AIBU to hope the £100k cliff edge for funded nursery hours is removed?

[horchatatresleches]

News is that the education secretary is looking at nursery funding but it’s unclear if it’s to reduce or increase the support available at either the upper or lower thresholds. AIBU to hope that the harsh cliff edge which stops all nursery funding at £100k is removed or least replaced with something tapered so that people aren’t losing money for being marginally above the threshold?

The number of clinicians who work extra hours to be worse off is probably higher than zero, but we already know about some who are choosing to work less because of it. This is a problem that needs to be solved, especially with our ageing population.

It’s so interesting that these are the %! It makes it even more of a no brainer to make it a universal benefit considering the additional costs wouldn’t be that much and the benefits huge, especially with the issue of low birth rates we should be encouraging everyone to have children particularly higher earners.

It’s not about paying “as little tax” as possible though, it’s about not actively losing more money than you earn. And it’s about high tax payers receiving the same support for a really important life stage that is hugely required by the country (people having babies).

The cliff edge is a lose-lose because people avoid earning over 100k to keep getting the childcare benefit means that the government (1) pays for the childcare benefit anyway and (2) doesn’t earn any tax on the extra income that isn’t earned. If it was universal the cost would be similar but they would also be taking in more tax!

The Canadian government did a study that showed every $1 invested in childcare = $2.80 return for the economy. It is better for everyone to make this universal.

Additionally, if you call yourself a feminist you should support this benefit being universal. You need a salary of around £32k just to cover the cost of FT nursery without subsidies - so if the higher earner meets the £100k threshold there is pressure on the lower earner (typically the woman) to stay out of work and do the childcare herself, which is shite for women’s financial empowerment and equality in the workplace.

Nope, no one does.

Know any doctor who uses childcare who allows themselves earn over the line? Didn't think so!

I am on multiple doctor groups and literally no one who uses childcare goes over the mark. We actually go to great effort to ensure we don't!

Happy to have some unpaid leave.

Definitely no one bothers with waiting list initiatives or whatever, when the 'reward' would be to lose a load of time and money in terms of childcare eligibility.

Hilariously foolish that you think ANYONE is doing this 😂

Hilarious that you think you know everyone’s circumstances.

Not hilarious. Is just a fact that I am all- knowing.

Of course you are. 🙄

I imagine if she is a doctor, she will know a lot of doctors in similar positions. And I know if I was in that position, I’d cut
my hours to end up under the £100k mark

Precisely. I am on many doctor discussion groups.
Very obviously there isn't a doctor in the country working extra to have less money and less time with their children!!
We regularly discuss keeping pay below threshold and limiting NHS hours to ensure this.

It's actually delusional to think there is ANY doctor in the land doing additional work to lose both money and their previous personal time.

100k is a fuck of a lot of money (to most ordinary people) and I think it’s pretty hard to justify any childcare benefits for a family with this coming in given the kind of cuts and shortages happening elsewhere.
If there was less inequality in general, or years of austerity hadn’t hit everywhere else, then sure.

This.

I thought the point of funding childcare was to encourage people back to work in lower paid jobs where there would be no benefit to them going if they had to pay childcare bills! The fact that this is available (or people think it should be available to) high earners seems mad to me.

This.

on a salary of £100k, they would come out with about £5k a month after tax and NI. There could also be student loans payments, and other professional / CPD fees. Including childcare costs and in some areas; high housing costs: they are really not earning ridiculous money.

The people earning £100k via PAYE are paying a very high proportion of the very tax that covers the benefits and childcare that everyone else gets. They are quite right to expect to also be entitled to the same as everyone else

It’s about £5k per month. Once you’ve paid out £2k+ for childcare and similar for rent, there’s not a lot left. I personally work in London with three single mum’s on £100k. They are all living month to month. One was quite depressed about her finances when I spoken to her last week. The killer is that they are paying £30k+ in tax and NI to support people who have more disposable income than they do. It’s a very unfair situation.

199k is almost twice as much, yet the system that some people are defending on this thread allows the childcare hours to that household as long as neither parent goes above 100k.

And it does need to be pointed out that one of the shortages elsewhere is in specialist NHS doctors. But we have a system that makes some of them worse off because of working more, and the introduction of the free hours at 9 months rather than after 3rd birthday has hugely expanded the period of time may be applicable for. I have a family member on the waiting list for an NHS consultant appointment at the moment, as no doubt many of us do. I wonder if they're having to wait even longer because of the 100k cliff edge.

Re NHS consultants
Will work less than full time for NHS
Why would you shoot yourself in the foot, losing money and time, by working full time for NHS

In other sectors you can safely bump your pension
As that's not possible in NHS, working less hours is the solution, declining any waiting list initiatives etc

But as is pointed out, they just salary sacrifice into a pension or work less hours to get it below the threshold, get the benefit anyway, and there's less tax overall to the treasury.
Plus longer NHS waiting lists where doctors work less hours.

In some counties (including mine) there were state nurseries. It very quickly became apparent that the funded hours funding wasn't sufficient to run them and without parents paying full fees to subsidise them, they couldn't maintain the buildings and equipment to a safe standard and had to close

I'm in Wales and we don't get any funded childcare until 3 which is so frustrating, same in Scotland and N Ireland I believe. Devolved issue but high earners are not the only non-benefiting group!

I agree only really high earners shouldn't get it the support with childcare. I'd set the limit closer to £500,000.

We really ought to be helping the people who actually contribute tax in this country to work.

You've not read the thread nor understood the problem have you?

You've just seen the number £100k.

It's depressing that so many people just see the headline and don't understand how this works in practice to the detriment of everyone.

Tapered would be better, yes. But presumably more expensive to administer?

In all honesty, I don't get how you can begrudge paying full whack if earning 100k+. Our children were before the free hours, youngest on the cusp with free hours from 3+. We were earning ~£35k each and cut our cloth accordingly. We were paying more than our mortgage on childcare but that was a known, temporary expense we had to consider before conception. Mortgage £1622pcm, childcare £1675ish pcm. We were absolutely broke, but it's temporary.

Earning 100k normally comes with a stressful job with long hours. On 100k a third will go on tax then after student loan repayments and pension and commuting costs you probably have half it at most. After nursery costs for 2 you probably have only a very small amount left and less than others who are getting the childcare free hours.

Why shouldn't multimillionaires get child benefit? There's not very many of them so it won't cost the state that much.

Making it universal will simplify the process, reduce the cost and complexity in the tax system, and make sure all citizens feel they are benefiting from the system that they are contributing to.

Just to clarify, do you understand that because of the free hours rules, people with DC in this age bracket can be worse off if they go from earning 99.9k to 100k? Because the value of the childcare they lose entitlement to is greater than the extra money earned.