to think that it is disgusting that in 2011...

[StuckinTheMiddlewithYou]

So many people cannot raise a family without state support. The economy is so skewed towards the needs of the rich that it is almost impossible for many to support themselves entirely.

Wages are too low. Housing costs are too high.

Attacking those who have no choice but to rely on the state, is missing the point.

YANBU
Agree with everything EricNorthmansMistress posted.

It is not about 'the poor' more than half the population have their wages subsidised to make up for the shortfall between housing and wages, so that includes familes with two parents both earning more than average wages!

Our economy is hugely skewed towards the rich who are the only ones profiting from this as they can buy property to invest in.

More people taking jobs when offered might be the effect of that? It certainly would have been the effect when Labour were in power?

pseudo-moralistic ? er no, I just don't care, I've been lied to too many times and too much of my money has been thrown away or stolen

so not even pseudo moralistic, really

I don;t think youa re pseudomora;istic: I do think you seem angety andlet down which I can understand.

But wouldn;t that be better dealt with by a system that did reward effort whilst not allowing anyone to starve?

I'm with KnittedBreast - we do need a revolution.

Cameron and Clegg do not represent me, and their policiies go some way to prove this.

They kick the most vulnerable,namely the poor and lone parents, because they safely assume that these groups will create the least fuss - which is true.

We had a whole load of bemoaning about the selling of our forests, and yet when the government talk about issuing sanctions to the most vulnerable no one so much as bats an eyelid.

From 2010 lone parents with a child of 7 were no longer entitled to income support, and were switched over to Jobseeker's allowance.This was in spite of warnings from charity groups that there are insufficient jobs, and a great lack of affordable childcare. Nevertheless, the government ploughed on. No U-turn for the lone parents, as there was for the forests.

We need a revolution is such utter tosh.

Gimme culture starts giving up and you want to have a tantrum about it, basically.

Scram, stuck called me pseudomoralistic.

Yes it would but then people will always abuse it. Two million jobs not taken is a lot of lying, scrounging and theft. This is a broken trust. If it was up to me, no more chances. Cut everything that can be cut.

I am a capitalist. Our current model of capitalism is labour-based (as in 'work' not the political party). The labour economy has been heading for trouble since WW1. Economic thinkers have been aware of this fact, which is due to increased mechanisation & computerisation (a similar thing happened during the agricultural revolution).

It's been evident for a hundred years that central authorities would have to do something about supporting those who depended on income from the jobs that are lost to technology. Until now, in this country, that has been achieved by a combination of top-up benefits and mass public sector job creation. The 'money' for this has been increasingly generated by the financial sector.

You have to bear in mind that finance no longer means money, if you take money to mean tokens for tangible assets. Finance is more of a concept - you can't buy a bottle of milk with it. The value of your house is only 'money' if you haven't got to live in it: until then it's finance, which is useful, but still only a concept. Banks became very clever at creating finance- and paying themselves in money. Hence the lopsided distribution of tangible assets.

This was going to be my dissertation in the 1970s but I was told to pick a different subject. I couldn't see any long-term alternative to massive taxation on the few owners of tangible wealth, to faciliate job creation amongst the rest. This is, of course, anti-capitalist (so not a good topic for a business student), but not one of the economists I consulted disagreed with me.

I don't think we're now witnessing the end of capitalism, as greater minds than mine have forecast, but I do think we're watching it crumble. The theory that work = money is becoming less and less tenable, as it has been doing for decades. People shouting "Get a job!" don't grasp that the job is most likely paid for by public funds (refuse collector) or subsidised by tax breaks (shelf stacker).

A "benefit culture" is the only way forward. The alternative is revolution & destruction :(

Well there've been four million jobs created in britain, only half of which were taken by our lot, so work was certainly an alterntive which quite a lot of people ignored.

Isn't council housing available for practically next to nothing for people who cannot "survive" on their wage (while paying for rent, food etc). Why don't all people on benefits just live in some sort of state housing? I wasn't aware private landlords took housing benefit people?

The 2 million jobs taken by forriners thing is a crock of shit. It takes no account of how many British citizens emigrated elsewhere or retired out of the labour Market.

Or how suitable the average long term unemployed British public were in comparison to the jobs offered. As above only 20% of hb claimants are long term unemployed. Obviously that's not great or perfect - but it's not so much that the 50% of new jobs going to imagrants stats make any sense.

Lady, you've been too long in your manor

There's been a council housing shortage since the 1980s sell-off. Numerous social housing creation schemes have been axed by governments of both colours. The majority of private tenants receive housing benefit.

• haven't checked that 'majority' btw, I read it somewhere.

tis not a crock of shit

you seriously telling me there was no british person qualified enough to take a job at my doctor's receptionist? or man the till at Primark, or Next? or take a job at my bank call centre? etc etc etc etc etc etc etc

purlease

Yes perhaps I don't know enough about social housing.

rpo - it's not four million jobs, it's four million more people reported as working over a 13-year period. It is true that 3x as many foreign-born workers (1,871,000) as UK nationals (612,000) were added to the workforce. This reflects the greater mobility of labour throughout Europe since 1997.

Dividing 1.87 into 4 doesn't work in this scenario. As Fullfact puts it - of those 4 million jobs, an insufficient number were in the fact-checking department of The Sun :)

RPO you need to get in the real world.

I have many "British" friends with decent CVs and experience who do not even get offered interviews for these menial receptionist or Primark jobs.

These friends have often joked that maybe if they change their names to something that sounds Eastern European or Indian then they might get offered an interview.

You might say this is racist, but when you are that person turned down by countless companies who are then served by people who cannot speak English properly- you might wonder why you don't get offered work but others do.

The Jobcentre don't offer jobs to people - they show you a computer and tell you to have a look for vacancies.

Most unemployed people would be ecstatic if the Jobcentre suddenly starting finding them jobs and telling them to start on Monday!

RPO i;vebeen applying for call centre work for months, with a degree: it's not so mcuh ho applying as who is hiring is it?
Jobcentre give out job numbers that are IME always out of date (old experience admittedly- as a crer jobcnetre dont want to know)

It's almost like this has been planned..a situation where families can not afford to live even when both parents are working full time.

It's scary, I think that in this country we have the illusion of democracy, but us proles are being royally screwed over.

I thought this thread was about state help being required for people who have jobs, so all this talk about foreigners taking jobs etc. isn't really relevant in the context of this discussion.

I am not blaming foreigners-they are entitled to work just like the rest of us.

I was responding to the insinuation that the reason why a large proportion of new jobs have gone to non-Brits is because all the unemployed sit at home watching daytime tv and not looking for work.

This is what they want you to think- when this is not the case at all.

I have been of the opinion that it is the cost of housing, be it rented or owned, that means we are no better off than we would be if we were on benefits for ages.

We are not entitled to benefits but after paying rent we live on less than we would if dh were unemployed.

If employers were forced to pay more than the current minimum wage, the country would face mass redundancies (even more than now), so the answer is to artificially reduce the cost of housing so employees can afford to support themselves without help from the state.

I'm with Knitted and Chicko, nothing short of revolution will sort out the inequality between rich and poor.

Marx said that " every four years we have democracy when we get to vote in our next oppressors" and this lot just like the last are in the pay of a few very wealthy backers.

I think Grace makes a lot of sense except I think we are witnessing the death of capitalism, well I hope so, it's the only thing that keeps me sane.

tyler80 Sun 20-Feb-11 18:10:27

I thought this thread was about state help being required for people who have jobs, so all this talk about foreigners taking jobs etc. isn't really relevant in the context of this discussion.

Yes it was. However some people will take any oportunity to howl about the evils of immigration.

I agree that house prices need to be reduced.

As for social housing, didn't we used to have a lot of that, until someone decided it would be a good idea to sell it off?

It's a bit like the Tram system. Had them, got rid of them, reintroduced them.

If they had not meddled with this in the first place, I don't think the problems would be so bad now.

Ladyofthemanor

Isn't council housing available for practically next to nothing for people who cannot "survive" on their wage (while paying for rent, food etc). Why don't all people on benefits just live in some sort of state housing? I wasn't aware private landlords took housing benefit people?

Where to start?!

In my city there is a waiting time of around 6 years to get housed in social housing, unless you are homeless through no fault of your own and unable to pay rent (or various other exeptions). I have a friend who has three children in a one bed flat, and is not considered unacceptably overcrowded. When Thatcher promoted the 'right to buy' and nobody built council properties to take their place, it caused 1) shortage of social housing 2) a culture of fetishising property ownership and 3) inflated house prices and private rents.

Private landlords will often be letting to people on HB without being aware of it, as many, many working families can claim HB to top up their wages. However, yes, private lls do let to full HB tenants - Local authorities will have departments which source and negotiate with lls to take HB tenants and they will often place homeless families in private lets rather than council. This has led to many unscrupulous chancers letting out substandard properties for top whack to HB tenants because they know they can get the full amount paid directly to them by the council - so they can bill HB for eg £850 a month (top rate for 2 beds here) for a flat that a working tenant wouldn't pay over £700 for. This is obviously worse and more expensive in london boroughs. If there were suitable social housing available then the HB bill for these tenants could be halved or more, but there isn't.