Here is my total income as a lone parent on benefits.

[HereBeHubbubs]

Inspired by a thread which is glorifying us lone parents as 'rolling in it', I'm prepared to declare my benefits income. It's not gauche to do so, because it's your money after all (looks at taxpayers), and you should probably know that I am also grateful for this support, prepad to pay back into the pool when working again, and am not extravagant nor consider this a 'lifestyle choice'.

I don't have Sky, a plasma tele, holidays, credit or catalogue accounts, smoke, drink and rarely socialise due to childcare issues. I buy all our clothes from charity shops. I do however have a concession rate council leisure centre swim membership of £18 a month and a £10 rolling contract mobile phone, with a phone somebody gave me.

I am terrible at budgeting and have been living on a £500 overdraft for at least the last couple of years - I never have enough income to return the account into the black, so I'm generally always at least £400 overdrawn.

My utilities are on prepayment meters currently eating up old debt weekly and a not competitive tariff.

I'm currently looking for work and can't understand how people sit at home without good reason, because since my youngest started school, I have been going stir crazy and begun to feel quite down and despondent about not working.

Fortunes will change in the near future as doubtless I will find work, but meanwhile, when you break down the cost of my outgoings, hopefully you can see that lone parents really are not 'rolling in it'.
Especially the ones who receive little or no maintencance from their absent children's father.
Unimagined outgoings include things like termly Brownies subs, school snacks at £8 a month, school shoes every new term, birthday and Christmas presents, rent shortfall £75 a month, winter utilities alone are £40 a week each gas and electric.

Lone parent age 45, two children 5 and 7, private rented three bed (officially two as one leads off the bathroom) terrace Anglia region.'Housing Benefit and Council Tax Benefit don't enter my bank account, they're paid direct to recipients.

Weekly Income
5.00 CSA
72.40 JobSeekers Allowance
34.05 Child Benefit
114.08 Child Tax Credit

£225.53 week
£902.12 every month

I wasn't saying having a mortgage made you wealthy - in this country it makes you 'respectable', 'secure', 'worthy', if you like (I'm not saying this is correct either). Someone, somewhere, has decided that you can have your house because you're working and able to pay. People on benefits may appear to have more disposable money, but even then they can't get a mortgage, or a loan (not counting pay-day/loan shark type loans) and will most likely be left high and dry when something goes wrong.

IMO it's not the level of income, it's what the 'having a job/not having a job' represents. You can see it here (on MN).

And what's going to happen when people retire? They have no option to downsize, release equity or any other option people who own their own home have.

The point I think Driven was making is that paying a mortgage is NOT like paying rent from wages. Rent goes for your housing there and then, but a mortgage provides you not only with housing but with a future where you have paid it off and have zero housing costs in retirement (unless you bought beyond your means), and in many cases a huge lump of asset you can then choose if you need to sell to liquidate. Rent is a cost; mortgage is more equivalent to putting some of your money into savings each month, as you still have the money- it's just in the form of a house rather than cash. (I say this as someone who has a mortgage btw- I am incredibly privileged to have that rather than be paying what would be more in rent which is effectively throwing away money into the pocket of a landlord who is richer than me).

OP, you probably need to make it clearer that you still pay a rent portion out of income. Also you are stuck on prepayment meters and yes, £80 a month (or more in winter) is about what you pay in a 2-bed house on those. I have had them. If people in work are worse off than this then I would strongly suspect they are not claiming appropriate tax credits, as those effectively ensure you have more money in work than out, regardless of your per hour wage. Either that or they have mortgages which they can't really afford, which is just a bit daft.

I think that given the OPs age and those of her dc I will assume that she has paid plenty into the system to get this just-liveable amount as she had her first child at 38.

To those posters that say they earn less and rent please do apply for HB, WTC and CTC you might be pleasantly surprised because if you really have less to live on after childcare costs, pension contributions, etc (except travel to work costs but income is assessed on a sliding scale not pound for pound) you should be entitled to some of these benefits. Sad but true in 2014 - the working poor have to get benefits to get by.

Unfortunately those with a mortgage do have to suck it up for a while but it should get easier and one day you will own a house - little chance of that for the OP.

For all those posters who feel hard done by through working would you really prefer to feel worthless and less of a martyr? Hopefully there will be no life-affecting changes over which you have no control whereby you might have to rely on benefits to get you through.

In fairness I really don't think the OP is asking or sympathy or suggesting it's not enough - she's just laying her cards on table as to what she receives.

£900 a month AFTER all your rent and council tax has been paid. Nope, you're on your knees and will be scratting around in bins on that kind of disgusting income.

Kormachameleon:

www.gov.uk/maximum-weekly-working-hours/overview
www.gov.uk/national-minimum-wage-rates

Sounds like your partner needs to look at those.

CTB - Council Tax Benefit - not CTC but apply for those too.

It's not the lap of luxury no, but for a single person it would be a damn respectable amount. Now the OP has children which changes the game considerably, but it's still a decent household income - she admits she's not in penury and utter poverty, and so tbh I don't know what she wanted to achieve with the thread.

.

It's probably important to note that most of the money comes from the child tax credits and child benefit...take those away, and it's an entirely different story.

For a 24-year-old disabled person, for example, you get £73 a week. You could also get HB and CT, but that won't pay the bills, and neither will £73 a week. When you get out of the assessment phase, which takes 32 weeks on average where I am, you get a maximum of £108 a week. So about £450, ish, a month, to pay utilities and look after yourself.

I worked this out for a friend last night, who has been advised to stop working. She can't afford too. Even with rent and CT paid, she has to pay utilities and food, and she'd have absolutely no money for travelling to hospital appointments.

I worked it out with her because I was convinced that we'd missed something. We aren't including DLA/PIP, because there is a 42 week wait just to be assessed for that.

It's not all rosy if you take away the child-related elements, and not a lot of people would argue that children should be raised in poverty.

A 42week wait? That is disgusting. ??

Sorry posted too soon - feeding ds.

Is it a case of 'the grass is greener'? Because then no-one's ever happy. Which makes for an unhappy, disillusioned, divided society. Sad.

My husband and I are both professionals and would kill to have 900 after everything is paid. We don't. Nothing close and it pisses me off that people who don't work are finically better off then people who do, get to bring up their kids themselves rather then paying 1K a month, so that I can pay higher taxes to help them be better off then I am. It's not fair. I don't mind the benefit system helping people, but I do mind it being the equivalent to working full time in a professional career- where's the incentive to work?

Driven this argument assumes people who are on benefits are the only ones renting! I pay £1000 a month to rent my family house and pay council tax, well slightly over that, for exactly what the OP has. I can't get a mortgage and I work full-time in a demanding job which requires high qualifications!

Getting £900 to live on is not hard done by, it's what I have working full-time after paying rent and council tax!

I wonder if the posters thinking the OP is in a great position have ever lived on JSA. If you managed to without the depression and despondency stopping you from getting a job, then fair enough. If not, the money doesn't take away the fact that you're completely miserable.

OP, I can only imagine how you feel with kids to support as well. I moved home rather than live on JSA (I thought I was managing, between jobs) when I met with my mum as I usually do and she was shocked by how skinny and ill I looked (mixture of what I now know was depression and not being able to eat properly).

That was a long time ago though, and I've been working full-time for a while now. I may have less disposable income than you, but I understand where you're coming from. I hope you find a job soon.

And Woodlice put it much better than I did

What is the incentive to work rather than being on benefits? Other than pride and self development?

I agree that's actually rather a lot. Not that it's your fault op, but you make it sound like you can barely get by on it, when you can.

I have 1 DC and earn just over £30k but by the time I pay rent (high rent area) on my 2 bed flat, bills, council tax, student loan, car expenses, and minimal food (we only have dinner at home) I have less than £100 a week.

This has to cover all clothes, shoes, outings, school trips, clubs, party gifts etc. Im lucky that mum takes care of DC 2 days a week so I give her whatever is left...usually

I love how people are saying that it is wages that are the problem and need to increase. Where exactly does that increase come from?

The balance is wrong. If we as a country can't afford to pay people who are working properly why on earth are we paying more to people who don't work?

It would be great if everyone earned more but that is not reality. This generation is not as well off as their parents, but people seem to be under the impression that standard of living will carry on rising indefinitely. It won't, and our benefits system needs to adjust with it.

HerebeHubbubs

I used to be you. And then I got a job, and now this is my income:

Wages (work full time 8-3) - £950 per month after tax
Tax Credits (@£160 per week) - £693 per month
Child Benefit (@£20.80 per week) - £90.13
Total - £1,733.13

Go to your local Job Centre and do a "Better off Calculation" - I was £70 per week better off going to work part time and now that I'm full time I no longer have to adhere to their stupid Housing Benefit rules!

No, Hair, the majority of people here were pointing out that they had less after paying their mortgage. I understand people rent too - and the whole rental thing stinks so much I don't comment on those threads.

Like I said, is the grass really greener? Having been on both sides, I know which I prefer.

What are the school snacks you are paying for?
And why are you buying new shoes every term?

I was £70 per week better off going to work part time

But there is something so wrong about that! You should never be better off with working LESS! (Not bashing you, sezamcgregor just hating on the system)

You own your own home (I get that the bank 'owns' it, but to all intents and purposes, you own your own home). How many people on benefits can say that? I bet they'd give their back teeth (and would love your level of income) if they could say that they own their own home.

having a mortgage isn't a meal ticket. A lot of people lost thousands and thousands when the crash came. People forget that, probably because the media is so London centric. I have tons of friends who bought at the wrong time. Many "owned" homes (as you put it) where they owed for more than the value.

buying carries lots risks that renters don't have to take.

This is really interesting for anyone interested in the spending figures:

www.theguardian.com/news/datablog/2013/jan/08/uk-benefit-welfare-spending