"Benefits are a lifestyle choice for so many these days"

[Bellerina2]

I'm on the bus and two women behind me are having a long conversation about perceived benefit cheats and one of them just said the above phrase. WIBU to hit her over the head with a rolled up copy of the Guardian??

But seriously, it's so depressing that people think this. Well done to the government and likes of the Sun and Daily Mail for convincing people that those on benefits are leading some sort of charmed life

All sounds like consistently histrionic, unintelligent, tabloid-driven, anecdotal, eugenics-flavoured tripe to me SnowBells

Fine with you.

I'm definitely not unintelligent- rather the opposite in RL, really - but I know I have views others might hate. I'm fine with it. We can agree to disagree.

Benefits are meant to be a safety net - not a lifelong provision that may stretch out for generations.

DH and I had to think hard whether we could afford to have kids. How come some people who never worked and whose parents never worked breed like rabbits? Maybe castration of the men who don't work and are never planning to work is due , and we can stop this endless cycle.

Oh yes. Hilarious

If you are intelligent Snowbells, you will doubtless be able to appreciate that it was your tripe that I just described as unintelligent. Not you.

So we can't joke about castrating men these days?

Read that on MN all the time.

indeed

Arsenic, you really can't handle jokes, can you?

Wow, how super-serious you must be.

Out of interest.. . How do you plan on breaking the cycle where kids just become like their parents who never worked (as described by Wicked)? Schooling alone obviously does not work, because home life matters, too?

Snow. Slippery slope logical fallacies do not enhance your argument.

Oh I wouldn't dream of interrupting your flow when you are on such a policy roll Snow.

Forcible adoption of the DC of the poor, shittest housing available, castration...

What else? I'm agog.

Oh, and snow picking up on one posters anecdata isn't helpful either. Various studies have been done to show that there are very few families in which generation after generation have been out of work. Take a look, as stated before at JRF studies on the subject.

Or was removing people's DC for adoption becuase they claim benefits a 'joke' too?

^because

I am talking about children who are not cared for at home. So you want them to stay there?

Neither you nor I are in a position to judge whether they should stay there or not. What I do know, snow, is that just because the parents are on benefits, there is no justification for removing the children.

Snow you have the rhetorical gifts of an over-ripe camembert.

I am not talking about people on benefits in general. As I said, I was referring to Wicked's experience.

You might want to read back your work there.

I don't know how to solve the benefits cycle where generations stay on the dole, not doing anything. Given that their kids are not looked after, maybe it would have been better to have been adopted by other parents?

Arsenic - I've read it.

I say some people, and I said that I can't see any other way to break that cycle for a specific set of people (namely, the one described by Wicked where generations remain on benefits). I just can't see it. Parental involvement in is very important. But what if parents are not involved?

And can you pls tell me how you would solve those situations, as I asked previously?

I have this feeling you like to spread very safe, politically correct rhetoric, but don't actually know how to solve the problem.

Certain posters on here are espousing the views of Friedrich Hayek . These views include that by being on state Benefits, people have been sent along the road to 'Serfdom'

Hayek states that no matter how principled a state may be in trying to reduce inequality. The greater the welfare benefits offered by the state the more likely society is led down the road to dependence in all aspects of life .

This can be seen in a modern way today, with the fact that people on low incomes are in many circumstances better off not working.

Whether or not you agree , with Friedrich Hayek is down to your political ideas or beliefs.

The problems that need tackling are 1) unlivably low wages 2) overinflated housing costs/ undersupply of housing and 3)oversupply of low-wage/low-skill labour

It is not possible to have a safety net/ benefits system without a risk of freeloaders, but the harms or disadvantages to society of some freeloaders are much smaller than the harms to society of having no safety net?.

this !