AIBU to think that people earning £960 per week don't really need Child Benefit?

[OldGreyWiffleTest]

Well, am I?

I think the bigger problem is actually finding a job. The job market is awful.

Can I just clarify that my comments about moving out of the south east were in response to people trying to claim that they deserve benefits more/deserve higher wages than people in other parts of the country. I was arguing that cost of living manifests in many different ways, not just inflated house prices. It was merely an argument about regionalisation (is that a word?)

How would it work if say there is a lone parent who earns £49,000 and has custody of the kids. Their estranged partner earns £100,000. Surely they should not be getting cb? Both parents should be contributing to the upkeep.

I'd like to remind some posters on this thread, that the "choice to breed" is otherwise known as taking on the responsibility of raising the next generation of taxpayers who will pay for everyone in their old age. I've said it before and I'll say it again - just who are the selfish ones? The ones who make all the sacrifices involved in raising children, or those who choose to live the high life thinking only of themselves? I know the answer.

Therefore a small contribution from the state towards the costs of raising that future generation is not too unreasonable, I don't think anyway.

entitlement.......or what

Sorry 2shoes was that at me? I've no axe to grind - I can only dream of earning £50k. But the loss of a universal benefit that supports people raising the children - THE most important job in the world - sticks in my throat.

Sorry but I have to disagree gaelicsheep.
I agree that raising children is hugely important. However, it is disingenuous to make out that people are choosing to do it out of altruistic motives- to provide taxpayers of the future. People have children because they want to. Some people enjoy having children so much, they choose to have 3, 4 or even more (despite being a hugely over populated world). It's sim

It's simply muddying the water to try to play the 'having children is an unselfish act' card. Tbh it's probably the most selfish act we do!

Gaelicsheep Therefore a small contribution from the state towards the costs of raising that future generation is not too unreasonable, I don't think anyway.

Does free education, free NHS, VAT-free children's clothes and shoes not already count as a small contribution from the state?

Well yes I suppose it's selfish in the broadest sense, being a biological urge designed to maintain the human race. If we all stopped having children what then? A pretty miserable existence for all of us when we get old, and our children that we have already selfishly brought into the world.

Just to make myself even more unpopular - not sure why mums want to diminish their role so much tbh - I'm going to pick up on something from earlier in this thread. That is the claim that couples earning more than £50k/£60k somehow deserve to keep the CB that single earner families are losing.

It has been claimed they deserve to keep it because they are poorer, due to childcare costs, than the equivalent family with a single earner and a SAHP. So that being the case they can afford to make the choice to have one of them stay at home and eliminate those costs can't they? Instead they have chosen to buy the bigger house that a double income affords them and thereby find themselves trapped into higher mortgage payments. And I suspect therein lies the crux of this.

So shoot me.

Gaelicsheep- you are making the mistake many people are falling into of thinking that it's 'fair' to make a straightforward comparison between a singe earner family with an income of 60k and a dual earning family earning, say, 45k each. You are not comparing like with like. A single earner family has ONE person working. You are talking about the man hours of a single person. A dual earning family are working double the number of man hours to achieve their income. In the single earner family if push comes to shove, you have another adult capable of going out and contributing to the family pot. If childcare is beyond their reach (difficult to imagine with an income already of 60k but IF) then the SAHP can find evening or weekend work to top up what they're losing in CB. They are starting from a position of having a high income with just one adult working- which frankly is a luxury beyond the reach of many. And if you simply resort to banging on about dual income families just having larger houses and more luxuries, then frankly, it just shows you have no concept of what it's like HAVING to work

OK! I think you are making some rather sweeping judgments there gaelicsheep - assuming families with two salaries all have bigger houses than those with one. There is also a major flaw in your argument. If these dual-earner families are already poorer because of childcare costs, how do you figure thay can afford to give up a job? Presumably most have both parents earning slightly more than their childcare costs, but you're assuming they can afford to give that up making them even poorer. Strange way of looking at things.

We earn half the amount that is being discussed in relation to the CB cut and I am the single earner. We are therefore not rolling in it, although we are comfortable. As it happens we are in the position where it is not financially viable for DH to work - due to the nature of the jobs here, the fact we'd need to run another car, etc. etc. Therefore we make the sacrifices accordingly.

Now I realise that my post was unfair to a family where, say, both parents earn £30k - meaning their income is twice ours, so I wouldn't say they were hard up. But honestly to claim that a family on £80k or £90k needs it when one on £50k, with a single earner, doesn't is plain ridiculous.

Of course there are nuances and subtleties and everyone's situation is different. Which is why the Government should not be intervening and making the politics of jealousy even worse by creating such an inequitable state of affairs.

Callmemrs.

I am a single earning family - and I earn over 60K. BUT as a lone parent I cant see why I should be put at a disadvantage verses two parents earning 30K? How is that fair.

BTW I have no issue with CB being means tested or with giving mine up. But why not come up with a fair system?

As I have said before, it should be means tested and based on family income, minus the costs incurred in earning that income (i.e. childcare costs). I can't see the flaw with this but perhaps someone else can.

But assuming your child has another living parent who is capable of earning, then that other parent should also be contributing elastamum.

Again, this is yet another issue which highlights the problem of absent parents thinking they can 'divorce' their children.
If it were totally accepted as the logical thing, that parents use their income to provide for their own children whether they remain as a couple or split, then we wouldn't get these ridiculous situations where an absent parent might be off earning a fortune, while other couples who remain together but earn less, are subsidising them!

Means testing far more people would cost more to administer.

No more than CTC/WTC already does.

As it is I can quite easily see that this will cost more to administer than just leaving things as they were.

If they want to abolish universal child benefit then, as I said earlier on this thread or another one, they should just have abolished CB altogether and made up the difference in Child Tax Credit. And yes I agree that childcare costs should be taken into account before determining the family income.

There must be a reason why they didn't do this - anyone? Seems like a no brainer to me.

Before you get on your LP soapbox, nobody is subsidising my children callme mrs. I dont claim a single other benefit other than chid benefit as I am not entitled to any WTC or anything else. So dont you worry your poor head about subsidising my children, as I expect I am more likely to be subsidising yours through the amount of tax I pay.

If you are a widow living in London supporting three kids and a very elderly parent (who has no assets and a minimal pension), then actually £960 a week doesn't really go that far, especially if the youngest child or two children are still under 8 - the children cannot be at home on their own, the elderly parent needs a carer, and costs in London are much higher than many other parts of the country. I have seen this happen to friends who went from being comfortably off to being just one crisis away from repossession of the family home! Or if you are a single parent whose partner has simply walked out. CSA cannot enforce maintenance - it's not like they have powers to freeze a negligent father's bank account just because he decides not to pay child support. Not everybody lives a straightforward 2 parents, 2.4 kids plus one dog and picket fence life. However, if it was £9000 a month before tax, then yes, of course the child benefit can be scrapped without much of a dent in the household finances.

Ok if somebody ticks all those boxes i will concede they do need there CB, highly bloody unlikely though isn't it ?

Calm down elastamum. I know nothing of your personal income. I was simply responding to your point about lone parents. If it were accepted as the norm that parents who separate continue to pay for their children's upkeep, then society would be much fairer all round. No matter how much you earn, your child's father should contribute to his child's upkeep.