To hope that some people now understand that it's not somebody's fault they're poor?

[Moomin8]

All of a sudden loads of people have had to claim UC

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/mar/24/britain-benefits-rishi-sunak-claimants-austerity?CMP=ShareiOSAppp_Other

Torsten Bell, head of the Resolution Foundation, says people on £50,000 salaries have been anxiously asking him about benefits rates. They’re in for a shock, he says.” Funny, that: before this crisis, those doing alright were adamant that benefit rates were too high. Now, they’re worried it’s the opposite.

The thing is there is some jobs available not just in supermarkets but in other parts of quite literally the food chain, in that farms need an incredible amount of workers. They need I think 70,000-100,000 workers very soon within the UK.

Our local 111 service is recruiting to for phone operators.

Now of course I am not saying every person who has had to stop working, can nor is able to do that sort of work. They're are plenty who cannot yet I would if necessary/I could. However the options are there for lots of people.

I say this as my husband has already applied for farm fruit picking as we are both self employed and I'm currently pregnant so incredibly limited in what I can do. He's worked hard in his business for over 8 years building it up and is having more and more customers pause him working for them. So we're hoping to be able to use the farm work to be able to tide us over especially if his work gets included in a tighter lockdown. It isn't yet but who knows what will change.

There is always inequality in every situation in life, it's just usually many do not have to consider it.

@JuanSheetIsPlenty

No, there were other options that were family friendly hours and paid more, but she chose that one because she enjoyed it.

Although please, do try and tell me what my own mother decided...

but she chose that one because she enjoyed it.

So it was because she enjoyed it then! Nothing because it was low paid! She didn’t go out with the intention to get a low paid job!

@Miajk

An individual's entitlement to benefits is not decided by what another individual gets. That's a nonsensical view of the entire welfare system.

If you are not eligible for help, it's because your government has decided you don't need it. Not because Sharon down the road has three kids and lives in a Council house.

Do you honestly think that if people who have entitlement stopped claiming tomorrow that the government would just put the savings back into Welfare State for previously ineligible individuals? They've done nothing but turn the screw on Welfare for ten years. Tory ideology is the problem, not a shortage of money, and certainly not existing welfare claimants.

I'm always confused when people say there are 'plenty of other options' when it comes to jobs. They seem like flies to me - apparently plenty of them but they flee whenever I approach.
Jobseeking is freakishly difficult - I remember £2 hour factory jobs and crappy NMW jobs with an equally crappy commute to support myself. But I guess I was too dumb and lazy to get better jobs then.

@pentium85 that should have said.

The system is obviously broken if the government gives Sharon the council house so she can have 3 more kids and work part time, but won't help someone who paid taxes all their life and really doesn't have a choice now. I don't think it's nonsense to think about how these things are related.

Let's not turn this into a political debate, as my point was about some people making conscious choices leading to their financial situation. Some, not all.

Also for the argument of people choosing low paid jobs, but we need people to do low paid jobs.

Yes we do! We need all the people and the work they do is important. It sucks that they're not better paid.

But that doesn't change the fact that they have chosen to do these jobs. It's a shame that on Mumsnet unless you agree that everyone who is poor has been a victim of life, external forces and the government you'll be eaten alive. It's not unfair or untrue to say some people had a choice, some didn't. It's also not unfair to say many people chose low paid jobs. That doesn't take away from the fact that they should be able to make a good living, it's just stating a fact.

I don't see how benefits is fun for anyone but especially in deprived areas, if you have had a poor education and poor upbringing, your self esteem and belief in yourself is going to be much lower than someone who had a loving family, access to good education and got lucky. No matter your income, status or education level all of us are only 2 or 3 life events from things falling apart for any of us.

@Miajk

The point is, one is not directly responsible for the other.

The Government doesn't deny anyone a council house simply because they've given one to Sharon and her three kids.

If you're entitled to Social Housing, Benefits etc, you're entitled and you get it. If you're not, you're not because you're not deemed to be in sufficient need. It has nothing at all to do with Sharon.

What would you have the government do with 'irresponsible' Sharon anyway? Turf her out in the street and starve her kids simply because someone lost their highly paid IT job and can no longer pay their mortgage?

Sharon might well be 'irresponsible' for having children in your view, but the children themselves played no part in that. They are potential tax payers of the future. It's not just the decent, compassionate, humane thing to do for a government to look after them, but it makes perfect sense from the pragmatic position of giving them every opportunity to be that high tax payer of the future the treasury and welfare depends on.

And does your mother complain about being poorly paid? It seems perfectly reasonable to me to chose a lower paid job, which has family friendly hours, and which you enjoy into the bargain.

Also know a lot of people who don't want to learn anything, so they just do the bare minimum at work, or less. That's just lazy.

Are we talking about Boris Johnson here, who I believe has got a good brain, but is too lazy to use it, but was lucky enough to get paid well for writing rubbish for the Telegraph?

This corona virus is teaching us that people who are lower paid are in fact more useful than many higher paid members of society.

I know people that choose to do very few hours cash in hand work a week and would rather get stoned than do a full days work.

I know people that will only work 10-2 even though their kids are at secondary school when they could work 9-5.

I know people that choose not to go for the higher paid role as they don't want the 'hassle'.

I know people that have 5 children, live on benefits, the children are dirty, run their parent ragged, the single parent doesn't work.

All these people have choices, choices that make them struggle to with money, they are not victims.

This is not the case for all people of course, but I know too many people that are lazy, that don't help themselves, or think the world owes them something.

If this crisis has shown us one thing, it's that the social welfare system isn't fit for purpose.

If it was, everyone who had lost their income as a result could have been moved smoothly to the existing welfare system. All of the extra measures that have had to be taken should've been completely unnecessary.

Again, I see nothing wrong with not going for a higher paid job because you don't want the hassle. As long as that person isn't whinging about being badly paid, what's the problem? Some people think it's better to have less money but time to enjoy life, rather than work themselves into an early grave.

I know people who are lazy, who think the world owes them a living - I wouldn't necessarily say they were low paid either.

They are whinging about having no money, all the time, it's frustrating, they could clearly do the extra few hours a week, they are more than capable but they don't.

@Pentium85. Where you disadvantaged because your mother chose a job that she enjoyed over money. I suspect she had the luxury to make that decision, because she wasn’t the main earner in your household.

This discussion is just nasty and pointless. Poverty is largely structural.

The welfare system is supposed to provide a safety net for everyone regardless of education or previous income level. It has been cut back to the extent it's now not reasonable to expect to be able to live i.e. feed, clothe, heat the household from it.

People who voted for it to be cut are now having to enter into it and to be honest they deserve to be horrified and to suffer. This is the life they condemned fellow human beings to. I hope more of the 10% come crashing down.

It's disgusting that in a wealthy country the benefits system has been slashed like this. It could be anyone at any time who needs to use it.

thing that puzzles me is that the stuff I've read on employment subsidies is that it is to a max of £2.5k a month.
The self employment stuff I've heard today (I've not had time to study in depth) implies that if earnings are above £50k pa, you're not eligible for assistance. I can see limiting to the first £50k, but tough not to be eligible.
Not affected by this now, but would have been in some years depending on employment status; very rarely my choice to make.

@Pentium85 - yes, and I imagine you would be one of the first to complain if the jobs being done by the lower paid suddenly weren't done. Supermarket workers or cleaners for instance.

Keep your nasty judgemental thoughts to yourself maybe.

I am a trainee lawyer, I'll be fine. But people who do the jobs we chose NOT TO DO are being ridiculed?!

As I have already said, if everyone chose to get a high paid job there would be no one serving you at the supermarket, serving your coffee, being your auxiliary nurse, your au pair, your cleaner, your gardener, your bin man...

So many idiots on this thread!

@ pentium85 Have you not heard of the hundreds of graduates who can’t get jobs, the massive unemployment figures we have had. It’s not always choice. How judgemental.

Oh and actually no nurses because they get paid shit money.

@blackswan88

Well yes.

I get endlessly irritated by people who are happy to benefit from being part of a free market capitalist economy, that only functions through the widespread use of cheap, low-paid labour, and would cease to be functional with full employment, who then turn around and sneer at and decry those who fulfil the low-paid roles or can't find worthwhile work.

Never seems to dawn on them that there are reasons why the UK isn't a nation of 67 million IT consultants, brain surgeons, Head teachers, QC's , CEO's etc

It would have been simpler just to give everyone a basic income for the duration of this crisis surely. The Uc system is swamped and how on earth the government are going to afford to pay people up to 2.5k a month , it's ridiculous. I understand some people on higher incomes will have a bigger mortgage to pay but mortgage breaks have already been offered. The mind boggles with how much it is going to cost to administer all this, far cheaper to provide everyone with a basic income for a few months, excluding pensioners who generally have a stable income anyway.