Do all 18 years old go on UC if they cannot find a job

[Crystalovertherainbow]

Do the family needs to show their income or the new adult is considered their own financial unit now , even if they live with the parents and their UC is given them

Exactly! Claiming basic rate UC and saving it for a year or two might be the only way the person in this situation may be able to give themselves a fighting chance, through saving for driving lessons/car, a rental deposit etc.

I grew up in a village that didn’t even have a shop. There was literally nothing. My dad was self-employed and did me the 25 minute journey to school and back in between jobs. Mum was disabled and couldn’t drive.

There was an 90 minute bus but it didn’t turn up half of the time and when I reached high school they cut the afternoon service due to “lack of demand”.

Luckily we moved in my teens (we were in council accommodation and were able to exchange our property) but if we hadn’t have moved I’d have been screwed.

You’re not listening to me. My children would not be entitled to benefits when they turn 18. Thankfully.

And actually, perhaps there should be more shame attached to claiming benefits. The normalisation of claiming benefits, as demonstrated on this thread, is so very, very depressing.

So many people trying to dress up parents passing on the cycle of claiming benefits to their children as somehow being beneficial for them. Dreadful.

I guess it depends where you live but hese jobs definitely exist! They Pay £60 a week for a paper round and lifeguards start on £9+ an hour minimum from age 16.

Dd is 17 - all her friends have jobs. They’ve found hand delivering cvs to be the most effective. They’re not career jobs - I know the market is hard - but minimum wage jobs are there.

Well they moved from Liverpool back to the south in 1980, just after my older brother was born due to mum giving up work to raise a baby and dad then was made redundant. Negative equity on the house meant they had to start from scratch. So their experience was Liverpool and South East Kent.

If your kids have so much savings at 18 that they cannot claim, then they are very lucky. Many people aren't that lucky.

Being on benefits for 18 months was soul-destroying enough without people adding extra shame. It didn't motivate me to get a job any faster. It actually harmed my job search because I ended up reverting to self-harming and spent time on incapacity benefits whilst under the care of the community mental health team.

There was a saying where I live that explained the high rate of IB claims: If you aren't depressed when you start JSA, you'll be depressed after six months on it.

parents passing on the cycle of claiming benefits to their children as somehow being beneficial for them

1. Literally no one has done that. Several of us have said that UC is a lifeline for some young people and have said that it's OK to claim what the law says you are entitled to.
2. Learn the difference between cause and effect. Inter-generational mass unemployment isn't caused by people claiming benefits, it causes people to claim benefits. When the steel works and the pits and the shipyards close, jobs don't materialise out of thin air to replace the ones destroyed by those closures.

I delivered the free paper for about £15 per week. Wasn't even close to minimum wage. That wasn't decades ago either, it was after graduation, just to get something on my CV. Strangely, it didn't help me find any other work.

The local shops near me and near Mum haven't advertised for paper rounds in years. Maybe, northern ex-pit villagers and northern urban dwellers can't afford to have newspapers delivered.

I remember walking for miles trying to do that. No joy. It's almost like people don't want to hire autistic teen girls into Saturday retail jobs.

"Sorry, we've already filled the vacancy" was something I heard a lot.

So your children have > £17,000 in savings. They are very fortunate. Would you expect them to live off that while they find work, or would you support them yourself? Are you teaching them that it’s shameful to claim benefits?

The problem with people who view benefits as a "last resort" is that they put off claiming what they're entitled to until they're several months into unemployment and on the absolute bones of their arse.

Then they have to wait five weeks to revieve anything.

In adult life, this is how unemployment can spiral into homelessness. So yes, Id absolutely discorage my kids from this dangerous attitude.

I've had several claims for JSA that have never paid out a penny because I found work quicker than the claim could be processed.

Im glad i made those claims. It was responsible of me to make sure that I could still support myself and/or contribute to the household, if things didnt turn out as hoped.

Also amazed at the number of people who think they can or should stop their ADULT children from something they're entitled to do. At 18, they are grownups. Its not your choice.

Not sure about “most”, but in Scotland a lot do, yes. An HND is the equivalent of second year at uni, and many people like to stay at the same college, or there could be elements of the HND that suit their future career goals better, so they just go to uni for the final year to get the degree.

Mandatory (school) education might be finished by 18, but higher education is certainly not. I don’t know any 18 year olds who have an HND or a degree.

Get her on turn2us, it is a government backed website with a calculator, you put all your details in as you are now, and it will tell you what if anything, you can claim and gives you the links.

An 18 year old would not get JSA ! You need to have two years of NI contributions so unless they've been working significant hours for the past 2 years ( unlikely at 18 ) they won't qualify.

Yes. I was just saying that this is such a thing as JSA.

theres a lot of attacking ‘privilege’ in this thread (and some of the comments seem to suggest that privilege means ability to do any job, any where and live in a grotty bedsit to do it) but most of those comments were responding to the actual title of the thread ‘ do ALL…’ so are they not allowed to respond ‘no ALL 18 yr olds don’t because X’
this thread seems to be full of why some 18year old need to sign on accompanied by some big chip on the shoulder rant, when actually no one, not one comment I’ve read, have said that no 18 yr olds should sign on. They have stated things like ‘my child won’t because X’ and then got attacked.
benefits are supposed to be a safety net. Use them if you NEED them. There are many 18yr olds who do not need them. And some that do.
in this thread we’ve had people saying that their child cannot possibly babysit, be a carer, move, wash pots etc and that is a huge problem for our country. Work ethic has left the building.

All those saying that 18 year olds shouldn’t be claiming benefits are presumably thinking that the parents should be paying to support these young adults, why? What’s the difference between them and an older parent that needs support, an 18 year old with a baby, a 27 year old that has lost their job?

How come parents are expected to house and feed their young adults? When does this become someone else’s problem?

Why should society give pensioners who haven’t all their money extra help? Should their children then be obliged to help them? Why is society paying to ferry children to school, why aren’t their parents doing that?

Society decided that benefits should be embraced, no shame just a helping hand. The result of the over generous benefits system, which in some cases is now paying better than working, paid for by relentlessly taxing the very people expected in this thread to just pay for and support their young adults. Frankly if the benefits are there to be gained my young adults will claim them, I know numerous people taking full advantage of what’s available when they could indeed step in/pay up. Who can blame them.

You can’t have it all ways, either family is important and we all support and take responsibility for ourselves or government continues to undermine parents and continue this downward spiral of ‘not my fault’ and ‘what am I entitled to’ culture.

If they can’t find a job, get them into some sort of training. Healthcare assistant for eg will do on the job training. Benefits are a last resort and I don’t think that would help an 18yo in the long run.

how on earth will OP’s 18yo become homeless if op is housing them?

@unlimiteddilutingjuice was (obviously) looking at the generality of claiming benefits.

What's said about the consequences of waiting until you're on your uppers before claiming is 100%.

You won't do many sessions providing UC advice before you have somebody with rent due yesterday and overdrawn at the bank.

They wont right away.
But if they carry the idea into adult life, that claiming benefits is a shameful thing, to be put off until the last minute......they might in later on.
At the least, they'll get themselves into an avoidable pickle.

If they can't get a job they will be unlikely to get any training that's "on the job" because that's a....job 🤷

It depends how much money parents earn. If you're really struggling the family may need it.

All those saying that 18 year olds shouldn’t be claiming benefits are presumably thinking that the parents should be paying to support these young adults, why? What’s the difference between them and an older parent that needs support?

the difference is that they are 18. At the peak of their physical fitness. Mostly no one dependent on them (and if there are, that is of course different), so they can move location. Also at an impressionable young adult age, where, if it can be avoided, sending the message that they can get £300 a month rather than work for 20 hours isn’t a good one. There are jobs in this country for able bodied people, there just are. An 18 year old can move about.

off the back of this thread, I’ve just popped on my Facebook local;
’housekeeper available. Looking for a room to stay in for free in return for 3 hours a day cleaning/errands in your home.’ 27 comments - yes please.
‘Im Beth and I’m 16, at school at X and I’m available for babysitting this Saturday night, £10 an hour.’ First comment posted the same minute ‘yes please.’

Why should society give pensioners who haven’t all their money extra help?
because they aren’t as agile, flexible or physically capable

Should their children then be obliged to help them?
I think yes, they should. The countries doing well atm are the ones where family exists, and family support, not the ones where everyone is sat with their calculators working out what they can get for free

Why is society paying to ferry children to school, why aren’t their parents doing that? eh? They don’t.

in this thread we’ve had people saying that their child cannot possibly babysit, be a carer, move, wash pots etc and that is a huge problem for our country. Work ethic has left the building.

Nobody has said this.

theres a lot of attacking ‘privilege’ in this thread
Disagree. It's saying people who are privileged have no idea how hard it is for some other people who are not.

Yep paper rounds sadly no longer a thing. And as a PP said, most jobs at supermarkets in London are inundated with applications from adults with relevant work experience. The youngsters without work experience struggle to get a look in. Things are just not the same as they used to be