To think many mumsnetters have little or no understanding of life on a low income

[crocodilesarevicious]

It's going to be hard to know how to phrase this as I don't want to cause offence.

I've been hanging around for a while. One thing I've noticed is that benefit threads become angry very quickly because so many are quite loud and fixed in their view that the UK is full of starving children reliant on value baked beans from food banks to fill their hungry tummies.

However, if someone who is on benefits or a low income is searching specific advice! they are often given quite short shrift. I've noticed this a few times - they are told, often brusquely, to retrain as something at university - usually a teacher or a nurse. These are graduate professions yet they are chucked out as something anyone can do. Not everyone can go to college or university due to financial restraints but also, some people don't have the academic ability. This is dismissed and shrugged off - if people aren't on much money then they need to find a way to make more money, even if this isn't possible.

Childminding, or starting a business is also suggested. People who rent may not be able to do this. Again, this takes a certain amount of financial and business savvy not to mention starting up costs.

Cooking is another area people seem to have little understanding of. It's so easy to cook healthy, cheap nutritious meals if your kitchen is large and a pleasure to cook in and you can whiz in the car to sainsburys or Tesco. If you have a small, grubby, dark kitchen and the local Spar or premier shop it's a bit different.

I suppose what I'm getting at is that when talking about people in general terms, Mumsnet likes to be left wing and PC. Yet when it's someone specific, irrelevant and often patronising advice is given to them and then they are flamed when they can't act on it.

My own position, while I'm a graduate and employed in a professional capacity, is perhaps between the two. I've never been reliant in benefits but was homeless for a time in my 20s and am able to see how things that look simple often aren't.

I've nothing to add really except to say this is a fascinating, fascinating thread.

I completely agree with the OP. Many people don't really have a clue - and over the course of this thread I've come to realise that that includes me.

Lots of food for thought here.

I totally agree OP - once I came on here asking advice as I had been asked to pay my gas bill upfront - 700 quid!
some of the comments were un - fucking - believable and one of them even called me a scrounger who expected other people to pay my bills.
Other less nasty ones told me to 'save up'.

Something positive from this thread - last night I got talking to DH about it. Brief bit of background, I'm 43, we were both made redundant 3 years ago, I've had a couple of jobs since but not great and both short term, he has had some interviews but nothing (he's older and strongly suspect this is going against him, my background is middle management, his very senior)

I didn't finish my A levels (had a baby and dropped out)

I am going to finally do my degree - I hope! I just need to work out money, if DH claims JSA instead of me, I think we can do it. Has to be OU as nowhere easy/cheap to travel to (and we can't move - can't afford to and have a DS in 6th form and I don't want to disrupt him) As far as I can tell, maintenance grants have been removed for distance learning, which is a PITA.

Plan today is to ask at JCP if they can put me in touch with anyone who can go through everything with me and work out money...
If I study FT for 3 years, I still have potentially 20 years working at the end of it, so it is worth it. If I'm honest, it's worth it anyway, I want to do it for me as much as for improving my prospects.

Unless DH gets work, we will still be struggling, so it's daunting but I have had several interviews in the last few weeks that have all ended in a thanks but no thanks, so just feel increasingly that I need to change something.

It's not a quick fix and it will be bloody difficult, I couldn't do it without DH being so supportive, without my children being much older now and many other factors, so this really isn't a "If I can do it" type post, just a thank you really for pushing me to have the discussion with DH about it.Oh and a shameless "please wish me luck and that it will be feasible money wise" :)

thing is,. I think a lot of people just dont have a clue how others do manage. I'm forever being told how good I am with money, like I have a choice! .....to me, money gives you choices and if you are used to having choices in life it becomes normal and anything else is seen as weird eg. its your choice to have a badly paid job/live in crap rented accommodation you can barely afford/feed your kids value beans, a lot of people dont see there is no choice in this at all, its a complete necessity, but because they have so many choices in life they cant understand why you dont.

Perhaps among some people an understanding of the system, tax credits, housing benefit etc, which is supposed to prevent grinding poverty and thus a gap in understanding why that system at a macro level is not working for an individual.

^^This, especially for 3+ DCs. A relative of mine has 5 DCs. He is 30 and has worked very little since leaving school. His DW has always been a SAHM, which is understandable given the large family as she has no qualifications so no chance of getting a job that would cover childcare.

He does bits of work sporadically when the Job Centre put enough pressure on him, but it never lasts long. They rent a HA property in the north and the combination of CTC/ESA/HB/CTB/CB they get was above the benefit cap and was equivalent to an annual salary about £35 to £40k pa so not peanuts by any stretch of the imagination – I assume that they now get whatever the benefit cap is, or his wages plus CTC, which probably works out at a similar amount when he manages to stay in work.

I know there are sometimes problem with the system, but surely someone on that sort of income can afford the basics at the very least (rent, bills, food, some transport, clothes for the children, basic household goods – you can get a new washing machine for £200 for example).

The really poor are those without DCs, or perhaps only 1 or 2, because the tax credit top up is little or nothing.

also, maybe its just me but I know a fair few folk who complain continuously they are skint when I know they aren't? I mean really complain, all the time...its so bloody annoying.

For many of the skintest people, surely things will gradually improve as the kids get older, and working options etc become much more flexible? They won't have wee kids forever.

And what are they too eat in the years before these options open up? I very much doubt that anyone plans to have children that they cant afford to feed. Things happen, redundancy, disability, illness, marriage breakdown, abuse. Its funny that on MN you will get cries of LTB when he is hitting you and then the sort of responses the OP is talking about when 2 years down the line you are struggling to feed the children you saved from that abuse.

But there's something about the benefits/poverty threads which brings out the responses discussed here.

Because "my taxes are paying for you to sit at home all day, just get a job!". Many people feel that simply by paying pennies towards out of work benefits (and it is pennies, most of the benefits bill goes to pensioners, the next biggest chunk is paid to those with a job) gives them the right to dictate how those who receive that pittance should spend it.

how can people who are skint study with the OU? I've contacted them and the courses are expensive

This is just the world though?! Isn't it? We aren't all the same, we don't all start out in life the same.

As much as the assumptions of those in poverty there are just the same assumptions about those who have wealth here. Not even just here, if you have money you damn well better not talk about your life otherwise people with pitch forks come running. Don't you know you've got it so good? So shut up and don't you even think of complaining.

I actually don't know if I even like MN, I kind of would rather talk to people just in my social circle where I'm not judged. Even though I come here to offer advice and read about other issues, it gets to the point where it's not constructive. It isn't helping anyone to be judged, help isn't offered by many without judgement.

A real shame.

OnIlkeleyMoor - that's why I've taken pains to point out it isn't only or even mainly people on benefits who are impacted by poverty.

I've never claimed benefits. Not once. But as a single woman with no DCs life was expensive and I couldn't afford a washing machine. I earned, then, £1100 a month. £500 went on rent. Then after council tax, travel costs and student loan repayments came out I had about £300 to feed, clothe myself and socialise.

I didn't starve but I couldn't afford a washer either. Just how it was.

Yes that's it Bogeyface. I was horrified by the format of the new tax statements that HMRC are sending out. There's a pie chart that shows where your tax goes. Welfare (separate from pensions) is the largest chunk, but what the document fails to tell you is a significant proportion of that is housing benefit (which is in effect a subsidy for private landlords) and tax credits (which allow business to get away with paying low wages). But many people will look at that and think bloody scroungers, living the life of Riley on my money.....

how can people who are skint study with the OU? I've contacted them and the courses are expensive

You can apply for funding via the Student Loan Company and then pay it back in the same way that other students do, when you are working and earning over £21,000 but you have to commit to doing a full degree. I am not sure you can do it if you are doing an individual course, but you can do it over 6 years iirc. There is info on funding on the OU website.

This year my ou study is being paid half by a grant and half by a charity.

I think that benefit bashers are usually people who are in shit jobs working long hours for low pay for a tax avoiding company because that's all that's that is available and they have been pushed into it by the benefit office. It is not far off slavery and i am not surprised they are resentful and I don't blame people for inventing illness or bending the rules in order to stay out of that degrading and depressing situation. We need a much higher minimum wage and better working conditions. The working conditions will follow a higher national wage as people will be an investment rather than disposable labour. The Labour Party's plans to increase the MW are, like all their manifesto promises, too little too late. This attitude is becoming entrenched and normalised.

We have always had elitism and snobbery but that's been a take it or leave it attitude that makes people appear selfish and odd. This kind of vigilante benefit bashing is something else and it needs intervention on the ground with decent policies that work long term. Preventing immigration, dropping out of Europe are knee jerk solutions that will not address poverty or reliance on benefits. Once wages are good, local settled people with families will become the employee of choice as they will have the stability and long term commitment that is the backbone of a healthy business. Yes, immigrants do take those basic jobs at the moment but that's only because they are the only people able to manage on those low wages because they have a 'home' elsewhere, a backup option.

Rant over

siarie, I come on here as there are so many different points of view, some I like and agree with, others I dont like at all, but all of them make me think and make me realise the world is much wider and more diverse than my little box....but if you want to stick to your box then thats fine too, but you may be missing out a bit...

willkommen, I have a basic job on NMW, its not just immigrants who take these jobs!! and I manage, not because I have a home elsewhere but because I bloody have to!! I find your post patronising and offensive.

ssd I don't mind other points of view when they are constructive, but the point of this thread is often they aren't as they are full of assumptions.

But due to the format of this being a public forum you have to just filter through and pick out the parts that apply. I have plenty of friends that I grew up with who are in different circumstances but won't judge (because it's not an anonymous forum), thus perhaps it's more effective to speak to them rather than here.

fair enough, do what suits you

I agree with you OP, every word, except that it is not just Mumsnet, it is everywhere.

People don't like facing the ugly truth of poverty. If they did, they would have to face the fact that 1. It could happen to them and 2. They are part of the problem.

Much more comfortable to dispense harsh judgements and "helpful" advice.

I also think that, as a recent poster pointed out, comprehension is not a strong point. Why bother to read the posts or think about the topic when in fact you could just post, Yabu or Get a cleaner.

Most fascinating and interesting thread I have read on mumsnet for a long,long time...

also slightly embarrassing as I have been moaning about having "no money" for the last couple of months (probably telling people at home,with my heating on,talking into my newish mobile phone) whilst on the other hand telling people it is doable to be sahm by having cheap holidays and an older car (someone gave this as an example of misguided "well off" people soliciting advice)

However I think there are people who genuinely could manage their money much better if they wanted to or choose IMO to spend money/prioritise the wrong things. For example I have a friend who lives in a poverty stricken area whose children go to the catchment school for that area,he is constantly moaning anbout his children having to go to that school whilst having a brand new Audi on the drive....

Anyway that's another thread entirely!

so what are you saying with that anecdote ispent? he should sell his car before he complains about the schoool? seems like a total non sequiter to me.

'I very much doubt people plan to have children they can't afford to feed'.

Some do. Statistically, they can't all be victims of redundancy, ill health or abuse. I know lots of people who have had kids in very tight circumstances, some of my family included.

As the years have gone by, their lives have materially improved. But those early years of lost wages etc are very tough. How could they not be?

For many, the desire for kids over rides practicalities, and we are told 'don't wait for the right time, the right time never comes'. That's a personal choice, but it's not one I'd make myself as the idea of raising children on such tight margins would terrify me.

I used to believe that Americanism of if you work hard enough anyone can be rich. Mumsnet has made me realise that's rubbish.

Sunny - Maybe he could have an old car, and use the money saved to take the children to a less local school? Or to pay the legal costs of moving house to a better school area?

Siarie - maybe rich people should be judged sometimes? God knows, poor people have to put up with plenty of judging.

yeh it is probably financed anyway.