Philip off This Morning

[NorthernWreck]

Just said that he thinks Child Benefit for higher earners should be cut, and then he went, incredulously "I mean, I get child benefit! It's nuts!"

AIBU in thinking that you don't get CB unless you actually apply for it?
You don't have to apply for it if you don't need it, do you?

So by that merit I should hand back the £500 tax credit I received on my pay cheque?? Cos I don't need it exactly...I could survive without it. Surely the £20 I receive per week is it (?) is adequately recouped in my high tax payments??

Sozzled... put me down for a no.

And I guess I should not use the NHS or state education? Cos you know,..that would be the moral thing to forego?

I agree with coraltoes that as I pay a lot of tax it is covered so I dont feel guilty that we are currently getting it and it is being invested for my DH not being spent on me.

But on the other hand I am not complaining that we will be losing it and do think it is right it should be means tested (although obvioulsy the plan where 1 person on £43k in a family couldnt get it whilst a family with 2 on £41k each is plain bonkers)

coraltoes - that would be a no for me too then as we are over the bracket and we still claim it. Will not cry and moan about it when it goes though, c'est la vie!

I claim it - we ae a higher tax bracket household.

mostly, it pays for extra stuff for dd1 (severe ASD - I do not claim DLA or carers allowance).

I will not complain about the loss of CB, as such (although it is not somehting we can 'afford' to lose - SALT, OT etc are an expensive thing to have to provide)

but I am bothered by the loss of pension (for what it is worth) protection and NI etc - and will probably end up claiming DLA and Carer's to compensate for that. I stay at home because I need to - dd1's school run alone means I cannot work in term time, let alone her appts etc. to be penalised for that is ridiculous (the loss of NI protection, not the loss of CB)

Catgirl, how do you know you are going to lose child benefit from October? I thought it came into action April 2013?

Sorry - I thought it was October but havent really looked in to it. April then....

Of course you should use the NHS and state education coraltoes. Those things are available to everyone. An 18 k trust fund provided by the state is not.

NorthernWreck please don't discourage your DCs from going to university because of the fees.

I won't be paying my 3 DCs fees, and although they'll be leaving University with debt, its not a millstone. If they never earn a living wage it will never be repaid, if they choose to work in a very low paid sector, they won't need to repay it, it won't be taken into account when applying for further loans (ie mortgages.

Northern, actually for now the cash child benefit IS available to all. What people do with it is up to them. I had a student loan...15k by the end of uni. I had to have one to survive. Friends took it out to invest. Low interest rate made it a smart investment. Their use of the cash didn't impact my access t the money I needed. Similarly my use of 20 quid per week doesn't impact what you receive. I pay it back easily in my tax.

Btw my student loan was considered debt when I took out my first mortgage despite promises t the contrary. I was still the best thing I ever did. I it wasn't for that degree (and debt) I'd never be the person I am today nor have even a fraction of the opportunities I have been afforded! 15k pales into insignificance in the grand scheme of life and earnings. The repayment system is so easy and fair... Deducted from your pay cheque, dependant on salary etc.

Well coral, I use mine for..er..food.

Future students will be in debt for over 30 k.
I had a student debt too, but after uni I could have feasibly afforded a house on my salary.
Food was less expensive, travel, fuel,council tax, everything.

Yes the repayments come out of your salary, but on a low salary it could take a graduate until they were over forty to pay it back. Thats just mad.

In the US, where they have always had fees, there is a large network of scholarships in place to help less fortunate students. Not so here.

So the child of wealthy parents gets 18k on turning 18 from all the CB their parents have save for them, their fees paid by their parents, and leave uni with no debt.
What happened to fair play?

Sorry Northern I was slowly bashing the keys while trying to stop the baby on my lap doing the same so took so long to write my post I must have missed later ones of yours. Apologies and that.

northern you are very black and white in your reasoning

we are higher rate tax payers and well off but have a huge mortgage
we have saved none of our dcs child benefit not have no savings nor ever go on foreign holidays - lovely lifestyle and all our own choices or making

our kids (already do) and will all pay their own way if they wish to go on to university and its the same for 90% of their mates

they will all start out adult life on the even playing field of a HUGE debt

Frankly no one would ever progress to the higher echelons of business or law or whatever if things were totally classless etc...someone has to make it big and be rewarded don't they?

"Frankly no one would ever progress to the higher echelons of business or law or whatever if things were totally classless etc...someone has to make it big and be rewarded don't they?"

Why wouldn't they? My sister is a hot shot lawyer. She earns a lot. She went to uni when there were still grants, because she was very clever. She worked very hard, and that, combined with her natural abilities enabled her to get where she has.
That has nothing to do with class, and everything to do with fairness of opportunity.

so how much should higher earners pay, what should they be entitled to then? what would be enough for people who are not high earners?

Social inequality ie the gap between rich and poor leads to all sorts of trouble though. It's the primary factor in growth of crime rates, civil unrest slowing of the economy etc etc etc.

northern has a good point in that saving CB is a state funded trust fund for the rich whilst the poor use it to survive. Having a huge mortgage is not a necessity is it? You have a choice about where you live. Your choices increase as your income does IMO.

However I disagree about Uni fees. Why should those who aren't bright enough to go to uni and (therefore can expect lower wages pay for those who attend Uni and get higher incomes because of it. If you pay to attend then effectively you are paying a higher rate tax on your earnings. If you don't find you are better of from attending Uni then you don't pay the "tax" do you - it only kicks in after a certain level of income.

does your sister not take her family allowance?

You mean her Child Benefit? I highly doubt it!

i think you should ask her

I will.

But nothinggold, in reality a kid from a rich family will be a hell of a lot less worried about that "tax" than a kid from a poor family.
Kids from rich family have a myriad of trust funds, parental help, knowledge that they will always , actually, be OK.
It also discourages people from studying subjects which may not pay brilliantly but will be sociall useful, like midwifery for example.
The level of income you have to be earning to pay it back is not actually that high.

Northern - if by higher rate tax payer you mean rich then you are being awfully simplistic

many of my friends are HRTP and yet have no trust funds etc etc etc no pensions etc etc etc....

Plus i want my children to develop a good work ethic- i am a great believer in this fostering a good attitude to life as a whole - enjoy working and reap your own rewards

Yes Northern but the point is grants mean the working poor pay their tax to subsidise those who then get richer. The level of income this year is 21K I believe which is going to be hard to achieve if you work in a shop or the lower ranks of the local council for example. Most socially useful jobs pay less if don't have a degree but still have jobs available. I don't think we all need to go to Uni because it takes away 3 years that you could actually learn how to do the job rather than how to reference properly or use a Uni website/library.

I don't mean that ,no, not exactly.
If my sis does claim it, well, she lives in London, her partner earns a lot less than she does, and I wouldnt think they are loaded at the mo. Loaded compared to me, yes, but not in the grand scheme of things.

Initially this thread was about my incredulity that a very well paid TV star would claim CB.
Its simply that lately the discussion about benefits has become so much about morality: who is "deserving" and who is not, and yet there is no shame attached to claiming CB basically because the rich can have it too.