Budget hits the poorest hardest, says IFS

blueboy43

Generali wrote: »

It is a projection for 2010 and the figure should be 53% not 52% (link), I was out by 1% due to my faulty recollection.

Government spending = £772,000,000,000
GDP = £1,451,000,000,00

772/1451 = 0.532 or 53.2%

The numerator you have used is net public debt (£771bn 2010).

Shouldn't it be total Government spending (£661 bn 2010) ?

This gives 661/1457 which is 45.3%.

Generali

blueboy43 wrote: »

The numerator you have used is net public debt (£771bn 2010).

Shouldn't it be total Government spending (£661 bn 2010) ?

This gives 661/1457 which is 45.3%.

Whoops!

I stand corrected.

In that case for the above read a drop in income of 13.25% not of 25%

blueboy43

Generali wrote: »

Childcare costs are expensive and that is a problem (I am a father of 2) but as at present single mothers aren't counted as unemployed for the most part that isn't going to be a factor in trying to get unemployed people back to work.

Its pretty questionable whether there should be so much effort spent trying to get single mum's back into work (particularly those with very young children). Childcare is expensive for under 3's as it is very labour intensive

Shakethedisease

So I'm right then, single mothers aren't currently included in the 2,500,000 unemployed

Childcare costs are expensive and that is a problem (I am a father of 2) but as at present single mothers aren't counted as unemployed for the most part that isn't going to be a factor in trying to get unemployed people back to work.

They will be in October 2011. And they certainly will be a BIG part of getting the unemployed 'back to work'.. since they'll make up a fair proportion of it. Hence my misgivings that government will penalise these people after 12 months of unemployment by reducing their benefits further, LHA in particular, when we both know childcare is prohibitive. Let's remember these are people with children to feed, clothe and house, whatever anyone's thoughts on their personal circumstances.

Oh and if you don't mind.. it's single parents..

Childcare is expensive for under 3's as it is very labour intensive

Childcare is expensive whatever the age of the child is. And getting a job to fit in with the summer holidays, easter, bank holidays etc etc will be next to impossible in the current climate.

Would you be happy to see your disposable income cut by 25% to maintain the status quo or do you think someone else (The Rich for example) should foot the bill?

Of course I wouldn't be happy. But if needs must, and we really ARE in it together. I'd accept it without too much complaint. I wouldn't like to see anyone 'hit' harder than I am, and certainly wouldn't want to see the most vunerable and worst off already groups in society hit even harder.
Especially the children already here ( not the debate of only having em when you can afford them et al).. no, the children here already I wouldn't want to see suffer.

Living on benefits is crap enough as it is. Why would I want to see them suffer more so I can have an extra £50 a week to spend on shoes or whatever (if we're talking disposable income)..?

Would you ?

Their only hope is a private sector boom and childcare costs reduced to the more acceptable levels our European cousin's enjoy. But that might be a long time happening..if ever.

ps

called your stereotyping grubby rather than you grubby strictly speaking but I didn't mean to cause offence and am very sorry if I did so

No problem.:)

Generali

Shakethedisease wrote: »

T
Of course I wouldn't be happy [with a 25% cut in disposable income]. But if needs must, and we really ARE in it together. I'd accept it without too much complaint. I wouldn't like to see anyone 'hit' harder than I am, and certainly wouldn't want to see the most vunerable and worst off already groups in society hit even harder.
Especially the children already here ( not the debate of only having em when you can afford them et al).. no, the children here already I wouldn't want to see suffer.

The problem is, people don't want to see the kiddies suffer, not even a poor-people hating Tory like me. Also, people don't want to support people (mostly women) who appear to be having kids in order to keep getting benefits and housing from the state. It's a hard circle to square.

FWIW it could be worse, over here druggies have kids for the baby bonus of about $8,000. The kids are taken off them at birth but they still get the money!

Entertainer

Rochdale_Pioneers wrote: »

Its an interesting one. The Tories spend years lauding the IFS for the work they do in exposing "the truth" in Labour budgets. When Brown had a habit of having nice headlines with a hidden sting, they always quoted the reliability of the IFS in digging behind the numbers. Osborne himself even referenced his budget to them when delivering it - no need for their work, here are the details!

And yet the IFS do their usual work, dig behind the numbers and demonstrate categorically that the budget does the polar opposite of what Clegg claims. Osborne latched onto Clegg's comments about it being progressive and the whole government has been parroting that ever since.

Except of course that it isn't, so now they have to attack the IFS for doing exactly what they spent years praising it for - exposing the truth. According to Clegg "It does not include the things we want to do to get people off benefits and into work".

Hmmmm. The work point is hilarious 2.5m jobs would be created they said, nonsense said the HR indusry Nonsense now says the Bank of England et al pointing out that the budget makes it more likely than not that we get a double dip recession. Moodys now points out that this - not our deficit - is threatening our AAA rating. Remember how Osborne said before the election that protecting the rating would be at the centre of economic policy? They point out that the deficit was dropping thanks to growth - growth now threatened by the budget. So what will the government be doing to create jobs when not only does the budget directly threaten yet more jobs, but they're cutting funding to the various agencies and charities that create jobs?

And benefits? Yes, the IFS shamefully failed to factor in the impact of IDS's changes to the benefits system. The changes that as widely reported he is having to fight a serious battle with the Treasury over to keep in play.

From the Tories, no surprise. A budget to hammer the poor to deliver ideological permanent cuts isn't exactly unexpected. For their voter base who like that sort of thing I can see it being popular as it was in the 80s. And you have to admire the speed at which they are going about things - compared to the paranoid nervousness sown by Blair in the early days of his government, Cameron's administration has been a revelation.

No, the criticism on every news comments board and web forum all seems to be aimed at the LibDems. And what a surprise. Clegg continues to read off Oik's script despite the reality being so cruelly exposed. He sold the budget to a sceptical party on the basis that it was helpful to the poor. Thats been exposed as a blatant lie. He is getting serious form for blatant lies now (yes I changed my mind on cuts but didn't tell my party colleagues and campaigned on the opposite).

So, with respect to comments about the thread being pathetic or partisan, lets just look at the facts. The IFS have a reputation for doing exactly that and consistently deliver the same critique of budgets whoever writes them. To attack them is to attack reasoned argument. But here's the thing. Were it not for the LibDems I'd expect the Tories to laud the fact that the budget hammers the (no good !!!!less scrounging) poor - thats their thing. Another thing Clegg is screwing up.

I don't exactly think it's hammering the poor as the percentage income drop is virtually the same for the lowest decile and the upper decile. And that doesn't take into account some of the tax rises like CGT and the fact that housing benefit cuts are not cuts in living income merely encouraging people in to living in cheaper accomodation. But I agree that the "fairness" "progressive" hype from the Lib Dems was never going to stand scrutiny. This is a budget where everyone is going to pay and for a long time to come and there's no use soft soaping the issue. Why politicians continue to come out with hand wringing "I feel your pain" words is beyond me.

LydiaJ

Janet Daly has written about this in the Telegraph.