To work or not to work: That is my question!

Poppie68

Alot of people want family time, but they realise working to keep a roof over the familes head and food in their bellies is more important.

People like the OP shouldnt' be allowed to give up work for 'family time' and make up the sort fall with tax credits.

missbunbury

Seems to me like there's an awful lot of negativity on this thread directed towards a family where between them the parents are working 75 hours a week, is there any need?

OP - as others have said, it's your husband's hours that are really causing the lack of family time more than anything else, is there no way he could look into working more sociable hours?

elmer

When my teenagers were little I saw my husband one Sunday every six weeks due to him working full time shifts in the police and me working part time around those shifts.

we usually had less than £20 spare every week after all the bills were paid, nursery fees every term were saved up for as there was no tax credits/ We didnt go on holidays, and I cycled to work to save costs.

Im not sure why parents these days expect so much more, the decision to have children was yours and you should work to keep them.

elmer

Face1992

sniggings wrote: »

£50 a week, yeah they are rich :rotfl:

Just hope the kids don't need new shoes or want to go to a dance class.

How dare a family with both parents working expect a holiday or a night out.

If after paying all the essentials they still have £50 a week to do what they want with, what is the problem? The £50 left a week can go towards the shoes or the dance classes. At least they still have money left after paying their bills, lots don't.

I and my OH work, we pay the bills, when there is money left over we can have a night out or save up for holidays.

colleensims

It may sound harsh but......

You made a choice to have children, why should the taxpayer have to pick up the bill?

You said you receive very little help from the government. You should be grateful for everything you get because it is given to you .....as funded by people that work all day, you have not earnt it so why do expect it??

Why do people have a sense of entitlement these days? It should be about the pride of working and providing for the family you chose to have.

LisaW123

sniggings wrote: »

£50 a week, yeah they are rich :rotfl:

Just hope the kids don't need new shoes or want to go to a dance class.

How dare a family with both parents working expect a holiday or a night out.

And how dare that family expect £60 a week in child tax credits and child benefit payments on top, paid for by the rest of us?

bridgemant

I feel the need to apologise for all this confusion around my original question.

Sorry it has angered a lot of people, this was not my intention.

Blah blah blah about why should tax payers pay for you to be at home... THEY DON'T! I WORK, MY HUSBAND WORKS. EVEN IF I WASN'T WORKING, MY HUSBAND WOULD STILL BE PAYING TAXES AND IT WOULD BE HIS WAGES THAT WE RELIED UPON TO KEEP OUR FAMILY.

Yes we do get tax credits to help towards childcare. Thats all. It's £60 per week towards a childcare bill of £75 per week (term time) and £225 a week during school holidays. but to be fair, we pay a hell of a lot more than that in taxes ourselves so I don't feel I am getting something for nothing here.

Some of you seem to have actually understood my question, and for this I am grateful. The advice about shifting hours around seems to make more sense than any other advice offered.

Why some of you have felt the need to get angry with me over this is beyond me, I was just curious about how others can survive on 1 income and exploring my options.

bridgemant

LisaW123 wrote: »

And how dare that family expect £60 a week in child tax credits and child benefit payments on top, paid for by the rest of us?

We don't EXPECT it, we are entitled to it according to the Government. It's not your money, it's coming out of our wages in the first place. We pay our taxes thanks.

OldMotherTucker

There are 168 hours in a week.

A 2 parent family therefore has 336 hours to budget with - plenty of time to work sleep and spend time with the children.

Sometimes you have to be MSE with time too;)

BigAunty

bridgemant wrote: »

I feel the need to apologise for all this confusion around my original question.

Sorry it has angered a lot of people, this was not my intention.

...

Why some of you have felt the need to get angry with me over this is beyond me, I was just curious about how others can survive on 1 income and exploring my options.

Best thing is to focus on the positive posts and ignore the judgemental ones which breach forum rules and etiquette anyway.

It's hard for regular forum members to post neutral post after neutral post as we get pretty jaded by the mentality of some posters (this isnt' aimed at you, btw). I'm definately getting fatigued at some types of posts (not yours again). We should definately just be focussing on answering benefit entitlement questions and no more but most threads go off topic into personal opinion, nostalgia, social policy or worse.