Universal Credit implications for long-term SAHMs??? Help please!

[CSLewis]

Hi, I've just read the Mumsnet summary about Universal Credit, and read that parents of children aged 5-13 will be required to seek work during school hours, though I think those with a baby under one may be exempt.

Does anyone have any further details about this? It feels to me that a parent of young (primary-aged) children is being forced to return to the job market, regardless of whether they judge it to be in the best interests of their family

Except, I don't want to really - it doesn't sit well with me. I pay my tax, I know much of it gets squandered, and I know most of it is squandered not by individuals, but by about 20 people sat around a table in Downing Street.

D'you think we frightened them off with reason, wannabe?

Gaelic - yes so do I. People think that they pay some tax and that gives them the right to have a SAHP, use the NHS, have free education all for £7k tax per year (assuming average wager earner!).

Heard a young couple on This Morning the other day say it wasnt worth them working and anyway - their parents paid tax. They are just claiming what is rightfully theirs!

Its the higher rate tax payers and the two income families paying for your choices!

:o I can only hope!

Worrying times ahead, jobs are scarse, and soon money will be too.
I know they need to make cut-backs but in my area with not a lot of work available and not many childcare options i worry what the future has in store for me & my dc.

If this is all true & is going ahead, i can see poverty, actually meaning poverty. Do we as humans want to see others suffer, i certainly don't.

Are we going back to the olden days, where children don't know where their next meal is coming from, workhouses, starvation, homelessness??? I hope not.

Who is going to be paying for all the childcare costs when all the sahms find themselves fulltime work? Mw won't pay it and if UC is going to disallow people claiming, then what?

Bleak times ahead, for many including me.

Why are we all fighting eachother, we should stand united as mothers/fathers, yes the state shouldn't be made to pay everything, but it should be there to help everyone that truly needs it.
Being a sahm saves the government money, as they'd be paying p of dds childcare if i were in work.
Don't get me wrong i'd love to work, but the jobs are not there to take.
Boy i should know, dh has been redundant for 4months now, has applied for anything he can, but never hears back and so far no good.
I help him with his jobsearch, looking around, asking around, internet searching, but theres fuck all there and those that are all mw, which is fine but he never even gets an interview, because atleast 200 people are applying for each position

Are you seriously saying that everyone has the right to draw on a pot of money that they, and only they, have contributed? You do all realise that none of you could afford any of the services you use on that basis don't you?

You know what you lot would get out of my DH if he was working as well? About £500 a year on a quick calculation, assuming he could only find a MW job which is more than likely. So you'd save just over a £1000. Except mark my words we'd be claiming our full allowance in childcare vouchers - we would have to - so we'd be costing you around £100 a month. Net loss to the taxpayer.

Quite gaelic! £7k the average tax for someone on £25k per year will not be able to afford for their partners to stay at home. But of course then of course others should fund. My DH and I both work full time and both higher rate tax payers. We have private medical insurance and educate our children privately. Lets have some of this money back and see what it does to this general pot. No wait, someone earlier wants us to take from their own pot.. What if it doesnt cover their 2-3 children, their use of the NHS, their choice to have a SAHP. Lets just blame the bankers, the MP's anyone but themselves.

A SAHP is a choice, its not a right that others should have to fund

maisiejoe - bully for you. I truly hope you, or god forbid you kids, don't develop an uninsurable, expensive medical condition. There wouldn't be enough in your pot to pay for it.

On this argument, who gets to spend the 80% (at a guess) of tax revenue that comes from companies and corporations? Is that what the government gets to spend on war-mongering? That's one of the only things I can think of right now that doesn't benefit private individuals in some way.

maisiejoe

Its awfully easy for you to say that in your position. It really is.

When a parent is facing leaving their children in childcare to break even or make a loss, its a lot harder to see the benefit in working.

Who is going to pay for this full time childcare when you find work. Er - you! Its what I did. I didnt sit around moaning there were no jobs, if there arent any around you move, get more qualifications, think more creatively. I really think it is convienent for some posters to claim they would love to work if only they could find a role that would fit in with them, paying £50k per year with all school hols off and finishing at 1500. Of course any family emergencies would also be covered including taking your children to have their vacinations and other such things.

As a working parent always full time how do you think we manage it....

Maisiejoe - you quite clearly haven't got your head screwed on quite right.

What's the minimum wage now, £6 something. And childcare is around £5 an hour if you're lucky. You need at least an extra hour to cover either side of working hours. Do the maths dear, I'm sure you can manage that, you earn enough!

How do you know what is in my pot? And why do you think it is easy in my position? It hasnt just landed in my lap... I went to a bog standard sec modern which was complete reubbish. No expectations of pupils. If you got 5 o'levels you did really really well. I chose to live in the SE because that is where the well paid jobs are.

Why do you think you are only deserving of the minimum wage? Why not higher wages.

Average wage in this country is £25k. Why aim lower?

Maybe because in certain areas these 25k jobs don't excist

Unless of course you are a uni graduate

And please stop saying "you" - I work as well as you do, I've done all the things you've done, and my DH gave up everything to allow it to happen. I am eternally grateful to him, and having worked for 35 years and taken a lot of shit along the way, plus being in ill health, I don't begrudge him one bit if he gets a little bit of time to himself once our youngest goes to school. He works as hard as I do, probably harder, for barely any reward at all.

I do wonder why being a SAHP is so derided. Yes it's unwaged work, but that doesn't mean it's worthless. It all contributes to the economy.

Nanny-housekeepers expect to be paid at least £350-450 a week for a full time Live-in Position. For Live-out this rises to £400-500, or about £10 per hour for part-time or temporary work.

Incidentally, if my DH and I both worked full time for the same combined income, you my precious fellow taxpayers, would receive £2,000 a year LESS from us.

Then you have a choice. Stay where you are and accept the lower wages or if you cannot get a role, you will have to move. Otherwise others will be funding your choices. I chose to move to the SE. I chose to limit my family so that I could afford what we wanted.

Didnt go to university. I would probably have been the first in the school that went tbh if I had! I wish I had gone. My children will be able to have these choices, something that I never had

I don't think being an SAHP is derided.
If anything, it's elevated to a near mythical status.
Childless friends of mine get really pissed off with all the allowances and leeway given to parents especially in the workplace.

The problem goes a little deeper perhaps in the sense that many people have children with other people but there is little expectation that the other person should be involved in maintaining the child or the parent. That can't be right.

We aren't talking about the scenario in other parts of the world, like the developing country my husband works in where a woman alone is utterly shafted if she has no man to look after her or her children.

I would be interested in knowing how welfare payments compare to those spent on defence.

Yes because everyone can move, when theres not enough money to actually do it
Deposit, delivery van etc etc

It is the inflated economy of the south east that is causing the problems for the rest of us! Please don't encourage more people to add to the problem people like you have created.

I could move. I want to move (cant due to DDs dad) but yes, I could uproot my family and try to find a £25k a year job.

We would all be miserable as fuck though.