feeling that tax credits are totally biased towards working mums?

[Dragonhart]

I am a SAHM and I get the min working tax credit as my DH earns just over the min for getting more help.

I was talking to my friend yesterday who works 4 days a week as a teacher (their combined salaries are just below the top of the band of getting any money) and I was saying what I got now we have two children. I get just over £40 plus about £40 baby element. When dd is 1 and I have two under 3 I will get £40.

She told me that she gets about £160 a months towards childcare in vouchers on her and her husbands paypacket (not sure if this is classed as tax credit?) and £75 permonth for her only ds in tax credits.

I am not making a coment about whether or not people choose to work as I stongly believe that everyone should have a choice to do what is right for them.

I just think that I should be supported in the same way as working mums. Surely I am my childrens 'childcare'?

I think people moan about the cost of childcare because it is an expense incurred only when both partners work and is perceived to be deducted from a second earner's (mostly women's) wages (this is a moot point that I don't want to address here). Food is part of family expenditure however many wage earners there are.

But being a nanny is a far more responsible job than being a cleaner.

I think people moan about the cost of chilcare because it's high and for many people it's the first time they've been employers with all that legally implies. But if you work, it's a cost you just have to find. There are many many other things it would be better to skimp on than good childcare.

The parity between nanny and childcare wages is certainly strange. It's a bit misleading though because most cleaners are cash in hand and don't have holiday/sick pay etc.

Here in France cleaners cost more than childcare...

Anna - is that because the government subsidises nannies?

tax credits. Pah!
they tell you to let them know of any changes.
So I phone up, go through the options, sit on hold for 7 minutes 14 seconds and then pass all the security questions, to tell them I start work again next week.

What happens? Oh sorry, you can only tell us after you have changed something, not before.

W T F ?????????
Now I have to ring them up all over again.
Bloody brilliant.

I think it's a simple answer - tax credits are biased towards working mums as they're TAX credits. You have to pay tax to get tax credits. Clue is in the title.

It bugs me when people think they should earn money for staying at home.

I understand that some people have no choice, and there are other factors involved - but that is a seperate issue - one that needs to be addressed by the government so that additional financial needs are met.

NKF - no. The government subsidies a domestic employee (through tax breaks) but that can be any domestic service - ie I use a window cleaning firm, and can recover 50% of the cost of that in our tax bill at year end, up to a certain threshold.

If you employ a "nounou", they are generally expected to do anything you ask of them around the home - they are servants but also have responsibility for children's safety, meals etc. If you employ someone only to care for children, they are largely doing "nothing" (ie watching a baby in a play pen or younger children in front of the TV) and get paid less than someone only doing housework (which is considered harder labour).

On nannies it never really bothered me at all whether they'd spent 2 years doing childcare qualifications or just loved and talked to children and we had both. I wanted continuity, security, love and obviously ability to deal with practicalities, know what to do if one had a fit (as one of the twins did with the poor nanny one day - she was marvellous - got him to A&E, called us etc) and then you put in a lot of parental attention too and probably more likely to send them to nursery school at 3 if they have a nanny at home although it can feel like paying twice (although we had younger ones she had then).

"the top 1% of wage earners pay roughly 25% of all income tax. " Yes, we should get extra credit for that, no more tax to pay once you've paid a fixed maximum, better services to your home if you pay the highest council tax, rewards for hard work may be. Instead the more you earn the more they take.

I looked into these tax credits a couple of weeks ago. Maybe not many people know, but you can get childcare credits even if you are a SAHM. It's up to 80% of a maximum of £175 a week (or £300 a week if you have 2 or more children) and depending on your DP's income.

I moan plenty about the grocery bill.

I don't have a cleaner, so I guess the nanny makes infinately more.

People moan about the price of childcare because it teeters on the brink of unaffordability -- not becaue they resent the nanny or childminder personally. Again it comes down to the cost of living.

Anna, I agree with all you said about what a nanny should be able to do. In fact, interesting point about the language because for the first time, I actively sought an English as first language nanny this time specifically so she would be able to mingle with the mums/nannies/childminders at theschool gate.

Are you sure Christina? Surley both parents need to be working. If you can claim childcare costs as a SAHM, then would I be able to study and claim child care costs? Anyone know?

yogimum: i assume you are referring to my post

my cleaner gets paid £7.50/hour but she only does 2 hours a week.

the nursery gets £1300 a month for 2 children for 3 days = 14 days/month approx = less than £100 day, so £50 each, and 10 hour days (what i pay, not how long they go).

there's the calculation.

the point isn't that the nursery/childcare doesn't deserve the pay, it is that the govt should subsidise if they want women with children back to work

amidaiwish - do you think that it is the business of government to decide on the electorate's behalf whether mothers of young children should be working or not?

CF - I may have got confused, I think you have to work 16 hours or more but you can have children in childcare for longer than you work. I was looking to see if I qualify to let DD at nursery 2 days a week but I work 10 hours a week so I don't qualify at all. I think i'm in a muddle again but I'll look back into it once I get all the details needed from my employers and the nursery (registration number, PAYE number etc).

Depends how much you believe in the nanny state. In the UK we need women to have more babies. We also spend a lot training some women who then leave so there have often been schemes to get mothers who left teaching or nursing or being doctors back at various times when we've had shortages but that comes and goes.

Governments do need to tell people some things like it's illegal to smack a child and it's not best practice to swear and shout at them either. Presonally as a feminist I'd obviously preer the Government to try to get more women in work and more men at home until we have more women in Govermnent etc than men and only than cease that social engineering but I doubt many mumsnetters agree with me.

Tax credits for child care for stay at home mothers - I don't know. It should be easy for someone to look up.

I think it is the government's role to to make it possible (i.e. affordable) for the vast majority of parents to remain in work. This goes for mums and dads.

If you want parents to work, it needs to be affordable for the vast majority of them to do so.

Xenia - that's an interesting perspective.

In France, where the state has been nannying the population for a lot longer than in the UK and more women work, there are far fewer women in positions of power than in the UK.

So your theory may not hold (I believe it doesn't).

Anna, Eleusis has summed it up.
if they want women with children in the workplace they need to make it affordable.
it isn't.

I just looked - www.direct.gov.uk/en/MoneyTaxAndBenefits/BenefitsTaxCreditsAndOtherSupport/TaxCredits/DG_4015483

That seems to say as long as you earn under the threshold which is about £53k depending on various things which excludes some high paid men and women, then you get the tax credit for those who work and it seems at the bottom to include a childcare element so surely a man on £40k a year whose wife doesn't work could get that if he is paying for childcare even if his wife has her feet up all day doing her nails.

Anna, with all due respect, I don't think France is a good example of a non-sexist culture.

nor of a successfully economic culture from an employment/employers stance.

One thinks of France, mistresses, over concern about superficial matters like appearance, huge skiivng in the work place, massively long summer holidays, acceptance of adultery, endemic smoking, sexist men never mind the funny language. And they were the last country to conquer us - we will never forgive them.

I found the link here \www.direct.gov.uk/en/MoneyTaxAndBenefits/BenefitsTaxCreditsAndOtherSupport/TaxCredits/DG_4015478\Child Tax Credits}
"Families with children can claim Child Tax Credit if their income is no more than £58,175 a year (up to £66,350 if you have a child under one). The amount you get depends on various things, including your annual income."

In addition, there's the Working Tax Credit which may also have a childcare element.