to think that there are people who choose to live a life on benefits?

[autumnlights12]

the recent threads about George Osbourne made me wonder..
A high number of posters say that people don't choose to live like that, they stumble into it, hate it, what a miserable existence it is, nobody would ever choose it etc..
but if you have two or three children through choice, whilst at the same time having no job to provide for them, or if you turn down the job at the local factory (as I know someone who did) because it pays £7.50 an hour and a full time job there doesn't give you the same unemployment rights and benefits, isn't that choosing to live a life on benefits? Or being trapped on benefits? I'm not talking about people who can't work, disabled people, ill people, women dumped by feckless ex and left to fend for herself etc.. of course they should be protected.
I was watching 999 What's Your Emergency and I know that area. And I know people like that exist. And it's often a second, third generation who have never worked a day in their life, even during times when work was freely available. In the town I live, we have numerous Eastern European immigrants who all seem to be working, but mostly in low paid work the locals wont do
What say you?

It's case of throwing baby out with the bath water for every one making life on benfits your also affecting thousands who are genuine

I am not saying remove benefits

I am saying there are people who choose not to work

Some people play the system, some people don't see a way to make working work and others really cannot work

I suspect the latter groups is as least as big as the first two groups

I'd personally rather work, have choices, better finances and work colleagues. In the middle group I see it as a huge plus to be enabled

I also know that every disability varies as does mine. But I do find it odd when others describe the same problem as a complete barrier.

I agree with you Toothbrush, in 2004 I had some quite severe mental health problems - in fact I've seen those same problems described on mn as being an absolute barrier to work and yet I continued to go in to the office - not saying I performed to my best ability, but work certainly helped (and no, it wasn't "depression", it was a mental illness which sees most women turn to drugs and/or prostitution - it's severe). Likewise, until 6 weeks ago my mother (67) was working on a saturday morning and by sunday afternoon she was in a wheelchair and will be for the rest of her life. Yet, she still wants to work despite having several illnesses which many (on these boards) would deem an inability to work. I do agree that some illnesses limit what can be done, e.g., my wheelchair-bound mum isn't going to be lifting bales of hay any time soon! I think it's an attitude which makes you want to work, not having a 100% healthy body.

Anyway, I wouldn't want to push all people with sickness into work, that of course is inappropriate - but it's not to say that a disability means you cannot work ever.

Dolomites I am also disabled under the Equality Act (bipolar disorder, severe, frequent suicidal ideation and the odd attempt. Etc)

I have found that work doesn't affect its seriousness (although I also think I do not perform to the best of my ability, with implications for my long term career, promotion etc) and in fact I feel worse when I don't go in!! However this does not mean that I think all disabled people are the same as myself. Also a lot of them didn't have my advantages growing up so would be pushed into low wage employment.

My job although stressful is very interesting. If I were in Tesco sweeping floors it would probably send me to suicide in 2 weeks!

Most disabled people want to work. They simply cannot.

In the case of carers for disabled people it is even more stark. These people may well be capable of work but if they go in their disabled child or relative will be uncared for. It is not even a choice for them.

Thanks wannabe and Londonone. Very weird stuff.

There is undoubtably a huge amount that could be done to remove some of the barriers to work that disabled people face. Anyone who wants to work and is capable of work should be able to do so if they have a disability. Sometimes the things that need to be done are very simple, sometimes not, but I'd be more than happy to see taxes go towards enabling people to work and giving them the support they need, no matter what it costs.

If there weren't fit and healthy people out there deliberately playing the system and timing their pregnancies so that they can have as many years as they want off work and taxpayers felt secure in the knowledge that the only people receiving benefits were people that genuinely couldn't work, then I think public opinion would change massively towards all benefit claimants.

Entirely agree HumanCatapult.

For every 'scrounger' there are probably 5-10 genuine claimants who are going to suffer horribly.

I can't forget in Rome how many people in wheelchairs, including children, I saw begging on the streets alongside their elderly parents. (And yes some of them may have been 'faking' (!) but I'll bet most of them weren't). That is what we have coming.

Paralympians get up to £83k/pa in direct and indirect support over and above their disability payments.

If DP got £83k he'd be bloody successful too! But that's not reality for disabled people. The reality for most people is scraping along the bottom and forms and waiting years in bed writing begging letters for the aids and adaptations simply to go to the bathroom. Please don't EVER cite the FUCKING PARALYMPICS as any kind of LESSON because it just makes me want to cry and cry and never stop that people just don't get WHAT the lesson is. Hint: it's not ATTITUDES, it's HARD COLD CASH.

I'd be happy to move this thread off disability. I don't know how to redirect the conversation successfully. It does seem that once it's brought up, that's it for the thread.

ohhhhh god the Paralympics comparison.

How many 'able-bodied' workers can run a bloody marathon? Have any of you run one? (someone will say yes I'm sure :D)

Well I'm able-bodied (although 'mad' as I'm frequently called and sometimes refer to myself :D) and I couldn't bloody do what the Paralympics athletes do so don't flipping well expect it of 99% of the disabled either.

indeed acumens you're quite right.

domesticgoddess That's great, in fact the disorder I had wasn't too disimilar to yours at all (BPD, so same meds, ups & downs etc. but a base in psychological rather than physiological). It certainly did affect my promotion possibilities and some people really held it against me - but their personal opinions were but their own - I still collected a pay cheque at the end of the month. :) It was really fucking hard at times and I had a manager who said to me "I will not let you sit at home and fester, if it comes to it I will drive to your house every morning and bring you in". I remember feeling furious with him because I wanted to wallow in misery... but when I look back now I'm so glad that he did take that attitude. Dunno about Tesco - the job which gave me the "most" mental happiness was picking fruit on a farm... No responsibility, no worries, no complications and out in the sunshine!

I completely agree Acumens.

As wonderful and inspiring as the paralympians are, for every one of them that made it to London 2012, there are probably two or three others who trained with a view to being in the Paralympics, but couldn't make it because of complications related to their disability. I know two people that this happened to.

I think the only lesson that can be taken from the Paralympics is that amazing things are sometimes achievable, but only with the right support.

If we put more support in place, then more people would be able to achieve, but there will still be countless people who simply cannot.

WRT the SAHM debate earlier in the thread, I ran some figures through the benefit calculator.

Couple, 2 children, one parent working 35 hours at minimum wage. Council tax of £1200 pa, local housing allowance of £125 a week. Their benefit entitlement (incl. child benefit) would be £282.99 per week, tax/NI paid would be £20.71, net cost to tax payer would be £262.28.

If the other parent in that same couple also worked 35 hours at NMW, they would then be able to claim help with childcare costs. Their benefit entitlement would be £390.26 per week, tax/NI paid would be £41.42, net cost to tax payer £348.84 - £86.56 more than if the second parent didn't work.

With those figures in mind, is it really so bad that someone chooses to be a SAHM rather than claim help with childcare costs?

I'm at work for the rest of today but yes, it's bad that the system allows it, and this is what should change. Don't forget that people paying tax for others to stay at home are often poorer than those receiving the benefit. Is that really so bad? I think so.

People talk about money as if it was floating around in the air just ready to be grabbed. Somebody earns it, and somebody pays it in tax.

But it costs more tax for that person to go to work than it does for them to stay at home.

Whatever the issues of fairness or otherwise we have run out of money. Labour proposed 20% cuts and the current Coalition have 25% (very little difference betwen them really - it is not mucho f a party political issue). Any of us who run a famiy budget know that you cannot spend what you don't have. Also very few people are rich (1% of us pay 25% of the tax paid) and given how things work if you increase taxes on the rich too much you receive less money in. So that leaves either taxing the squeezed middle more or cutting benefits - and we are doing both.

Most benefit claimants don't have large families so I doubt it will have a big impact to pay benefits only for the first two children but it will certainly make the working squeezed middle feel happier. Benefits are fairly high - if I chose not to work we get a 4 bed house and rent up to about £20,000 paid, I regard that as a huge amount. Why don't they instead move us after a year say to somewhere with much cheaper rents?

As bloody usual every mumsnet thread about welfare gets turned d to disability. No one has been talking about Carers and people with disabilities save to say they should receive more benefit. Don't let that stop you though

It is strange how often disability is brought up. I wonder how many of the families on benefits are so because one of the adults if disabled. Also have we more disabled people today thatn we had? There has been a huge increase in depression rates which may be in part linked to diet now people eat junk food, don't go outside much and don't exercise - all things which affect levels of seratonin in the brain. We should perhaps tax very high or ban most processed food and we might find that the 25% of claimants whose disability is linked to obesity, diabetes, and mental illnesses exacerbated by lifestyle and diet reduce.

It temporarily might cost more tax for that person to work than to SAH, but once the second child is in school it won't, and by that time, either or both of the parents could have been promoted so that they are earning more than minimum wage. They also aren't beginning the search for a job when the youngest starts school, so in exactly the same month that their child starts full time school, they are not costing the taxpayer anything. The fact that their child is in childcare is helping to keep other people in employment, so that they pay taxes. All this contributes to the economy and society.

So yes, in my mind, it is that bad not to work, even when thinking of those figures.

There's plenty of money, it's just been misplaced.

I don't think you have to tax the very rich to get it btw, just stop giving them public sector gifts, such as business to oppress and exploit the less fortunate.

It isn't taxing that will create equality and reduce poverty. It is stopping the policies that are making the rich richer and the poor poorer.

entirely agree actually Xenia. I really wonder about the effects of the toxic environment and food we are now used to consuming.

I've tried v hard to change my own diet and think there have been effects- I still feel very depressed and anxious but do seem to be coping better and others say I am less crazy :D

London the whole point is that disabled people are indeed the hardest hit by these cuts ALREADY AND ITS GOING TO GET WORSE.

It doesn't matter if you think disabled people should be exempted. The government sure doesn't.

hear hear MrsDeVere