Impact of 2-child benefit cap on abortion decisions

[niceberg]

www.theguardian.com/society/2020/dec/03/two-child-limit-on-benefits-a-key-factor-in-many-abortion-decisions-says-charity

This was inevitable and as such must have been seen as an acceptable outcome by the government when it was introduced.

@NiceGerbil

Spain and the UK are totally different cultures. It's a pointless comparison.

EG not being able to leave home till you get married. That's a massive change to society. There's also the religious aspect.

Also so what? Is the fact it's shit in Spain a reason to make it shitter here? Why do people do this, who benefits from going but look, this country has a really rubbish social security system so why isn't ours like that? Funny how you never see the same said about the army, the police, the national galleries or any other social spending middle class people quite like.

Depends on your definition of 'shitter'.

It's different.

That's an interesting reaction.

Why isn't it mens responsibility not to get women pregnant, even if they have two or more kids they don't pay for?

Because men like this don't give a shit. I am the daughter of a "sperm donor" smooth talker and have never seen him, never received a birthday or a christmas card from him and he doesn't care if I'm alive or dead. Its all too easy for them to disapear, mine did a flit to europe to escape cma and was never seen of or heard of again.

AFAIK Spain was and maybe still is a very religious Catholic country.

Not leaving home until marriage is a part of that.

Transferring that culture wholesale, the whole attitudes, faith etc is a big deal and. Unrealistic.

Most of them don't need to do that catlady.

The gingerbread stats are interesting.

raskolnikova

Yes, Spain has one of the lowest birth rates in Europe, there's real concern there about the impact of an aging population as, of course, you need working age people on decent wages to pay the taxes needed to look after all those pensioners.....and Spain has, as well as a low birth rate, high youth unemployment and low pay for younger workers. It's not sustainable. Yet the UK seems intent on deliberately pursuing the same unsustainable path and feeling smug about it to boot. I think there's just this general difficulty in grasping how much people living longer is contributing to current population growth but how that's a temporary situation and if you overeact and suppress the birth rate too much in response you risk toppling the economic model that supports us all.

Surely a responsible and loving mother doesn't WANT to bring loads of kids into a squalid, miserable home where nobody works and she knows she is not going to be able to feed them all properly.
Why would you?
Would you not want to have fewer children and given them more opportunities?

Would you not want to have fewer children and given them more opportunities?

As campaigners for women's rights and improved access to family planning have found, time after time, women want exactly this, if they have control over their lives.

Low-income women of the UK aren't mindless, feckless milch cows, any more than women all over the rest of the world.

When women have the power to control their fertility, they do. Increase funding to women's health clinics, increase the opening hours, set them up so everyone has one within easily travelling distance, and hey presto! The birth rate drops.

@NiceGerbil

Depends on your definition of 'shitter'.

It's different.

That's an interesting reaction.

The point was more about how people seem desperate to race to the bottom rather than a point about the situation in Spain.

@NiceGerbil

Depends on your definition of 'shitter'.

It's different.

That's an interesting reaction.

It is shitter. I had my baby in Spain, and we were up shit creek without a paddle. Which, okay, maybe is my fault too, but I had been a fully functioning, working, member of society when I got pregnant.

I love Spain, and would actually love to move back when I'm in a better place, but I don't think the benefits system there is something to aspire to.

Ah I see.

I read the post where a woman was saying it was awesome in Spain as no social security, not leaving home till you got married etc and think I misunderstood some responses.

@Prestel

raskolnikova

Yes, Spain has one of the lowest birth rates in Europe, there's real concern there about the impact of an aging population as, of course, you need working age people on decent wages to pay the taxes needed to look after all those pensioners.....and Spain has, as well as a low birth rate, high youth unemployment and low pay for younger workers. It's not sustainable. Yet the UK seems intent on deliberately pursuing the same unsustainable path and feeling smug about it to boot. I think there's just this general difficulty in grasping how much people living longer is contributing to current population growth but how that's a temporary situation and if you overeact and suppress the birth rate too much in response you risk toppling the economic model that supports us all.

I agree. What I can't get my head around, is that the UK not only seems to want to lower the birth rate, but it also wants a 'hostile environment' for young, skilled EU workers at the same time. I mean why would you pursue both of those things, unless you actively want unsustainable, aging demographics?

Why should we pay for Prince Louis but not little Louis from the estate?

@MsSafina

I used to live in Spain 20 years ago where there were no child benefits and very little welfare. There was little teen pregnancy as you would have to either live with your parents or have an abortion. The State wouldn't provide you with a flat. It obviously affects behaviour and there's a low birth rate in Spain as children will not be subsidised and work has always been precarious, even more so now.

Sounds ideal. There's no shortage of humans on this poor planet.

[quote Ohalrightthen]@PearPickingPorky men have the ability to take zero responsibility for a pregnancy if they feel like it. women do not. that is a fact of life. It's not particularly fair, but there's nothing we can do about it. You would not rely on even the most responsible, morally upstanding man on the planet to protect you from pregnancy all by himself, unless you were stupid.[/quote]

Exactly. We can live in fantasyland or we can face reality. I prefer the latter.

Ultimately it is women and women alone who decide when a pregnancy will occur and what happens afterward.

@Prestel

Then use inconvenient methods, plus a condom, like many of us did for decades

Like back in the 50's and 60's when women had an average 2.5 children compared to the 1.7 they have now?

Nope, the 80s and 90s. And I managed not to become a selfish burden to society.

Keep coming up with bullshit reasons that women needn't take responsibility, though.

Did you leave home before you got married, perveen?

If you have kids, is that what you did/ will do?

What's your feeling on living in a society where orthodox Christianity is the order of the day (maybe less so now, but that's where the abortion/ live at home thing comes from).

Sounds good?

I don't see what or how Covid affects the benefits cap. I think Sunak granted a 1 year temporary benefit increase but it is due to end at end of March. Many families not on benefits go to work and pay taxes to pay for the benefits. These families often can't afford to have a second or third child themselves so why should they pay more taxes so people on benefits can keep having children they can't afford to pay for themselves? Two is fair.

Because there's a massive increase in the number of families claiming benefits? Due to massive job losses due to the pandemic, even with the cushioning from the government.

I'm surprised you hadn't noticed.

BBC

'Nearly 5.5 million people are now claiming benefits across Britain - an 81% increase since March.'

Universal credit

'A watchdog is to investigate the government’s monitoring of suicides among benefit claimants amid concerns about links between welfare reforms and declining mental health.

The National Audit Office (NAO) said it would call on the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) to reveal what information it held on the issue, after ministers refused to provide an MP with figures on the number of people in the welfare system who had taken their own lives.'

''Cover-up': DWP destroyed reports into people who killed themselves after benefits were stopped
Up to 50 reviews into deaths following harsh social security cuts and sanctions have been shredded, officials admit'

www.google.com/amp/s/www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/dwp-benefit-death-suicide-reports-cover-ups-government-conservatives

Yaassss

Problem is. Kids still there. Hmm.

Room for education on. If you're offing yourself take your kids with you. Otherwise even more pressure on the state Jesus how selfish.

Nope, the 80s and 90s.

Oh, so when contraceptives were the same as now and the birth rate was the same as now but, unlike now, families could claim support for all their children?

Women take as much responsibility today as they did in the 80s and 90s, the only difference is we used to care about children and provided for them irrespective of why they came into the world, using education to reduce the number of unwanted pregnancies rather than using deprivation to reduce otherwise wanted pregnancies as we are doing now, despite the fact that our birth rate is already well below two and if it drops further our economic model will become totally unsustainable.

Many families not on benefits go to work and pay taxes to pay for the benefits

Families on modest incomes with school age children do get benefits, though - they get child tax credits or the child element of universal credit - the very benefits affected by recent cuts and the two child limit. So those families still have to pay just as much tax, but are getting less back.

The majority of child tax credits are claimed by working families.