to think capping benefits at 2 children is a good idea

[moogstera1]

Child-related benefits may be 'capped' at two children"
*Iain Duncan Smith said the current system, where families get more benefits the more children they have, was among changes being considered.

Families on benefits were often "freed from" the decision of whether they could afford more children, Mr Duncan Smith said, and must "cut their cloth".*

yes yes, before I get jumped on, if both your arms fall off and a previously hard working wage earner is jobless, there should be ( and I imagine would be)a safety net for those who then need benefits and have more than 2 chidren; but, in principle, I agree that working families seem to have to make much more difficult decisions regarding how many children they have than long term non working do, and it's mostly about finance.
The suggestion is that this would not be happening till 2015 and then only to new claimants so no comments about which children should be sacrificed, please.
The idea seems to be to only factor in 2 children wrt tax credits, child benefit

I a sure the report will support the views of those that wrote it. In the same way using the same references they used the opposing views can be justified. It's how you cut and slice the references that provides whatever conclusion you want to come to.

it depends what you mean by 'individual choice and a failure to take responsibility'.

many people spend their lives in poverty with the sole aim their DCs will lead easier lives. I don't know if there is any other route out of poverty that works than this.

???

I should imagine the church puts a slightly different slant on statistics.
As Chickpea says, you can pick and choose your references etc. but in the real world the welfare bill is going through the roof and can't support indefinite numbers with no restraint

Moogya you sound very bitter going on and on that people on vendors have it better than you. So you want to take something from them because life isn't fair on those who work.

Well speaking as the parent of a severely disabled child someone suffering a pyschotic mental illness, the child of a drug addict and a victim of childhood sexual abuse. Life isn't fair but that doesn't mean I begrudge you your life or your normal children. Should I take something from you because you have it better than me? To make life fair no instead I use my abilities to make life fair by helping people with mental illness get help campaigning against drug abuse and helping others who have been sexually abused.

Why don't you try and do something positive to make things fair like I do. You could campaign for a legal statutory pay rise yearly in line with inflation. As every year people are given a lower wage increase than inflation meaning technically they have taken a pay rise.

If you are so concerned by fairness then do something positive about it.

Sorry technically they have taken a pay cut not rise.

FasterStronger not sure if you were referring your note to me. If you are, you will see from my earlier post that I am talking from experience and not purely from a political or intellectual prospective.

I do wonder how many people can say the same thing!

the reason they aren't fucking with the elderly is because IMO the elderly vote. Not all the elderly are sat on secure tenancies that entitle them to a home for life.

the solution to the bedroom tax is not the opinion that 'people are sat on spare bedrooms' becuase more often than not - they aren't, what constitutes a spare bedroom anyway? the government definition which was brought in to roll back the cost of the welfare state? should this definition be trusted.

y'know i have a friend who works in housing, she said " i agree with it, i mean, my two girls have to share a room" i said " yes, but that's becuase your au pair is in the other"

i own my own house, but still, i feel its a blinding bloody cheek for people who are sitting on something that will help their children in life dare to comment on what constitutes a spare bedroom - even if you as a homeowner have bloody 6 people in one bedroom.

there is a common sense approach to a growing population and a shortage in housing and that is to build more housing.

a couple of things here
1)rich developers with huge influence and deep pockets are sitting on land
2) England has huge amounts of greenfield sites which always get opposition to development from nimby's using 'saving the lesser spotted newt' as an excuse not to live near social housing....oh and they inveriably are posh MCs who vote.

DONOT BE FOOLED PEOPLE. this is not about the increasing defecit at all, this is about the wholesale distruction of the welfare state and the NHS.

Another ditty. Yesterday an old lady who lives in social housing told me that she thinks that 'all this is a good idea' when i asked her why she explained that people shouldn't be sat on their backsides whilst working people like me footed the bill. I nodded and then told her " I was made redundant a couple of yeas ago at the beginning of the economic downturn, luckily i had redundancy money, but i would have much needed the security of the welfare state having fallen on hard times through a circumstance not of my own"

the skivers V strivers is spin bullshit. Please Please if you consider yourself to even have the smallest amount of intelligence, please just do a google here and there where you have the time. Get some info from different sources.

"Contrary to the common myth, the overall cost of welfare has not been spiralling out of control for years. The proportion of national income spent on welfare has remained surprisingly constant over the past two decades (Graph 1). It is certainly true that spending has increased both in cash and inflation adjusted terms, but this can also be said for all the major government budgets (except for 55 which contracted post-Cold War) (Graph 2). Government spending, welfare included, increased broadly in line with national income until the banking crisis of 2007."

Welfare spending is cyclical, rising and falling in response to boom and bust, and the proportion of taxes spent on welfare (averaged out over the economic cycles since the 1980s) has actually stayed fairly flat.

i am utterly perplexed at people reading about the welfare reforms and seeing it as 'them' over there..'them' poor people 'them' shameless types and not thinking that it could be you.

Im not sure, but i think it was the big issue creator who said that we are all only one step away from homeless - its amazing how many businesses have fallen, self employed, or employed by blockbuster or HMV or public sector - no one is safe and yet people insist on supporting the destruction of a system that would support them if it came to it

hello parsing - fancy meeting you here

nope that's not unreasonable. However its a very very complex discussion more about population control than benefits and my views woul impact on how unreasonable IVF is as well....

By the way, moogy, where do you get your assertion that "the welfare bill is going through the roof"?

the welfare bill is greater than the income tax take.

parsing
www.economicshelp.org/blog/6810/economics/the-growth-of-welfare-spending-in-the-uk/

"Since 2001, welfare spending has increased from £57bn t0 £115bn"
just the first pone I googled. Pretty much going through the roof the way I see it..

is everone too stunned at the huge costs to comment?!

Have a look at the whole page and look at it in the "real terms" graph, it looks far less drastic.

Also bear in mind that is including child benefit and winter fuel payments which are automatic and entitled to everyone eligible in the time frame listed.

From the link you sent.

^"The most meaningful guide to the cost of the welfare state is to measure welfare payments as a % of GDP. If GDP is rising, we can afford to spend more on welfare payments, without increasing tax rates. Also between 2001 and 2012, the UK population increased by nearly 5 million. Therefore, the welfare payments per person increased slower than the total welfare bill.

This suggests welfare as a % of GDP has stayed reasonably stable at 6% of GDP. There was an increase during the recession ? which is to be expected as GDP falls and welfare payments automatically increase.

The figures for 2014 and 2015 are estimates.

Conclusion

Statistics such as this only show part of the story. To really understand the effectiveness of welfare payments, we need a close examination of each benefit, how it is spent and how it is claimed.

It illustrates the importance of being aware of different ways of viewing the same statistics. For example, the Daily Mail could easily run a headline (with a suitable picture of some immigrant living the good life)

?Welfare State is out of control as Welfare bill doubles in 10 years!?

Alternatively, you could say

Apart from expected blip during the recession, welfare payments as % of GDP remain at the same manageable level of 6%

The second headline probably wouldn?t sell as many newspapers. But, both statements are based on truth."^

ParsingFancy

Really well you wanna tell that to the lady 3 doors down who have 5 sons none of which work and nor the parents i been here for 10 years yes when there were plenty of jobs in the BOOM times

And all they do is spend the whole day sitting on the wall either smoking or waxing there suberro my oh even offered one of them a job ( there was a driver job going and they needed somone ASAP) no ta the oldest one told me

So not that desprate to work then ay

What Custardo said. Do you really want to remove the safety net that is there for YOU?

moogy1a agrred the only people who can have as many kids as they like with out fear of economics is those on welfare and those who are super Rich

There will always be people who fiddle the system, no matter what you do to it.

It doesn't help the people genuinely in need by dismantling the welfare system that is there to protect them purely because a few in the grand scheme of things manage to play it.

gimmeanaxe it stopped being a saftey net about 12 years ago now its a double bed with feather down duvet with satin sheets

'but the freed up social housing will then be occupied by another larger family, either from more expensive private accommodation or overcrowded social housing (leaving that house to be occupied by someone else).

if it doesn't save any money, it will have helped reduce overcrowding.'

No, it won't. Because people will not move into private accommodation! Get real! First of all, if they're on benefits, they will have a snowball's chance in hell of getting a private let at all. It's a LL's market out there, just look at all the threads on here in just the past two weeks from those with secure, good jobs and references who can't find a place to live for 'no children' policies.

Everyone I know in social housing, and I live in it so am surrounded by it, who will be effected by this is going nowhere, they're just going to be poorer.

I don't blame them! I'd happily near starve before I went back to private letting again.

And once again, anyone age 61+ is exempt. The largest proportion of under-occupiers are this age and up.

Bloody hell, how can you agree with Moogy? Or are you doing the same thing and only partially reading the link and seeing what you want to see?