To think people on benefits can’t win

[Flamingosareflummoxed]

I’ve heard so many people this week, in real life, moaning about people on benefits. I get it that we are all struggling. The cost of living is crippling.
But every week there are posts on here from women who were in 70K per year HR positions who are finding it difficult to get interviews for MW jobs.
There are no jobs.
The few jobs that there are will be flooded with applications, why would recruiters chose someone who has been unemployed for years?
Plus all those with long term disabilities who need reasonable adjustments.
Its like people want to bash people knowing there is no real alternative.

You have more faith in Reform than I do.

If they are also going to dismantle disability benefits, where are these people going to end up? Especially if they require reasonable accommodations, flexibile hours, are slower than what customers would like etc

What about those who can't work due to caring responsibilities? Especially those who have disabled children. How are they supposed to find a job if their child has no school place, school hours jobs are in high demand and/or are unable to access breakfast clubs and after school clubs?

My brother is working but has been applying for other jobs.

One was a 5 round interview process for £27k a year. Barely above minimum wage. 5 rounds of interview just for them to fill the role internally.

Jobs should be limited in how much they can expect from applicants.

There won’t be, don’t be silly.

I assure you I live firmly in the “real world”.

I worked in recruitment for over a decade, and I’ve seen how lazy people are and how many excuses after excuse are made for why they can’t or won’t commit to work.

Currently, I work as a contractor for the police and private security for firearms training. If anything happened to my current role, I’m aware of my transferable skills and wouldn’t take long to find a new role.

Have they looked at the apprenticeship schemes. This is the prime time to be applying for a skilled apprenticeship

It really worries me, too.

My DB hasn't worked for around 40 years. He has bipolar disorder and it is only kept under control by 4-weekly depot injections of a strong anti-psychotic. For around 10 days after each injection, he's like a total zombie: slurred speech, shuffling walk, very slow reactions etc. Then he has a few days of relative normality before he starts to get manic, paranoid and delusional. It's so marked that I can tell roughly where he is in the 4-week cycle within a couple of miunutes of talking to him on the phone.

I can't think of any job he could do where they'd tolerate him only being fit for work 30-40% of the time. The impact of massive benefit cuts on him, and people like him, terrifies me. I just hope that any changes won't come in until after he reaches pension age, but that's 7 years off.

We can no longer afford a garden, a dyslexia tutor and a cleaner.
We also can no longer afford to pay for DIY round the house. Our wages have not gone down... the price of everything is too high.

I earn £80k but I can't afford a £20ph cleaner. It has a knock on. If there were loads of cleaners the price would go down - but why be a cleaner when you can be on benefits.

My 17 year old applied to 300 PT jobs online and took out CVs in local town and just been hired at a food joint 👏👏 I told her in 2002 I applied 100 times to get my foot in the door in my first accounting job. Given the current market, I told her to start panicking once she’s sent out 500…. it’s a numbers game. You’re bound to strike. You want it? Be on it. Hard.

I think people with the conditions you listed above may benefit from regular work,

My eldest struggled at nursery even just on 12h a week term time. Then issues exploded at reception i thought she would get excluded. School were crap and didnt ‘see’ the obviously adhd so took until age 13.. finally near meds at 14. Hopefully.
All the while i had to support much more than an average teen.
also asd.
Hoping to just sort gcses now.
She wouldnt have coped with before after clubs daily. And its about 15 a day here. The breakfast ones still arent free at our school and wont ever be even for my younger one.
She is pda and trying to get homework done takes average 40 mins a day, but can take several hours… its exhausting and i have ended up putting both kids to bed (dp useless and he cant be bothered) and that takes about an hour. Just to get teeth/books in bag etc etc because of avoidance and distractions.

13years and not 1 day of not having to put the kid to bed (she was also a terrible sleeper).

I'll guarantee I can find plenty of jobs for him to apply for...

whether he wants those jobs is another matter....

A lot of folk want an easy life and it's hard to blame them as long as the system encourages folk to live of benefits and claim every extra they possibly can whether they need or deserve it or not.

So the jobs are there (because he is applying for them) but he’s not getting one. That’s totally different to ‘there are no jobs’

Then perhaps there needs to be legislation in place that affords more flexibility from employers put into place to accommodate more people.

Also, if less parents were classing themselves as carers for their children and outsourcing the assistance to professional carers, it would be creating additional jobs too.

Yanbu

Many minimum wage jobs are zero hours which must be a nightmare for budgeting. They often require full flexibility including nights and weekends and you can’t get low cost childcare (including funded hours) at those times. If you’re a single parent without grandparent support then you can’t take those jobs.

I'm in a similar situation except I have a disabled child and I can't work due to his high care needs.

It is really, really frightening thinking about Reform getting it and removing the benefits that allow me to care for him.

so your young person can go abroad and work then . cant' they? learn a language and go abroad...

The use of AI in recruitment is also problematic. I suspect it sifts out the people with gaps in their cv or over qualified for the role but am happy for someone with more knowledge to correct me.

Yet there’s multiple people on this thread who also have qualifications and transferable skills/know someone who has but have said they are struggling to find a job.

But you know you’d be able to get a job within a couple of days and never have a health condition - I’d love to know your secret!

I have had a consistent job for over 15 years and I’m young and healthy enough that I’d have a good chance of being hired over older candidates or those with health issues. I don’t have restrictions on hours that I can work as I don’t have young DCs and I drive. I have decent experience, qualifications and transferable skills but I am still not naive enough to think that I will never need to rely on benefits if I ever lost my job or had a health condition.

and where is the money going to come from to pay for professional carers?

A person I know owns a restaurant on the beach. The moment he sees on someone´s cv that they are anything other than a waiter, the cv gets shredded. He is not training someone who will the fuck off to their "real" job leaving him hanging. Especially not now high season is starting. My husband has had this when applying for supermarket jobs etc, He is an IT technician. Sorry, don´t want people who will leave when the inevitable real job offer comes in.

The problem isn't the people who really, genuinely need benefits it's the people that have chosen benefits as a lifestyle option - because the system makes it an attractive option!

I have a single mum friend who works as a TA and says she will never work more than 3 days, term time only. Not worth loosing her benefits and she likes having the time to herself and not having to pay for holiday clubs...

I don't have that luxury so I am a bit pissed off that my taxes pay for her 'me time'.

Don't be so humble and harsh on yourself. You also pay for her acrylic nails, lashes, brows, hair salon, and sunbeds.
Bravo...👏

Literally took me a whole month to get an interview today for a wage slightly above NMW...I have a robust education, varied experience and have never been on benefits and have tried my hand at everything even knowing that my physical health cannot sustain a job and they would dismiss me for not being able to fulfill the role - when my breathing worsens and I have peri issues like brain fog and 15 rooms for 4 hours looks to me like torture....you don't understand THAT THERE ARE SIMPLY NOT ENOUGH JOBS EVEN ON MIN WAGE OUT THERE FOR THE VARIETY OF PEOPLE WE ARE. And I am also an uni graduate ...imagine I would apply only for the creamy jobs with the big perks - No, do you understand, I am applying for cleaning jobs, kitchen jobs, any job....there are not enough jobs for everyone. How do I manage in life? Well, you guessed it, right? A nice husband and his wage.

What happens if he goes before me? I see myself on benefits because I am 50 and simply there are not enough jobs

Round our way there used to be tons of summer work available, but now there are hardly any in hospitality or retail (or indeed very few permanent jobs in those sectors). Friends of my DC who have had part-time supermarket jobs for years are getting their hours cut. My DC have applied for a lot of temporary / part-time unskilled jobs (they are students) and the vast majority don't even reply. One has managed to get care work but they have experience in this area. None of their friends are managing to get jobs over the summer either, and they are certainly not fussy.