@ Yunki big lol!
suck it up richy ex-husband guy. force your wife to buy a smaller house or move somewhere not as nice, it's that simple.
My wife and my combined income is about half your wifes.. With sensible management we dont live too badly.
This comes at a time when she is about take out a big mortgage to buy me out of the marital home
That's her problem. Move somewhere cheaper. Negative equity? Tough **** .
Is the OP about austerity or the bitterness he feels towards his ex?
this post would almost be funny if it was an attempt at humour, the fact that people actually think like this is frankly terrifying.. only on stw eh..
Actually ex-wife will get to keep it if her current pension contributions take her below 50k. Hurrah!
Something to ponder on....
The Food Stamp Program, administered by the U.S. Department of Agriculture, is proud of the fact it is distributing the greatest amount of free meals and food stamps ever.
Meanwhile, the National Park Service, administered by the U.S. Department of the Interior, asks us to "Please Do Not Feed the Animals."
Their stated reason for the policy is because the animals will grow dependent on handouts and will not learn to take care of themselves.
Ha! 😕
The conservatives haven't won an election since 1997, and with thinkers like that working for them, I can't see that changing any time soon.
My pension plan is to stuff the money down a grid and wait for a rat to pick it up and use it to make a nest, hopefully in twenty to thirty years time ill find the rats nest and some of the notes will remain intact so I can buy beans.
It's a lot like currant pension plans but the rats have tails and with luck ill have some beans..
A point to note is Rats are incontinent, and almost contiuously urinate and leave a trail, and sometimes it does smell.
After 30 years down a grid many rats will have urinated on your cash, with a rats life being about 2 years.
Best to just send me envelopes of cash to invest in CRC vouchers, and bike bits.
oldnpastit - MemberThe conservatives haven't won an election since 1997, and with thinkers like that working for them, I can't see that changing any time soon.
er..I think you'll find 'New Labour' won that, but an easy mistake to make.
A point to note is Rats are incontinent, and almost contiuously urinate and leave a trail, and sometimes it does smell.
After 30 years down a grid many rats will have urinated on your cash, with a rats life being about 2 years.
So it's nearly as risky as paying in to a normal one then?
At least they won't charge me for the privilege...
slackalice - MemberSomething to ponder on....
The Food Stamp Program, administered by the U.S. Department of Agriculture, is proud of the fact it is distributing the greatest amount of free meals and food stamps ever.
Meanwhile, the National Park Service, administered by the U.S. Department of the Interior, asks us to "Please Do Not Feed the Animals."
Their stated reason for the policy is because the animals will grow dependent on handouts and will not learn to take care of themselves.
Ha!
What is there to "ponder on" ?
That hungry children in the world's wealthiest and most obese country should be compared to wild animals ?
That they should perhaps be forced to fend for themselves or simply allowed to perish ?
It's things like that viral email which reminds me just how unpatriotic some Americans are towards their fellow citizens. And of course they invariably tend to be right-wing republicans. Hurricane Katrina was a headline-grabbing object lesson to the world in that respect.
Tax funded free health care, tax funded free schools, tax funded police and fire service. When will this free loading end. People with money should pay for these services. I was thinking that the real thing that drags the economy down is the cost of land and housing. Massive cheap social housing building program that everybody would not mind living in to reduce the stupidly expensive housing in the UK.
People with money should pay for these services.
People with money are paying for these services.
Yes they were paying for child benefits as well. That's the whole point of a welfare state. Everybody pays in and everybody gets something out. Now though if the people paying in don't get anything out why would they support it?
Surely we should restrict, or increase, benefit payments to the smarter, middle classes as they are more likely to have smarter kids, who will become higher rate tax payers, which will be better for our pensions.
There's no point sponsoring Wayne and Waynetta to raise a load of future dole seekers...
Surely we should restrict, or increase, benefit payments to the smarter, middle classes as they are more likely to have smarter kids, who will become higher rate tax payers, which will be better for our pensions.
you mean the people who have decided to delay children until there 30's anyway, who have decided kids can wait until they are financially stable, until they have a house?
There's no point sponsoring Wayne and Waynetta to raise a load of future dole seekers...
you mean the ones who choose to have kids late teens early twenties, who have decided that they have no point that the only way to get a council house is to have kids?
Everyone i have spoken to about neo-natal etc. comes back with the same story.
There are two groups, either very young or older, there are very very few women having first kids in the middle.
I have wondered if average IQ will drop, there was a time when the less intellegent would be sent to war, down the mines, shipyards etc. places where man power mattered rather than out and out academic ability. But as we are told we are a knowledge economy and have outsourced so much heavy industry, it does raise the question of what to do with the less intelligent?
well we either
1. help them
2. let them starve - bit of social unrest i would imagine so probably not the cheapest option never mind the morality.
Now though if the people paying in don't get anything out why would they support it?
If you need to ask you wont understand the answer
Bit troll central or the heartless only come out at night [ not you ernie nice to see you]
Bit troll central or the heartless only come out at night [ not you ernie nice to see you]
some real pricks in tonight. You got to feel sorry for them, its not their fault they where born with a silver spoon wedged up their shitters. Walking around with a blinkered view on life, if only the shoe was on the other foot:TurnerGuy, slackalice and Spongebob.
some real pricks in tonight.
some real gullible types around last night, you have to feel sorry for them...
OP what was the point of your first post? I don't understand. Are you having a bitter dig at your ex-partner? On a side note, why should we expect to receive government benefits if we earn over £50,000?
TurnerGuy - Membersome real pricks in tonight.
some real gullible types around last night, you have to feel sorry for them...
Learn to capitalise before mounting your horse, I thought I told you that the other day. 😆
Hora, I agree with your first question to the OP, but surely the side question is clear, although perhaps "should" would be better replaced by "do"?
The foundations of the welfare state as laid out be Beveridge included the idea that the best way or structure to achieve welfare goals is/was to move away from means testing and insurance to a system where benefits were available to all (universal) but funded more by those who earn more money. So everyone should have equal access to all benefits irrespective of their income, but the wealthy should provide more to fund the system. Of course, this throws up anomalies such as child benefit, wealthy pensioners receiving various allowances etc and they make easy topics for politicians and others to make headlines with. But the law of unintended consequences and other factors warn against tinkering at the margin in order to make the news! The current structure of the Welfare State has endured for good reason. Like democracy, it's not perfect (hence your question) but it is (arguably) better than the alternatives.
Hence the answer to the question is people earning over £x expect to receive benefits because the universal model works better than the alternative however illogical that may seem!
everyone should have equal access to all benefits irrespective of their income, but the wealthy should provide more to fund the system
That's pointless, though. If I'm a wealthy person, paying 350 quid in tax and getting 50 quid back doesn't leave me any better off than paying 300 quid in tax and getting nothing back. (Hypothetical numbers, obviously).
Surely we should restrict, or increase, benefit payments to the [s]smarter,[/s] subordinate middle classes as they are more likely to have [s]smarter[/s] greedy kids, who will become [s]higher rate[/s] obsequious mindless tax payers, which will be better for our [s]pensions.[/s] leaders
That's the whole point of a welfare state. Everybody pays in and everybody gets something out. Now though if the people paying in don't get anything out why would they support it?
Erm... that's not the point of the welfare state at all. Its put there as a safety net for people who fall on hard times, and to care for the more disadvantaged in society. Its this that distinguishes us as a civilised society, as opposed to Barbarians like America.
And also the main reason the Tories are trying to dismantle it. Because all this namby-pamby, pinko 'caring for disabled people' and 'keeping the victims of the economy our rich friends destroyed at a subsistence level of income' is bally well costing me money that could be going towards Tarquins school fees!!!!
The OP seems to share your assessment though. So well done to you both
there was a time when the less intellegent would be sent to war, down the mines, shipyards etc. places where man power mattered rather than out and out academic ability.
There's some rather large assumptions going on there. Are you saying that the only thing that determines the earnings of somebody is their intelligence? And that thick breeds think and smart breeds smart?
Erm... that's not the point of the welfare state at all.
+1
One big cut that will soon begin to hurt people is the reduction/loss of the children's allowance.
Until this month, my now ex-wife was receiving around £1760 per annum for our two children. As she earns a few grand over £50k, she will get next to nothing. This comes at a time when she is about take out a big mortgage to buy me out of the marital home. She will also have all the bills I used to pay, so her era of austerity is going to hit her like a steam train. Means testing is so crude, not that I wish to defend my wife's predicament - she chose that route and without any discussions about how how we might have mitigated the situation for the benefit of our kids - very upsetting, but I've a clear conscience
Sorry - zero sympathy. She earns over £50k - over double what I earn.
She does not have to take out a big mortgage to buy you out, you could sell and she could move somewhere cheaper. Cut your cloth, that's what the rest of us are having to do. I resent my taxes going to give benefits to those earning that amount of money. I want them to go to those in most need - she isn't, and neither are your kids, if she's got that size income, plus whatever yours is, then your kids won't be wanting for anything. There are kids growing up in serious poverty here in the UK, whose parents cannot afford to heat their homes or feed and clothe their kids properly.
This kind of middle class woe-is-me attitude bugs the hell out of me - the austerity cuts have hit the poorest and most vulnerable who already had very little far worse. Your ex wife needs to be grateful for what she already does have, and for the fact that she isn't in danger of losing her home due to housing benefit cuts, having disability allowance taken away or having the meagre wage supplementation that is tax credits for low paid workers cut or removed.
Sorry for being harsh, but get some perspective.
Erm... that's not the point of the welfare state at all. Its put there as a safety net for people who fall on hard times, and to care for the more disadvantaged in society.
Well said. And don't forget, there but for the grace of God, Allah, Gaia or whatever, go all of us. People can lose everything in the blink of an eye - an accident, chronic illness, redundancy....today it's your neighbour, but tomorrow it could be you or someone in your family. Would you not want there to be something there to look after them?
Of course, this throws up anomalies such as child benefit, wealthy pensioners receiving various allowances etc and they make easy topics for politicians and others to make headlines with. But the law of unintended consequences and other factors warn against tinkering at the margin in order to make the news! The current structure of the Welfare State has endured for good reason. Like democracy, it's not perfect (hence your question) but it is (arguably) better than the alternatives.
perhaps these anomalies are the unintened consequences and we can better deal with them now. It is also worth noting - the US constitutional righ to bear arms for example - that times change and so should policy.
Its not about radical change it about tinkering iwth the edges to make it fairer and more responsive to the times we currently find ourselves in.
For example I assume most think its odd that Alan sugar gets a bus pass and a state pension and a winter fuel allowance [ no idea if he claims to be fair]. Its obvious money is tight and there are far more deserving cases than him and the OPs wife on 50 k per anum for us to "help".
As for paying in - view it like insurance - do you complain every year because you have not been robbed or had your roof fall down. Someone else has and therefore they got more from insurance than you. Perhaps you should just stop paying to prevent this injustice as it is not like you need it right ?
Isn't there a difference between the "point" of the welfare state and the "optimum design" to achieve it. The point of the welfare state is indeed to provide a safety net for those in need (and mostpeople would agree the this does not include providing child allowances to households (?!?) earning (for the sake of a number) >£50k). But, and it is a big but, the best way to achieve this goal is the system that Beveridge introduced which ironically (?) does include universal access to all benefits as odd as this seems. A key criteria for a welfare system has to be take-up rates and there is plenty of evidence that suggests an inverse relationship between take up rates and means testing.
But at end of the day this is classic BS politics. We are talking of the pimple on the elephant's bottom of the level of UK debt. But the emotive nature of the topic here makes it an easy political goal to score even thought it will have limited impact on the end result (or even the opposite effect). Plus ca change!
X-post there JY. I take part of your point, but isn't part of the reason why the welfare and tax system is such a mess at present the very fact that both have been subject to constant tinkering and interference. Woods and trees springs to mind!
Its the see-sawing of the tax (and welfare) system that's created the present shambles. The labour party, when in power, try to level the playing field through taxation. Th Tories once back in, rapidly shift the balance the other way.
For instance, tax credits to boost incomes of the lower paid, and creating questionable public sector jobs in areas of high unemployment (which coincidentally tend to be in labour voting areas).
The Tories then get in and give tax breaks to their rich friends in the city, and throw some bones to the upper middle class (hence the existence of government benefits being paid to people earning 50k+). All to be paid for by the removal of benefits to those a the bottom.
At the end of the day, the 'benefits' system is the ultimate political football. And so it goes on......
Except Binners that doesn't seem to be what has happened. Under a Tory, sorry coalition, government, lower income families are paying less tax and higher income more tax than they did under Labour. Plus the latest wheeze is actually targeting (negatively) natural Tory voters. The irony of UK politics and economics never fails!
I've got to admit thm that this present move is far from natural territory. But removing a universal benefit from someone earning 50k plus is hardly socialism, is it?
My worry is that with the 'Universal Credit', and other reforms, these moves (that have a fairly miniscule impact on the middle classes), are a precursor to people on benefits at the bottom end (people on min wage, relying on tax credits to feed their kids, for example, amongst many others) getting absolutely clobbered!!!!
Ironically, the title of this post 'Austerity Cuts - We Ain't Seen Nothin' Yet'. Is absolutely true. These lot are only just getting warmed up. But any idea that the tories have changed their spots is fanciful.
I think we all know who is, proportionately, going to bear the brunt of all this! Despite the protestations of clueless middle-class professional whingers, who don't know they're born (the OP).
The most disadvantaged in society are the ones who are going to be hit hardest. Stuff like means testing child benefit is merely a fig leaf for business as usual. Same old Tories, at the end of the day!
And lower earners paying (slightly less) tax is just the minimum the spineless Lib Dems would accept to allow Dave and Chums to let rip at everything else. There's no way they'd have worn that particular concession unless they absolutely had too!
I agree that the title of the thread suggested something very different (and more accurate?) !!!
We shall see about the wider attacks though Binners. In the end, welfare spending is not the biggie that people imagine. What we are seeing (IMO) with the latest noise on capping welfare etc is just a reverse political stunt. Labour pulled it off spectacularly with the 50p rate of tax stunt, but I suspect that the Tories will be less successful with the workers should not lose out to non-workers stunt. Both make great headlines but dubious economic impact.
3 pages and counting, good trolling spongebob...
Agreed thm. I think they're just looking for people to blame for the ballooning defecit (you can't keep blaming Gordon Brown for ever, after all), and they're just having a pop at the usual suspects, with a helping hand from a compliant right wing press!
Like you said, the facts bear little resemblance to the 'Skivers versus Strivers' narrative they're trying to build up. Though that's not to say it isn't working.
Agreed thm. I think they're just looking for people to blame for the ballooning defecit (you can't keep blaming Gordon Brown for ever, after all)
Not forever, but for a generation or two at least. By 2100 he's definitely in the clear.
But we can thank him for not being in the euro, forever.
X-post there JY. I take part of your point, but isn't part of the reason why the welfare and tax system is such a mess at present the very fact that both have been subject to constant tinkering and interference. Woods and trees springs to mind!
well you can have fair or you can have simple - saddly in the attempt to get the former we get complex
Yes means testing reduces claimants [ ie those eligible dont claim]but so what - if they dont claim what they are entitled to is that not the freedom of choice the right love so much?
Under a Tory, sorry coalition, government, lower income families are paying less tax and higher income more tax than they did under Labour
You mean the Lib dems raised the threshold for the lowest as a commitment and the labour party increased the top rate of tax [ cut by the tories but stil lhigher than under labour - its obvious what you say is true and it is obvious it has nothing to do with what the tories would do - careful lest the halo of impartiality falls to the floor 😉
The main issue with universal credit IMHO is that they no longe rpay rent to the landlord but to the tennant
There are going to be alot of evictions over this and then the state still has to pick up the tab of re housing them [ at greater expense- law of unintended consequemces]
I get IDS about helping them to be responsible [ its a godd idea if support is given] but some folk do actually need the state to control theis spending like a parent does witha child
I get IDS about helping them to be responsible [ its a godd idea if support is given] but some folk do actually need the state to control theis spending like a parent does witha child
True, which is why there is a project going on at the moment between DWP and several UK financial institutions to help tackle this - the idea of basic bank accounts for benefit claimants with a "jam jar" budgeting system, so they can shift money into different pots for different bills. DWP is also commissioning some work to provide basic financial education, so hopefully everything is being done to help to get most people away from needing that nannying.
However....I think that for some people (addicts for example) they should continue not to allow them to have the means to spend their housing money - an addict does not necessarily make sound reasoned financial decisions or weigh up the consequences of roof over head versus next fix.
I wish I shared your confidence littlemisspanda. The work being done into budgeting, and supplying cards for benefits is suggested by Tony's favourite think-tank Demos, and being carried out by Mastercard.
I may be becoming very cynical, but I doubt that those two, between them, have the best interests of the benefit claimants at heart.
When you look at the Universal Credit proposals as they stand, its hard to see it ending well. And its going to cost a fortune to implement. Though I do believe IDS is genuinely trying to do it right, I see ideology and right wing dogma trumping more practical considerations
I'm a PM on one of the projects binners 🙂 (I don't work for Mastercard though - or Demos).
I don't agree with universal credit or the ideology behind it, as you can probably tell from my posts I'm no Tory, but I do agree with the idea of empowerment of claimants to manage their finances better, given the right tools.
Certainly where I work there is a genuine wish both to protect and educate the financially vulnerable (for example putting more free ATMs in poorer areas, which tend to be populated by pay-to-use ATMS who cash in on the fact that people can't afford to or can't for mobility/access reasons access commercial centres easily where there are free machines. So I do actually think there are some of the right intentions there, even if it is only to help make the best of a bad job that is universal credit.
DWP is also commissioning some work to provide basic financial education, so hopefully everything is being done to help to get most people away from needing that nannying.
Some suggests it is not national and there willbe cracks the size of chasms
As I said I think some folk do need the nannying as not everyone lives a fully independent life like a Tory MP and feels empowered by choice and options- we will still pick up the pieces
Makes no sense to not pay rent to landlord - surely it just save syou setting upa Direct Debit
Other thing is if you are skint and your washing machine breaks what do you think most folk will do when they have access to this pot
I do agree IDS actually cares and he is as good as you will get with a Tory but its still full of upper middle clas BS the likes of which dont concern folk on benefits- you can only empower folk on benefits with work or education not with a different delivery system.
How much funding for jobs or training is there? Both cut FWIW and most came from Europe any way Binners 😉
