‘Two-child limit taking toll on family life’

[SweetMelodies]

www.itv.com/news/2019-06-25/two-child-limit-taking-toll-on-family-life-study-suggests/

So the first detailed research into families effected by the 2-child policy, where tax credits are only paid for the first two children unlike in the past when it was every child, has taken place and has found that families are suffering as a direct result of this.

A lot of comments on SM seem to forget that many many working families are effected as well. Even some families with ‘above-average’ incomes used to be entitled to tax credits for a third or subsequent child.

Any thoughts on this? I have mixed feelings as to whether it will work on in the long-run or not. Of course we all know families who have carried on having babies with no thought because each child has meant another monthly tax credits sum... but then there are also the families who are going to face one unplanned pregnancy that could push them into poverty and make their other children suffer.

Was it suddenly taken away form people who were already getting it? That would be a bit unfair.

But the overall limit seems ok to me. I am pregnant and I am always aware that neither of me or my husbands jobs are a sure thing forever, so I am glad there is some kind of safety net out there. We will seriously consider if we can afford another after this one though, because we will be like most - just enough over the limit to qualify for no support.

Good. The plan is working

@BarbarianMum -

you said …
Please, please can people stop with the "circumstances can change" excuse? Yes of course circumstances can change - illness, death, disability, divorce, unemployment - these can happen to anybody at any time. That's not news, its always been the case. The solution is to plan conservatively when it comes to family size, stick at 1 or 2 if your budget won't allow you to pick up the slack for 6 if things go tits up. Prioritise health insurance before baby number 3. Double up on contraception if number 4 would mean you can't afford to work any more.

Yes you should save for emergencies, but what if the change is long term or permanent? You may be able to save enough to tide you over for a year, but the fact remains as I said in my earlier post, that the two child limit is population control, but applied only to those who are not independently wealthy. People on a normal income cannot afford to save enough to cover years of lost income.

Ive never quite understood the point of stopping CB at 3 children when the overall population is aging and the country as a whole NEEDS people to have kids.
Unless the idea is to open the doors to immigration, the way Germany has to do it (because of the low natality rates) but that creates major problems of its own and I dont think this is an acceptable idea in the uk.

so what next? expecting people to have children whilst putting in poverty and telling them its their fault whilst also expecting them to have enough children (above 2.4 so some people will have to have at least 3 children) to avoid the population shrinking and its economical and social consequences.

Its not fair that 2 parents working FT can't afford 2 or 3 DC because that means another massive childcare bill and other costs whilst other people gets more benefits when they have more children. That is totally wrong.

DevonDumpling .You are right ,my mum didnt receive any CB at all (I was the only child!)"where it all started " is a good website with a lot of information on this subject.One thing, now what happens is you have twins on top of older child?or triplets even!.Are the counted as 1 birth or two seperate children (oldest twin?)!.As far as the latest policy goes 2 children is more or less the norm here .I think this poicy is fair TBH.

The solution is to plan conservatively when it comes to family size, stick at 1 or 2 if your budget won't allow you to pick up the slack for 6 if things go tits up. Prioritise health insurance before baby number 3. Double up on contraception if number 4 would mean you can't afford to work any more.
Of course that is only working if people actually have enough money to get a health insurance. And if provision of contraception is widely available (eg where I am its so hard to get an appointment to see your GP that it will put people off/people will miss a minth of OCP etc...).
Seeing that we vert clearly going towards a private system where we will have to pay for all those things, it also means that its the poorest in the population that will be hit the hardest. Again.

Meanwhile....we, or most of us pay taxes, are part of the 'just about managing', brigade who can't really afford to have children any more

Why so alarmist? Of course most people who pay taxes can afford to have children. It’s all about choices.

I'm agog that there's anyone so absolutely wooly-headed as to oppose this.

Two children is more than enough to have in any case, much less on the state's dime.

And if provision of contraception is widely available (eg where I am its so hard to get an appointment to see your GP that it will put people off/people will miss a minth of OCP etc...).

Are you serious? What country are you living in? You can’t pop into a pharmacy or supermarket...?

I’m sorry but I’m agog at this. We can speak about people not having children for different reasons, but what if a person’s third child is a doctor that helps many people, or the scientist that invents a cure, or a career who impacts many many people’s lives? It’s like so many on this thread are forgetting the humanity aspect to all of this

If you are to consider the possibility that a hypothetic child may be exceptional, you have to consider all kinds of exceptional e.g. murderer, rapist, brilliant scientist.

I’m also curious if any studies have been done on the effect to the countries birth rate. I know the birth rate has gone down overall but it would be interesting to see if there has been a particular fall in 3rd+ babies being born.

I guess a family who would have had say 5/6 kids if tax credits were available would end up better off in the long-run even if a third unplanned baby was born. Once the children were older and the parents had more freedom to work they may be in a much better position than they would have been with full-tax credits but double the amount of children. Plus kids will arguably benefit from more space and more attention?

It’s just standard nasty Tory divide-and-conquer politics, dressed up as anti-benefit scrounger populist rhetoric.

Families aren’t as easily planned as people think. People can have twins, get pregnant unexpectedly, or whatever.

As always, it’s basically a hidden tax on the vulnerable. It sure as f**k won’t affect the rich.

Genevieva, the birth rate isn't dropping throughout the Muslim World. We aren't stopping tje rise in fundamental Islam and we are talking 9 children plus.

??? There is not a single country in the world where the fertility rate is at nine children. The highest FR in the world is Niger, at about 7 kids per woman. Fertility rates and birthrates are dropping either slowly or quickly almost everywhere, and they are falling in majority-Islam countries too. Iran has a fertility rate of about 1.9--about the same as France.

Isabella - no, not everyone who pays taxes can afford more children. Their disposable income may not be large due to mortgage, low wages etc. We pay taxes but wouldn’t’t be afford a large family. Our income wSn’t really any different to some people on benefits after the essential expenses (such as taxes, higher council tax etc) were taken out.

I’m also curious if any studies have been done on the effect to the countries birth rate. I know the birth rate has gone down overall but it would be interesting to see if there has been a particular fall in 3rd+ babies being born.

I believe there's reasonably good evidence that the birth rate increased under Blairs 'let's get the whole of Britain on welfare' policies... I'll try to find the study.

I think a woman who becomes pregnant with twins will receive money for one twin, as that baby was technically ‘unplanned’.

EverydayIm huffling.I see your point, and of course no one wants children going hungry or badly clothed.But this issue goes deeper than just CB TBH.When these children go to School ,maybe need some medical care ,and so on ,the taxpayers are stumping up for them over and over again . In the long run it seems to be a form of Birth Control to keep the population down ,and therefore keep public services at a safe level.With a right wing govt in power I think this is what they are hoping to achieve!.I think that this seems unfair because the govt doesnt properly invest in public sevices TBH

Ive never quite understood the point of stopping CB at 3 children when the overall population is aging and the country as a whole NEEDS people to have kids.

Not really. We are a crowded country with a growing population, and some work will be automated going forward, meaning that a slightly smaller population might be quite a good thing. If we want to deal with generational inequalities and other problems that are caused by the greying of the population, the main things to do are to raise the retirement age and reform pension and taxation systems. If you keep increasing the population pyramid from the bottom, you just keep kicking the can down the road (because that youthful population bulge will eventually age too, requiring even more young workers to be born), while the population grows, resulting in a diminished standard of living for everyone not to mention the toll on the environment.

Re: Blair

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-13809280

One aspect of the reforms, though, did seem to have a significant impact on people's decision to have more children - working family tax credits (WTFC). One study found that the payments increased the fertility of women in couples by 10%. Why? The money was expected to encourage mums back to work. Instead, they were staying at home and having another baby.

"This difference may be explained by the fact that eligibility for the WTFC depended on one of the couple working: many women in couples found that the WTFC increased family income without providing any incentive to enter the labour force, and may even have enabled them to drop out of the labour force in response to their partner's increased earnings."

We are not on any sort of benefits but I find this policy disgusting.

Why should children suffer for their parents falling on hard time?

"Sorry Oliver, you'll have to go without dinner tonight because your mum didn't keep her legs closed. You shouldn't have been born, really."

You have parents that are wealthy, tax paying citizens who are made redundant all the time. How many companies have been involved in redundancies lately? If one of those families has more than 2 children, then all children must suffer. It's bs and it's Dickensian.

"Please sir can I have some more?"
"No, fuck off."

Come on people, think outside your own little box. Life can change an instant. We are all 1 medical tragedy away from our lives being upheaved and our financial standing being rocked.

Those saying ‘what if my husband left me with three kids with no money’ or ‘what if we had three kids and my husband lost his job’. If you decide to have three kids, don’t have them on the basis that your only source of income to pay for the extra child is your husband’s job. There is no such thing as a ‘job for life’ anymore, redundancies are common place, if cannot unequivocally expect that your husband will never be out of work then don’t have three children, same goes for if your husband leaves you, why are you having kids with a man who could leave you in abject poverty? Surely the sensible thing to do before you have kids is to ensure that you are able to provide financially for your children should you husband leave you. It’s quite simply really

The 2 child limit is going to result in huge numbers of children being in poverty and suffering. Being hungry. That's the children. Who aren't to blame for their parents having them (if you can even assume that parents are deliberately flouting the rules by having the children - which you cant at all ) For that reason we should all oppose it, with no judgment on the parents or families who are caught by it (and if you read the actual rules, they are extremely restrictive).

If you want read the report

Hope people are aware the 2 child rule only applies to children born AFTER April 2017. If you have 7 kids born prior to this date you're grand and will recieve payment for all of them.

Sorry if this has been asked .......is tax credit same as child benefit?

What is the threshold? Is it per household or per 1 income? Like the government funded hours?