Why do people think the government is some form of parent?

[soddingsoda]

I've spent a lot of time in the US, i'm British but have a fair amount of family in the US.

While there's obviously huge social issues in the US, and I feel fortunate to be British I'm just not a fan of the British mentality. Someone said something the other day and it hit the nail on the head: If an American employee sees his boss turn up in a Mercedes he'll be envious and it will inspire him. The same situation happens in the UK the employee would be spiteful and call it unfair.

I have a second job working behind a bar once a week. Quite often when punters have had a drink they love to rant about the system. One woman 'debating' with the others then pointed to me. Apparently if there wasn't any foreigners over here I would be able to a council house. She seemed pretty stumped when I told her that it wasn't the governments responsibility to house me, I'm healthy, young, able to work and choose to live at home so I can save for a deposit and go travelling and spent a shit ton on starbucks.

Someone also had a conversation that she's had tooth ache for over a year as she needs a filling. She feels that she shouldn't have to pay for it as she pays taxes. I really wanted to point out that if she wasn't down the pub every week paying £3.50 a pint, she could easily pay for that filling within a month.

It's just really starting to grate on me, we live in such a privileged society where we get a free education, everyone has access to a fairly good health service and we have so many opportunities. I just want to give a good shake to some people and tell them to take responsibilities for their own lives as they're adults and that's what adults are meant to do.

eggsonheads wealth is dependant on cost. As wealth grows it follows cost has gone down somewhere or how.... usually by people being exploited. You cant have super super wealth without suffering. So id argue that wealth is finite unless you are willing to throw people under the bus for it.

It always amazes me why people who seem to hate the UK and despise the populace want to live and stay here. It must be very trying for you to have to put up with such an unpleasant life compared to what you would prefer.

Yes because of course if you dare criticise anything about the UK it means you hate everything about it

I think there's a place for you - across the atlantic with a big orange cunt running the show.

Referring to @EggsonHeads post, not anyone else's.

God I hate it, the sense of entitlement,

But what I hate more is the people that want things controlled. Control booze, control sugar, to live in a nanny state,where the government controls what you eat, drink and spend your money on. Why? Because a few folks can't control themselves, so we should all be forced to,live in a nanny state with our lives controlled.

Then there are the ones who want you to report every single misdeamer to the police, like telling your mum and dad. Women shouted you were a bitch at the school? Phone the police! Tell mum and dad.

Beyond ludicrous.

OP definitely has a point, people do need to take more personal responsibility in the UK. It is interesting that when someone mentions this some reply with outrage about dismantling the NHS.

Its not one or the other, people could be expected to be more self reliant without the state losing its ultimate safety net of the NHS. (for example)

The much-vaunted American dream, sold by rich people looking to make even more money by exploiting those desperate enough to chase it.

I don't know anyone like that bluntness. Most people are just quietly getting on with their lives without bothering the police!

I don't know anyone like that either ifnot, but there is a huge amount of posts in this vein on mumsnet, and that's what I'm referring to, sorry should have clarified, I've taken the discussion on here many a time about either not wasting police time or why I personally don't want to live in a nanny state.

OP, I’ve never met anyone in the uk who thinks the government should house them and support them, but I don’t doubt that there are a few people like that. And it might be that you are just seeing the positives of the US without meeting anyone for whom the massive inequality hasn’t worked out quite so well.

Benefits do exist in the US, and people expect them - food stamps, pensions (or social security), section 8 housing, welfare, Medicaid, Medicare - it’s all there but much smaller than over here and it’s probable that you just don’t meet the people living in section 8 housing surviving on food stamps and disability.

Try watching Judge Judy - until I watched it I never realised how many different types of benefits there are over there but how much poverty there still is.

And everyone declares children on tax returns and gets money back for them - isn’t that child benefit??

I work 50 hours per week on average, as does DH, might I have done better in the US? Well no, I’d be bankrupt or dead as I have a long term health condition, manageable with medication but life-threatening without, and the rates of death from it are much, much higher across the Atlantic.

As I said in my post I'm extremely thankful to be privileged enough to be British-European and all the opportunities that go with it.

As those who have spent time away/in the US it is a shock to come back to the British 'It's not my responsibility' attitude.

Something that really upset me recently is that the youth organisation I volunteered felt it unsuitable for me to organise a coach trip to a science centre. Apparently charging £15 with the opportunity for three instalments of £5 a month was too much pressure to put on families. The only reason I organised it was because 11/15 kids had never been to a museum and we're far from a low income area.

My dad went to college in the evenings to get a better job, he then studied at the OU to get his degree. He was never on mega bucks, on just over 30K a year 15 years ago. He then lost his job during the recession and as a family we had a hard three years on benefits (with him doing the odd agency job here and there). As I said we're fortunate as a country that we do have social system as it's designed as a safety net not as a way of life but should be better for the disabled or the abused granted. I remember him having a phone interview to an agency, as it was yesterday I remember him saying that he was an engineer but was physically fit so he could do anything, he said he could be a grave digger, he was good at gardening and he had a driving licence. After the phone call he said to me that there's nothing wrong with a hard days work and that any work was better than no work. During that time my parents went without so I could still have my instrument lessons, swim for the city team and go on Guide trips because to them education was everything.

In America it's heartwarming to see big banners in parents' yards in the summer celebrating their kids graduating high school, being a college scholar, going in the army etc. In America if you can't afford your kid to play basketball a parent volunteers instead. If you're in a dead end job in the US it's common for parents to go to night school. Right now, I can't afford kids, i'm in a better situation than most as I earn just below the national average and so does my partner but we consider the cost of childcare, bills and general life obviously we'd make do if we accidentally fell pregnant as that can happen. Someone said on MN the other day that music is just for posh kids- it's literally £7 for a twenty minute lesson in our local school and it's that mentality that keeps the 'class divide'.

I agree OP and think it's getting worse.

On here alone in the last week I've seen a posts where the OPs are moaning the council haven't given them the perfect house, a SAHM moaning she can't have free childcare etc. That's before you get to the ones who moan about having to purchase items for their children, stating they are entitled to work time and have somebody else pick up the costs etc. We are fast becoming very entitled and it's only going to get worse until we have a government strong enough to say no and cut right back.

julie8008 the problem with that is that not everyone is able to take more responsibility for themselves. Public services are being cut massively at the moment including mental health and addiction services. Instead of making people take more responsibility all that does it make front line NHS services take responsibility. The NHS exists in a framework of social care and outreach services that are supposed to support it but are now being completely stripped back. When you completely leave people to their own devices some may take responsibility for themselves but more often than not the most vulnerable become even sicker and more of a burden on frontline services.
The massive strain on A&Es at the moment are mostly caused by the closure of psychiatric wards and addiction outreach services. You can ask these people to take responsibility for themselves till the cows come home but very few of them ever are going to be able to. And you are left with them just dying on the streets or the pieces being picked up by already overstretched NHS frontline staff.

@Sprinklestar

Mirime - that’s as may be but the healthcare in the US, if you can afford it, is many times better than the NHS.

That's true - but as you say it's if you can afford it. You obviously could fit your DH, and I'm glad of that, but what about all the people at the bottom who can't?

The NHS has it's problems, but it saved my grandmother's life when she had a ruptured bowel, to the point of operating a second time when her chances are slim and she then spent six months in hospital, what would that have cost in the US? She then had free care at home for her stoma with nurses coming out in the early hours if she needed it.

My DH has a chronic health condition. His medication costs over £190 a month, if he doesn't take it he dies. We've never had to worry about affording his medication as he gets free prescriptions.

Some thing's obviously aren't great, I had to wait 8 months for surgery to remove an ovary with a dermoid cyst, but how long would I have had to wait in the US if my husband's health problems had bankrupted us?

I agree op. Anecdotally I see it at school. Mixed intake. Budget cuts mean stuff is being cut back that's really needed. Small cohort of parents trying to help, financially and also practically i.e. Painting, doing groundwork on the site etc - so it's not all about giving money. The majority don't do anything. "They" are supposed to sort everything. A few have mooted parents making regular financial contributions but that's met with horror.

windchimesabotage

I totally agree that we need more front line services as mental health and addiction. You sort out someones addiction and while they could become positive members of society it also costs the tax payer less in the long run.

I'm really not trying to suggest we cut services as we need more in this country but the general mentality that everything should be paid for us.

I can't remember the exact post here a few months ago but mother was worried about her daughter as she was becoming a recluse and not talking to anyone and she was worried she had been abused. Apparently the child seemed a little better on their holiday to florida(?) but had returned back to her previous state afterwards. I suggested that maybe the daughter needed to go to therapy as there's professionals trained for that. But the mother wouldn't as the NHS waiting list was too long. Maybe the parents didn't physically have the money but I got the impression that they did but didn't want to spend it because the NHS should have covered it. Yes the NHS should have, but why not pay it yourself when it's going to benefit your child? Not a debate that the NHS should pay for it, but a debate why not spend money on your child.

Because even if you work hard you can’t get a house or a Mercedes? Our poor to rich divide is getting bigger and that’s the ‘unfair’ issue that people blame the government for.

There are loads of people that work really really hard at their jobs and what they do

Aspiration is only a small part of it

I think you need to generalise less and read more

@KERALA1

Not sure that's a great example. I can't help at DS school because I work full time. I get home 6.30-7 and then have to spend time with DS and get him to bed. DH also works full time and often works late and/or at weekends. Neither of us are high earners so regular financial contributions aren't happening although we do donate small sums when asked.

It's not through any sense of entitlement or assuming someone else can do it, there's all sorts of things I'd like to do for me as well, but I can't fit them in either.

The US has this fallacy of the American dream which is anything but for most citizens as far as I can tell.

What happens if you’re not able to support yourself in the US?

For me, a measure of society is how well it treat someone it’s vulnerable.

Could you not go as a family on a Saturday morning to clear a forest school area so the children can use it? School of 450 kids about 10 families do stuff like that. Cannot believe none of the others can possibly help at all ever. To benefit their own kids.

When I lived in the UK I always felt slightly embarrassed that my children did well in school-the attitude definitely seemed to be that one should not ever make a big thing of it in case one made other people feel bad. But when I moved to the US I learned that here excellence is celebrated whether it is academic or sporting- and it is refreshing!

soddingsoda I had an American friend who had quite severe mental health issues in her teens and her parents never got her any kind of help because of the huge cost associated. Insurance plans dont often cover mental health assistance in the US . Same with some maternity services.

Another thing to add is that if people who can pay for healthcare in this country always do so then the NHS becomes just a basic service for people who cannot afford better care. Which i personally dont agree with. The NHS is supposed to be high quality healthcare available to everyone not just a fallback service. Everyone should be invested in it and care about it.
I have had to use private services as I said in a PP i have had to use some private maternity services and if my child was sick and I was waiting too long then yes id somehow scrape the money together to pay. But id be very upset that I had to do that, not because I thought the NHS owed ME something but because I believe the NHS should be providing good healthcare to everyone. Not everyone is able to pay. And I would feel guilty that I was supporting the private system.

KERALA I think that’s a perfect example. I am British but live in the US and have done for 20 years. What I find refreshing is the willingness of people to get stuck in and get things done, without waiting for someone else to take care of it. I see it often on threads here - the “why should I?” attitude. We recently had a massive snowstorm, over 13 inches where I am. Our city is notoriously slow in getting the streets ploughing, even though the works dept is well funded. Do when the snow stopped, virtually everyone was out in the street shoveling and snow blowing (and helping push peoples cars, etc.) I certainly appreciate the limits of the broader idea of American individualism but at a macro level it manifests itself in stronger communities, I feel. As parents it’s absolutely commonplace for us to go into the school to volunteer or - as is more likely in our school - to get together in the evenings to work on a school event, etc.
I have three children under 10 and work FT, and my husband works around 65 hours a week. I still make the time to be a Cub Scout leader (now) and coach my children’s sports teams (past).

In my part of the US, at least, there’s very much a sense of “if not us, then who?” In the UK I think the response would be “the council” (or government/school/whomever.)

It really is a different outlook on life.

windchimesabotage this must have been before 2014 and the ACA.