No point working - why not just go on benefits?

purch

The other does it - the likely result is that this person is more likely to be given the opportunity for promotion etc.

....and will be £ 270 better off.

SingleSue

wotsthat wrote: »

It is a problem but I don't think low earners spend too much time worrying about marginal tax rates. It's as much about attitude as anything - if two people earning £23,000 are offered £1000 overtime they'll only pocket £270. One decides to turn it down - it's not worth it. The other does it - the likely result is that this person is more likely to be given the opportunity for promotion etc.

My own take on it is the same as the person who would do the extra overtime, even if it meant only a small gain financially.

Money is not everything but having a good reputation, being known as a hard worker, being flexible etc is ultra important in my book. I actually made myself indispensible by always taking on the extra work, by always being willing to help my colleagues out and as a result, within a very short few years, I was a manager and earning enough to be a high rate tax payer (by age 21).

I have also been one of those who has given up benefits in the past (carers allowance and a portion of tax credits), to return to work after a short time out due to the birth of our middle and youngest son. We were initially no better off, in fact, after fuel, business clothes, tights (I went through a lot of them! Clumsy begger I am ) we were a fair bit worse off.

I again was at flexible as I could be although it was slightly more difficult because of the boys but any spare hours I got, I would offer myself for extra half shifts etc on the day shift. As a result, my pay increased, I became a senior which gave me responsibility in signing off colleagues' work and the company were flexible in return to me when time was needed for the family (always made up on my return to work).

Eventually, with pay increases and extra shifts, we came off tax credits completely...a blessed relief to be honest, I abhor government interference in our lives.

I have passed on my ideals to my boys and eldest has listened...last Friday, he was proactive and rang his boss for his Sunday part time job and asked if he wanted him in on the Saturday as the weather was looking nice and it could be busy, the boss said yes and was happy with eldest that he was willing to put in the extra hours and as a result, has given him a few extra hours....the boss didn't realise that eldest was perfectly willing to do more hours and had been struggling on without him!

ninky_2

The_Fox wrote: »

Remember Labour have not been out longer than a year now, and as much as it pains me to say it the Tories are the party for the worker. .

don't make me laugh. the tories are the party for the unemployed. not the idle poor unemployed but the idle rich (or at least those who could afford not to work even if they choose to) - those of inherited wealth, trust funds and income from assets.

quantic

Along the same theme of this thread. At work we sometimes get paid to put people into temp jobs, where they do training and hopefully it ends in them getting taken on fulltime. Most of our staff do it out of being good natured as the pay is shocking. We had this group recently, who where being trained in one of our offices and he made a complaint. I thought it was pretty funny.

He had measured the SQ footage of the room and said that it was not suitable for the number of people that where being trained in it (his claims where unfounded) but I thought it was pretty funny that he went to such lengths to stop us helping him. (If he was sent home he would continue to keep benefits but if he left he would lose them.

Why can't these morons apply this kind of thinking to getting a job instead of the other way round haha.

sunshinetours

ninky wrote: »

don't make me laugh. the tories are the party for the unemployed. not the idle poor unemployed but the idle rich (or at least those who could afford not to work even if they choose to) - those of inherited wealth, trust funds and income from assets.

What are Labour then....?

The_White_Horse

anyone on benefits (which is not sickness benefit -or whatever they call it these days - and even then, not for stress or depression disorders) for longer than 12 months and anyone sent to prison should simply be recycled.

it is the green thing to do. there are too many people. if we recycle the defective ones we can use their body parts to help real decent people and use their other stuff to help others. why should a defective be given a flat, when that could go to a hard worker willing to pay a small rent for it?

there should be an option to avoid recycling, and that is some real people - perhaps their family, perhaps a friend, a lover, a lefty do gooder - can vow to look after them from their own earned income. As long as the recyclee is not costing the tax payer anything, then that is fine.

Recycle. Do the right thing.

The_White_Horse

i also believe that kids need to be taught from a very early age that they deserve NO RESPECT and are just scum - unless they prove otherwise. they need to learn that respect must be earned. It is not a right.

Look at Jamie's Dream School. Just a bunch of idiot cretins shouting at each other coz they is not respected in it.

the headmaster doesn't help himself - calling himself Dabbs. You may as well say to the kids "look, i'm a lefty moron, please walk all over me".

Shocking that this filth thinks they deserve respect. they deserve a massive beating and a stretch inside.

julieq

C'mon, who DOESN'T agree with the white horse's post about young people? Sad to say this TWH, but you have my vote on that one.

Can we recycle anyone who sobs on a reality show too? There was someone crying because they'd been eliminated from a BAKING competition a few weeks ago. I mean, GET A F ECKING GRIP. And the next person I catch leaving a card saying the "angels must of wanted you" next to the scorch marks a Corsa makes when it bursts into flames having gone out of control and hit a lamppost due to crap driving is a candidate for full recycling with extreme prejudice in my opinion.

It all started when Lady Di Died

blueboy43

Mr_Mumble wrote: »

Yep, though I used the pension example to avoid the mention of other benefits which could lead to someone saying I was a heartless b'stard trying to steal food out of babies mouths .

The basic state pension does exacerbate the differences but you could have used almost any benefit over the past few years to show the gap between social security payments and the 'average' job - in percentage terms - fell between 2009 and 2011. The percentage terms is important for those on an average to good wage but for the low paid with kids I'm not so sure (and yes that'd take a lot of working out!).

I do think the pension example could sway decisions btw. The annual basic state pension will be £5540.60 in 2012-13 (that's assuming the OBR's 4.3% CPI estimate for September this year is correct, yes, unlikely!). Up from £4716.40 in 2008-9. Using wage growth over this period the basic state pension would be £5054.14.

For a potential retiree looking at the pros and cons of retiring in 2012-13 they'll have £485.86 more in annual income from the basic state pension than they would if it were uplifted with the average wage hike over the past four years. That's not an insignificant amount.

Now you can call me heartless for theorising about the state pension being increased in-line with earnings but I'd disagree. The genuinely poor receive a pension credit top-up. The biggest beneficiaries of the basic state pension are ladies in Chelsea and Knightbridge since they have the longest life expectancy of anyone in Britain!

You post a lot of sense Mr Mumble, but the pension example is hopeless.

As pointed out, you would get pension and your income from work.
And once past retirement age you don't pay national insurance & you get a better tax allowance.

Now an economist might start talking about marginal utility and the like, but from all the people I know working over the age of 65 - £500 wouldn't sway any from packing up their job.

At best it may persuade a few to take on a few less jobs if self employed. However the normal pattern of work for people past retirement age is to work a little less for each year past 65.

You are talking at the very margins at best.

The_White_Horse

julieq wrote: »

It all started when Lady Di Died

I read about a secretary who was still crying about a year after it happened, so her bosses sacked her. that made me laugh.

the people's princess? what did she do for the people? look at them with her doe eyes before going somewhere for lunch in kensignton, then a trip to the gym, a gala performance and then a sleep in her luxury bed. the next day, gawp at some ill people and then lunch in kensington....

there was some annoying woman on a mobile phone yesterday, saying how she loved someone, but annoyingly, in baby voice. she fell off the pavement in the dark because she didn't see the kerb. hahahaha the hateful moron. that will teach you to look where you are going.

you will be pleased to hear she wasn't badly hurt. she leapt up in that "i'm not hurt" way. but inside, you knew she was sobbing.