'Taxes are the price we pay for a civilised society'

[Bargepole45]

Having just paid an enormous tax bill, I frankly am fed up with hearing this. There are lots of civilised countries that have a far lower tax burden than the UK. It's just a form of blackmail designed to make contributors believe that there is no other way other than to pay sky high taxes to subsidise people's crap life choices.

Have too many kids and can't afford them? No problem, the state steps in. Have a terrible lifestyle and don't look after your health at all? No problem, the NHS will treat you. Spent all your money with wild abandon and have nothing left to pay for your care when you get old? Don't fret, the state will fund the same care home as someone that has saved all their life.

Don't people understand that these 'safety nets' just facilitate reckless behaviour? We can have a civilised society where people aren't cushioned from all of their bad decision making. I say this as someone from a background where I didn't have much money and I am so fed up with people pretending that poor people don't know that an apple is healthier than a chocolate bar or that it's a good idea to actually attend school. It's insulting and disempowering to keep making excuses for people that simply aren't incentivised to make different, better choices.

What unsubstantiated stuff? Most of what I've written is opinion based and can't be substantiated. When it comes to factual information then I have largely attempted to post evidence to back up my statements. See the examples around anxiety and PIP, information on Child Benefit thresholds and how housing benefit can mean that someone earning £85k in central London can be worse off than a family claiming benefits.

What I don't need to do is run through every possible scenario when we all know it's complex. There are obvious cases where the financial incentive to work is low like the benefits withdrawal clawback that I posted upthread. I don't need to model specific scenarios for you to prove that the government taking 55p UC for every additional £1 earned is going to make the difference between working and not working more marginal.

Quite

Exactly! It's not a big issue claims the poster that clearly isn't impacted by the problem. It's like me suggesting that homelessness isn't a big issue because it impacts less than 1% of the population and I'm not homeless. We don't define the size of a problem merely based on it's prevalence amongst the general population.

You have posted a few times about the link between anxiety/depression and PIP. But without explaining why it’s relevant information.

Posting that the majority of claims are for MH, without outwardly stating why that’s important information, seems like you’re avoiding saying that those claims are either false or not “worthy.” That would be just a Daily Mail sound bite, if so.

If not, why does it matter to you what specific disability claims are for?

But I don't see you suggesting anything constructive. Just endless complaints about how benefits are too high and you pay too much tax. All I ever see is whining from the benefits bashers, zero acknowledgement that complex problems are not easily fixed.

There was an interesting piece on Today this morning about one improvement. It involves employers taking some responsibility for their staff's health. And yes, it comes with complexities. But all I ever see on MN is 'slash benefits, bring back workhouses '. Nothing worth taking seriously, just another load of 'I'm alright, Jack'.

It took decades to get us here. There's no simple fix. And endlessly demonising disabled people may give you a warm glow, but it achieves nothing.

Oh for goodness sake look upwards. That’s where all the money is. No point blaming Susan down the road who has to claim benefit top ups because it literally isn’t possible to live on the so- called living wage.

Someone with 2 disabled children under 16, and 2 children of the opposite sex over 16, earning £86k p/a, with a £3k pcm rent, would be entitled to £2500 pcm in UC towards rent.

Of course, if 2 of their children were not disabled, they would not be entitled to the full rate of LHA, nor would they be if they were not working.

It does matter because in many cases these disabilities cannot be validated by objective diagnostic methods. It would take a person to "work" with GP and NHS for some time, possibly a year, to get diagnosed and be set up, frequently for life. It's not that difficult to get online and understand how to answer the questions to get diagnosis.
Every normal life stress is not debilitating anxiety.
It demands enormous and completely unsustainable welfare bill whilst simultaneously diluting much needed support for real disabilities, incl real MH disorders.

as to broken system - I keep on posting the link to this thread

To drop my hours to 22.5 even though I’m a single parent? | Mumsnet

Our current system incentivises people to work less; they are getting more on benefits than by working more. I think this is perfect illustration to the point which OP is trying to make on this thread

Anxiety is a real MH disorder, and in some cases can be genuinely debilitating.

Youre quite right, it’s not day to day stress. It is completely different, and that’s exactly why disability benefit can be paid for it. It’s also not up to use to decide what level of normal life someone could be debilitated by.

I think it’s more harmful to assume people make it up, because those who have real struggle are then tarred with the same “just toughen up” brush.

This does not tally with my calculations. An income of £86k should reduce all of the UC allowance including housing related allowances due to the taper rate. How have you got round that? Happy to be corrected.

I posted this because another poster suggested that claiming PIP for anxiety alone or as the main condition was incredibly rare. I was addressing this assertion. If anything, they were implying that claiming for anxiety alone was somehow lesser than claiming for anxiety and depression that had arisen as the result of another condition. You're directing your criticism at the wrong person.

There was an interesting piece on Today this morning about one improvement. It involves employers taking some responsibility for their staff's health. And yes, it comes with complexities.

The job market has almost come to a standstill. There is very little hiring. NMW and NI increases together with Workers Rights bill make every employer think 20 times if to hire or not. This is especially bad for younger people.

Make employers take responsibility over staff's health? esp youngster who are famous for MH issues?

Ever thought about consequences?

I plugged it into entitled to. 1 male and 1 female child under 16 with a lower rate of mobility and care element of DLA/PIP, and one male and one female child over 16 in FTE with no disability, an income of £86000 p/a, £3k rent, and 5% into pensions, with no savings.

Without the disabilities, there is no need for a room each according to LHA rates, but again, the same would apply if they were not working.

I put the same into the calculator and got a warning that 86k was a very high income and was unlikely to qualify for any means tested benefits. I then got a suggested UC level of £0. All the children in my scenario were under 16 though and only one has a disability.

This. Labour are making it harder for younger people to get jobs. That will impact their MH.

All under 16, only disabled means they don't "need" a bedroom each, that's the difference. A non-working family would not get the full LHA rate under those circumstances either.

To be entitled to a room of your own, you need to be over 16 and have siblings of the opposite sex or disabled.

This is what people mean when they say the examples of families "earning £70k in welfare" are manipulated to shock. In real life, the figures only apply to very specific circumstances, and it's unlikely that very many, if any, families actually meet those very specific circumstances.

I have put the same parameters in as you and got the same results. Thank you for explaining the disparity as I thought I was going mad then

“This. Labour are making it harder for younger people to get jobs. That will impact their MH.”

@EasternStandard - agreed. The job’s data for graduates is shockingly bad right now!
They bleat about NEETs and screw the same generation over yet again.
It is very important that all youngsters realise it is NOT them.

I also think I know who is more likely going to develop anxiety. It won’t be the person deliberately working just 16 hours to get top ups. It is more likely to be the single mother experiencing stress and burn out in a high pressured job getting ZERO support from the state.

Yes you only have to look at a some threads on here with posters worried about their young adult dc / graduates getting nowhere and declining wrt MH due to just being stuck at home.

It’s ruinous and Labour’s policies are making it harder for them.

But if you are an average earner not on benefits - bunk beds are your only option.

Really? How?

If you are an average earner and your family meets the very specific requirements where you would get full LHA rates on a 4-bed property in central London, you will receive the housing element of UC up to £3k pcm.

The rates and the eligibility do not change based on working status. It is based on your family's ages, sex, and disability status.

The wording about the amount of claims for PIP for psychiatric conditions matters.
There is mental health and physical health, which means 61% of PIP claims are for physical health conditions. But all the literature out there breaks down the physical health conditions into smaller categories, which will make the 39% for psychiatric look huge.