To think work no longer ‘pays’

[Cuppasoupmonster]

This is a controversial topic so I’m expecting a few biscuits to be thrown at me so I’ve got my hard hat on. Inspired by the ‘benefits overhaul’ thread.

I often see on here that working and owning your own home is always better than claiming benefits and living in social housing. But it seems like the perks are long gone if I’m honest.

It feels like every day I’m dragging myself up at 6am to take my daughter to nursery (when I would much rather have her at home with me), just to pay our enormous mortgage and bills, before breaking even at the end. We haven’t had a holiday in 5 years. A few months ago I went into my overdraft for the first time in about 6-7 years despite the fact my spending is no different. What are the upsides again? Is it just that we get to choose the care home we die in (perhaps)? Because right now I’m feeling pretty pissed off with the whole thing and wondering if anyone else feels the same.

I laugh at you @Cuppasoupmonster you have no idea (thankfully, you are fortunate, although you don't realise it).

Goodnight and pleas reflect on how lucky you actually are! You could in a blink of any eye be homeless, depend on benefits and be ONE OF THOSE AWFUL PEOPLE YOU criticise... you ARE incredibly fortunate try to remember that.....

Good luck and goodnight

Maybe in a hostel for mothers and children or a B and B until she gets far enough up the list after maybe two years that she can get a social housing tenancy. Oh sorry I’ve gone back to the reality of people and not the OP’s fantasy land of walking in to the free giveaway housing office where you go up and ask for a two bedroom house with a garden please and by dinner time you are settled in watching a 50 inch flat screen tv

Phony outrage and missing the point again 🥱

I think working part time with UC top ups is the best of both world tbh. Even working full time wirh UC top ups. I have no desire to be a homeowner as I’d never have money for a deposit anyway.

Some of the comments here do make me laugh though. As if someone waking up at 6am to take their child nursery everyday and then working all day just so they hardly have any money by the end of the month, really thinks ‘at least I have a job and can sell my house in retirement if needed.’ Give over lol most people will be wanting to throw the towel in.

You can die at any moment and your whole life would have been you slaving away for a nice ‘retirement’ and something you can pass down to your kids. Fuck that, there’s way more to life

This, exactly!!!

Some work pays. Some work doesn't.
Some work is socially worthwhile and fulfilling. Some work isn't.

It sounds like the problem is that your work is in the second category.
The alternatives you should be considering are how to change your work or work/life balance - not how to emulate those on benefits.

And there's a massive difference between having options but choosing not to take them, and not having any options at all.

People subsisting on benefits have wretched lives with no semblance of control. What people describe in envious tones as desirable leisure activities - drinking, smoking, sleeping in every morning - are addictions and coping mechanisms for mental health problems linked to a life devoid of hope or significance. In the olden days they were pitied, not despised.

@Hellybelly84

Working full time does not benefit everyone’s mental health. That’s a narrative that the government loves to spill out mind. It’s why they have implemented the IPS employment role into MH clinical teams. Get those severely unwell people working, it will do them some good but actually it makes them severely unwell and often back in hospital. I’ve wrote essays on this very subject. It’s very individual but working full time really depresses a lot of people, even if they’re in a relatively well paid career that they picked. You enjoy your job,
good for you. Not everyone does. I presume the OP feels like it’s all a bit of a drag. Many people do, even people in professional roles.

My kids love learning too, but even education is not a guarantee these days of that “great job that you just can’t wait to go into every day for the next 40 years”. Believe it or not there is more to some people than work.

Amen to this.

Why on earth are you presuming all people on benefits are in social housing?

Hundreds of thousands of people on benefits have mortgages. They get no help with their mortgage either.

You are infinitely better off in your position and If you have no awareness of that I pity you.

I couldn’t be further from outrage, enjoying some olives and a glass of wine, nearly as middle class as you OP! I’m not sitting stewing imagining divorce and single parenting to be ‘better off’. I really get the feeling you know the value of nothing OP, I pity you if anything

You need to take the long view. One day your mortgage will be paid off. Mine is and I'm having a ball!

@Eyerollcentral

The OP @Cuppasoupmonster has no idea about reality. Probably reads the Daily mail and buys into the benefit bashing. Sad rally... imagine if she ACTUALLY ended up on benefits... karma or just let you know what it is REALLY LIKE..... goodnight

Affordable housing is not a lifetime tenancy now.

I'm also very upper middle class @Eyerollcentral but can see that @Cuppasoupmonster has really bought into the Daily Mail benefits bashing theme and believes it to be true. I wish some of these individuals would wake up to what is the real problem.

Ive never done a job that hasn’t felt at least abit rewarding. There is no contest for me between working and not working. Having colleagues, a reason to get up and out the house and just the feeling of doing a good days work. Agree about pay for certain jobs though (NHS in particular).

I think you don't understand how hard it is to work in exactly the same job as everyone else, try to save (but it is futile and not possible) just to get a deposit but never quite get there. I work as hard as anyone else in my organisation on the same wage as myself and the only difference between me the renter and them the homeowner is family wealth. I live frugally, but at the moment it is impossible to save. It's not jealousy, it's frustration that people don't quite manage to understand that it's an inequality problem.

I totally get where the OP is coming from. It does feel like you are working for nothing.

I agree with you, OP. Life is hard on benefits, but it’s designed that way on purpose so people chose to work instead. The problem is that wages aren’t going up fast enough compared to prices. It’s expensive having a job with childcare costs, commuting, costs associated with looking professional etc. I would rather work than not work, but I do spend a lot of time thinking it isn’t worth it when you don’t have much left at the end of the month. Job = Just Over Broke and I’m sick of it too.

Easier to take aim at those they think are less than 🤷‍♀️ What gets me is the theme of ‘why do benefit recipients/social housing tenants think they’d are entitled to anything’ when what they really mean is ‘I am entitled to the lifestyle i believe I deserve and it’s YOUR fault I don’t have it’

I guess there is no universal right or wrong in this. If you feel like it is rewarding for you, then, for you, it is worth it. It's worth it for me as well. But it may not be for some, and those who work are not better than those who do not. David Graeber has written interesting texts on the misconception of work as a virtue. I found this very enlightening.

If you end up in a care home, you will no longer need a house.

This, a thousand times over. My dad struggled to pay his mortgage with he and my mum working their socks off. Now he is a widower and needs care and the house has to be sold to pay for it.
however, a friend of his who had a "bad back" all his life-although didn't stop him getting cash in hand-was in a council house all his life and spent his income-about the same as my dad's low paying job-on other stuff.
He is now in a home too-the same one-but has pissed his money up the wall and the has nothing to pay with, so it's all free.

It makes me fucking mad. My dad wanted my brothers and I to have an inheritance and he thought the house would be it.

I wish he had defaulted on his mortgage when we were little, lived in a council house and either gave up work or spend his money when he could enjoy it instead of working like a donkey to have it taken away from him.

I know one thing. There will be so many equity mortgages on my home that by the time I need care, there won't be a fucking penny left.
Work hard and when you're old, they'll grab it.
Doss about and when you're old, the state will pick up the tab.

I don't believe any old shite about the hard life people have on benefits. It's a lifestyle for many who live without ever pulling their finger out of their arse, claim pension credits eventually and get care for free.

No, work no longer pays.

I’m not upper middle class and I earn £26k.

Yep, I agree. Nobody will challenge your scenario though as it’s the uncomfortable truth in many cases.

I’ll be. And at the weekend.
It’s part time job to supplement my full time job. My HA rent each year is based on the rate of inflation so come April my rent will go up by 12% or thereabouts.

Could you not work on the weekends just to get a few more quid for the extras.

Could you not work on the weekends just to get a few more quid for the extras.

Ffs are you joking? When would I ever see my kid?