How can it be right that you can get so much money on benefits?!?!

Don't' forget cancer. Everything causes cancer according to the DM.

Classist, ableist, and gets all their reliable information from the daily mail. Here we go again...🙄

A lot of it pays for the landlords house

Given that The Daily Mail predict major snow events, monsoon levels of rain and tornados fairly regularly, I'm not sure I've much faith in their general accuracy.

Single people on full time NMW wage get no help. You only get help if you have kids.

They wouldn't be getting childcare costs then.

I had a look into this the other day, I wondered how a single person on full time minimum wage could survive, it appears they can't without help/housing from family and friends.

Same for a single person living on benefits.

It becomes possible to live by adding kids, I hope no one does that just to get the benefits. Would we rather the kids starved or were removed?

I also think the single people need enough to be able to survive.

I just read the article you’ve posted, and the chairman of the CSJ is Iain Duncan Smith, and there are things mentioned that do smack of the right wing.

Agree with what you say that people should be able to live off full-time wages, but it’s a massive struggle for many.

I get you, I really do anf I dont know what the answer is. But where do you draw the line, slave wages? People should have an income that enables them to pay bills and live relatively comfortably, in the snese they can afford food, clothes and a treat a month (albeit frugally)

Not be having to go cap in hand for a top up gor a wage that doesn't provide this for people who work hard in useful jobs.

If you are in the work search group, you get £400pm and have to prove you are looking for work or you get sanctioned.

Daily Mail and the like will have you believe that the people in the work search group are getting over £2kpm and they fake applying for jobs.

If you think it is that easy, then go do it.

OP, now that so many people have taken the time to come here and correct the misinformation in the link you posted, I do hope you'll come back and comment. Have you changed your mind in the face of new evidence?

It's perfectly ok to get things wrong - there's lots of misinformation out there, lots of newspapers are owned by billionaires after all - but it's important to update your views when you're given new information. You could take a leaf out of @HappyNewTaxYear's book, who immediately changed their view when corrected, and did so with grace and good humour.

There is a cap on Housing Benefit.

You’re getting a load of snarky responses which I get tbh but if you’re actually serious, then find out for yourself and don’t rely on newspapers and SM. Do a benefits calculation for yourself in your current circumstances on Turn2us or similar. Compare your results to your financial status atm. If you’re better off at all, compare all the extras it doesn’t take into account, career progression, pensions etc. Do also bear in mind that childcare costs last for a very short amount of time (and don’t cover 100% of costs) and then try to look at the big picture from where you start to where you end up, and compare that too. No one on benefits is going to be better off than you in the end, nor will their kids because of what you are able to provide for them. If it really seems unfair after weighing up every single pro and con, including disability for yourself and/or your kids, then quit, claim PIP and don’t ever work again. Apparently it’s really easy.

I’m a single mum on benefits.

currently I’m just sitting here in my 15 bedroom mansion, eating my plate of foie gras, caviar and oysters as a little snackie-poos while I choose my 5 star holidays - skiing in Val D’Isere in February, the Maldives for Easter - I haven’t decided where to go in the summer yet - any ideas??

Alternatively, in THE REAL WORLD, I’m trying to work out if I’ll actually be able to pay off any of my debts in 2026, or will I just have to add to them again to make sure my kids have food, a roof over their head etc.

I work full time - despite having a chronic medical condition that is life threatening, I am “not disabled enough” for PIP or any other disability benefits, my 2 neurodiverse kids are also “not disabled enough “ for additional support, my ex hasn’t worked since 2018 so hasn’t paid any child support in the 5 years we’ve been separated (I can’t actually afford to divorce him), my car is 17 years old and a wreck (but I need it because of my kids).

I have worked since I was 17 and am now 55 - that’s nearly 40 years of paying taxes and national insurance, so do I feel bad about being on benefits? Fuck off, I am entitled to them and am proud I am providing a decent home for my kids - the amount I get pays for only 3/4 of the rent by the way (oh, and my last holiday was 3 years ago - a week in Northumberland that my ex had actually paid for before we split, but kept getting delayed due to COVID)

£140k a year - don’t be daft!!

Yes I’m quite embarrassed now!

People still get benefits if working less than that it's just that they are supposed to be finding that much work. Plenty don't and plenty pretend to be looking.

Iain Duncan-Smiith, former leader of the Conservatives, was one of the founders of the CSJ.

Oh no! I didn’t know that - re IDS. Thank you for telling me.

Yes I agree re the spiralling wealth inequality 😭

It isn't realistic. That someone on a 10 k salary is living in the city on thousands of pounds of housing benefit. You can live close to the city affordably in rough areas it's rich people that live in the west end.

Childcare costs, yes, you are correct, in that in the end of it all you would be able to just look after them yourself, and not work.

However, the rules are that you can only do this till your child is a toddler. The only way around that is if you have an illness or disability

even though neither of them contributed to the economy?

Not all. Not everyone is employed by some massive company with shareholders. Many are small businesses that employ a handful of people, and are operating on bare margins themselves. And they get told to increase their wages but do not have any means to get more income to do so.

That talks about one adult claiming pip or a child getting dla though so the benefit cap wouldn't apply in that case. It's not a direct comparison to working vs non working families.

Lol that organisation was founded by Iain Duncan Smith. It has been given the second worst rating possible for funding transparency.

I agree with you about the wages though, and the reason you can't live on them is asset price inflation caused by spiralling wealth inequality

Employers and the constant push for ever greater profits for shareholders are absolutely to blame!! Or alternatively, blame Blair and Brown for starting the precursors to Universal Credit, namely, tax credits. They weren’t ‘tax credits’ at all, they were benefits by another name. These benefits supported the low-paid (and I was one - I claimed). But I really resent that I worked for the State, teaching the state’s children, and yet wasn’t paid well enough to take me out of eligibility for tax credits. What kind of a country does that?

@TerrazzoChips
Please have another child or 3 and drop your hours and come back and let us know how it’s going - I dare you