Actually I'd rather be on benefits

[Spudulika]

... than have to work 40 hours a week in a boring minimum wage job.

Not doing either myself thankfully (working DH, I have well-paid p/t job), but thoroughly resenting the line that the conservatives are taking that the reason many people have a terrible quality of life is because they're not working, and that they'll invariably have a better quality of life if they're not on benefits, because going to work somehow always makes your life better.

I suspect that the majority of mp's have never done these sorts of jobs, and have never had to live on the minimum wage, otherwise they wouldn't be saying this.

IMO what makes people's live shit is being educationally and culturally impoverished, poor housing and poor mental and physical health, none of which are likely to be alleviated by spending 40 hours doing repetitive manual labour.

If work doesn't leave you significantly better off financially, is in itself not interesting, and results in you becoming time poor, so you have fewer hours to read, stroll in the park, meet with friends or watch interesting films on TV (all of which activities are free and accessible to the unemployed), how on earth can you be said to be better off doing it?

And then there's the option of enriching your life by doing voluntary work while unemployed, or studying.

So - if you were an MP and I was an unemployed person, how would you persuade me that I would be much happier cleaning out buses for 40 hours a week, than sitting at home reading the newspaper and listening to the radio?

If you genuinely can't work or can't find work, then benefits are obviously a good thing.

If you can work but choose not to (longterm), you're a freeloader (assuming you are claiming benefits that is!). If everyone was like that, our society would collapse. There should be strong deterrent to put off lazy arseholes like that. People like that are taking advantage of those who work/pay taxes and effectively taking the piss out of those who genuinely need the benefits.

You DO realise that minimum wage doesn't give you enough to live on without tax credits? £6.08 a hour, multiplied by 40hrs (ft hrs), take away 20% for tax & NI. Comes to the princely sum of £194.56 a week. Or £389.12 if both of you work, but then you lose MORE than the £194.56 through childcare. A living wage? Like fuck. You slog your guts out, end up worse off, and miss out on seeing your dc grow up to boot. And every day you are resentful because you can't afford to retrain to get yourself out of this crappy job, because every penny goes on food and heat. And all your hard work is making some bastard fat cat big boss richer, not you. Why the hell would ANYONE choose that life without tax credits? Christ, when my ex was with me, we were WORSE OFF with him working than we would have been if he was out of work!

i agree with most of what OP says.

I also agree wholeheartedly with everything Loudlass just said. this is why i work for myself. i hope to NEVER go back to working for someone else.

The problem isn't with how much benefits pay, it is the cost of living is completely disproportionate to the average wage.

and i have less spare cash now than i did as a single parent on benefits now that i am married. (and DH is on a supposedly good wage (25k). .

Loudlass, your post is a bit brash, but you've basically distilled it down to a tee, for me:

You DO realise that minimum wage doesn't give you enough to live on without tax credits? £6.08 a hour, multiplied by 40hrs (ft hrs), take away 20% for tax & NI. Comes to the princely sum of £194.56 a week. Or £389.12 if both of you work, but then you lose MORE than the £194.56 through childcare. A living wage? Like fuck. You slog your guts out, end up worse off, and miss out on seeing your dc grow up to boot. And every day you are resentful because you can't afford to retrain to get yourself out of this crappy job, because every penny goes on food and heat. And all your hard work is making some bastard fat cat big boss richer, not you. Why the hell would ANYONE choose that life without tax credits?

... because (apart from the segment that might find the job fulfilling, see potential for better long term prospects, setting examples to kids) that's basically the choice we give people when we say "work for NMW and be glad of it, there's a good boy/girl, see how much self-respect you have now?"

In fact, the more I read posts on here proclaiming the value of work as morally enriching (which I have no doubt it is, it is in my case) and about how the country would be fucked if everyone was like the OP... the more I see this as a class issue.

How is it reasonable for me to sit here, in my professionally salaried job but from a very disadvantaged family/area originally, and claim that someone on NMW in a dead-end, boring, stressful job should be fucking grateful? Because work isn't fun for the majority of NMWers - I've seen it! Especially when a lot of the people I've met in NMW jobs aren't there through lack of ability - just lack of opportunity or bad timing or wanting to put the needs of others first (caring duties, brining up kids, whatever).

I've said it before: to get people off benefits and choosing to work, we need to make work significantly better. A good, living NMW would be a start.

Note this suggestion isn't the same as saying "push those on benefits to the breadline and make em suffer" - but that working should make people significantly better off. In too many cases, it just doesn't. Not enough to make up for the disavantages to working:

Missing kids school plays
Stressful home environment
Commuting "wasted" time
etc

... if we have someone £20 or £30 a month better off working than on benefits, are you telling me that they should be happy that they're getting more in relation to the things they miss out on?

Does it fuck.

Let's put a price on raising our kids.

My price is a few grand.

If I was told: sit home on benefits and we'll pay you £10k a year, I'd probably want to be earning about £15k or £16k a year to justify missing out on raising them.

My job allows me to make that choice.

If you're in a dead end NMW job with no potential, and you get no pleasure from it, it is human nature to make the benefits choice.

All this middle class cooing that the working classes are short sighted, ungrateful, etc makes my blood boil.

Excellent post!

Sorry, not read whole thread, but I am firm believer in the basic socialist creed that 'to each according to his needs, from each according to his ability'. It seems these days everyone focuses only on the first part. To be 'entitled' to the first part, everyone needs to contribute according to the second part.

I think the problem is that everyone these days has got the message loud and clear about having not just their needs but their non-essential wishes met - but view having to contribute in return as a huge infringement of their 'rights' to do whatever they fancy.

I think the problem is not that minimum wage jobs are dull - after all, so are many high-paying jobs. It's that the compensation is too poor. That is the real issue which the OP confuses - that difficult/dull/important etc jobs are not necessarily paid a premium for this reason, and may even pay less, whilst the really fun jobs may also sometimes be well paid. Thus you have the footballer on hundreds of thousands a week versus the hospital cleaner on minimum wage; the company director versus the bin man.

THAT is the real issue. Not that these people have to work at all, or that their jobs are dull.

But that's capitalism for you folks.

I personally would not like to see a world where some people get paid to live on benefits whilst others work to support them, but where wages were more closely aligned to effort/difficulty/importance/unpleasantness - a world where binmen were paid more than PR people, and where a CEO was paid no more than his staff working equivalent hours; or possibly less, if their job was more taxing. With some allowance for say, having higher qualifications he'd had to spend £ on or study for x years.

Pingu - i suggest you ring the benefits hotline.

It must only be in the North East they stop your money forr refusing interviews and refusing to attend 3 month courses. I love the fact that people think everyone on benefit swans about parks eating bacon butties.

Where is everyone supposed to work, what with all the jobs available. Hundreds of people are going for interviews for one job. Benefits are not a lifestyle choice. Do people seriously believe you can just go on the dole and stay on it.

My friends EXP has MS and can bearly walk. He is in sever pain with his legs and has injections everyday. He has been removed from sick pay and gets £120 per for fortnight JSA. He runs a house on this. He is deemed fit for work as he can sit behind and operate a till. Dont know how he is supposed to get there mind

The huge problem with tax credits, in my opinion, has been that it has enabled emplyers to pay their staff wages to low to cover basic subsistence (albeit over the minumum wage) in the knowlede that the state would subsidize their low wage bill.

Whilst I don't have a problem per se with the state subsidizing wage bills, if we are going to do this, we - the taxpayer - (a) should have a greater say in what type of companies we subsidize (do we want to subsidize junk food companies or arms dealers, say) and (b) should enjoy the same kind of return on our investment that shareholders do.

It is this unspoken state support for large, often global corporations through our tax system that is the real problem. Without it, either these companies would cease to function or they would start to pay real wages - albeit with lower returns to shareholders.

I had a debate about this with my uncle the other day. I'm a lone parent on benefits since my ex-H legged it with another woman last year. I didn't expect to be in this position, my crystal ball failed me miserably.

At the back end of last year and beginning of this year I applied for lots of jobs. Didn't even get an interview...as my BIL explains to me, why would they employ a mum with a young child when they can employ a child free graduate, who won't have to have a week off when their child gets chicken pox.

I'm studying for a degree and plan to be a teacher in 2 years. In Feruary I was admitted to hospital with a serious illness, I missed the only interview I'd been offered in 6 months because I was in hospital with a drip in my arm.

Since feeling better I'd started to apply for jobs, but now I'm on the waiting list for an op which will involve at least 3 weeks recuperation (time off work). So, should I apply for jobs, when I'll have to have 3 weeks unpaid leave. During which time I'll still have to pay for childcare, rent, bills and food? What would all the exemplary citizens on Mumsnet suggest?

Strangely it makes more sense to me to keep my children fed and secure on benefits until I'm qualified for a job with decent pay and conditions. If anyone disagrees perhaps they could suggest how we would survive 3 weeks with no income, or even a week or two if my DC have a tummy bug or flu.

breadandbutterfly, exactly. It's been state-sponsorship of the UK's employers with very little targetting or anyone answering for anything. Plus it gets political parties more power (vote for us or we're going to remove XYZ credits, because we know full well you can't pay your mortgage or rent without them).

Stupid situation from my POV, but actually quite smart when you look at the motivations behind these things.

The debate I had with my uncle incidentally was that he thinks the country is too generous with benefits payments....I queried why he claimed a state pension rather than go to work if he's fit and healthy and can easily live on his final salary private pension. He didn't have an answer either.

My grandma has a private pension and her state pension with pension credit. She gets more than i get with 3 kids . she cant spend it. She has £6000 in the bank but has to spend £500 per month as she is not allowed over £6000 in the bank and then her state pension. She has worked all her life so yes she deserves it but i think some people on benefits get unfairly jumped on

Well, I'll have worked as long as your grandma by the time I retire (I'll have had 6 years raising kids but will have to wait til at least 70 for retirement), but will get nothing in state pension. This was the point I was making...in the end I'll have had less from the state from today's pensioners. The difference is, pensioners vote and most benefit claimants don't, that's why they/we are easy targets.

My mother used to clean out busses. It does not enrich your life.

I have always had minimum wage jobs. Yes I prefer to work and be abe to respect myself then take hand outs when I am physically and mentally able to do so.

I do think that most politicans should re think their housing allowance for second homes etc as they are effectively council homes (only for the undeserved), but funny they think thats OK.

ballstoit your post rings bells with me. Becoming a single mother was how I lost my job in the first place. My now XH left me so I was 'let go' as a single mother did not fit with the ethos of the company' As in moral ethos with me being morally repugnant for becoming a single mother. Was my XH morally repugnant for walking out? Apparently not at least not in the eyes of his employers (a Christian Charity) ironic isn't it.

YANBU. My BIL has just been made redundant from his £16,000 a year job working shifts as a carer. Having been assessed for JSA HB CTB Child Benefit&Tax Credit for 3 young kids and my SAHM sister he has found he will be not much worse off taking into account saved petrol costs, school dinners and uniforms. He intends to use this opportunity to get educated. Good for him I say. Why should he and his family suffer more because he has been cast aside after working so hard for small reward for the last 14 years?

Loudlass, you are spot on about tax credits. I work full time, but my childcare amounts to twice my earnings! I have 3 in nursery and 2 in after school /breakfast club. If tax credits did not pay 80% of my childcare there would be absolutely no point in working.

IMO
Anyone who wants to can progress in work. The catering industry for example is crying out for British people to work and progress within but often has to resort to employing foreign staff because many British people don't come forward for jobs. You may start out on minimum wage but there so much opportunity for progression for more or less anyone.
On this basis no-one is better off long term on benefits and society is certainly not.

'The catering industry for example is crying out for British people to work and progress within but often has to resort to employing foreign staff because many British people don't come forward for jobs.'

They often resort to employing foreign staff because they pay below min wage under the table or offer zero-hours contracts. Foreign staff often come on their own, without families in tow, so can share very cheap lodging and don't need to worry about childcare and schools.

The real problem, which DC et al have no clue and don't care to, is that housing costs so much (even rents). And when someone goes to work the system is set up so that they lose all benefits immediately, including housing and council tax benefit. HB is paid a month in arrears, so the person must immediately come up with a month's worth of rent whilst their new HB application is being processed. Their tax credits stop, too, until their new application is processed.

This means they are fucked. Oh, and tax credits aren't set up to work on zero-hours contracts. So you have to estimate your income and if then you don't get as much work from the zero-hours contract, you can wind up in debt to HMRC big time.

So basically, you wind up losing your home and in scary debt.

But like DC and co. give a fuck.

The other very real problem is the fact that many of these 'minimum wage, menial' jobs are being out-sourced out and are temporary or zero-hours/relief.

So the poor are getting kicked in the teeth. On the one hand, they're feckless low-lives who refuse to work. On the other, if they get a job, it's very likely going to lead to debt and even homelessness because it's not a steady job.

Working does not always improve your life.

I was unemployed. I got a job which is barely above minimum wage. It's a desk job. Since I started I've put on weight and got a bad back from being chained to a chair all day. I hate the job with a passion. There is no chance of advancement and very little else going round here.

I'm not much better off than I was on benefits and am shortly to be worse off.

It's all very well preaching about "contributing to society" and some sort of vague concept of "pride", but what it's very hard to care about those sort of high moral ideas when you're job is hell and you're still broke on payday.

OP, YADNBU.

expat
I work in the industry and rarely receive applications from British staff and I am desperately trying to recruit them. Did you happen to see Raymond Blanc series where he sucessfully trained up some young British staff with little or no qualifications? He highlighted that the majority of maitre d's in London were not English because people don't apply for the jobs.
Isn't it better to earn minimum for a while whilst you learn the trade and then go on to earn much much more rather than stay on benefits?