'Should we starve the jobless back to work?' poll discussion

liswan

carlos1973 wrote: »

I personally think that I should be given a work-shy layabout to look after. If I feel they've made a genuine effort to gain employment or attempted to improve their marketable skills then I'll give them some money. In order to do this I could stop paying Taxes and National Insurance and keep the money to support my charge.

So slavery is a live and well and living in britain!:rotfl:

carlos1973 wrote: »

I know some will be spitting pure vitriol at my opinion, but it is mine nonetheless and I won't apologise for it.
.

it is only an opinion why should you feel the need to apologies for it?

carlos1973 wrote: »

I work 5 or 6 days a week, full-time and sometimes a days overtime, for just above NMW and I am sick and tired of seeing others milking the system. I don't have a games console, large screen TV, Satelitte/Cable, pet, car, addiction (Alcohol/Cigarettes/Recreational Drugs), and yet see others who have all the above provided by The State..

oh so its the politics of greed you follow, instead of complaining about your own exploitation you attack those weaker.

carlos1973 wrote: »

If I gave up my job I would be in the same position financially as I am now, if not better as I would have considerably more leisure time. The reason I don't is that I feel it is inherently unfair to expect others to support my idleness. Unfortunately too many in todays society feel otherwise.

What about when you are sick, should we support you then, did you receive an education in school visit hospital there is a bigger picture you know . Also you are not very secure to come out with these comments while on just more than minimum wage their are people out thier looking for jobs it might be your they get. :rotfl:

educatingmyself

ceridwen wrote: »

I had a feeling I would depress myself at other peoples voting if I had a look at this thread - I voted F myself (as an ablebodied single person - who has been unemployed before now herself).

But then - I recalled that a surprisingly high number of people dont actually listen clearly/read clearly what they are seeing. So - I suspect that many people havent quite realised that the amount of money they voted for has to have £50 deducted from it for rent.

Hence - I voted F (meaning I know that they will have £100 left over after paying the rent). I know £50 per week after rent would be nowhere near enough to live on - and think it MIGHT just be possible to get by at a passable level on £100 per week after paying rent.

I know everyone should have read the question clearly and realized the amount they voted includes that rent - but I know some people wont.

The other thing is that the vast majority of people think unemployment "would never happen to me" until they realise their big mistake one day - because they have just been made redundant and it has.

Another thing one has to take into account is that there are lots of people out there perfectly capable of doing a job and genuinely trying to get one - and there just arent enough jobs going round for them to get one. What about that school-leaver that was in the Press in recent days? She was perfectly capable of getting a job - A Levels, attractive, genuinely trying hard to do so and she couldnt even get a NMW job - because of not enough jobs to be had. A lot of people live in parts of the country where they really arent many jobs to be had and its not easy in others.

£64 odd per week that is paid currently (less than that even for people under 25) is simply not enough as it is - without anyone trying to make excuses that an even lower amount would do by saying that people COULD get jobs if they tried hard enough. Sometimes - no they really couldnt - no matter what they do.

If anyone doubts that - then read some of the threads that come up on the Jobs Board and see how many threads are starting to come up with people complaining that there are so few jobs to go for and they've spent months without so much as a job interview.

I think also that some people currently in jobs have never had problems getting a job themselves because they've not had to try and get a job for years. If I had stayed in the first job I ever had (a long time ago now......) then I suspect I might wonder what the fuss is all about myself - as I might well be in it to this day. BUT - I asked for that job all those years ago (ie when getting a job was easy-peasy if you were halfway okay) and waltzed straight into it with no problem at all and didnt even have to ask for any other jobs. That was then - and this is now. In the interim - I did swop jobs and have found myself at times unemployed due to no fault of my own. I have found that unemployment can even last for months for someone like myself (and that was before things got half as bad as they are now) - and...yes...I really was trying to get back in work as soon as I could.

This is my first post and I may not have read enough yet and the answer may be here already, but does it include rent in the calculation, because if a claimant is in receipt of JSA, IS or ESA, they are automatically passported maximum housing benefit and council tax benefit? Therefore, there would be no rent to pay!

The question needs to be clearer and that is why I have not voted yet.:)

liswan

carlos1973 wrote: »

I work 5 or 6 days a week, full-time and sometimes a days overtime, for just above NMW

Working all these hours no wonder their is no job for the rest of us:(

Abida_2

minerva_windsong wrote: »

I voted for £100/week, as that covers rent, food, utilities etc - what I would consider the basics - thereby allowing people to survive but at the same time encouraging them to work.

Ok - where do you live... Alderly Edge?
I'd be happy to live it up on £100 per week.:j

Abida_2

luke666 wrote: »

In other european countries like Spain, Germany you have to work for a peroid of time before you are eligible to claim any benefits. These only last for a short duration to tide the claimant over til they can find employment.

This method of paying benefits only once a contribution has be made into the system , could in my opinion work very well to motivate people back into work.

I think this is a fab idea!:T

chocolady

Love this post it is sooo true. All these fat cats are like the spectre of Dickensian england returning to the present day, Digby-Jones will be advocating the work houses for the poor next while he is stuffing down his pork pie paid for on expenses. Where are all the jobs these people are supposed to be able to apply for anyway that is what makes me laugh - we have currently have airline pilots who are desperate and cant find work what do we do just starve them too? This stereotype of a "shameless" style character does exist but they are in the minority and one cant help but think that plays very nicely into the hands of Digby-Jones and his ilk.

yellowduck_2

i cannot describe how relieved I am to have managed to get some work after redundancy and ill health, my gas and elec have just gone up to £71 a month, despite very careful use, water rates have gone up as has local travel costs (think fares to interviews and no the job centre will only cover these if they think they are outside the area that it would be "reasonble" for an individual to look for work). My fuel, water, Tv licence and prescriptions come to £112 a month, that is a large amount to find on ESA of £90 a week let alone JSA. I can no longer afford insurance which is worrying as I live in a high crime area, the rellief of having some money coming in is great. I only have a 12 month contract and heaven only knows what is going to happen to the jobs' market during this time. I would like to see the likes of Digby Jones try to job hunt and survive on JSA without using the old boy network to help him out, I'd like to see him try to keep warm and fed during a winter like the one we've just had.....in my dreams!!

James__5

liswan wrote: »

So You would call yourself a caring humane individual would you?

Erm, yes? What's your point?

liswan wrote: »

Can I ask you what you think a commie is.

I know what a commie is and the reason I mentioned it was in reference to the posts above and because some people may think that what I posted could be the start to a communist State.

Cerisa wrote: »

James: I agree from a green perspective that people should have less children. But seriously, I don't know where you've gotten this idea that richer people are morally better.

I didn't say that richer people are morally better, I only said that they generally pay for their children to go to University. Also I was refering to upper middle class level of wealth, not extremely rich people.



Also, in reference to many of the previous posts, nobody seems to be differentiating between lay-abouts that play the system and people that genuinely want to work and are trying to find a job but can't. Many of the dissagreements would be moot if you did.

iwblue

If its fine to give £100 a week to a single person without a job then its about time thats what people with children received. God knows why we through massive amounts of cash at people with children and then expect a single person to starve. Whats good for the goose is good for the gander.

alienwarthog

Just came across this thread on a rainy bank holiday saturday...
This is an age old debate with no easy answer. Basically I think there are several different reasons why people don't work. Starving people would make some people work. I think many more would resort to crime like burglary and prostitution making society as a whole a worse place for the working person (The rich wouldn't suffer - they would just lock themselves away in their gated communities with their private security companies). The 'starving' idea would also lead to an increase in desperate people taking their own lives as well as those of their dependants.
If you look at history, since the industrial revolution their has always been some people who don't work, lack of benefits may reduce the numbers but it wouldn't eliminate them. I think many of the long term unemployed are stuck in a vicious circle. Influenced by their lack of positive employed role models and brought up by parents who have never worked, the next generation feel themselves part of an exclusive group, funded by us 'fools' who go out to work to pay for their lifestyles. They have no aspirations beyond maintaining their position within their own social group and therefore no motivation to join the job market.
I feel that I myself are part of yet another group. I am neither ashamed nor embarrassed that in my younger years I spent about 2 years unemployed, at which time I wasn't really that bothered about finding paid work. I feel that this time enriched my life, it gave me the opportunity to experience things I would not have had the opportunity to do if I had been working. I met people from a broad range of backgrounds and believe this time was an important part of my own personal growth. This time led me to my current position in which I have not claimed benefits for 17 years and have a rewarding and fulfilling job in health care.
We all have our own complex reasons for living the lives we do. It is easy to criticise people for living differently to ourselves. It is much more challenging to try to understand the reasons why this is. I would say to those of you that make sweeping statements about people on benefits, if you think their lives are so great - why don't you join them? If it's because you don't want to take money from the state, or because you want things benefits can't pay for, ask yourself why don't the long term unemployed want these things as well? I could go on, but I think thats enough for now. I'm not suggesting I have any answers, but it makes me angry when people suggest benefit claimants are automatically bad people.