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MNHQ

"Strivers vs Skivers" - what do you think?

493 replies

KateMumsnet · 18/01/2013 09:57

Hello all

Prompted by a blog post this week from MN Blogger Sonya Cisco, and this opinion piece by BlogFest panellist Zoe Williams, for our first blog-prompt of the New Year we thought we'd ask for your thoughts on the current debate around benefits cuts.

According to both Sonya and Zoe, politicians have deliberately encouraged us to think of people as either 'skivers' or 'strivers' in order to pit people on low incomes against one another - and to divert attention from the fact that the economy simply can't provide enough jobs.

Do you agree with them? And if not - why not? Post your URLs here if you blog - or, if you haven't got a blog (why not? Wink) do tell us what you think here on the thread.

OP posts:
williaminajetfighter · 21/01/2013 16:43

wannabe the lowerpaid workers in my area have access to council-led and funded childcare which is literally half the cost of private and which I didn't and don't have access to. I don't begrudge that (although I admit I did when I was paying so much in private) but again it's silly to say that everyone pays the same amount and it's just not true that childcare costs are universal.

Yes, all the costs start out the same but some people have access to different/varying costs of childcare. For me, my big bugbear is that if you stay at 'home' within your own community then you get access to family assistance but if you decide to leave 'home' to get further on in life then you just don't have family resources to tap into.

wannabedomesticgoddess · 21/01/2013 16:47

william I used to live 2 miles from my mum. I had no family assistance with childcare. Im not sure what point you are trying to make about family childcare. IME its not very common.

ethel I addressed your point once on this thread. Once.

williaminajetfighter · 21/01/2013 16:52

I'm not interested in a bunfight just trying to point out that things aren't always black and white.

over and out...

swallowedAfly · 21/01/2013 17:05

well of course if you move away from your family you lose family support Confused

again - choices. most people i know who get family support do so through living where they don't want to be, earning less than they could by doing so and putting up with a hell of a lot of strings and obligations they wouldn't have if they lived elsewhere.

swings and roundabouts as ever.

swallowedAfly · 21/01/2013 17:05

and duh to living within your means - yes you chose to give up work and live on your husbands salary - that's not you being savvy it's you having a choice. that's not a choice available to someone whose partner doesn't earn enough or a single parent obviously.

wannabedomesticgoddess · 21/01/2013 17:06

Someone disagreeing with you does not a bunfight make.

swallowedAfly · 21/01/2013 17:11

i think some people get really defensive when called on their relative privilege and the stock response is to imply those calling it are bitter, poor people who are jealous and angry.

swallowedAfly · 21/01/2013 17:13

apologies as this is a controversial statement but i have to admit that i actually feel sorry for people who have over 60k coming in and still feel hard up and hard done by. seriously.

it's actually quite a sad reflection.

wannabedomesticgoddess · 21/01/2013 17:19

I agree swallowed.

ssd · 21/01/2013 17:26

williaminajetfighter, I live in Glasgow and earn mw and pay for any and all childcare I get

something tells me you wont miss living here andwewontmissyou

ssd · 21/01/2013 17:28

I agree with swallowed too

I might not be well off but I try not to live in a bubble and Im teaching my kids there are people better and worse off than us financially, thats just how it is.

MrsDeVere · 21/01/2013 17:33

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

morethanpotatoprints · 21/01/2013 17:34

Swallowed.

My dh earns the minimum wage, we have 3 dc albeit 2 are 18 and over but they still need feeding.
We get TC/WTC for one dd aged 9, and manage to survive. I'm sorry but it is all about choice and everybody has that same choice. Ok we may be better off if I worked but unless I was offered work which gave me a profit why on earth would I take it. I know people from all walks of life and all types of income, the one thing they have in common is they all made their own choices. Nobody holds a gun to your head.

swallowedAfly · 21/01/2013 17:38

morethan i'm confused because you seem to be agreeing with me. a) in that it's possible to survive on less 60k and b) that people make choices.

Xenia · 21/01/2013 17:40

£60k doesn't pay many school fees and it's only £41k after tax which is not much more than the cost of a nanny or three full time nursery places plus your travel costs in London never mind housing

I suggest women seek to earn £100k plus if they can to make life easier - if you can pick high paid work you enjoy go for it.

Getting back to the thread topic - yes some people in all culutures are basically lazy. Some of those laze and live on male earnings whilst having help at home too. Some get a cushy job and spend the day polishing their nails before leaving work early. Some never work or have children and live on benefits for life. Those skivers will always exist in various forms. Then you get people who work very hard indeed. I am probably in that category, work 50 weeks a year most days, never mind 5 a week, and not even had a maternity leave in 30 years. Now I could also work those hours on the minimum wage or in higher paid work but I do work hard - my choice and gosh it certainly paid off. I am terribly lucky and the harder i work amazingly the luckier i get. Most people are in the middle - wouldn't work if they didn't have to, take a sicky when they can, sit around quite a lot at home watching television, go part time if they can get away with it, retire early if they can manage it, never do very well.

Bonsoir · 21/01/2013 17:42

Earning a gross salary of £60k does not mean that "you have £60k coming in". Taxation and other costs of working (childcare) can eat very significantly into £60k.

And whomever expressed surprise at the idea that childcare costs increase with earnings - yes, they do. People who need to be at the beck and call of their employers, with frequent overnight travel, require 24/7 live-in childcare. This is very expensive.

swallowedAfly · 21/01/2013 17:45

unless of course you get a sah wife bonsoir - then it's free

swallowedAfly · 21/01/2013 17:48

it's hard to listen to sah wives talk as if they were hrt tax earners and everyone is lazy or feckless. you don't earn anything! yes you facilitate your partner to earn it by being his free domestic and childcare labour but you're not earning it yourself and you don't get to comment on other women's earnings and finances imo because you're not in a position to - given you don't work yourself.

trust me i could earn a fortune and would happily work very long hours if i had free domestic labour and childcare and cooking at home.

swallowedAfly · 21/01/2013 17:50

this royal we shit really irks me. what talent or merit is it that you feel you have over a woman earning a low wage or claiming benefits? that you managed to snag a man who earns well and to put up with him?

JakeBullet · 21/01/2013 17:51

Please can we stop using the term "skivers". If you are in the outside then you have no idea why someone works part time or not at all. The term "skivers" is basically a lazy arsed stereotype being pushed by our right wing media. Yes some will never contribute by choice....but they are not as common as we are being led to believe, everyone has a story.

Bonsoir · 21/01/2013 17:57

swallowedAFly - in your book, nobody is allowed to complain or comment - and you have very little idea of anyone's circumstances. What gives you the right to censor people's opinions?

ssd · 21/01/2013 18:08

agree again swallowed

I'll tell you a story about something my ds said to me. I have always worked part time around dh's shifts, I've got no family to help with childcare and can't afford to pay a childminder, so I've always worked nights/weekends/when the kids are in school, cleaning/ironing/waitressing/bar work etc , basically anything that fits around dh and his shifts so one of us is at home for the kids. Where I live many woman are married to men with good jobs and dont need to work, even when all the kids are in school.

So anyway, ds and I were talking about one of his friends mums who doesnt need to work and has all the trapping of a well paid dh keeping her in the lifestyle she wants. Ds didnt know she didnt work, he asked me " but what does x do if she doesnt work?" and I said "she looks after the kids" (they are all at school), he said "but doesnt she feel guilty, you look after us too".

what about those mums, who dont need to work, come on here moaning they are losing their child benefit, spend each day the kids are in school at the gym/having coffee etc,. looking down their noses at the rest of us cleaning their houses and serving their lattes, does the skivers label not apply to them just because hubby brings in the big bucks?

morethanpotatoprints · 21/01/2013 18:13

Swallowed

I totally agree with you apart from the bit where you say that some people don't have the choice.
This is a soap box of mine, where people assume that because they have hurdles to overcome and decisions to make that sometimes the decision they make is out of having no choice.
Like I said, if we had a higher mortgage (bigger house), I was determined to follow a career, perhaps a few debts then of course I may feel like I needed to work but the choice would be mine.

williaminajetfighter · 21/01/2013 18:15

Ssd your email comment to me was unnecessarily chippy! I'm just telling my experience of where I lived which happened to be in Glasgow but being quick on the defense IS one of the traits of weegies!!Grin

As for your comment about moms who married well I am pretty sure they'll not want to be judged about that probably thinking their biggest achievement and unique talent is marrying well!

ssd · 21/01/2013 18:19

morethan, ffs of course some people dont have the choice!!!

and I dont mean the choice between getting a big house, getting into debt for a new kitchen or something else like that

I have a choice between going to work or not, getting into a shitload of debt or not, because I am healthy and so are my kids, I can work, they can go to school, we have choices there

but for people in poor health with kids or partners that require full time care, there is no choice, they have to live with the hand fate has dealt them and telling them they have choices must be so grating to hear