Best friend compared her inheritance to my benefits

I suspect that some people on benefits ( not ALL people I hasten to add) know very well where the benefits come from but they don’t care.

Surely your benefits open the door for a better life for you and your children? As in, you're living a life where your children's basic needs are being met, specifically because of handouts. That's the better life you have, better than the one you would have without them.

You and your friend are the same, you've both received "free" money to enable you each to live a better life than you would have without it. The scale is different and the outcomes are different, but her original point that you are both where you are because you received financial help from others is valid.

So let me get this straight. Women should presume that their husbands will just fuck off and so they should make sure they have several thousands of pounds of savings before they have children with their husband?

Have I gif that right?

Well she’s not saved for anything before DC by the sounds of it. Three DC are a commitment.

Workhouses were paid for by the state too. We obviously will support families with no reasonable income but the thread wasn’t about that. It’s about the source of unearned income.

@Noononoo

Maybe some people are saying money for nothing. I think many of us are not slating OP for being on benefits many of us are really happy that this country provides benefits for those in need and wouldn't want to change that.

But we're also trying to understand and direct why her friend might have said what they said. Of course we can't really because we weren't there.

But suggesting that friend may see it, that her gift from her father wasn't a direct result of her going to work, and OP's benefit provision comes from taxation and not as a result of employment.

Saying this isn't denigrating benefits or suggesting any disparaging about OP, rather suggesting how that equivalence might be drawn.

Now we could say that OP has a greater need, is more deserving of extra financial help because of her circumstances, anyone is free to do something. I don't like to do it because these things are always inevitably nuanced and difficult.

The whole thread is full of shortsighted ideals.

Im sure most of them would vote for workhouses if they could.

How do you know the children were out of the OPs affordability when she was married?

or should she have a Time Machine?

How do you know she hasn’t tried her damndest to get dad to cough up?

Are people really this naïvet to not know how child support works? If he won’t pay then theres frequently NOT MUCH THAT CAN BE DONE because the child maintenance service is less than useless.

And even when men do cough up it’s woefully inadequate.

Get yourself some education

You do understand that there are plenty of single parents out there working even full time who still qualify for financial support, right? Such is the situation with low pay and high housing costs.

@Noononoo I think you are a bit confused. It’s all about who is paying. Not the desirability of being with children. Many mums don’t work or work very little. However the father’s pay for them and dc. Here DC are seen as something that needs to be paid for largely by parents. When mums have the state paying because the father won’t, then it tips over into being unreasonable. The ones who work and fully support their dc feel undermined and under valued. With high taxation it’s a feeling that won’t go away.

I agree.
My words were just answering the other pp questioning why is she bothered.
I never said it was what I believed or thought.

Equally, maybe it bothers her friend because she would like children and cant have them, or maybe she cant afford them/hasnt found a partner to have them with. You can spend your entire life looking at what other people have and feeling "bothered" by it but what good is that going to do other than cause you to lose friends because of it and end up alone?

We can all find someone in our lives who we feel has it "easier" at one moment in time but it doesnt mean life will always be that way. If you view friendships as the suffering olympics where "luck" must be fair to everyone then you wont have any friends left once enough time has passed. Fine to feel what you feel, but there is no need to verbalise it out loud to your actual friends. Its not her friend's responsibility that OP cant buy a house, neither is it her fault.

@theusualdrama For me, owning a home feels so out of reach, so I don’t share the same perspective. That’s really what’s bothering me. so what is really bothering you is the BIG GREEN EYED MONSTER!!! you get your money for nothing and she got her money for nothing. your money is not earned any more than hers is!! you are on a hiding to nothing by posting this OP!! get the kids father to step up and stop bleating about your circumstances! three kids when you couldnt afford them???

I can’t believe this. All these comments about ‘getting money for nothing’ Where are you coming from? Do you all think that women (wives) who have husbands and children and are full time housekeepers and carers of their children are getting money for nothing? Or is that OK? Is it because the state is paying?
The whole ideology that working for a pay packet outside the home, whilst paying for outsourcing child care and cleaning etc, is the right way to be? That women have no choice about this without being tarred with ‘getting money for free? I am really shocked. Childhood is a short period in life if women feel the need to be full time carers of their children of course they should be supported whether from their partner or the state. Everyone knows it is a difficult, vital job that is highly valued by society and deserves respect.
Of course a right wing state would prefer not to pay for it, they would prefer you gave money to them via a pay packet and your children not their responsibility, but all parties agree nowadays that costs everyone more in the long run. So the care and upbringing of children must be supported though it’s a very tough task when living hand to mouth and very self sacrificing so please let’s hear no more of this ‘getting money for nothing’ and give mothers more respect.

Maybe your friend really wants children but hasn’t been lucky enough to be in a situation to have any yet. Maybe she sees this money for a house as an investment for a future family to support them.
You still haven’t earned your money regardless what you spend it on and if she had children already she would have probably spent the £50k on her children.
Just because you have children and she doesn’t, it doesn’t make your money more worthy or give you the moral high ground

Oh absolutely.
I was just explaining to @Mrsttcno1 why OP was bothered by it

Women are stuck because benefits, housing (and leaving safely), childcare and flexible working and the completely useless child maintenance system are all dire.

Yes. Those are the same people that think benefits come from the magic money tree. The rest of us are aware pensions are (barely, unsustainably) funded by current tax payers and that most people are net recipients.

This thread is proof that many don’t realise that pensions are also benefits that are being paid for by the current tax payers.

This thread is proof that many don't think at all about where benefits come from. As though it's magic money.

But you could equally look at it from the perspective that OP is lucky to have sufficient benefits available to her, that have allowed her to have the opportunity to leave her ex and bring up her children by herself. There are plenty of women stuck in relationships that they can't leave for financial reasons. Those women are probably envious of OP.

It is obvious what you meant, OP. It’s picky posters playing at being pedantic. I wouldn’t have bothered replying to them.

It bothers the OP because the life choices that have happened means she doesn't have the opportunity to be able to buy a property being a single mum and working part time whereas her friends dad has come on the scene, chucked guilt money at her and now she's able to do what the OP can't see herself doing (currently, we don't know what the future will hold).

UC isn't free money. OP pays tax and probably worked full time pre children so it's not quite free imo

@llizzie I don’t think many people think about how others are going to pay for their benefits at all and that’s also why we have generations expecting benefits. They don’t end up paying for them. Obviously some will but we have had an explosion of benefit recipients, all of whom are entitled to it for decades. We don’t pursue men sufficiently to meet their obligations and expect the state to do it instead. We do need more accountability.

It's hardly 'lucky' for someone to receive benefits. It means that that person is experiencing hard times. The friend receiving money from her father does seem to be in an easier position financially with her windfall. Can't understand all the negative comments about them both receiving 'free' money. One is in greater need than the other and is not in a position to buy a house. That doesn't mean that she's jealous.

İ think deep down you are envious. I have been told by friends who don't have a lot of money that I am 'lucky' to have inherited money when my parents died. I would rather they had said they were happy I had a safety net. I do think that's what she picked up on, that you were jealous. And I think you know you are.