JDL
Player Valuation: £1.5m
Do you think multiple generations of benefit claimants are a daily mail fantasy?
Benefit Steet
- Thread starter Jags..class
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tonyhorne
Immoderate
I would genuinely like to know what the scale of this is. Assuming such situations exist, do they contribute excessively to the welfare bill to the extent that many politicians and "newspapers" suggest? Are they a very small minority in reality that are outweighed by the good that the system does?
I know many feel there should be a zero tolerance approach but such things are not always practical. People still run on to football pitches at times. It does not mean that the fences have to go back up.
evilwebby
Player Valuation: £50m
The top 10% of earners pay far more in tax today in absolute terms and also as a % of overall tax receipts than they did 10-15 years ago. But hey, don't let that little detail get in the way of another opportunity to bash the rich, eh?
The really sad thing is that the significant rise in welfare, and indeed all government services, has done bugger all to reduce the gap between the rich and the rest. Indeed, the very richest are richer now (relative to the mean) than they've ever been before. All the huge increase in welfare, and the rest of the supposed equality initiatives, has done is massively increase the size of the government.
Despite this rubbish outcome however, people still seem to insist that the only solution is to give even more money to government.
Indeed, you have to question whether it isn't making things a whole lot worse. Things like food, technology and so on are infinitely cheaper now than they've ever been, yet as a society we seem poorer, despite that is so many households having two people working.
Printing enormous sums of money however has made easy money for the financial sector (with socialized 'risk'). It's also caused the property boom, thus making houses unaffordable for most people, whilst also contributing to the enormous expansion in government services, and correlating debt levels to saddle our children with.
Most sectors of society have seen a huge increase in value for money over the past few decades. The only ones that have seen things get worse are property and public services, both of which have inflated ridiculously.
So far from making society more equal and fair, successive governments have actually made things much, much worse.
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Bungle
Player Valuation: £90m
Say what? All I need is Davek to be in agreement with these 2 now and my world has been truly blown apart.
There's potential for a 10/12 paragraph per post debate here and neither of you have taken it?
Blue Cheese
Mental Patient, GOT Ward
I have worked all my most of my adult life, Been unemployed twice, once through redundancy. I needed the system to help me transition until I found more work.
Currently I am out of work, by choice, as I'm starting an apprenticeship in engineering in September so that I can better myself and have a better future.
I am not entitled to anything despite paying into the pot for most of my life because my partner has a full time job. Basically we get a little bit of tax credits, just over £20 a week.
Meanwhile I see people who have never worked a day in their lives spitting kids out getting over £300-£400 a week in some cases, as with the mum with 11 kids £66k per year. I have never come close to earning £66k a year. They also get council tax and rent paid, whilst we have to pay our mortgage.
I also see immigrants sending home hundreds of pounds a month after claiming for kids that don't even live here.
The system is needed, but it is massively broken.
Currently I am out of work, by choice, as I'm starting an apprenticeship in engineering in September so that I can better myself and have a better future.
I am not entitled to anything despite paying into the pot for most of my life because my partner has a full time job. Basically we get a little bit of tax credits, just over £20 a week.
Meanwhile I see people who have never worked a day in their lives spitting kids out getting over £300-£400 a week in some cases, as with the mum with 11 kids £66k per year. I have never come close to earning £66k a year. They also get council tax and rent paid, whilst we have to pay our mortgage.
I also see immigrants sending home hundreds of pounds a month after claiming for kids that don't even live here.
The system is needed, but it is massively broken.
Of course, it's an isolated example, but don't forget that is equivalent to earning around £110,000 a year once tax is taken into account.
Blue Cheese
Mental Patient, GOT Ward
It's just plain wrong. Me and my partner watched that series and it boiled my blood, we are struggling along whilst some of the people are raking it in and have never paid a penny in tax.
Isolated example again as you say but plenty more happens. that lady who was supposed to move into a new £500k house, how many on here can afford a half mill house?
We work for self respect whilst the Government gives away the taxes to people who come here just specifically to claim benefits. Not a dig at all on benefits, some genuinely need it and are looking for work. A lot are taking the michael.
dead_soft
Player Valuation: £35m
It's not based on how much you earn though or how much you come close to earning. It's how much is needed for that family and those children to be able to be fed, clothed and kept in a house. It might seem wrong that someone is getting money for nothing but what exactly is the other alternative with the 11 kids? Forcibly remove them from their mother, which would take years, and then cost even more in finding them new families whilst they are in care.
It's easy for people to get angry about others on benefits as no-one will defend them, it's the easy digs to get angry about but if these people didn't exist, very little would change in your own life or anyone else around.
And the immigrants comment, do you have quotes and stats for that?
EDIT: Also needs to be pointed out that the £60k included the supposed rent on this 'eco palace' which she never got allocated and is not moving into
Blue Cheese
Mental Patient, GOT Ward
I'm debating the programme benefits: life on the dole, their was a whole episode dedicated to immigrants who specifically came here to claim benefits. I was not having a go at immigrants in general, tried to word my paragraph carefully.
I know not all are like this and I realise the programme was designed to be controversial and perhaps even aimed at causing bad feeling. The fact is it happens even 1 immigrant taking the pee is too many if they haven't paid in the pot.
http://www.express.co.uk/news/uk/48...make-40k-through-benefits-the-rest-I-ll-STEAL
that's about that particular episode.
Again I'm not having a go at all immigrants.
heres the episode on 5 demand
http://www.channel5.com/shows/benefits-britain-life-on-the-dole/episodes/episode-5-489
Would you feel happier if you were given more freedom over where and how your taxes were spent?
dead_soft
Player Valuation: £35m
It's really not a big deal if one is doing it. It is such a small percentage of overall benefits that it isn't worth mentioning. People get really angry about it being 'unfair' which is crazy when so little is unfair. People live in areas which mean they get worse hospitals so they are more likely to be mistreated, they have worse schools so have worse exam results - these directly affect everyone but it is benefits that gets people so annoyed and it's because it is easy.
If you are looking for the perfect immigration system, where everyone is in full time education and none of them go to prison, then you'll be waiting forever, as it's neither possible or even reasonable to expect.
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