Sense of entitlement to the benefit system

[user1482079332]

I might be abit antagonistic here but wondered if my opinion is shared at all. I grew up on welfare, Very poor at times no food or electricity. Fast forward, Im now a single mum getting ready to go back to work. I have been offered a job full time that will mean I earn alot more in the future, it's worth the short term sacrifice of juggling it all and being skint for awhile . Prior to this I was making arrangements to go back to work part time in a very low paying job. I couldn't get over how much I would receive in benefits working only 16hours a week. There was very little financial incentive to work full time and admittedly if I didn't have this job opportunity I would more than likely stay part time and receive enough in benefits that's I'm on equivalent my previous full time job salary before I had a baby. I can't help but think this creates dependency and entitlement. I had a friend recently earn more and she complained that her benefits had been reduced as a result. I think the benefits system in this country Is a mess and there should be more incentive to work full time than part time if your fit and well.

I work part-time and get benefits as a single parent as I like to have the luxury of taking my daughter to and from primary school - do I feel guilty? A bit to be honest. I could get a full time job and earn more but the resulting cost of paying for childcare would wipe out any extra money leaving me in exactly the same circumstances financially but without the pleasure of spending time with my child. It's a no brainer for me really.

I did make some good financial decisions when I worked full time at a high wage and managed to buy a property so I don't get housing benefit just WTC and CB.

YANBU and I wasn't aware that these sort of benefits existed until I started coming on here. We had no money at all for about 5 years after having kids & I couldn't work out how people who weren't working could afford to do things I couldn't when we were both working. By the time we had paid car loan/childcare/petrol etc there wasn't much left. In hindsight I think we would have been better off on benefits rather than both working as DH was getting about £18k when we had first one. However none of my friends were living like that and I just assumed I would need to work to make sure bills were paid.
I am now pleased however that I carried on working - I have carried on paying into my pension and have been able to carry on paying the mortgage.
Life was very stressful though for a few years and I don't think people who get help with things understand that people not claiming have no money for extras either. It's quite depressing when you are working a long week and having to put kids in childcare from a few months old and then still have about the same free cash as a family who don't have to work.
It is interesting that there are people coming on here saying they can't believe how much they have been entitled to. I think there needs to be an incentive to work - who will support these people in their old age if they have never even worked?

I find your attitude utterly baffling OP.

Single parents like you are bringing up a member of the next generation single-handed. That's an extremely important and difficult job and I'm perfectly happy for the state to recognise that by allowing you to work 16 hours a week while at the same time bringing in enough money for you and your child to live comfortably. That way you keep up your skills, contribute to the economy and have enough time and energy to give to your task of carrying on the human race. Everybody wins.

It seems to me that you've absorbed the idea that being a parent is a worthless task? Or that single parents are somehow not 'deserving' of support?

Btw you have every reason to feel proud to have made it and have wanted workforce skills with sheer hard work and determination, and little backing from a poor childhood.

But don't be down on those who haven't been able to turn it around, for varying reasons

^TBH op. You seem to one of those who has forgotten themselves.
You were reared on benefits. You should be more understanding than anyone.^

Awwlookatmyspider

They're tenapenny. I remember meeting a lady when I first split from the ex. Single parent on benefits like myself. Was on it until they're DC turned 5. Cue a few years later when shes got herself a part time job, and also a wealth of family to provide free childcare, and shes stood in the playground slagging off all the benefit mums (her turn of phrase( and that how 'how she'd be better off on benefits but she's never going to be on them'. Good job I never saw you in the jobcentre fortnightly then isn't it love.

Yes yet another goady thread about benefits and bashing those in reciept

There has been cuts and there are many reasons why some people can only work 16 hours such as childcare issues, children with additional needs or that there are no full time positions.

BTW I work on average 46 hours a week and still get tax credits, I qualify for housing benefit but have never claimed it.

There is a balance that right now clearly isn't met.
I had a similar experience to the OP, I was told by citizens advice unless I was earning £21k a year I was better off on benefits.
I did work full time, because I was concerned about the employment gap, especially as I was only 20 when I found myself to be a single Mum of 2.
At one point I tried taking a second evening job, telephone fundraising from home, a really difficult soul destroying job and they cut my tax credits by more than what I actually earned, so I quit the second job to be better off.
I don't necessarily agree as a single parent you are automatically entitled to not work whilst the child is young, especially as not all couples have that option, but we need a situation where you don't go hungry or cold, have a roof over your head and can work to be on more money if you choose.
To get to that though there needs to be radical changes and someone will always by worse off as a result

Well: If you meet the qualifying criteria you Are entitled; whether you have a sense of it or not.

I'm a part time worker on tax credits.
DH and I find that it works best for us if we both work part time and share childcare.
I work in welfare rights so I was able to really crunch the numbers on my return to work and do a "better off calculation" for a couple of different scenarios.

I worked out that my family would have the exact same disposable income if I was working 3 days or 5. I negotiated a job share

So I guess I am one of those awful people leaching off the tax credits system to get out of working proper hours.

Except: My tax credit entitlement would actually have been more if I'd have worked full time hours, because I would have incurred higher childcare costs.
I would actually have been more benefit dependant.
And this was one of the reasons why I preferred to take part time work- because if a payment didn't turn up for whatever reason, we would have been gubbed. Its a very insecure way to live.

Also: I do notice that I never get a moment to sit down on the days I stay home with the kids. So I don't accept that I'm lazy.

worridmum you may want to check your bank account. Electricity prices up 30% this year, inusurance premium tax doubled in a few years, council tax also up. You pay all those things. Even official inflation is nearly 3%.

If your rent is up 30%, please tell me where the house is!

The biggest sense of entitlement that I see around me is that of employers who think that they should be entitled to a cheap workforce with little job security.

These employers believe that they are entitled to have the State subsidise those crappy wages and maybe even send a few more workers their way for free under the Workfare programme.

OP before you make the mistake of assuming that "benefits" only include JSA and related money for unemployed people, you'd do well to clarify exactly WHICH benefits you have an issue with.

Firstly "benefit claimants" include those who are chronically ill or disabled. PIP and ESA have been cut and cut again, and the indignity of trying to prove how ill/disabled you are and how much pain you are in is horrific. Many people having to claim have worked in the past and paid their NI.

Secondly, anyone who accepts Child Benefit is a "Benefit Claimant". A lot of Daily Mail readers conveniently forget that.

So if it's "only" people claiming JSA that you have a problem with, it would be wise to clarify that, before people think this is yet another goady thread.

HTH.

The true measure of any society can be found in how it treats its most vulnerable members

Mahatma Gandhi

Agree with Agnesnitt and others...Don't bash those in receipt of benefits It is rare that they are ripping off the system, though some may laugh to cover their shame

I find the attitude to benefits in the UK really bizarre (I'm not from the UK). There's sort of a weird envy/judgement situation going on where people look down on those who get benefits but also seem to be jealous of them at the same time.

If you think benefits are great, you're quite welcome to claim them. I certainly don't envy people who for various reasons haven't managed to get a work life going for themselves - there are huge disadvantages to that that go far beyond money. I have no interest in being on benefits at the moment because I don't need them but if my circumstances changed I would claim them, that's what they're there for. And I wouldn't expect my family or anybody else's family to be starving and scrimping while on benefits either - benefits should genuinely sustain people. Otherwise we're into the realms of punishment through poverty and that's a pretty sick approach to life.

Don't worry OP, when universal credit is rolled out everywhere, all low paid workers will be in deep do do. Then you can be sanctimonious and sneer as much as you like. Plus, there will only be benefits for 2 children. Some people may agree with this but they aren't thinking long term. Who will be the workers of the future who prop up the pensions of those who eventually retire?

It's a sick country that prides itself on being one of the richest in the world at the same time as being unwilling to provide properly for all it's citizens.

It's the old deserving and undeserving divisions again. If you're poor or become poor then you're automatically undeserving. If you're better off or even rich you deserve everything you have and want more.

And yes, we are all entitled. Every person born is entitled to a life whether or not they can work. There won't be any jobs soon anyway.

So, is someone seriously suggesting that single parents are supported and paid for by the state? They choose unwisely with regard to men, have a child or two and then come on here complaining they need to be supported.

What a load of nonsense! My Dh was a single parent and carried on working to give us a role model. And aren't people assuming that the single parent is the mother and the father is no where to be seen? That makes her choice even worse!

I think you are right Sparrowhawk some people are jealous of those of us earning sufficiently low enough amounts to need to rely on additional help.

I recently struck up a friendship online with a woman and I mentioned to her I wasn't well that week so doubted my earnings would be very much to live on for me that month as I am self-employed. She replied 'Well you do at least have the benefits to live on'. My God that really put me off her. Is that really what people believe? That we are doing fine as we have additional help.

It soon put me off her sadly and it has really made me wonder if I am viewed with this apparent envy, unbelieavable!!

Perhaps she did not realise that if I did not get that money in for me and ds then we would not be able to buy in food.

Hillingdon Yes, we should let children beg on the streets, and their widowed mothers should have to sell their bodies on street corners. Its their own fault for choosing unwisely /s

DM (not DH!)

Polly you sound weird.

You're put off someone because she asked if you had any benefits to live on?

YOU were the one who brought up finances (very crass) and she was showing concern and checking you had any other income!

star But I bloody worked for it, as in working 35hrs a week while I was full time at university! Working two jobs to get a mortgage, etc.

Right. I guess mere mortals who can't do the equivalent of two full-time jobs are just not trying hard enough eh?
This sort of attitude means an awful lot of slightly unwell or disabled people are cut out of the workplace and end up relying on benefits, because the bar is set too high.

What exactly is being "loaded" on benefits, street? How much money are you talking about?

Loaded means different hinge to different people I'm guessing.

The problem is that low paying jobs don't pay enough to support well anyone, but certainly a family. So the government steps in to make up the shortfall. It's not the people who receive the benefits fault. They're just doing what we'd all do, the best option for them.

Actual unemployment benefit is very low (isn't the dole £80ish a week and job seekers £20?) it's all the other benefits you're getting which make benefits comparable to a wage, such as housing benefit and child support. And all those are acknowledgements that you can't earn enough to support a family in low paid jobs

I believe cuts to benefits for the most vulnerable of society are obscene and that a country as rich as ours has zero excuse for that.

I also believe (first hand experience of this via IL's family) there are those who abuse the system &/or there are families who have a benefit dependent mindset.

The above are not mutually exclusive - it's possible to be fully supportive of a decent benefit system whilst at the same time calling out those who abuse it or see it as 'pay'; I literally have to bite my lip when DC1's MIL (late 40's, no medical issues, comes from a family where no-one seems to work even though in area where there are jobs) says 'oooh, I'll get that when I get paid ....

no-one is suggesting benefits should not be available for those who need them - but tax credits are nothing to do with tax as those in receipt of them are not paying income tax at all.
It should not be possible to be better off on benefits (including tax credits) and part time working than working full-time.
I was a single parent with one child in the 1970s and HAD to work full-time to survive and pay the mortgage, and HAD to pay the childminder for full-time hours and had only child benefit (no ctc no wtc etc). Income tax rates were much higher too (over 30% I think)
I know you will respond that was then and this is now enlightened times - blah blah but I do feel there are people out there taking advantage of the relative generosity of the welfare system to make a lifestyle choice (and see nothing wrong with doing so)
Those who can work should do so and contribute to society
Those whose life circumstances mean they cannot work - should be supported more with the funds saved by not supporting the lazy/entitled.

Absolutely DJ they should go begging on the streets etc to be punished for their parents poor choices.

I do not believe that all single parents should be completely supported by the state. I am very lucky to have a supportive family who look after my child, without them I would have found it incredible difficult to have worked the shifts that I have to do.

Not everyone has a support network or access to child care that would enable them to work either full or part time.