To see benefits as a safety net, not handouts?

[ForGreyStork]

It’s the way benefits are talked about. To me, they’re part of a social security system -a safety net that people may need at different points in life, rather than “gifts” or handouts.
I also wonder whether increasing conditions and restrictions risk undermining that safety net over time.

AIBU?

I have absolutely no idea tbh as it would never occur to me to expect the council to install a fence for me.
Actually, it was a councillor, not an MP.
My mistake.

They dont normally unless there is a need for it and you would need proof such as an OT assessment
I would think a councillor would have even less infuence than an MP

The poster I quoted made zero mention of disabilities. They actually said why would you chose to work when better off on benefits which is what my reply was too. So very clearly my comment wasn't about people who can't work but rather those who chose not too.

The lumping together of much-needed support for those with disabilities and those who won’t work started under Thatcher as a way of trying to manipulate the unemployment figures. Long term unemployed were put on disability benefits and almost literally thrown on the scrap heap. Even though many of those workers really wanted to work - it was their identity (thinking of miners, car manufacturers and so on).

It’s now got murky with a loosening up of the criteria for mental illness as a disability - so today’s young people report record levels of mental illness stopping them from working. When we know that work generally has positive effects on most people’s mental health.

I think as a nation we need to have the difficult conversations around the balance between tax and benefits. And the fact that there is an entrenched underclass with a mix of low aspiration or none at all, and bad mental and physical health - both of which could be improved by good quality employment and training, plus investment in the nation’s best resource - us, the citizens!

Is that you Hyacinth?

Want to reduce welfare and reduce people misusing government money? Introduce mandatory monthly drugs tests verified with DNA matching to prevent fraud. Do this for all claimants of government money including pensions, unemployment, disability,child support,MP expenses and all jobs paid by the state like the NHS and councils etc. Any illegal drugs found immediately stops entitlement and comes with a ten year ban from claiming any support or working for the government.

These drugs test can be done via post or in person to tailor it to those who have disabilities. This is not cruel or intrusive it's morally correct as if you are taking any government money you should be willing to be scrutinized.

Then sit back and watch the claims halve overnight and also watch 100s of MPs and government workers lose access to the gravy train.

It's not a perfect solution but it would be effective as too many government employees, MPs and benefits claimants take drugs and that's a fact whether you like it or not.

Your username makes sense.

As I said, I’ve no idea.
But she did get a fence installed for free.

You understand addiction is an illness right. Often caused by mental illness, trauma, abuse. Dangerous prescribing by drs.

But i thought you knew everything about her?

Oh, come on @TankFlyBossW4lk , if you know anything about research you would know that interviews and other qualitative methods are very much not the way to find raw quantities. As is asking questions such as ‘have you ever worked?’ and excluding anyone who has even worked for a tiny period. If ever there was a study where the methods were made to fit the required outcome it was this one.

This post wins, for most batshit of the day, imo.

Totally agree. I’m in a similar boat. Unbelievably, I have a so-called friend who is envious of my lifestyle. I would swap her good health and go back to my job and all my dreams for the future in a heartbeat. I’m very very grateful for the benefits I receive but OMG the DWP makes life stressful and I am not well enough to be jumping through all the hoops that they want me to jump through. My horizons feel very limited now.

Why does it even matter? Benefits get spent on goods and services that have VAT. It all goes back in the economy, they are not hoarding it.

Given the user name I get the feeling it's satire and based on some of the other extreme things I've seen on similar threads. I could be wrong but the way it's worded sorta gives it away.

Tbh that poster has also done a better baiting job than 90% of these goading benefits thread posters we see daily at least they put some effort in lol!

1. Because it’s less money in the pockets of working people who are taxed more to ‘assist’ them
2. Because unlike working people they’re not providing a service or being useful in any way
3. Because a life on benefits often leads to boredom, crime, addiction and other very expensive ‘hobbies’

HTH

Yes this needs to be faced. Most cases of anxiety or depression could be managed medically and being in work better than not in most cases. I am really unimpressed by Labour on this. Benefits are literally for those who are in real difficulties. They aren’t there to fix all social problems.

I have an idea as I've been through something similar myself with my son though in our case it meant moving house completely and evidence is needed including a home assessment from OT.

It isn't as simple as just emailing someone. Far from it.

But you're not looking at quantitive data. The study was looking at attitudes to working. What it actually showed was that the children of parents who didn't work still valued working and wanted to get jobs.

This was a qualitative study. That was the nature of the study. It wasn't counting anything. It was studying attitudes.

Just to reiterate, this group was the group with the lowest levels of being at work. What do you mean "have you ever been in work?" The study was only looking at qualatitive data IN THOSE FAMILIES who had SIGNIFICANT WORKLESSNESS. ie. Those people with 2 generations of family without a job. They wanted 3 generations, but they couldn't find enough of them. So they looked at 2 generations. Tbh , if they ever had a job, good that they were excluded. We are studying WORKLESSNESS.

The whole point of looking at this particular group is to study the group who had the least work within the family generations.

I really can't spell it out any further. Stop conflating qualitative and quantitive data. This study was a qualitative study.

I'm beginning to think you have an agenda.

Yeah, 'cos lots of people on disability benefits are on drugs, don't you know...
Prescribed ones 🙄.

Tbh , if they ever had a job, good that they were excluded. We are studying WORKLESSNESS.

I can’t really see much difference between someone who has never worked and someone who did a few weeks somewhere tbh.

Good oh. The point is, they were trying to collect those people who had the fewest working days. They were studying the affect on the subsequent generations. The fewest days of work.

God help us if they this is what MN means when they say "critical thinking."

I can only tell you what she told me and what the email said.

I'm not sure why you'd think it is only one thing, OP. There are various kinds of benefits and various reasons for them.

Almost everyone thinks it's a good idea to have a safety net and support people who really can't work, or can only work at jobs that have very low productivity. By which I mean jobs like my local cafe where more than half the employees have intellectual disabilities and need a little more support in their work than would be usual. Their wages are subsidised in part by the government. This benefits them, but also the community.

But if there are people working standard jobs, they shouldn't really need benefits to top them up. Those kinds of benefits, aside from being a subsidy for business as others have mentioned, tend to create a lot of unintended and unhelpful incentives, and even unfairness, in the wider system.

Of course there are also people who become leeches on the state.

I think a real issue is that what can often happen is that people stop thinking of benefits as something provided by other citizens, through their work, to help those who need it. And instead they think of it as the duty of the state - an abstract entity - to provide for them.

And its a bit like Walmart vs the local business where the owner is a local figure, people might not dream of taking advantage of Bill who they know and see how hard he works, but they are happy to get one over on Walmart. This is why people don't think it's in any way dodgy to reduce work hours to reduce income and keep a benefit, they just think it's sensible. They don't think about the fact that someone else, a person like themselves, is working to provide that money.