to ask if most of you realise the tax credits cuts affect people who work, not the unemployed?

[ssd]

yes, that's right, people who work get tax credits, you must work to get them

the cuts affect people in work, not people who dont work

I'm fed up reading here about the lazy unemployed who will get their tax credits cut...err no they wont.

[BettyCatKitten]

At the end of the day, lots of people are going to be worse off, fact. Unless you don't have a claim, qualify etc.
It is not fair or right to just pull away the rug to those who have had help.
It clearly won't work on the right wing philosophy that they will increase wages in 2020? What about now?
As I've said before many are lone parents, the majority of LP are women!

[Prelude]

Good post, Needs... yes it is a race to the bottom [sa What will it take before it impacts on the rich, I wonder? With more hungry and desperate people around and fewer police. Social Security as it was once called, was supposed to benefit everyone, even if indirectly.

[BettyCatKitten]

Social security has been a thing of the past for many years.

[Prelude]

Dave and George probably have chums waiting in the wings who will make further fortunes providing private security to the privileged few.

[NeedsAsockamnesty]

Well it's going to effect me despite me not being on any benefits. It will effect me when I want to buy a coffee or a paper,when I walk down the street.

Every single day apart from when I'm holed up in my office being antisocial my life is improved in some way by the work done by essential but lower paid people. In reality we are talking about a huge % of the population I would struggle to think of any interaction I have or service I recieve that is not facilitated in someway by someone considered to be in low paid employment and it makes me feel quite uneasy (in a these changes are shit way) that their lives are about to be made harder

[NeedsAsockamnesty]

Prelude surely you can't mean the private security industry that relies on job centres churning out sia courses so unemployed people can get the license and then get paid peanuts to risk there own wellbeing?

[Prelude]

Oh it's already happening? I was thinking that we'll also end up a bit like parts of S.A and the U.S.A. Gated and patrolled communities. As usual, the poor will suffer more when a section of them are desperate.

Muggings in my town have exploded in frequency since 2010. As has theft of food from shops.

[BathshebaDarkstone]

We're one of those families whose tax credits have been cut. DH is a caretaker, I could only afford to work in school hours and am looking for a job. We're struggling to make ends meet.

[BathshebaDarkstone]

We're one of those families who take advantage of the system and only work the minimum hours, if we didn't we wouldn't get housing benefit and couldn't afford the rent (expensive London borough).

[Anniesaunt]

We have been receiving some CTC. I find the suggestion that I'm a scrounger, lazy, no responsible enough to try and better myself and all the other insults I've read here and in the media very upsetting. Quite distressing actually.

When we decided to start a family we both had good jobs but then both of us were made redundant after a number of other setbacks we lost our home and had to start again from the bottom. The past 2 years I've been studying to retrain and working 2 jobs working 60 hr plus then coming home to complete assignments. It's finally starting to pay off but NO I'm lazy anything else doesn't suit the Government's agenda.

[lougle]

VelmaD "if my tax credits drop by £30 will my HB rise by the same amount?"

No.

Housing benefit is deducted at a rate of 65p in the £1 (65%). So every pound you earn loses 65p HB. Conversely, every £1 you lose gains 65p in HB.

£30×65%=£19.50, so you'll be £10.50 worse off overall.

[bearleftmonkeyright]

Another scrounger here, when I had my third child I couldn't find any evening and weekend part time work, (I worked in an off licence, it closed down). We couldn't have managed without tax credits at the time. I have been a volunteered endlessly at playgroup and school and been a midday whilst doing Level 3. Finally managed to get a job as a TA in November and my contract has ended. Don't know if I am going to get more work from the school.

Believe me I could work all the hours I could if I could find work in my field. There is a job at the garden centre up the road I am going to apply for. But I have to be at home for my DC, there are no childminders in my village. So those people who endlessly spout on about how they have a friend who.....and claims for.....they can quite honestly fuck right off. Because you are insulting all of us.

[RedDaisyRed]

Bath, so the policy is working then? It is making you get a job so that full time working mothers are not instead subsidising your staying at home? So therefore many of us are delighted with the policy and if you live in an expensive London borough lucky you. Most of us who are not kept by the state cannot afford to and have horrible and expensive commutes or else have to cycle for an hour to work! Welcome to the real world.

[LuisSuarezTeeth]

Red, you are beyond offensive.

[BathshebaDarkstone]

No, it's not making me get a job, I'd love to get a job and can't find one I can afford to take. I'm not lucky to live in an expensive London borough, when DH was born here it was a cheap London borough. Just about every London borough would be too expensive for us except for the complete shitholes.

[BathshebaDarkstone]

Thanks Luis, that made me

[BathshebaDarkstone]

Also Red I've been living in the real world since I was 8, unfortunately, so I'd STFU now if I were you.

[DirtyDeedsD0neDirtCheap]

YABU as I think people realise now

on my FB in the days after the budget it was seething with (working) people that voted conservative thinking they were safe as they were working (LOL). they were furious that their tax credits are being cut

BUT THOUGHT WAS JUST THE SCROUNGERS, WAAAAH

newsflash: dave and George think you ARE a scrounger because you don't earn 60k. that's why there cutting your money YOU TWATS

vote more carefully next time and stop reading the fucking sun and mail

[RedDaisyRed]

It is what the voters wanted - that those of us who work full time and have our chdilren in full time childcare are not subsidising some to work part time or not to work at all. It seems to be working. However I agree it can be hard to find jobs but not that hard. My son has got a job full time as a post man - okay some might not like 5am starts and carrying heavy bags but these jobs are out there.

[Babyroobs]

I guess as with everything some families will be hit harder by these cuts. I have friends who bought ther house years ago and their mortgage is paid off. They use their tax credits to pay for a foreign holiday each year so obviously will have to cope without that but they won't have to cut back on essentials. I have another friend who is a lone parent with 3 kids and no mortgage and gets hundreds of pounds a month from a high earning ex. She works also and she will cope with the drop. Another friend is a lone parent who has thousands stashed away in ISA's. She was upset that her tax credits would be cut and she may have to use some of this money for daily living costs. Obviously there will be other families who use their tax credits for essentials food, heating and will be harder hit. The problem with tax credits is that they take very little account of savings or outgoings and so aren't always targeted at the most needy, obviously it would be impossible to do this.

[LuisSuarezTeeth]

Oh, just realised who I'm engaging with.

Pointless.

[diploddycus]

Do think if your full-time postman son married a full-time postwoman and had two children in full time childcare, do you think they'd not get tax credits? They'd probably get the childcare element.

More likely is that they (still, even with the childcare element) wouldn't be able to afford a nanny for the 5am starts and the mum would work part time and, oh, now they're scroungers!

[Babyroobs]

My colleage married a postman, he works earlies, she works lates in the evenings to avoid childcare costs for their 3 young boys. they have done this for years. I understand some families can't do this but to be honest the vast majority of working mums I know are working some kind of opposite shift pattern to their partners to get by and in doing so are sacrificing family time. These school holidays I will have worked worked nights and every weekend to be able to get the time off in the week and avoid childcare costs.

[diploddycus]

Yes, but do they get tax credits Babyroobs? Quite possibly.

Red seems to think her boy wonder postman would be far too successful for tax credits. Not true. This is real people, with real jobs who work hard who are being affected.

[DirtyDeedsD0neDirtCheap]

Luis , indeed, I worked it out on her last post as well

ignore, do not engage