To not be able to sympathise a financial situation?

[Rudechoob]

Ok, my friend called me up And had a whinge last night saying as she has started work part-time (16hrs pw) as she refuses to be away from her 2kids any longer. She now has to start contributing towards her rent £130 a month towards a 3bed house. She has her wage and tax credits etc etc so she isn't struggling as such. Shes always clothes shopping even able to book a holiday during school holidays!

She wanted sympathy.

I didn't have it, i was pissed off. Me and DP currently work 42-46hrs a week each (he has his own business and takes a minimal salary) and we are struggling, no benefits no hand outs, nothing soon as my wage goes in 90% is on bills, rent etc. Dp does the food shops, pays loan etc...its all even.

I snapped and told her welcome to the real world...its a struggle etc etc and how if she can book a holiday she can't be that hard up...and she flipped calling me jealous etc.

Sorry for fucking being honest!

I'm sorry but to complain about having to pay £130 for rent?!???

But we cant afford jack shit, no holidays, new clothes,

And I am sick of people who obviously believe everything they see on benefits street. Come to my place of work Op and see the people who are having to live off food-banks and the disabled people on the breadline who have to make the choice between eating and heating. If it's such a good life then pack up your business and do it yourself

I assume the friend originally did not work, so her house was paid for ?

If friend is now working, she is paying £130 a week for her house

So I guess the friend was moaning about HER change in circumstances

I can understand if you are a working house hold why you are annoyed. Because if you work, you have to pay for everything and rightly so

£130 a week for a 3 bed, that is a bargain !

So the friend is basically saying "It's unfair that I have to pay more towards my housing now I am earning some/more money" and the OP is expected to be sympathetic to that attitude

Apparently so Bikegeek.

"Sick of benefit claimers complaining.."

This, to me, highlights your lack of understanding about what it's really like for people in the benefit system. Yes, you work hard, you pay your taxes and hopefully your husband will create a job for somebody next year - potentially a current "benefit claimer". Your friend is not living the life that many people do with decent salaries, she's hardly living it up with a decent quality of social life, shopping in high end stores or holidaying in high end resorts. She couldn't afford to do that living on benefits. She also has to pay for childcare, live as a single parent (emotionally, socially and financially crippling at times) and is trapped by her circumstances, until her child is older. Of course £130 a month is going to be a stretch to find because it has to come from somewhere. The childcare money? No. The food money? No. Money spent on her child? No. The only thing it can come from is anything that she spends on herself - remember she's not shopping in high end stores - so the little pleasure she gets she is going to be eaten into by the additional stretch of £130 for the rent. Shes single so evening conversation and company is not usual for her at home with kids. Do you really begrudge somebody in her circumstances the time to moan about having to find a bit of money to pay towards the rent?

Be grateful you can work, be grateful your husband can work, be grateful you have somebody there to share your burden with and stop judging other people's situation when you have never walked in their shoes. Personally, I would be hoping my friends circumstances improve for her and her child so that she doesn't remain dependant on benefits instead of 'woe is me, her life is easier".

My god my and my husband bring in in 20k between us and manage a mortgage, two holidays and we manage to go out when we want plus the expensive of paying for nursery and having a child. I count ourselves lucky

I can't stand the fact that DH and I work full time just to make the ends meet

I work full time but there's only me and I don't have a great salary so I get full tax credits which means that I can make ends meet Does that mean I can have a moan about money or not?

I'm struggling with my health at the moment (fibromyalgia and possible RA too) so I mentioned it to a friend this week who went mad because he had cancer last year (fully recovered). So I can't have a moan about my health because his was once worse!

I bet the OP will bloody detest me !

I am in receipt of Income Support and Carers Allowance at the moment. I scrimp and save every penny , cook from scratch, sell/buy all our used clothes, use cashback sites etc.....and I occasionally do moan about how tight things are. But I deal with it. This is not forever.

Despite being on benefits, I am also going on holiday abroad with my kids on Tuesday. I paid a whopping £70 each for flights, transfers, and a hotel. That's cheaper than a haven caravan! And it won't be our only holiday either. We will be going camping in the summer holidays. What a bastard I am :grin:

People are allowed to moan, it's not a right that is directly linked to the amount of hours worked or the wage we are paid.

Well console yourself that at least she's had a taste of what it's like to actually work for a living. Heaven forbid she has to actually contribute towards her own living costs. How unfair. .

Benefits have created a culture of dependency, which discourages people from being self-supporting. The system seems to trap people in an endless cycle.

I can well understand why people choose to remain on benefits, when they would make little or no financial gain from working longer hours (or even from working at all, in some cases). That is what's wrong and needs to change!

What if everyone received a monthly amount from the State, which was not means tested (like child benefit used to be not MT). That's all you get. Anyone who works will obviously have more money than anyone who chooses not to work. Every £1 earned would actually be worth £1. So the person choosing to work 16 hours would be worse off than the person working 40 hours. It's logical and fair.

I volunteer at a foodbank and the people we see, only some of whom are on benefits, all want to improve their situation. They range from the company I work for is going under and I haven't been paid for months, to my OH left me with our young kids and has vanished and so I have no money and can't find work. That's not their fault. Like it's not her fault she wants to be with her children and you have debts to pay.
We live in the most expensive county in the country and have a maximum of £29k earnings (if I do overtime) before tax. We manage because we're sensible with money and prioritise things that are important (like housing and utilities) before others (reading Mr Money Mustache has helped a lot!). Whether you sympathise with her or not you can't expect her not to want to offload to a friend about something that will mean a big change in her home life.

It's not a competition to who has less.
Everybody has a different idea of struggling you have yours and your friend has her idea of it.

I think it's sad when people fall out over who has more/less, a girl I was at school with and I would of classed as one of my best friends had a very good friendship until last year when I got pregnant with ds and she ask about work after ds was born and I said I was taking 2-3 years out of work to be a SAHM she then went on about would it effect our lifestyle and my dh say it wouldn't effect it. She just blew up in to a rage about how I didn't know what the real world was like and it's not fair I don't have to go to work and can still live a good way. It's been 10 months since we spoke.

Have you gone to the CAB and asked them to do a benefit check for you? You may be entitled to help yourself, if your income is very low. Though tbh if your husband's business makes so little that he can't make minimum wage on those hours, the benefits agency may argue he should seek a salaried position instead. It can be a real catch 22, because a business often doesn't make a lot in the early years, does it.

I know a family whose income is lower than ours, who have a far better lifestyle. But they economise on different things, when you look closer, and also we have extra costs related to having a disabled child. If she's getting housing benefit and tax credits, then her income is low. Does she get maintenance from the children's father? It's possible that that money is what makes the difference - as an income source it isn't reliable enough to be calculated in income assessments, because too many absent parents never pay what they're supposed to. But that means that when they do, it can bump a low salary up to a fair one.

She can't be rich on benefits plus a low waged part time job. She just can't - the figures won't stack up.

dollymixture Seriously? Because you're going to have to run those figures by me. You earn 20k between you and your husband and have one child. That works out at ~1650 month.

1. Childcare: 800/month (25 hrs/week @ 8/hr)
2. Mortgage: 400/month
3. Food/household - 400/month

Fuck me. Your budget's looking tight and you haven't even turned the hob on.

So tell me exactly how you subsequently fund 2 holidays, clothes, house repairs, bills, blah-di-blah on what you "claim" to be getting.

I don't think Rudechoob is being unreasonable to be annoyed at this particular friend.

The issue is not whether the friend is better or worse off. It is that you are always on thin ice when you start complaining about your financial position to somebody else and you are likely to hit a nerve unless you are in identical situations. There is a potential for friction between self employed and employed people because their positions are very different.

It is however unreasonable to be 'sick of benefit claimers complaining'. Just as Rudechoob's friend didn't take into account Rudechoob's situation, 'benefit claimer' includes vast numbers of people, and it isn't possible to know the ins and outs of everyone's financial position or why they need benefits. By complaining about people on benefits in general, Rudechoob is being just as unreasonable as her friend.

This isn't a rant about being on benefits. This is a rant about people who don't appreciate how lucky they are being able to spend time with their children without having to work their life away.

StarOnTheTree, why would you want to moan about money if you can make ends meet?

Right op so neither you nor your do are resident parents. Yet you think you've got it harder than a single resident parent of two.

Of course she's gonna have a moan she's probably a lot worse off working. I'm guessing her incomes about 280 a week.

Rent will nearly half that.
So about 100-150 I'm guessing left over.
That's for everything.
Electric ,gas food ,transport ,clothes, kids clothes, kids uniforms ,shoes, Pe kits, any clubs her kids go to.
She's responsible for everything.

I think you as someone who is not a rp have no idea.
Of course your much better off than her.

You can fuck right off with your benefit bashing.
I'm on benefits. Ill fucking moan all I like because my life is shit.
Do you have a clue what it's like to have to wear go key clothes every day so your kid can eat?

MrsDeVere

I think your Bing accused of being a keyboard warrior and that the views you express here you wouldn't dare say to someone's face.

Its not easy my sister is on a small income and often whinges about money, I take it with a large pinch of salt, mainly as she has lived in my house rent free for 20 years.

Mrsdevere your views on this do not differ with mine we both agree that if someone can contribute that they should.

Hildur im sure they dont spend 400 a month on food
also a fulltime nursery place is 650 where i live and less if the dc is 2 and 3 and you factor in 15 hours paid for, so their budget is perdectly doable depending on area they live in, mortgage amount and food spend.

The op had an income of 34k and maybe just wasnt budgeting well either way to be moaning about a friend is bu as everyone has different circumstances and it is not a race to the bottom as the govt would have us believe.

It suits their purposes to pitch us against each other, the friend may work harder in her 16 hours than someone doin many cushier fulltime jobs, we wont know and therefore we should not judge.

If the op live is so hard she needs to make whatever changes she can and if its shortterm pain for longterm gain then just remind herself she will come through the other side in due course.

We need to stop judging and feeling jealous, to all those who work fulltime and have kids then thats your choice when there is a system which would allow you to work less hours and spend more time with your kids. That system is in place legally and you have a choice to use it or not if eligible. To those who may be loneparents or carers for dh or dw in addition to working fewer hours, they often have no choice in the matter.

Also some jobs are only available on part time hours. Most of the local socalled job creation have been parttime so the companies can say we created 200 jobs when if they mixed in more fulltime jobs then maybe they were only creating 120 new jobs.

Either way this thread proved it was a benefit bash by the ops last sentence. Also depending on how many kids the op has she may well be recieving tax credits herself.

I don't think the OPs financial situation is the issue here. The issue is the friend who is complaining about having to pay £160 because she now works 16 hrs per week. Even at minimum wage that's £500 per month so even having to pay £160 the friend will still be much better off. She shouldn't be moaning.

Yes the system is flawed - it shouldn't be so hard to get back to work when paying childcare but there are also a lot of people that seem to think it's a right to get benefits. There are plenty of countries that aren't so fortunate and if you don't work you don't get anything. Paying £160 for rent is hardly the end of the world.