To think that if you will not even look look at this pie chart regarding the welfare spend from last year you have no right to comment?

[MadameDefarge]

THE FACTS

I will now try and find a breakdown of figures of those on long term benefit JSA/IB etc.

Then perhaps we could all have a reasonable discussion.

Tax credits fall under the HMRC budget not DWP, but are about £30b. Here's a better diagram.

public spending 2012

The winter fuel allowance is a tiny percentage. The interesting thing is that the only way to cut the right hand side is to decrease the state pension. And it's not so much that the state pension is large as the fact that there are so many OAPs. We are an ageing population and set to get older.

I know quite a number of pensioners who have VERY little money, who need their winter fuel allowance, and who didn't have the luxury of living in a centrally heated home until they were in their 40s. A number of them had to leave education aged 14 to work to support their family.

I wholeheartedly agree that winter fuel payments should be means-tested, but it really gets my giddy goat that everyone under 30 thinks the older generation has had it so much easier than them!

As someone of the generation between the two, I just know that that is bollocks.

This is what is meant by the ticking time bomb of an ageing population.

Quite. We haven't seen the half of it yet!

where is that pie chart from in the op, looks like some crappy one i could produce on excel 2004.

The way things are going I intend to check out the moment I cannot manage or if I become a burden to ds. I refuse the end my rather splendid life like someone out of Zola.

The second one is from the IPPR the Institute of Public Policy Research. zwishes is more comprehensive but takes a bit of looking at. all data in the public domain.

we can hardly hold the elderly responsible for the welfare bill, most did work all their lives, and most bought homes, and paid into pensions, if they hadn't the bill would be higher. If my parents had done nothing all their lives they would be getting £600 HB per month, 100 CTB a month, and free care home when they need it, so they are saving the government at least that.

(I will make a presumption about what your point is...)

I don't actually particularly about the size of the benefits bill. I do care if it creates perverse incentives and some people abuse the system. YABU to suggest that the degree I care about that should reduce because other people are getting money for other reasons (e.g. pensions.)

If the pensions bill were 0% or double the size it is it would and should make no difference to my desire for action to on perverse incentives.

If the abusers are 1% or 99% of the people in relevant subcategories is irrelevant to me. If it's possible to create reasonable reforms that stop them doing what they're doing, I want them added.

For example, someone posted earlier this year about a friend who was planning to have a baby every five years in order to stay on benefits. I have no idea how many people do that and I don't care what the number is. But I would support a measure that requires women to go back to work at most six months after birth, like working people do. And I would support it even if to enable it it was necessary to proved 55 hours a week of free childcare, and so this cost the state a lot more. It's possible that removing the incentive to have children will actually save money in the long-term though. Even if it doesn't, I suspect there will be benefits to mother and child from working/nursery.

(I suspect that someone will be along shortly to say no women has ever done this, in the whole history of the welfare state. Actually, even if that's true, I don't care. I want the rules changed so nobody could do it!)

Couldn't the state pension be cut to some people (eg those with ample private allowances) and upped to others who don't have enough to live on?

I realise this is probably hopelessly simplistic, but why couldn't it be done?

Because whichever government means tests state pensions for anyone at or near pension age will be in opposition for the next 20 years.

The 'rich and on benefits' pensioners certainly should have their perks stopped. Some pensioners need to income, many do not. Equity release should also be more widely used to support old age - the old are sat on the vast majority of housing wealth and are far and away the biggest winners from the house price boom of the New Labour years.

The thing is society cant disincentivise people having children, as we need children to keep society going. the lower birthrate is the reason why we have such a topheavy non earning pension burden.

Also, 12 billion on working tax credit? That's not really benefit, that's a state subsidy for private employers who don't pay a living wage.

No it isn't. Employers pay exactly the same wage to people not on tax credits to those that are. That wage is the rate for the job.

Tax credits are 100% a subsidy to the worker who receives them.

chris 481, people do do that, they must be insane, 3 children and I can't wait for them to leave home so I can get my life back. Eldest Ds moving out with work friend in 10 days and counting. gonna miss him LOL

Great links, thanks OP and zwischenzug

So it's more a case of...they come to this country [when born in 1940], steal all our jobs [in the same company for 50 years] and get given houses [which Maggie Thatcher sold to them and they now own outright]

i agree, but please remember this isnt about saving money; this is about pitting people against each other & redistributing money from poor to rich & from public to private. Seems as though it's working horribly well.

Let not forget where the property wealth goes when passed, on to their less well off offspring, taking people out of benefits. Swings and roundabouts.

I'd have plenty to say. Ofen have. But as I have said in chat there are astroturfers about trying to undermine anyone who has a left wing opinion. They are nasty and cruel. They have pushed one poster from these boards and I have said elsewhere, whilst not flouncing, I'm taking a break but do take a look at our very own boards.

smugfest on pages 4&5

You could make pensions mean tested. I suspect it will have to be done. There comes a point when the balance is all messed up. Too few people paying tax and too many claiming pensions. This paying in argument is nonsense. The money comes out of tax. Just like all the other public expenditures.

the MW is not enough to live on for most single people, certainly in big cities, let alone have a family. The unpalatable truth is that those on very low incomes do the shit jobs (picking fluff out the tube every night, anyone?) and often are exempt from MW rules due to being employees of contractors. But those jobs need doing.

great link thanks OP.

Longer life expectancy is the biggest cause of the top heavy age profile surely?