To think that working people should get help too

[cantthinkofabetterusername]

I read today about another COL payment next year for people on benefits, pensioners etc. Now I completely agree that the most vulnerable in society need help and i don't begrudge them a penny. My AIBU is working people are struggling too! I work 30 hours a week, dp does 50 therefore we get no government help as we apparantley earn too much. In reality we're scraping by most months due to increasing bills and general cost of living, I'm aware I may come across as jealous, I'm not im just bloody frustrated that working people who don't get government help are seen by the government as not struggling

Yes totally agree with this

I'm living off savings at the moment, plus DH's state pension and housekeeping from adult 'children' - so this doesn't affect me, but....

I have to agree that those above a certain limit of income are being disregarded. Not everyone received £150 Council Tax payment and value of homes in Bands is not equal across the country.

Claimants can receive 10 per cent rise - yet nurses / healthcare workers aren't valued as such apparently.

Going to work is expensive. My adult children pay over £100 per week each for the privilege of going to work. It's money they don't see, but when their wage is quoted, it's seen as a good wage. The difference between not working and working on an average wage is diminishing. If Minimum Wage continues to rise and the pay for other jobs does not, everyone will be on minimum wage in due course!

There are one size fits all answers to this, but someone on the same wage working as someone not working - is much worse off now, and that doesn't seem fair.

This! When I was a child my dad worked full time, my mum was a SAHM and we still had a good quality of life, had holidays etc.

I'm a single parent to 1 child (14 years old) I work 33 hours a week and my child has disabilities entitling him to dla. I also receive tax credits for him. In the past year we have gone from being relatively ok,ie, being able to meet household bills and stay in a cheap caravan for three nights once a year, to struggling to meet bills for basic necessities. I currently have £16 available to feed us both until Tuesday. This is obviously not a humanitarian disaster but an indicator, for me at least, of the reality of the cost of living changes. IF I should receive the cost of living payment this month it will ease things for two months at best and for that I am grateful.

Also on MN if you graft hard and work your fingers to the bone for a not half decent salary you should take a second job (already work full time) done better at school (have a degree) get a similar job that pays more (never heard of NHS pay bands then) or move to a cheaper part of the country (somewhere cheaper than where I am?)

Call it quits then?

The benefits system (as meagre as it is) is there to help those less fortunate, disabled, elderly, vulnerable etc. they are not laughing it up. They are getting by. You want to blame anyone, blame the government, blame the rich tax avoiders, blame the companies that use loopholes to avoid paying tax.

I'm not sure I understand. Working people pay tax and that goes into the govt pot to dish out as they see fit - according to manifestos that citizens use to decide who to vote for. If working people want more out they have to pay more in but then they'll be paying more in so having less....

Everyone is feeling the COL crisis but giving more benefits to working people is not the answer.

Out of interest how much help do people think each household should get? A flat amount for everyone regardless of income? At what point should the help stop? Should it be based on outgoings instead of income? So a frugal family get less than a family in a large house who send their kids to private school?

30 hours a week isn't full time though is it - especially if you are "scraping by"

I'm a single mum working full time. Apparently I can't afford a mortgage even though I pay £1250 a month on rent before bills. No help for me.

Oh wow, quelle surpise... another benefits bashing thread. DO, pray tell, who are the people who absolutelyu can worka nd choose not to, and how do you know? I wouldn't deny that there aren't a small minority of malingerers claiming benefits. There are a small minority of malingerers claiming wages too.

But yes, let's make a list of all the people whose fault the country is in this state - it's the workers, the unions, the immigrants, the migrants, those on benefits, the disabled... if I have missed anyone out please feel free to add them to the list.

Because it certainly couldn't be the fault of a bloody government that has run the country into the ground, destroyed trade with our neighbours, or the unrestricted rampant profiterring of big businesses and their friends in government; or the idiots who voted for all that????

Were you furloughed OP ?

Like whom?
Those that can work that chose not will only be getting very basic benefits ,i cant imaginr msny people choosing to live like that
We get the payments my dh works full time on a low wage ,i dont work as my son has severe autism and learning disabillities ,hes 12 but cognitivly ,at pre school level ,we are hardly living the dream .

Actually I grew up on a very poor area, left school with zero qualifications. Lived in a shitty estate with an abusive husband until one day on my early 40's I decided enough is enough. Left him went back to collage then university iny 40s got a degree got a good job and half decent pay. I worked arse off to now listen to people like you who think you deserve a huge chunk of my pay each month irrelevant ofu personal circumstances because o got of my arse and should fund you. Yes I can be pissed off!

Yeah 'the squeezed middle' as we are called will never get help, just taxed to the balls 🤷‍♀️

Yep. I'm a single mum working full time, no help for me. I am feeling irritated tbh.

@Quveas it's 100% the fault of the government that's what I'm saying. And at no point did I refer to immigrants

@Justthisonce12 no I wasn't furloughed I work for the NHS

I didn’t get £150 of council tax and my house is a very modest end of terrace- band E apparently.

@Justthisonce12 correction, I worked for the NHS when furlough was in place. I work in a different sector now

I do get where you're coming from, I qualified for tax credits for a long time and it was a real struggle at times, my DD is now older and I don't qualify.
The cost of living increases have put me back to the times of struggling to make ends meet and there's times it all feels a bit pointless, but I'm also incredibly grateful that I am in this position because if this had happened 5 years ago, the extra help I'd qualify for would have made the difference between survival or going under and having bailiffs at the door because I couldn't pay my bills. I'm not in that situation now, and yes I've worked for it, but it's also been a combination of circumstances - many of them out of my complete control, like jobs becoming available at the right time etc.
People I know are in that situation now and it's appalling that in 2022, in a so called developed country, we have people in this situation, like you I don't begrudge that help at all, and for me it's more that I can't have the things I was looking forward to, rather than I will go without food or heat to a real degree (though I will have to be very careful).
What pisses people off and I think gets negative comments are attitudes like this -

Don't bother OP, apparently on MN your expected to graft your fingers to the bone and if you work hard and earn a half decent salary you should be expected to pay through the nose in taxes get zero in return apart from a good feeling your having to help people who despise you for doing well and begrudge you not liking the fact you have to pay for them 🙄.

The old 'work hard' bull shit, implying that anyone struggling to the point they're not surviving just doesn't work hard enough and just expects handouts from all the saintly higher earners that work so hard.
As I said, my situation improved in recent years, and I did work hard, but no harder than all the years I couldn't make ends meet. I'm lucky that the right opportunities came along at times I could take them and I was supported to make them work. Not everyone has that and I'm very grateful for it and aware that I'm not some sort of superstar that's done all this singlehandedly by my own graft and nothing else.

That's a massive over reach, but whatever.

@20weeksandcounting2023 no but it's the closest I can get to full time at the moment, it's pretty much there though bar 10 hours

When I was a child my dad worked full time, my mum was a SAHM and we still had a good quality of life, had holidays etc.

When did you grow up?

Perhaps they claimed Family income supplement or family credit to enable them to do so.

I agree OP. I’ll benefit as I’m on disability, but I really feel for working people just over the cut off, who really need that help as well. Plus, it’s such a divisive policy.