To be irritated by this £100k a year whiner

[Viviennemary]

On Question Time tonight they were talking about subsidised childcare and the new benefits for younger children. Then a woman came on with a boo hoo sad face and said she wouldn't be getting it. So I think Fiona Bruce said because your income is £100k a year plus Then she said that it wasnt fair as there was only one wage. And their household only had one earner.

Well tough. Folk on just over £12k a year are paying tax and this cheeky woman thinks her child care should be subsidised. It made me mad.

Please read my other posts on this but please tell me how tax works if it is not like this. The idea of a progressive tax system is to subsidise lower earners. Who do you think is paying for the salaries of the nurses, the teachers etc. that the person earning £12k uses? Or the benefits they get? It does not make it wrong that it happens but it doesn't mean it is not happening.

Mmm, I thought that too. It seemed a very wild and unsupported claim.

Some people earn £12k because they are sick or single parents. Some earn £12k because they are low skilled and a bit trapped in often undervalued occupations. Some earn £12k because they couldn’t be bothered at school and have no interest in bettering themselves because they are happy with their lot. But they all rely on the people who did make the effort to better themselves and/or do work hard or stressful jobs that might not always be especially fulfilling to pay the taxes required for the people earning £12k to enjoy the benefits of the welfare state they enjoy.

You've articulated well what I was trying to say on another thread. I've no issue helping the genuinely needy but if I had property which I'd worked hard to attain I'd be pissed off at people saying "yano what, let's tax her more and we can use her money". Especially if some of that money could be going to people that couldn't be arsed themselves.

I've met plenty of 'live for the moment' types that claim not to be materialistic but then think a higher earner should pay for them once the shit hits the fan.

When did you go to university?

There is 0% chance someone with a plan 2 loan would have paid their loan off within childbearing age, unless they were purposefully overpaying thousands a year. They will have a £60k+ debt accruing interest at 7.5% a year.

Childminders local to me in London are £10 an hour - and, few and far between (due to the cost of housing). £6 an hour is astonishingly good value in London in 2024.

I looked at childminders and there were none within a sensible distance of my home.

I have opted for the cheapest nursery - most of our local ones at now >£2,300 a month. It will still cost me £4k a month to have two there.

I own a nursery (well, two actually). Both are full to bursting with excellent reputations. But running them is like purgatory and it’s almost impossible to make a profit.

Who are these shareholders and how do they profit from businesses that have turnovers roughly equivalent to your average corner shop but have to employ 10 x the number of staff? How does it work and where do I sign up to become one?

There’s a post about this very issue in the FT this morning (subscribers only, sorry). Apparently the marginal tax rates for higher earners and the loss of childcare and child benefits is high up Jeremy Hunt’s list of things to fix in the March budget.

Absolutely - I’m on plan 2, and only have £9k loan for teacher training. I’ve been paying it off for 5 years so far, and still owe £9.5k 🤦 having paid £4k so far

Good!

I guess many of the posts here proved the points that the OP was making:

People on high salaries complaining about their high mortgage, living in the South East and how they work hard while the low paid live a life of complete leisure at tax payers' expenses...

Basically a bunch of privileged, whiny people who don't have a clue and should instead realise how lucky they are to have a house and a job that pays well.

And no, you don't work any harder than your office cleaner, hospital porter, catering assistant or the person behind your supermarket till.

Can you share a link please?

Equally, your post and a number like them have fleshed out more fully exactly why the OP is BU. Both sides are as bad as each other.

We simply can't afford to be moralising about who works harder and complaining that people we personally don't sympathise with aren't behaving financially like we want them to. Instead, we need sensibly designed tax and benefits systems that tackle bottlenecks and cliff edges wherever they occur.

https://www.ft.com/content/08f678d7-1ac2

In the same issue, there’s also an article about the birth rate in England and Wales hitting a new low…

Keep seeing people on this thread referring to ‘free’ childcare. No one is getting completely free childcare.
This isn’t a thing.

If you are eligible for help with your childcare costs it’s £500 towards your bill every three months, and soon 15 hours or 30 hours funded through your childcare provider for 2/3 year olds.

Worth keeping in mind that what the government thinks of as the cost of an hour of childcare and what that childcare actually costs to deliver varies from one provider to another. And the government estimate of costs skews low.

So if you are with a nice provider that pay their staff slightly above living wage, have good child to adult ratios, provide home cooked meals each day, the odd nice extra, like Santa at Christmas or an external person coming in to do a session with the kids the government money might only fund 9 hours rather than 15 in that setting. So you would still pay out as a parent if that makes sense.

I don’t know anyone getting anything for free.

https://www.ft.com/content/08f678d7-1ac2-4f9d-86c9-3da040ca4107

sorry - link got mangled first time

👍

Do you think to pit against each other on salaries from 0-100 or even more is helpful or tackling the root of wealth inequality? You shouldn't be angry towards these people, you should target your questions at wealth and those who own all the assets now. Why are we seeing the demise of the working and middle classes, working in professions that are a good income not affording you any kind of correspondingly good life. Why are young people in professions still living at home with their parents in their late 20's and beyond. Why is there such wealth disparities regionally. Watching breakfast news this morning there was a piece on the Comic relief climb by three women celebrities in the Arctic, Comic Relief is now raising money to feed people in Britain, many of the people who go to these foodbanks are in jobs like TAs, Nurses or even if they aren't, why is this the answer? All the women were stating how much we needed these Food banks now more than ever but why do we? This is a symptom of the unequal wealth distribution in this country, what is the cause, who is addressing that? The current trajectory of wealth distribution in Britain means that by 2035, 200 families will own more wealth than the whole of the UK GDP!

By 2023, the richest 50 families in the UK held more wealth than 33.5 million people- half the population! The systemic problems with economic and political policies is where it has gone wrong, lambasting someone on a good income is not the root of the problem!

I might not work “harder” than someone on a checkout but I do have a damn sight more responsibility than someone behind a till.

You're right, she should quit her job and sponge off the state with a clear conscience 🙄

Honestly, I find threads like this absolutely baffling. Who do you think funds welfare in this country? That woman will be paying thousands a month in tax. You seriously begrudge her being entitled to the same benefits as everyone else?

I know a doctor who has just dropped a day a week to get under the £100k income threshold as otherwise she'd lose the childcare allowance. How does that benefit anyone? The NHS would obviously much rather have her working full time and then she'd be paying tax on the extra income.

You're essentially saying other people should pay for your tax breaks and not get them themselves, all without a word of complaint. You are being ridiculously unreasonable.

Doing well isn't only about what you earn though, is it?

I'm a single parent of 3, I have taught a shortage subject for the last 15 or so years (and did so at the beginning with 3 in primary school). I received a considerable sum in benefits to help me out. I should point out here that one of my children is classed as disabled, receives middle rate care and as such, I could claim Carer's Allowance or reduce my hours to be able to claim Carer's Allowance but I have worked (mainly) full time (just part time when my mum had dementia).

My role as a teacher is an important one to society as a whole, something most of us agree on, but yet still people are critical - critical that I receive benefits, that it's my fault my ex had an affair and walked out, that my children were the first into childcare and the last to leave, that I put my career before my children, that I should try harder to get off benefits, that it's not good enough they've had to subsidise me.......blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

Civilised societies are not those that only respect and encourage high aspiration. Civilised societies recognise that everyone working is making a contribution - that we are all contributing to the greater good - and that is what needs respecting. Chase money - that's your choice - but respect that doesn't work for everyone and that when it comes down to it, many of us playing essential roles in our society aren't doing it for the money. That doesn't mean we shouldn't be afforded a roof over our heads, food on our plates or warmth in our radiators when we are out there working 60 hour weeks.

The fact is that the middle band pay a lot more out than they get back and are being squeezed even more constantly. The super rich evade tax, the poorest don't pay it (other than on spending etc). Amazing that parties that want to destroy wealth creation and sneer at the people in the middle also rely on both to so much to pay for all their schemes!

EDIT - And yes, I do believe in society and I do believe in public services etc

^^^^^^ well said.

It’s also all relative, the more you have the more you spend, the higher your outgoings.

As a pp points out, if you make the decision to have a child and work then you must come to the conclusion at some point that it’s going to cost you.

Having a child is a choice, it’s not a mandatory requirement.

I think unless you disagree with govt help for childcare at all it's very clear it's unfair. It seems to be to be crackers that a couple on 199k between the two of them gets more than a couple on significantly less just because one of them is over the threshold.

Convenient to ignore all the examples that model how a low earning family with childcare costs is likely net better off than all the "whingers". There's also a severe lack of economic understanding in dismissing the contributions made by those living in the South East with all their high costs (not me btw, I'm a 20% tax rate payer living in a cheap part of the SW).

Given the sheer resentment from the ignorant and under educated on this post, I don't blame the whingers.

Imagine being thick enough to berate the hand that feeds when you are net better off than the very people that subsidise you.

Most of you are just plain bitter and incredibly ignorant.

Why would a couple with only one of them working need help with childcare?

It is really unfair on single parents, but having a sahp is a choice. And they are at home to care for their child!

I didn't mean only one of them working? I didn't say that?!