To question this...?

[foureleven]

I saw this on another thread and kind of hope the mum in question doesnt see this because I dont want to cause offense... just genuinely interested in peoples views..

(..treads carefully...)

I spotted this person say that she is a SAHM and her husband brings home £1000 a month. Plus they get child tax credits. Now I assume this is not 'working tax credits' as thats for childcare right? And they wont need it if she doesnt work.

It may be that its not a lot of money anyway and not worth getting one's knickers in a twist for but AIBU to wonder why a SAHM can claim benefits (other than initial maternity benefits of course)?

If you are a SAHM because your partner earns enough to cover everything thats one thing (and a debate for another thread, this is not ANOTHER SAHM Vs WOHM debate!)but why can women receive top up money to be able to stay at home with the children they cant really afford to?

Shouldnt we be responsible for bringing enough money in to the home for our children?

Genuinely ponders....

porcamiseria - Thank you thank you thank you! An good solid explaination that makes a whole load of things much clearer!

There are still quite a few opinions that I hold that are different to some on here but at least I understand the facts.

KarmaAngel - you get £1000 in CTC and WTC. I'm totally shocked at the vast amount. No wonder you say that the system is serving you well.

How can you claim WTC when you're not working 16 hours a week?

"You don't agree with values such as people, particularly children, should have enough money to eat and have heating and things?

Nice. hmm"

No, I just think that people should be able to go out to work to provide these things for their family rather than be stuck in a benefit trap where the government pays for it. However as porcamisera has explained it a tax break, I understand now that it is not so simple.

So who looks after all these children that mum has gone back to work to provide for?

2dcs full time nursery is nearly £1000 if i went back to work ft i could only at this time earn min wage so my take home would be about £850 so we have to pay out so i can go back to work??

Tax credits help us as dh is on just above min wage.If tc were not about we could manage to live just cover basic bills.Nothing else at all.

Not everyone can be a high flyer earning 50k+, who would empty the bins, pick litter, work in supermarkets, clean streets, plow snow (so you can get to your well paying job?)and so on?

Your right it is a trap.

RoseBlooms; I have a childminder who I pay approx £760 to for full time care.

So I pay tax on my wages, then she pays tax on hers... hmm...

It is, and thats what I dont like.

sorry to butt in, but, prior to leaving the UK my DH earned way less than £30k a year, after tax and transport to work we had around £1100 a month to live on. that's before mortgage btw. We were not entitled to ANY benefits other than child benefit. We set up our own business overseas and now our salaries each are in excess of £50,000pa, he took a sabatical from work (civil service) after more than 20 yrs service, has just told them he will return and been offered £150,000 pay offand will retain his pension. at last we get something from the country we both served (i was a c s too)meanwhile our business goes from strength to strength, a business we could never have set up in the UK. we would have spent the rest of our lives scraping by. we will NEVER return to the uk

Also, I dont think you have to have amassively well paid job to be over the threshold. The average UK salary is £25,000 so if you are both working that is £50,000... nearly there..

Shouldn't the way out of that trap be to raise minimum wage?

A family clearly cannot live on minimum wage- even if both parents are earning it, as RoseBlossom's example points out.

WTC and CTC mean that a family can survive with one person working; without them, the only alternative would be that neither of them worked, and claimed benefits.

CTCs are assessed on the number of children you are responsible for, their ages and also takes into account disabilities, whether they are registered blind etc etc. Not a benefit and can be claimed whether you are working or not. Google if you are unsure, should answer any questions and whether they are being claimed fairly or not (separate issue from WFTC and childcare costs so no debate whether families with SAHMs should be able to claim or not)

Ah LadyintheRadiator; common ground. We dont receive it either because our household income 'looks good'

In reality, with childcare, two tanks of petrol a week, having to pay out work expenses and wait 2 months for them to be paid back etc theres really not a lot left.

Its grounding to hear people say anyone would swap WTC and CTC for a household income of 50k, because I think its easy to think that you are the one who is hard done by. Which is what I beleived. But its seems with every post on here I find more and more that we all have our own axe to grind, and all of us suspect there is someone outthere who has it eaiser than us!

People are sooooo different, I love it!!!

foureleven - My DH used to earn £9ph (a good bit above min wage for a non prof. job) and work 60 hours a week, 50% over the average working week. He was on £28,000. If I was to do that too (and I'd be lucky to get his job) then who will feed my baby past 6m for me? Who is going to be the one to ring their employer for the 13th time that year as one of the DC is ill and cannot go into work that day? People choose to work, fine. But it's isn't realistic to expect both parents to work. I am sure shop workers, cleaners and the like would love to be on this coveted £25k.

ok will put it another way, we got NO tax credits OR benefits other than child benefit, i have 2 out of 3 children with SN

(goes off topic...)

'60 hours a week, 50% over the average working week'

is that true...? jeesh I've a new soap box to jump on! would 30 hours a week be considered full time then?

40 hours + 50% of 40 hours = 60 hours.

must revise maths.. or maybe read properly.

Still, I do more than 40 hours [woe is me emoticon]

For someone to bring home £2k a month they would need to be earning £32K a year. If the average salary is £25k why are we giving families such huge tax credits like the £1k a month KarmaAngel says she gets. The system is totally wrong.