Child benefit to be scrapped for higher rate tax payers from 2013

lostinrates

bendix wrote: »

Am I the only one who thinks it's rather shameful that this post is full of reasonably affluent people - certainly not people on the breadline - who are feverishly working out what this change to the benefits system means to them?

A change to the benefits system should - in principle - mean NOTHING to 80-90% of the working population, and yet here we have crypto-middle class dinkies up in arms because a benefit they don't need and shouldn't get is about to be taken away from them.

When the middle class are up in arms about losing a benefit - well,that tells me there is something fundamentally wrong with that society.

No more than the rest of us working out what we can legally avoid in paying tax and getting excited or disappointed by that. Its a gut reaction and a blow I guess. People might well feel different in a few days...although a few middle class people who can well afford milk still gleefully rhyme Thatcher with ''milk snatcher'' so who knows.

LilacPixie

Graham_Devon wrote: »

This is where I was going earlier, and what seemed to me to be on an individual basis.

Say Mr Smith earns 56k, so he's not entitled to child benefit.

However, his partner, Mrs Smith works part time in Spar. She earns 8k per year, and she always been the named recipient for CB, and the CB has always been paid into her account.

Surely she will still recieve CB? The tax system doesn't recognise whether 2 people live together, and more critically, have parental responsibility for a child, does it?

Or would Mrs Smith need to notify someone? I might be missing something obvious here.

AFAIK you are right. telegraph says HH income but other sources including this site are saying its being removed if the person claiming is a HRTP. MSE newspost also says that means couples earning 80k+ will still get it as long as neither pay 40% tax.

Bizzarly that means my family will still get it despite having a household income of over 60k. Very strange.

ILW

carolt wrote: »

How does this reward hard work? Why bother trying to progress in your career or take on extra hours, if you're just going to be penalised for it.

It's clear - under the Tories, work doesn't pay.

Oh do stop moaning, on your income losing £20 quid or so a week is not really going to make much difference to your lifestyle.

Really2

carolt wrote: »

It's clear - under the Tories, work doesn't pay.

Well it does, you just don't get benefits if you earn top rate. I dare say you could not give up work and be better off. So the case would be work pays.

lostinrates

Really2 wrote: »

So it works out better if they are both part time.
But on £18K who could afford to work part time? Child care costs?

I did children aged over five, so that the hours of childcare could be absorbed ito school time, with one partner working low waged longer hours and one working 1-15 hours a week...probably very few hours.

Does anybody else imagine the family?:o:D Do the kids have names etc?

chucknorris

bendix wrote: »

Am I the only one who thinks it's rather shameful that this post is full of reasonably affluent people - certainly not people on the breadline - who are feverishly working out what this change to the benefits system means to them?

A change to the benefits system should - in principle - mean NOTHING to 80-90% of the working population, and yet here we have crypto-middle class dinkies up in arms because a benefit they don't need and shouldn't get is about to be taken away from them.

When the middle class are up in arms about losing a benefit - well,that tells me there is something fundamentally wrong with that society.

You are not alone

chewmylegoff

carolt wrote: »

Fair point - I took it as 18K as gross - but can't see the disparity being huge.

My point was that those on 18K, whom are quoted by George Osborne specifically as justification for the changes - his 'it isn't fair to expect a family on 18K to pay from their taxes towards benefits for those earning 50K' - may actually be earning virtually the same as the family with one earner on 44K and one scraping together a tiny mount of income through part-time work - eg typical working family I know (and I'd include my own family in this).

How does this reward hard work? Why bother trying to progress in your career or take on extra hours, if you're just going to be penalised for it.

It's clear - under the Tories, work doesn't pay.

this is the "entitlement" effect. you've previously been paid child benefit, so you have convinced yourself that you are entitled to it and it is enormously unfair for it to be taken away.

personally, i think it is enormously unfair that for many years i paid tax which subsidised the upbringing of your children when i earned less money than you. it is still the case that i am paying tax to fund child benefits payments to people who earn more than i do. it's ludicrous. pay for your own children.

carolt

bendix wrote: »

Am I the only one who thinks it's rather shameful that this post is full of reasonably affluent people - certainly not people on the breadline - who are feverishly working out what this change to the benefits system means to them?

A change to the benefits system should - in principle - mean NOTHING to 80-90% of the working population, and yet here we have crypto-middle class dinkies up in arms because a benefit they don't need and shouldn't get is about to be taken away from them.

When the middle class are up in arms about losing a benefit - well,that tells me there is something fundamentally wrong with that society.

If I didn't need it, if it meant nothing, no you're right, I wouldn't be bothering - but it does mean a lot to me.

It means I shall have to find more work and my children will see me even less, and when they do, I shall be even more tired. 44K to bring up a family is a tiny, tiny amount, certainly in the South East. Typical rent/mortgage of family home is going to be easily 50% of that take-home pay almost everywhere in the SE.

Children can't bring themselves up - if you create a situation where all the potentially good role models never actually get to spend time with their families because they are out woring every hour there is, is this really going to benefit the country in the long term?

I despair.

lostinrates

chewmylegoff wrote: »

this is the "entitlement" effect. you've previously been paid child benefit, so you have convinced yourself that you are entitled to it and it is enormously unfair for it to be taken away.
.

I think a lot of us will feel this, at least short time in the next few years. I even think its kinda natural. It will be more telling to see how we all feel when we are used to it...which will be well after its introduced I think. There is a good chance higher rate tax earners could, for example, plead increased cost of living at next pay reviews in profitable companies...negating the issue somewhat.

The_White_Horse

this is a disgusting manouevre. I would have been happy for it to be capped for one or two children only. I would have been happy for it to be scrapped altogether. But no, once again, the people that actually pay for this are no longer allowed it and the grasping chav filth pumping out 7 kids by 7 different fathers will continue to collect it to spend on booze and fags.

massive own goal. cap it or scrap it. don't bite the hand that feeds.

these people have lost my vote.

the people who should suffer should be (a) layabout scrounging filth and (b) public sector workers. no one else.