To wonder why the UC savings threshold is £6,000?

[GiddyLurker]

Why is the Universal Credit savings threshold set at £6,000? What’s the reasoning behind that number?

It feels quite specific and I just wondered whether there’s a particular logic or policy decision behind it?

😂😂

That wasn't me but I like that person.

I also like steak. I'll add it to my shopping list. After all Tesco are going to do me the special scrounger prices so it'll be fine.

I remember that. A week over xmas... like the people complaining about you getting in for cheap would have been going anyway.
I like how those threads end up with people sharing the discounts and deals anyway.

I liked the zoo but I was quite pregnant (with baby number 4) and it was Edinburgh zoo in summer and those who know will know about the hill. Anyway a lot of the animals stayed inside. Perhaps they knew we were on UC and felt we didn't deserve the whole experience.

The only zoo near me is my actual town centre. Rough as hell 😂

😂

No, it is £16k. She could still claim, but there is a taper.
Between £6k and £16k, you are deducted about £4.50 for every £250 you have over 6k... up to £16k where you would not be able to claim at all.

Yes exactly. Say our hypothetical nurse has £10k in savings. That's about the cost of a car that doesn't incur repair expenses so hardly an outlandish amount of money. She'll have £72 knocked off her UC every month, even if her savings are in an account that she can't access for two years. Which is the only kind of account that pays 5% a month. That's a week's food shop, isn't it?

Yes, sorry. It still stands that there are nurses (and others in professional work) who are using food banks. It's been in the news.

This report is over 3 years old, but if anything has changed, I imagine it's for the worse, not better.

No one should need foodbanks. They should not exist.

I am a working person

She is not even a net contributor anyway. All the moaning about people on benefits, and she takes more than she gives anyway. Hypocrite.
Not you.. but the person you are quoting.

I know she's always on these threads. Yet still hasn't learnt one thing about how benefits actually work.

Or how life in general works.

I have £0 savings, enough in the debit account for the month, when something goes wrong unexpectedly, like at present I need a new car, I look into finance options. All my friends and sister are in a similar position. We had savings and better lifestyles 5 years ago, now in the same job (me) and better job (hubby) with all our costs going up but wages not matching it the savings have gone. So yes, £6,000 savings seems steep!

Is not fair for people who inherit money though .

Not everyone manages to save whilst on UC. Some people do come into small inheritances of over £6000 which they then have todeclare even though they didn't technically save it themselves.

Well the council tax saving alone is £125-£300 per month saved.

You also don't need to pay your own national insurance contribution. That's another £79 per month saved.

Not everyone gets prescriptions and dentist free on UC. I also don't get free school dinners. Soon will though!

I don’t think anyone who doesn’t work and is reliant on the state is in a position to look down on people who work hard and earn an average wage. I think this attitude is why Reform is so popular and has announced they would lop billions from the out of work bill to retain the triple lock. People are sick of the entitlement.

That poster is disabled.

It’s also growing increasingly rare that someone is a net contributor over the course of their life. Pensioners now, on average, take out £1.20 for every £1 paid in, and that’s just on their pensions. When you take into account NHS services it’ll be much more.

My 73 year old dad will proudly boast about how much tax he’s paid in his lifetime. So we sat down and calculated that since he’s retired, he’s taken nearly £75k in his pension pls about £300k in NHS treatment! That soon made him be quiet. This idea that some people have contributed therefore they deserve it is insane to me.

this attitude is why Reform is so popular and has announced they would lop billions from the out of work bill to retain the triple lock. People are sick of the entitlement.

As you said, over and over again.

Stop threatening people, it's not working.

Is that adjusted for inflation? I would have thought if a pensioner takes £1.20 for each £1 put in then that is a net contributor over the course of 40/50 years.

as for NHS, not sure how you could work that out. Seems a lot at cost if you are counting from starting 570 years ago.

I’m not threatening anyone, they’re polling ahead of everyone else. I won’t be voting for them for a myriad of reasons, not in the least because I’m actually a big believer in the welfare state and NHS, and have no desire to see them decimated.

However they will be because they’re being given a terrible name by pee takers who are far too mentally ill to work even a basic admin job but can spend all day chatting lucidly and happily online after a lie in, every day for many years.

Sorry 70 years ago not 570!