To wonder what else can be done to break the cycle of generations living off benefits?

[Allonthesametrain]

Sounds harsh because It is. As a former teacher, then eduation social worker, now the past few years more heavily involved with school attendance.

My desire has always been to help children from unprivileged backgrounds to know their worth and achieve the best they can and this has been my career from age 23 to 57.

The number of times I've cried, torn my hair out, is immeasurable. I and colleagues have gone above and beyond to support the families, genuinely care about them, but unfortunately the outcome has been, as I've said in title, it's a continiation of the cycle of being brought up within a small community and low expectations.

So many gorgeous kids (supported throughout their young lives until they leave school) who tell you their dreams of what they want to to achieve in life, we do everything we can to enable it and some have indeed broken out of the circle but unfortunately the reality has been...

Parents who live lifestyles of no bedtime routine, tell their kids not to come back before ...pm, sleep in and don't get them out of bed ready and fed for school and as for weekends, pub and take back a new bloke

Parents who have issues themselves and project them onto DC. The kids soon realise they can stay off school for feigning illness and would actually be a comfort to Mum

The parents who just cba and say shall we just still in bed?

Of course there are so many other mitigating factors but these are the 3 main experiences we've dealt with. Unfortunately it really does come down to poor parenting and no matter what interventions we do to encourage attendance, only a minority are genuine.

So the cycle...DC think education isn't important, parents are hopeless role models and can often be aggressive to teachers, a deflection of blame.

Then oh DD gets pregnant at age 15, DS has been reprimanded by the police for scooting around in a balaclava. Then pure hostility when we try to continue to talk to them and what could be done to help.

Basically it's just such a shame, these sweet young kids who say they want to be ... become so influenced by their homelife, a need to fit in with their family and peers from the same estate, that they ignore the support we give them, don't turn up to appointments etc.

For the genuine cases, DC with SEN, the effort to try and ensure they are in best place is utmost and it's heartbreaking there aren't enough of them. Yes, we do know genuine cases and not just so many parents striving for a diagnosis because they feed DC a terrible diet and let them stay up late so are tired and irritable at school.

Expecting some backlash, whatever anyone says I can reason with.

Exactly this, what a gorgeous child with so much potential but restricted to flourish because of a poor parent. Allowed to play games all night to go to school shattered 😲

This is what my point was and I didn't even mention the 5 kids to different dads so single Mum can't cope, the dads are a waste of space.

Ideally they would have some responsibility to not get pregnant but they don't. Advised and offered on a plate to get contraception, free, don't bother.

One thing that is massively overlooked is the fact that there is a thriving poverty industry that requires a constant stream of "clients" to generate funding and grants to private enterprise who absolutely do profit from it, leaving the "service users" with second rate and ineffective interventions.

Case in point, which I have pointed out dozens of times on threads like these - temporary housing provided by private landlords costing the state thousands a month when people are evicted and cannot for one reason or another fund new permanent accomodation because of low income and lack of ability to save. The outcomes for these families, often confined to one room with a microwave, sometimes out of area away from work / education / family support networks generates further costs due to declines in physical and mental health, disruption due to moving schools etc etc. Plus navigating all the heavy handed bureaucracy laced with sanctimony, assumption, and over zealous conditionality.

If poverty was eradicated tomorrow, whole armies of workers who "support" them would be out of work.

Such is the catch 22 of capitalism. When you run out of problems to solve by selling a solution, you have to up the game, or even invent new problems. And poverty, ironically, is a very lucrative industry for the "saints" who work in it.

I have so much to say but was already a long post. Please AMA..xx

Excellent points @MistressoftheDarkSide

Lol please believe me we are not judgemental and have gone above and beyond to try to help. I commute 3 hours a day to try to help because I care and will spend evenings researching after own DC are in bed.

Can I ask what your job is to question?

Culture is very difficult to change, and it accounts for so much.

@Allonthesametrain im guessing you have read my points, basically am i wrong ?

Thing is i do and most who go into jobs to care for others do so because of an understanding that life isn't perfect. No judgement here, you should hear our conversations, just pure caring and wanting to help.

Do you have a similar job? Any advice welcome

Personally I don't think replacing capitalism with communism/socialism would improve anything. If you have a work place pension, you would be foolish to want capitalism to fail. There is however some truth in the concept that to have a properly functioning high welfare society, you need some social cohesion and population stability so that everyone knows their role in the implied contract between individual and state. That is what is currently broken.

Little known fact pre Margaret Thatcher the UK system used to have a similar earnings related element. Unlike Starmer's MPs who refuse to vote through his policies, Thatcher's changed this overnight which meant being unemployed just paid a flat rate.

Research shows that not many people are out of work for more than 12 months at a time unless they have a disability of some sort. So fixing the NHS and increasing support for people with disabilities would probably have the biggest impact.

But there are areas where, even if households aren't completely workless, the culture is one that isn't likely to build a self-supporting financial situation. This is largely down to the loss of jobs and lack of any sort of concern for what happens to whole communities under Thatcher. I think in some of the old manufacturing and mining towns that have been depressed for the last 40 - 50 years need massive investment in in the local economy, developing and industry of some sort with apprenticeship jobs that people with few qualifications can start in and work their way up to a wage that they will feel worth their efforts.

Then invest in WEA style night classes and the like to improve adult attitudes to education. Schools like the Michaela Community School might have a place for a few decades in some communities where the school culture has completely broken down, with further support for young adults to engage in GCSEs and A levels post 19.

part of the issue is theres no investment unless profits can be made and sometimes once the wealth has already been extracted then theres no more wealth to be gained or at least in terms of what the captains of industires would consider worthwhile etc

i think this is very true too, lots of families I work with actually have quite low IQ’s, they are unemployable, we have to accept that some families will always need support.

It was possible to have aspiration and have a better life than your parents so why not now, it must be the amount of benefits.
I grew up in a mining village in the 1960s, lived in a terrace house and most of my friends did too or on council estates. My immediate circle all did well at school, all still married to first husband, living in detached properties with grown up kids who are even better off. I can think of others outside my circle who are also far better off than their parents. The common denominator was hard work. Personally we had so little, particularly as teenagers that I wanted more and was prepared to work at school to achieve more. My parents encouraged me (they worked but in poorly paid jobs), same with my husband from a council estate.
Like I said at first it must be the amount of benefits that stifles the ambition combined with poor wages and high taxes

Tax the rich, UBI and while we're at it abolish the monarchy

its the lack of productive businesss, how many big names have gone under, with global competition not to metion most of the public want to pay as little as possible, then you have the main giants that can scale costs of porduction etc and make it alot cheaper, basically yea the economy is fucked

the rich , nope, they will fly unless we have a one world govt then there are always tax havens,

Ubi yes seems the likely option

as for our monarchy, how dare you suggest such omg

It is possible that it could help. One thing that private schools seem to have in common is a level of expectation, it's not usually spoken about directly but it can be quite powerful. The regimentation of it can help too, eat three meals a day, always at the same time. Have a bath or shower on definite days at definite times. Settle down and do prep (homework) in the boarding house in the early evening for an hour or so. Keep your clothes clean and tidy. Conformity can be very helpful. Learn to make friends with many different types of people from a wide selection of backgrounds. Have the advantage of extra subjects and interests, music and sports.
It would not work for all and then the question is; how do we help the ones who don't cope with it?

So where’s your sense of social responsibility? You can support you family through working, why take from the state?!

The rich aren't going anywhere. The amount of tax they would actually pay would still be a drop in the ocean of their wealth but it would pay for UBI and public services.
Why is it wrong to want to abolish the monarchy? They're just a bunch of rich, greedy, inbred parasites with questionable choices in friends and acquaintances. They're living in palaces and literally driving around in golden carriages, parading their vast wealth and luxurious lifestyle before the people they call their 'subjects' who are struggling to pay for food, fuel and shelter. Taxpayers (like the teachers I work with who also have to use food banks) are funding these people.

if you take out the monarchy, then we lose more ££ than we gain so from a pure numbers game, then the country needs them. and not all of the monarchy are rogues

your points on the rich, ill need more research on your points but yes some rich would be stuck but im guessing the other rich would easily transfer

Not everyone is lucky enough to be born a Boomer.

Boomer doesn’t refer just to baby boom, but also the longest running BOOM in the economy that have uplifted everyone in your generation like a tidal surge increasing wages and house values faster than inflation all on the back of free University level education.

Later generations have endured multiple small boom, big bust cycles. Which is why wages are low and taxes are high. They also have had to go into debt for what was free for your generation.

The stats show it.
The lowest 10% of earners saw their wages increase in real terms from 1975 to 1999 by 100%. That’s right, their buying power doubled. This is an opportunity to build intergenerational wealth for nothing.

However, from 1999 to 2023, the lowest 10% of earners saw their wages increase in real terms by a mere 10%. This is barely scraping by, there’s no opportunity to build intergenerational wealth just by working hard.

I hope you have enough mathematical ability to understand the difference and impact it would have.

House values, I am sure you know the story there where bank of (boomer) mum and dad either as gift or inheritance have been the #1 way that FTBs are able to get a starter home for over twenty years and counting.

I agree with on the child maintenance aspect.

However, to just say people should have abortions is very reductionist for such complex issues. Just to clarify, I’m very pro-choice. But, sadly, a lot of people who haven’t got the skills or temperament to raise children well still dearly desire to have their own children. They crave providing love and offer of love from the potential children too, even if they don’t know quite how to provide that or receive it. For example, a lot of children who have been in the care system have kids young, with the full intention of giving their own children the love they didn’t receive themselves, sadly some do not have the emotional stability (or general stability) or correct support to fulfill this properly, but they don’t know this until it doesn’t work out and nothing will tell them any different due to the strength of their emotions.

FYI this is just an example of such a scenario and not me saying that someone who has been in care can’t be a good parent.

Benefits should be entirely contribution based, if you haven't paid into the system you shouldn't get anything out. And if you don't work, you don't eat. Simples.

The majority of people on uc are either working, disabled or carers so how are they going to have the time or ability to do that