maternity allowance if she has worked enough? Otherwise it is just child benefit and working more hours.

Sounds like he earns too much for that.

Absolutely agree.
Children are our future.

What I can’t cope with is why some younger generations then go on to whinge ( and I’ve read some truly horrible comments on MN for example ) about the elderly receiving pensions, or even any type of care when they need it.

Its all for one or nothing at all.

I’m more shocked that your friend is going for another child whilst relying so heavily on state benefits.

Maybe start your own post.

Hello, just after any advice. I work full time, my partner is currently 10 weeks pregnant and unemployed. I earn too much to receive any help according to benefit sites but I don’t earn enough to cover all bills.

my partner cannot get JSA or anything like that because of her national insurance contributions, does anyone know anyway around this? Or any way to get some extra help for us or her to receive some sort of money.

And the worse of it, these kids are not stupid, they see the world around them, they see people slogging their guts out in minimum wage, hard jobs, and being no better off than the people who don't work and have the luxury of free time.

That would be great, and some of those children will grow up to do those things, I think the kids from these workless backgrounds that do go on to be doctors, lawyers and politicians are very much the exception sadly and are extraordinary people. They've had every disadvantage and barrier hampering them and still achieved. I come from a community and family were generations of worklessness are common, for the most part, it's not great futures waiting for these kids.
I don't know what the answer is.

Your friend should do (or get someone else to do) a manual calculation rather than relying on the calculators. How much her mortgage is won’t alter the UC calculation - she will get a higher work allowance compared to someone who rents, but the mortgage amount doesn’t matter for UC.

Child maintenance doesn’t lead to a deduction because, for too many, it isn’t reliable income.

Your post is lovely and has restored my faith in humans(well almost).
It's almost like they are the future or something, the kids I mean. Why people don't think about who these children will grow up to be is beyond me. They are literally the next generations politicians, engineers, doctors, lawyers, carers, cleaners and everything in between.
Instead of investing in these kids, lets just bash their parents for daring to claim benefits instead that is the attitudes of so many.

I pay for other people's kids, their education, their healthcare. Very happy to have done so for 40+ years, very happy continue doing so, despite never having had any of my own.

A civilised society looks after its children, it is in everyone's interests to do so.

It probably shouldn’t surprise me given how bad I know some of the tax related tools are but I’d assumed you’d get some rounding errors for a calculation like that not that it would be out by thousands of pounds a year. I know someone who earns around that £36k (which I know only due to her role having published pay scales) with 2 kids who thinks she’s entitled to nothing and while I don’t know what savings she has or how much her mortgage is I was thinking of her when putting an example into the tool. I should maybe suggest to her she checks again as she’s trusted whatever calculator she was referred to from the gov.uk site.

There also just seem to be such a lot of inconsistencies and weird rules. Why are you effectively penalised for savings but not for any child maintenance you receive (& why is the process to get child maintenance paid over so shitty to begin with though that’s a whole other question)? Why is your mortgage not eligible but someone’s landlords is? Some of the tax rules for high earners are similarly mental.

Also, any single claimant earning 2k a month with 2 children would be entitled to some UC.

I posted up thread - I earn £2160 a month and get between £300-£360 UC depending on how much childcare I pay. Anyone getting housing element would get more.

The calculators often aren't correct. I'm in a Facebook UC group and the admins always advise doing the manual calculations rather than relying on the calculators.

I don't particularly begrudge any benefits payouts if granted honesty. I think once someone has earned 12,570 they're liable to pay TAX on any earnings after that so seeing some on benefits being given more, in some cases a fair bit more than that in total can sting a bit.

I will edit this to say I also think from a taxpayer/workers side of things being told contributions to a state pension is included in those TAX deductions should be abolished, purely based on when I started work at 16, I was told monies taken from my earnings would be put towards my state retirement pension when I reach 60, having reached my 60's the goal posts keep moving so I'm in doubt as to whether there will actually be a state pension in x amount of years time.

The calculators often aren’t correct and they are only as good as the information inputted (people often use the wrong figures or put in amounts in the wrong space/don’t put in amounts in the rights places). That’s why I posted the manual calculation. All the information is available online for a oh or who wants to check something manually. UC is based on earnings after tax, NI contributions and pension contributions but before things like student loan repayments. That is why you have to enter things like pension contributions on the calculators.

Like I say maybe the entitled to tool isn’t correct. It asks for your gross salary to be entered and I shoved in details based on an average salary and that’s what it fed back. I have no idea why it would be so far off what you are manually calculating but if it’s that wrong might also explain some of the frustration as frankly it’s what everyone I know used to check if they could claim anything while on SMP or unpaid mat leave and it’s where I’d start if I lost my job.

This is the problem - minimum wage is too low.

It isn’t £3k after tax, NI and pension contributions. Although even with earnings of £3k pm UC would still be more than £100 per month.

Maybe the tool doesn’t work but I put in those details and it came to the amount I said. Although £36k is 3,000 a month not 2,500 so maybe that’s the difference?

We had a lovely Ukrainian woman live with us for 15 months. She really didn’t have to do a massive amount job hunting wise and had no dependents. She actually found it really frustrating the job centre were so unhelpful in directing her on how to find work. She applied for loads and did eventually find something but I know she wouldn’t apply for care work or cleaning jobs for example and that didn’t seem to be an issue

That’s not correct. They would get UC once their savings were below £16k. They would also get CB.

The manual UC calculation for a single claimant over 25 with one child born before 2017, one other child and childcare costs of £500pm with earnings of say £2500pm.

Standard element £393.45
First child element £333.33
2nd child element £287.92
Childcare element £425 (85% of £500)
Total of elements =£1,439.70

Earnings minus work allowance
£2,500 - £673 = £1827

Deduction
Earnings x 0.55 =
£1827 x 0.55 = £1004.85

Total of elements - earnings deductions = total UC for month
£1,439.70 - £ 1,004.85= £434.85

Less if they had savings between £6k-£16k or they were under 25 or their first child was born after 6/4/17. More if they had a disabled child like the OP does or if they were a carer.