to think that 20 grand on benefits a year is loads

[MrsBucketxx]

considering they dont pay any income tax.

just watching we pay your benefits program and worked out that this is over 30 grand if it was a normal tax paying salary.

why was this not mentioned.

Even with one child I would have earned £40 for 2 long days. I would have to pay for work clothes and petrol/wear and tear on car out of that. Plus I woukd have had to take time off when baby was ill etc etc.( 60 mile round trip.)
Now with 3dc it would be I would be paying over £60 per day during term time. This would rise to Almost £90 per dayin school holidays. So if I got a job say paying min wage or just above wecas a family would be worse off.
I do appreciate though that a gap on a cv could make it harder to find work. That's why I am self employed. I may not do many hours but it's something to pyt on a cv.

When I spoke to a Jobcentreplus adviser recently about going back to work in the next few years he said that if I took a job at NMW I would need to do a minimum of 30 hours to be better off financially than now.

Jake your advisor lied on the nmw at 16 hours per week in addition to your current benefits you get £99 wages exchange IS/ESA for WTC still get to keep CA CTC but via HB the in work income disregard and 100% child care disregard it works out that you would be about £45 per week better off granted you lose FSM but I remember you saying you don't use those any way.

One thing that interests me on all these threads is people always when going on about deserving or undeserving poor include carers in the deserving but do the know that officially and for DWP purposes you are not a carer unless you recive either CA or a under laying entitlement to CA ( you get the status but not the money) you cannot get either if you earn more than £100 pw.and you are not disabled according to the DWP if you do not get DLA or PIP.

I'm a carer for 5 disabled children but my children according to the gov are not disabled and I am not a carer, they all qualify for DLA 5 at higher rate care 4 higher rate mobility 1 low rate mobility and even if I did claim it I still wouldn't be a carer because unless you earn no more than than 16 hours pw at nmw you don't count as one.

I'm wondering how many people realise that until recently, Tax credits haven't been seen as a benefit, also that cb is a benefit. Although it was traditionally awarded to all parents, how bad do you lot feel for sponging off the state. Although, I forgot its different for cb.
FFs there are some hypocrites on here.
Tax credits weren't for people who needed welfare, lol. They are to top up the income of working families, especially those on a low income.

Bring back the workhouse I say and prison for debts. Dickensian times.

Very true morethan so really only people who don't receive child benefit are not being supported at all. Yet they put the most into the system.

martini - absolutely right. Single people who work and don't have kids like myself have always put most into the system and got least out. However, over time, I think, for all sorts of reasons, we are getting clobbered more and more heavily. As someone else said earlier, I think, for all the trouble over the poll tax, everyone paid the same rate, unlike now, because it is based on the property and not the person.

I used to read that child benefit (although it had a different name then) was introduced to encourage people to have kids following the second world war. Is that true or an urban myth? If so, it should have been stopped long ago rather than become a universal credit and a better way found to support ONLY those who need it.

Martin that's not true.

Only people who pay for there own medical costs there children's schooling as well as the many other things on top of not taking out any financial benefits or discounts are doing so.

Vivienne you make a good point about the taxation of someone on 20k.

Child benefit was started in 1946 and called family allowance it was never paid for the first child only 2nd children +

In about 1977 it was changed to CB and then also paid for the first child in the early 90's they started paying a higher rate for the eldest child.

It was introduced as a result of the beveridge report for no other reason apart from challenging the 5 great evils of society those being squalor ignorance idleness want disease and started to be implemented by a coalition gov (labour/ conservative) it was the same report that is responsible for the NHS and the expansion of national insurance.

Thanks, Sock!

If you are earning say 65k though you are paying enough tax and ni surely to offset most of your education and healthcare. Pluse those children are the taxpayers of the future. Plus both me and dh had worked for 20 yesrs each before having dc. Both putting into the pot and rightly so.

I think, for all the trouble over the poll tax, everyone paid the same rate, unlike now...

I'd happily pay more overall for our household, if that's how it worked out, in the interests of fairness.

How can it be right that a single person only gets 25% discount on the full amount when another household could easily have 4 wage-earning adults and yet only pay 33% more, as a group, than the single person?

Shelly - that's precisely it. I don't see why I pay, proportionally, more in my one-bed flat than my three friends who house share a three-bed rental property.

Ah so the adviser at jobcentreplus was wrong then. I thought it seemed odd.

Good point about the Carers Allowance. I am hoping to return to work in the next two years but am realistic enough to know that my circumstances mean I will be constrained regarding hours. I am assuming this means that if I lose Carers Allowance I will no longer be classed as a carer. This will possibly mean that I will have to challenge the system in order to justify not working more hours.

Difficult.

No I don't use FSM although I do claim for them so that my son's school gets the premium. He has a packed lunch by choice and being autistic he needs that sameness.

You will not lose CA as long as you only work 16 hours at NMW but your right CA does protect you from being subject to working more hours at times when you have to fund childcare on that income 70% gets paid but 100% gets accommodated for by HB/LHA so it still works out to be about the same from a being better of perspective. CA protection will even carry over to UC but only up to obtaining 16 hours work,from the info my office received recently it does not after a certain amount of time protect you from having to take any work only more than 16 hours.(but I'm quite sceptical about how they intend to do that).

So low paid job means no challenging the system at all and a bit better off but a higher paid one will make you worse off due to loss of CA and its protection.

That's it exactly, but the fact still remains that people not facing squalor and disease were given the benefit. Until recently the very rich were entitled to it.
There are many on here who are arguing against benefit, unable to see they are the biggest hypocrites.
Tax credits weren't originally considered a benefit and now they are.
The goal posts have changed, but instead of recognising this, some people are refusing to see they to would take this money if offered, as they did with cb. Instead they call people names because they are jealous of those who don't earn the same as they do.

Tax credits are definitely benefits.

Anyone receiving tax credits is on benefits.

No one can pretend or kid themselves otherwise.

If you decide to SAHP whilst someone else pays for your tax credit lifestyle and existence then you are the same as any other work shy character who could work but chooses not to.

SAHP is an admirable choice as long as you self fund. If you fund it via tax credits then imo you are the worst type of benefits 'cheat'

Child benefit was a universal benefit...always a benefit but somewhat different as everyone in the country received it.

Ronald - "Child benefit was a universal benefit...always a benefit but somewhat different as everyone in the country received it"

Actually, it shouldn't be called a universal benefit. Because, obviously not everyone in the country received/receives it!

If you are earning say 65k though you are paying enough tax and ni surely to offset most of your education and healthcare. Pluse those children are the taxpayers of the future. Plus both me and dh had worked for 20 yesrs each before having dc. Both putting into the pot and rightly so

How much do you think schooling costs? Also the reassurance that if any member of your household get seriously ill or injured your medically sorted.

Say child gets run over age 9 is seriously injured requiring extensive treatment (I use that example as that happened to my child) right there you've got about £5 million worth of treatment (or what it would cost if self funding that type of treatment was possible in the uk cos its not) in one year.

National insurance is not a net that catches what you pay over your lifetime for service use even if its paid by you like that just because you don't use the services at that time does not mean you can't use them until you have paid for them you can use them whenever you need or want to even silly rich people (by that I don't mean they are silly people I'm meaning the amount of money) have that option.

Ronald

They weren't benefit when they first started. You got a letter telling you to apply and how much you would receive.
As far as I know everybody was entitled to apply.
CB is a benefit too, even though every household with children has been entitled to it until recently.
If you didn't claim yours, or are not arguing against TC you aren't one of the hypocrites I refer to.
Yes, all those people funding your cb, what a scrounger
Tax credits are also universal if you happen to be earning a low income.
People who are sahps are not necessarily work shy, you should try it sometimes.
So really you are saying you shouldn't be allowed to care for your children unless you are rich. Ah, thats really I pity you.

SAHP is an admirable choice as long as you self fund. If you fund it via tax credits then imo you are the worst type of benefits 'cheat'

That makes you sound quite silly. Being a benefit cheat is being dishonest committing fraud not following the rules.

I also think that removing tax credits will make it more likely that people have the children that they can afford.

Not the children I afford for them

I'm all for big families.
I'm all for SAHP
If you play for them yourselves

I think contraception would become massively more reliable if someone else didn't pay

If tax credits are removed from families where one parent refuses to work because they can and do take advantage of the benefit system then the SAHP will have to work to support their family like anyone else. If they refuse to do so then it will be that SAHP's fault if their child suffers. It will be their choice to SAH that causes the suffering. Not the lack of system to exploit.

I think it is hard for some to see that they need to support themselves and their families. It is no one else's responsibility except in circumstances of caring, disability or extreme life chance ( for a ltd period )

Ronald

I meant to ask, where does this self fund come from then?
Both parents working and paying childcare, in many equates to the loss of one wage, how is this self funding?
In addition, if you are claiming child care costs up to 70% in some cases, how is this self funding? Its expecting people to fund your choice to work. Which don't kid yourself is necessary if no profit is gained in the end.

No tax credits were only ever given to earners under a certain threshold

No one paid for my children's childcare as I earned enough to do so myself.

Imagine if everyone decided it didn't pay them to work

Who would pay your benefits??