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

Cerisa

Okay, you only get a portion of your rent, not the whole whack, and you have to claim separately for council tax which you may or may not get. ON top of that £45 a week is not a lot. E.g. I happen to have gotten my bills this month, which add up to £250. If I were on the dole I wouldn't be able to afford that, and I probably wouldn't have any overdraft left (nevermind any savings). So I'd have to call them up and hope they would allow me to pay £50 a month, because that is all I'd be able to afford. It's very very easy to say benefits are generous when you aren't on them.

That said I did have Daily Fail moment when I read this article http://menmedia.co.uk/manchestereveningnews/news/s/1423544_familys-11-year-wait-for-new-council-house-while-five-kids-are-sharing-a-bedroom

relaxtwotribes

nordtraveller wrote: »

why not should shoot all us jobless while your at it.

put us out of our misery!

With 4,874 posts on MSE in just 2 years I suggest you put less effort into posting on this website and more into jobhunting. You clearly have a talent for something or other.

rickbonar

alan8253 wrote: »

What did I pay all that national insurance for then?

For these worthy causes below:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1295601/Somali-refugee-given-2-1million-taxpayer-funded-house-owed-7-000-rent-previous-home.html

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1232386/Dutch-mother-posed-penniless-Somalian-immigrant-claim-70-000-benefits.html

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1231795/Taxpayers-pay-1-600-week-family-ex-asylum-seekers-live-luxury-storey-home.html

http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/news/3586390/Romanian-gangs-800k-benefits.html

I don't expect MSE to keep this post on long because someone will say it's racist though.

This just brief selection of stories every other week from the press ( and you know it's the tip of the iceberg)
Almost makes the MPs look respectable doesn't it? but you will notice there is a common theme.

tara747

Cerisa wrote: »

Okay, you only get a portion of your rent, not the whole whack, and you have to claim separately for council tax which you may or may not get. ON top of that £45 a week is not a lot. E.g. I happen to have gotten my bills this month, which add up to £250. If I were on the dole I wouldn't be able to afford that, and I probably wouldn't have any overdraft left (nevermind any savings). So I'd have to call them up and hope they would allow me to pay £50 a month, because that is all I'd be able to afford. It's very very easy to say benefits are generous when you aren't on them.

That said I did have Daily Fail moment when I read this article http://menmedia.co.uk/manchestereveningnews/news/s/1423544_familys-11-year-wait-for-new-council-house-while-five-kids-are-sharing-a-bedroom

I clicked, and had a Daily Fail moment too! She wants her kids to have their own rooms/space... don't we all love! But some of us accept that we can't afford to have that many kids OR that they're going to have to share rooms. Jog on! You have a roof over your head, for free! And youre not going hungry. Try living in a country with no welfare system. Sorry for getting so irked but the sense of entitlement in that article is a bit shocking.

BigMummaF - just playing DA here, but you say that you *have* to live in an expensive area... how come?

rickbonar

MarzipanFish wrote: »

bills:
7 internet
14 line rental / landline calls
25 gas
35 electric
food/toiletries/cleaning stuff etc:
60 tesco grocery order
70 fresh/top up shopping
TOTAL £211 per month

the food bit includes the occasional takeaway/pub lunch/bottled beer/day out at i guess £15-20 per month.
That's for 2 of us. Obviously it wouldnt halve for 1 person though.

So I am one of those who think rent + council tax + £50 is definitely reasonable for long term unemployed.


However, i do realise that it would be a massive wrench for someone used to living on a normal wage, with a larger flat/house to heat, a car etc.
I'd prefer a system that gives a larger allowance for the first 6-12 months of being unemployed for people that had worked in the past. Maybe £120 for 6 months, £80 for 6 and then £50 but i have no idea how feasable that would be.
I'm a bit torn between making a system based on peoples actual outgoings and thinking it would be best to simplify to save on administration costs and hopefully reduce people taking advantage.
In theory i would cap the extra money provided by having more kids, but in reality it would probably just result in kids living in worse circumstances rather than less kids/less wasted money on cigarettes/expensive goods.


Alan, i'm sorry if i'm being out of line here but having to borrow money of a friend just to survive seems like a pretty bad situation. Are you on a cheap gas & electric tariff? I'm paying £15 less a month having moved mine and also got £23 cashback. Moving both to scottish power gets £130 from quidco.
Also theres a lot of info on these boards about cutting expenditure like 50p a meal challenges.

I think you have this summed up very well I must say.

OK it's not luxury but it is living quite comfortably especially by standards of the pre 1970s.

rickbonar

I think the old adage of giving someone a hand up not a hand out philosophy would be good but the government don't want to do this. They could provide decent training for all forms of trades and services but just leave it to employers who only train people already with some kind of skill.

People without skills to be honest don't feel they got much choice but to stay on benefits rather than take low paid employment. It's a catch 22 and until they offer something that people can get an opportunity then it will continue. Foreign workers may be the governments answer in the short term but long term it works against the country as a whole.

We're in this situation I think because cheap of immigrant labour and they're still doing it.
By next generation of immigrant offspring you are back at square one. They should have limited but renewable work licences of 2 years and a condition that they and their children and families remain citizens of their native countries.

Serious mistakes have been made from the 1950s onward and we really could with a few law changes and special Police force to bring us back to order.

BigMummaF

tara747 wrote: »

....BigMummaF - just playing DA here, but you say that you *have* to live in an expensive area... how come?

Everyone has to live somewhere

I was trying to say that--with the considerable variation in the cost of basic living needs across the country--some people have less change from their fiver than others even when buying exactly the same products from the same retailer.
Petrol & diesel is a prime example. MrT here was 137.9 & 30 miles west, 133.9 last time I looked. Charity shop prices are still pretty reasonable one town over & eye-watering the next one again. Water rates notoriously high in the West Country & domestic fuel tariffs linked to your postcode & as for the dreaded council tax...need I say more?

Take a look on the (e.g.) Grocery Challenge thread to get a glimpse of huge differences in food prices & availability of good grocers, for a better illustration of my view-point. Yes I could move, but somehow I don't think Yorkshire et al would welcome a sudden influx of basic wage workers somehow. I am not complaining as such; the South & South-East is always considered a 'rich' area but it does come at a price, regardless of your pay grade. We have cleaners, shelf stackers & redundancies here too, so please don't class us as all being the same!

tara747

BigMummaF wrote: »

Everyone has to live somewhere

I was trying to say that--with the considerable variation in the cost of basic living needs across the country--some people have less change from their fiver than others even when buying exactly the same products from the same retailer.
Petrol & diesel is a prime example. MrT here was 137.9 & 30 miles west, 133.9 last time I looked. Charity shop prices are still pretty reasonable one town over & eye-watering the next one again. Water rates notoriously high in the West Country & domestic fuel tariffs linked to your postcode & as for the dreaded council tax...need I say more?

Take a look on the (e.g.) Grocery Challenge thread to get a glimpse of huge differences in food prices & availability of good grocers, for a better illustration of my view-point. Yes I could move, but somehow I don't think Yorkshire et al would welcome a sudden influx of basic wage workers somehow. I am not complaining as such; the South & South-East is always considered a 'rich' area but it does come at a price, regardless of your pay grade. We have cleaners, shelf stackers & redundancies here too, so please don't class us as all being the same!

Thanks for the reply. Hope my question didn't come across the wrong way, I was wondering whether you had family ties to the area etc. In any case, I feel for those on a low wage who just happen to live in an area which is inundated with rich incomers, especially if they're holiday-homers who are hardly ever there (starving the local economy of income).

ipod_killed_the_musicshop

A more relevant question would be "should we starve the jobless when there are less jobs than people?"

Gareth_Lazelle

ipod_killed_the_musicshop wrote: »

A more relevant question would be "should we starve the jobless when there are less jobs than people?"

I think that simplyfying that question results in:

"Should we starve the jobless?"

Which is pretty much what "Starving the jobless back into work" results in if their really is no work.