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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

feeling that tax credits are totally biased towards working mums?

572 replies

Dragonhart · 13/05/2007 15:23

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'?

OP posts:
Original poster
Dragonhart · 15/05/2007 21:00

I think it is pretty clear from this thread that everyone works pretty hard, both SAHM and working mums.

I could say that as a SAHM, I do not have 'leisurly days with my kids' while working mums pay me as

  1. my dh works damn hard for the money we get and
  2. I spend my days making sure my children are as stimulated and cared for as working mums would expect their childcarers (that they have to pay so much) to be.

But what is the point because I know that most working mums are working as hard as most SAHMs. Not all but most

I would like to say that the friend I was talking about is, as I said , a teacher and has 13 weeks holiday a year. She still takes her ds to nursary during that time, still gets help from the state to do so via tax credits and childcare vouchers but just uses the time to 'catch up on things' which includes shopping (not the food type) and getting her hair done and topping up her tan.

OP posts:
Original poster
Dragonhart · 15/05/2007 21:04

Sorry re-read. Does this make more sense?!

  1. I spend my days making sure my children are as stimulated and cared for as working mums would expect their children to be with childcarers (the ones they have to pay so much!).
OP posts:
MeAndMyMonkey · 15/05/2007 21:12

ami - cleaner .

Let's face it, it's all hard,no? Unless your hubby is a Boden-wearing merchant banker or whatever .

amidaiwish · 15/05/2007 21:14

dh caved... couldn't bear the "crunching" when he walked barefoot and wants his shirts ironed

toomuchtodo · 15/05/2007 21:21

By beckybrastraps on Tue 15-May-07 18:41:00
I don't get the whole 'lunch break' thing for SAHPs. I cannot see it as work.

becky surely you don't mean staying at home with your kids isn't work?

and bloody hard work in my opinion!

(I must have read you wrong?)

CristinaTheAstonishing · 15/05/2007 21:27

I don't know exactly what BBstraps meant but I, for one, don't see staying at home as work. I do 10 hours a week paid employment, which I see as work, the rest is being with DD, doing stuff I'd do anyway but having her in tow, but not work. Of course I also do things just for her or mainly for her, like going to the park or M&T group, but I don't see that as myself working for my DD.

lesliephillips · 15/05/2007 21:31

dragonhart the whole teachers' holiday thing is an entirely different issue

Original poster
Dragonhart · 15/05/2007 21:33

I dont see looking after my childrenas 'work' but it is hard work iyswim. I do enjoy it but spending your days with 2 under 2s can sometimes be...well...damn hard work.

OP posts:
MrsWho · 15/05/2007 21:34

OOh teacher bashing how many contraversial threads in one now ?

Original poster
Dragonhart · 15/05/2007 21:35

leslie yes, but the friend I was talking about in the op is a teacher and I was comparing her situation to mine.

Someone further down the thread (sorry cant remember who) was saying that working mums never get a moment to themselves or to do things for themselves and in this situation it was not true. Just pointing it out.

OP posts:
NKF · 15/05/2007 21:36

Probably for the purpose of this thread, it would be best to make a distinction between a "job" and "work."

Original poster
Dragonhart · 15/05/2007 21:37

I WAS NOT teacher bashing. God, my dsis, mum and most of my close friends are teachers and I know just how hard they all work. Not saying that she does not work hard.

I was just saying that she was getting help for childcare from state when she did not need it.

OP posts:
lesliephillips · 15/05/2007 21:37

no, but that working mum is working to educate the children of other mums, working or otherwise and it is damn hard work, physically and mentally. Without the hols we wouldn't keep going

lesliephillips · 15/05/2007 21:39

she's not getting help when she doesn't need it, if her nursery is like the one I use she has to keep them there in the hols like it or not - I'd far rather not have to pay for the extra 13 weeks' childcare I don't need but I have to in order to have them there in term time

NKF · 15/05/2007 21:39

And, as has been pointed out many times already, the teacher gets tax credits because she works and earns less than a certain amount. The childcare vouchers - do they come from her employers? Not that it really matters.

MrsWho · 15/05/2007 21:41

Teachers and holidays is done regularly on here and the answer is always teachers do work in the hols and don't get paid for it .

I mentioned no lunch breaks if thats what you mean?

SelfishMoo · 15/05/2007 21:42

Lots of teachers have to pay for nursery places all through the holidays to keep the place for their DC, I thought it was fairly standard practice?

SelfishMoo · 15/05/2007 21:44

Sorry, too slow, can't keep up with this one!
The vouchers will be from the friend's salary, just bits that she won't have to pay tax on - and those 'bits' then won't count towards pension etc, as I understand it.... It's hardly a huge additional handout!

Judy1234 · 15/05/2007 21:46

Depends on the teacher. My ex husband and a lot of his colleagues trying to bring up children in London would often work the summer holidays or 4 or 5 weeks of them to get extra money to make up for the low salaries teachers get.
Also you can't just lay your nanny off for a 10 week private school summer holiday anyway so we had that childcare help then.

I find looking after under 5s/doing house stuff at the same time which is what most parents at home do is very hard work. Sometimes you're breastfeeding for 30 minutes or more and then hanging them and then they want to feed again and then the toddler's tipped the potty over... you're lucky to vacuum a floor some days. We used to escape to work for a comparative rest but that's what I mean about some parents being suited to being at home and others not and we weren't.

NKF · 15/05/2007 21:48

Hanging them? I know it's a typo but I'm trying to work out what it should have been.

Original poster
Dragonhart · 15/05/2007 21:49

Ok, I really didnt mean to start the whole teachers thing. She gets her vouchers from her and her dh pay. It didnt occur to me that she might have to do it to keep the place as she always say that she needs the break not that she has to pay for it.

Mrswho, no it was chocolatedot who said

"When do you think working women get time to go for a walk by themselves, go to the hairdresser etc? SAHM have far more time than WOHM. After all, if your children are too young for pre school then they must sleep for at least 12 hours out of every 24 if not more."

OP posts:
lesliephillips · 15/05/2007 21:51

I enjoy the fact that I can have some holiday time to myself whilst DTs are at nursery tbh

NKF · 15/05/2007 21:51

So the vouchers are just part of her salary. It's hardly help then. Just a different way of paying her.

beckybrastraps · 15/05/2007 21:52

You didn't read me wrong. It is utterly different to work. I just don't get the whole 'it's really hard work' bit. I'm not saying it's all a walk in the park. It's not better or worse, easier or harder. It's not comparable because it's not work.

And when I did work, I was a teacher, and yes, I had to pay for my child's place all year round. Even when I didn't need it.

1dilemma · 15/05/2007 21:53

With reference to Anna8888s post from about 4 20 don't we have that system in the UK? Is it not the case that 2 parents working full time each earning about 31K get no tax credits and no help with childcare costs whereas a family with one person working full time earning 55k and the other parents full tima stay at home get child tax credit of around 1K if a baby and 550 if not? oh and childcare is generally not tax deductible in the UK

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