Capping benefits at 4 kids?

tom9980

cleggie wrote: »

I think it should be capped at the amount of children you have when you first need to claim benefits (taking into account if someone is pregnant at that time obviously).

What if someone gets ill at a young age and has no real chance at a job but is capable of managing a child or two in the future with a few reasonable adjustments? what if that person was to bring that child up to be a good, honest young person who would benefit society in a meaningful way?

Having said that there should 100% be some form of cap and i personally think 2 children can be claimed for at a time and thats it, until that time they should start with a higher cap reducing it every 2 years to help people plan.

Gloomendoom

I would support a two child cap. I can see why people would want a system where benefits are capped at the number of children you have when you start claiming but, in my opinion, it would be open to abuse.

nottslass_2

The problem with this idea is that we,as a society could be unfairly subjecting children to a life of poverty.



In an ideal world no one would have more children than they can afford,but what happens if you can quite comfortably afford to have maybe 3 or 4 children and then suddenly you loose your income,through illness,berrevement,redundencie or a buisness failing ?


What would actually happen is that the "!!!!less few" (who breed knowing that the tax payer will foot the bill )will simply stop at 2 kids, but will still spend years living off the tax payer, Yet Someone who has spent the last 20 or 30 years working and paying into the system & unfortunately loses their income ,will be having to send their "excess kids" off to the work house because they literately cannot afford to feed them.

I agree that their a flaws in the benefits system,but is it really humane for children of today to be subjected to living in poverty ?

tea_lover

tom9980 wrote: »

What if someone gets ill at a young age and has no real chance at a job but is capable of managing a child or two in the future with a few reasonable adjustments?

If someone can bring up children, then they can work (at least in some capacity). There are so many adjustments that can be made to the workplace, and so much work that can be done from home now too.

If someone is genuinely so incapacitated that they cannot do any form of work, how on earth would they manage "a child or two"?

CH27

I think capping it at two children is a good idea.

Lotus-eater

nottslass wrote: »

The problem with this idea is that we,as a society could be unfairly subjecting children to a life of poverty.



In an ideal world no one would have more children than they can afford,but what happens if you can quite comfortably afford to have maybe 3 or 4 children and then suddenly you loose your income,through illness,berrevement,redundencie or a buisness failing ?


What would actually happen is that the "!!!!less few" (who breed knowing that the tax payer will foot the bill )will simply stop at 2 kids, but will still spend years living off the tax payer, Yet Someone who has spent the last 20 or 30 years working and paying into the system & unfortunately loses their income ,will be having to send their "excess kids" off to the work house because they literately cannot afford to feed them.

I agree that their a flaws in the benefits system,but is it really humane for children of today to be subjected to living in poverty ?

I agree, it's like many ideas, great in principle, until you start working out the details.

You can't have politicians saying they are going to wipe out child poverty (apparently now not having a 3DS means a child is in poverty) in one speech and then talking about capping benefits at 2 kids.
It just doesn't work.

Caroline_a

Some years ago when I worked with long-term unemployed I had it said several times to me that a decision had been made to have another child 'because we need more money'. I always thought this was appalling (and said so) but because the system allowed it to happen more than the people who took advantage of it. I do seem to remember that this type of capping happens in other countries (I seem to think Canada, but not sure), so it wouldn't be a new idea.

thatlemming

I'd support a two child cap. (with exceptions for people who end up having twins the second time etc)

Lotus-eater

Interesting to see people on here saying one thing on this thread.
https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/3641471

And another thing on here.

It seems the criteria needed to get extra help is down to the niceness of the people involved?

Who does the judging then?

Soubrette

If we were in a system with capped child benefit then people would have to take out insurance in case they lost their jobs etc.

The difficulty is trying to impose a new system on our society where there is an expectation that when times are harder, the state is there to catch you.

Personally I would do away with all child related benefits, it's not like the 50s where the husband worked and may refuse to give his wife any housekeeping. Children are too precious to take the chance that a small minority will use them as an income.