To think that this woman is a greedy bitch?

[TheHairyDieter]

Greedy Bitch here

I believe that state handouts should be for people who genuinely need them. There is just not enough money to go around without giving them to people who are well-off. If Child Benefit was means tested, people on low incomes could be given more. That might be enough to get them off the dole and into work.

Honestly, this article had me seething. I hate greed

Those corporations that are avoiding.

I think the banking crisis cost the country more than the entire welfare bill.

I'm fed up with pointing a finger at the poor or mid income people, George Osbourne must be laughing his arse off at all of us arguing who should lose their money. These politicians are sitting on personal fortunes and they have no idea about real life.

Whilst we're pretty okay off we have noticed food prices accelerating, heating our home costs so much more, etc.

I'd like to see the shortfall made up by ensuring that companies who make money in this country pay tax in this country. Amazon, Starbucks, TopShop etc.

That would bring in a fair bit of tax revenue

(sarcasm, in case it wasn't evident)
(PS I know there are plenty of disabled people who work and/or are wealthy. But as a group they're fairly hard done by)

Posie and Jins, I can't disagree. Does make me think that my arguing is very limited on this.

I actually think they should scrap child benefit altogether and sort out childcare and all sorts of other issues that cost families dearly.

It's very clever manipulation by the govt and media SHREIK.

Everyone is doing it whether you're championing people losing CB or pointing at your neighbour who cleans a few windows. The govt has made us feel powerless against those with lots of money, so we turn upon eachother.

Posie
Greedy pig Tony buys 100 donuts with the wages he worked for. The shop give him an free donut 'on the house'
Tony gives 35 donuts to the other pigs to share.

Some pigs wanted Tony to give them more donuts.
Tony said "No, I've given you enough donuts"
The other pigs wanted him to give them the free one and thought that Tony was being very unfair.

"If Child Benefit was means tested, people on low incomes could be given more."

Do you really think it'll work like that? That's very naive!

People on low benefits will not be given more if CB is means tested. That's not what this government are about, not at all.

They will be cutting money for people on low incomes, while giving tax-breaks to the wealthy.

I don't understand why people pretend that benefits problems like this are okay and the issue that needs to be sorted is corporations avoiding tax.

BOTH are issues that need to be sorted.

You could try ONS and Core for the raw(ish) data. You would then need to model the cumulative impact.

The EIA needs to consider the impact each individual change will have on a particular group. They tend to be vague and woolly so that there is enough wriggle room to avoid a court date. Along the lines of :
this change will be universal so geographically there will be no where disproportionately disadvantaged by the proposed change

Which carefully ignores the tendency of different groups live in different areas. In the letter of the law it has been considered. Just not fully.

I can see both sides tbh. On a day to day basis they obviously don't need the money as much as a family on significantly less would, but like anything, it's 'swings and roundabouts' - they pay more tax and will have to contribute more when their kids go to uni etc.

There's also no denying the fact that it makes no sense to apply the cut to family with one £50k earner, but not to a family with 2 x £49k earners.

The whole idea obviously needs a bot more thought whichever 'side' you're on.

Just like to remind you people keep saying she's on 100000 which would make her take home different to what they income actually is.
For a start she said he earns considerably more... What's that? (Fudging on her part for a start)
Anyway 2 people earning 125k take home 85k (unlike one person taking home 125k as they would take him 63.5k) approx.

There's also no denying the fact that it makes no sense to apply the cut to family with one £50k earner, but not to a family with 2 x £49k earners.

Yes, why is this? Can anybody come up with a workable alternative that is fairer?

Each Government always looks to the same people to claw revenue back. It's always the PAYE tax payers or benefit recipients that get hit because that is where budgets can be controlled directly by Government. It's predictable and achievable.

The trouble is that it sets people against each other. People on low incomes start to begrudge CB payments to higher earners. People on higher rates of tax start to begrudge payments to non-earners. It all turns very unpleasant very quickly.

The squeezed middle are squeezed every time there's a budget. There's only so much squeezing that can go on before there's a rebellion. Many of the people who will lose CB object as much to the principle as to the reality. I agree that £50 a week or so won't be missed too much by many of the families who are affected but the erosion of this universal benefit is a bad thing. If we all start agreeing that higher earners shouldn't get a universal benefit then what's next? We should all be objecting to it regardless of whether we are affected or not because we may be next

Do people really think that the DM doesn't know exactly what it's doing when it publishes stuff like this?

Presenting a child benefit claimant in a way that readers think she's "greedy bitch" just perpetuates the demonising of all benefit claimants.

Don't allow yourselves to be manipulated.

Completely agree Jins. We barely hear about corporations avoiding tax they make the news for a couple of days and these 'benefit scroungers' are daily news. I think when one minister looked at no welfare of more than two kids he was looking at 35,000 families which would really make no difference at all, which really makes it looks like the Govt ONLY pitting people against eachother as we (country) gain nothing finacially.

Just because the DM have written a story about it, does not mean that it is not a valid topic for debate.

for families with more than two dcs

Of course it's a valid topic for debate. But what we're getting from a lot of people on her isn't debate, it's ignorant ranting.

given that 54% of households take more benefit than they pay in in tax, its hard to know where these poor people are that are paying for the rich's benefits.

Ah yes, the squeezed middle 30% earners.

I think both arguments are invalid. The wealthiest should not be paid benefits. But nor should "the poor" - Money should be used to pay off the national debt or pay some top notch people to block the loopholes in tax law that allow business to wriggle out of its tax obligation.

I cant help but feel that all this hysteria plays very nicely into the hands of Messrs Cameron and Clegg so that we fight eachother rather than fighting tax dodging companies.

tony earns 100 donuts - everyone else should fuck off and get thier own.

Of course, if Tony earns over a certain amount, they will be iced donuts (or doughnuts as we spell them in the UK) covered in hundreds and thousands.

Which is probably why the others are REALLY jealous.

Amazon paid no corporation tax on profits generated by last year's UK sales of £3.3bn

What sort of revenue would that generate for the Government? Add Starbucks, Top Shop and all the others and there's a big chunk of money there.

Fiddling with CB is rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic

And the donuts needed to power the street lights?

Actually I believe I said that Tony had 100 donuts, noone is surely under the illusion that Tony has earned the right to keep them all? What with his wealthy parents whose descendants waaaaay back just took the land for themselves and his private education, high living standards and his old boys network. I think we can assume that Tony has no real right to keep many of his donuts.