just stop all benefits.

grizzly1911

A._Badger wrote: »

consider whether a society where the majority receive benefits - not just at the expense of the net payers but of the poorest and genuinely needy too - is heading for really serious trouble.

Yes

[QUOTE=Forever;56558221

What would be even better is if Osbourne could actually look into creating growth. Now that really, really would help things.[/QUOTE]

That is the key solution in the long term or perhaps culling of the anyone classed as of no further use.

A._Badger

Forever wrote: »

And again, here is the benefits bill:

- Total benefits for families with children 18.11%
- Total benefits for unemployed people 2.58%
- Total benefits for people on low incomes 22.08%
- Total benefits for elderly people 41.64%
- Total benefits for sick and disabled people 15.17%
- Total benefits for bereaved people 0.36%

In the context of this, we have 5 million unemployed and only 400,000 job vacancies.

DWP has said that the fraud level is 2% ie. not a lot.

So what can we do? Make the pensioners, the ill and the unemployment live in the streets and left to starve to death?

I have also mentioned various other ways we could save money such as tightening tax loop holes, stop foreign aid, stop using our tax money to pay people to work in supermarkets which is displacing jobs and forcing more people to claim benefits, stop MPs fiddling their expenses, stop MPs being able to retire on a full pension before state pension age and pull out of the EU. We would save billions and billions of pounds on what I have said already and I am sure when I walk away from here, I will think of a few more ways to save billions of pounds.

What would be even better is if Osbourne could actually look into creating growth. Now that really, really would help things.

Let's just dispense with the 'pull out of the EU, slash foreign aid, hang expense fiddling MPs' stuff. I have no disagreement with you here.

What I take issue with is these meaningless figures. You quote them for the 'low paid', or 'families with children' or, even 'sick and disabled' (dangerous territory, I accept) as if they were gold-plated.

Yet, we know that 'low paid' is a moving target, and that the system dispenses 'tax credits' to many "middle class" families. We also know that 'families with children' includes many who could quite easily support their families if they chose to live more frugally and we know (at least we should know) the degree to which the 'sick list' is manipulated.

It isn't fraud that is the major problem (though it is an issue). It is the very idea that people not genuinely in some sort of distress should be receiving state benefit that is the problem.

And that, I suspect is where you and I will never agree.

wouldbeqaulitymoneysaver

@ABadger et al.
ACADEMIC thinking cultivating a more complex approach to the whole problems of the !!!!!! and !!!!!! behaviour on benefits is what is needed that takes in good and bad that exists in all Classes and Social Problems.
I suggest a little Self Teaching and learning to read books again with your own Questions etc might be in order, something that ANYONE can do (and my Thesis has it's flaws as well).

wouldbeqaulitymoneysaver

The working class needs to recover itself to be a Working Class Intelligentsia not be made to feel small and have their wealthier betters tell them what to think etc.

wouldbeqaulitymoneysaver

We are forgetting that Work does NOT mean move out of poverty and in work poverty with the need for tax credits.
How do you deal with pay that is a race to the bottom? is that any kind of existence.
If only there were the jobs.
Arguments for the abolition of all benefits ignores statistical facts of those on benefits and the wider problems caused by Globalization, the upward pull of money from poor to the rich, 1trn or more salted away in Offshore Accounts. The punishment of the poor who work.

wouldbeqaulitymoneysaver

I have noticed here that the economically successful and prosperous look down on their struggling counterparts.
What they should do is spreading the love and we should be discussing how to make a life under impossible circumstances.

dori2o

A._Badger wrote: »

Actually, it's just that when I read the phrase 'benefit bigots' (I corrected the spelling for you) applied to anyone who questions the current system, I lose the will to argue with what is, clearly, an ideologically closed mind.

Had you read the many posts I have made on benefits you will see that I am not opposed to reform, but not at the expense of those who a) did nothing to cause the current crisis and b) need their entitlement to survive.

If the Government want to review every disabled persons case, then as a disabled person in receipt of DLA that is completely fine with me, but to do so in a way that a) costs more money than it will save, and b) is being conducted to remove a pre-set number of people from the benefit rather than simply verifying they still meet/don't meet the criteria to receive the benefit, is quite simply unjust.

You can't say prior to reforming a benefit, we are going to get rid of 20% of claimants. That suggest either the Government believes 20% of people are swinging the lead and therefore disagrees with it's own departments figures on fraud, or they have decided, before any assessment takes place, that 1 in 5 people will lose their benefit whether they meet the criteria or not.

I have no problem with people being expected to apply for jobs and attend interviews, and be sanctioned for not doing so. What I object to is people being forced to work for free when there are on average 17 people unemployed in the UK for each advertised vacancy. If there are positions available for big businesses to have a person providing free labour to them, then these positions must surely exist for that person to actually become an employee of the company rather than just a slave.

I have no problem with the sick being assessed for their ability to work, but the assessment process has to be fair. Currently it isn't and there are thousands of documented cases where their HCP's have blatently lied on assessments to prevent an individual from receiving what the current law says they are entitled to.

What i do have a problem with is that since 2010, upon the arrival of this unelected Government, the poorest, most vulnerable in society (and the civil servants, most of whom are low paid) have been charged with the responsibility to pay back the deficit, whilst the richest in society (companies and individuals) have been given tax cuts and have the means to use various tax avoidance schemes, and those responsible for the breakdown of the worlds economy have had no sanction or recourse and are continuing to operate as they did before the global collapse.

I have a problem with bigots who refuse to accept that not everyone on benefits is on the take and won't 'discuss' in a reasonable manner the subject of benefits but instead keeps up the rhetoric that every claimant is a cheat, that the money they get is too generous, that they are scummers, that every child of a benefit cklaimant will amount to nothing and be a scummer, that all benefit claimants are obese or all smoke (I don't) or they are all alcoholics (I can't remember the last time I has a drink), that they are 2nd class citizens as should bow down to their masters who pay taxes for their benefits (or in the case of civil servants bow down to those who pay their wages).

So there you go. I have no problem with reform, as long as it is open and fair, and that those who need the help are given it.

wouldbeqaulitymoneysaver

Benefit Bashers have NO concept of what people need to actually COME OFF THEM,.
How do you get something or indeed substantial SOMETHINGS out of NOTHING.
Since a lot of Claimants are old will you explain whether we have a Society that is cultivating the older person in work whether by a Company or as some kind of Entrepreneur??

Forever

A._Badger wrote: »

I have already quoted that source. Read back.



Did I say that? No, it's what you wanted me to have said. A straw man.

What I said is that the last government attempted to buy votes by engineering the benefits system so that a far larger number of people became recipients. The result has been a swathe of society that has no genuine claim on benefits being on receipt of them.

Ironically, some of the prime sufferers turn out to be the poorest in society as quite well to do families soak-up benefits that could be more equitably distributed.




We have had the foreign aid and MPs debate already. You still have to countenance whether a society where more than half of its inhabitants live on benefits from the minority is healthy.

I don't know where you got your statistic and I just tried to Google it and have been unable to find an official source yet. Do you have one?

And I do agree that people who are better off shouldn't be receiving any benefits at all. I still can't believe wealthy pensioners can still get a bus pass and free prescriptions. Especially when compared with the under 25 year olds who are no longer even eligible for housing benefit and will be made homeless if they happen to be unemployed and without family to help them. However, these benefits for people who are better off will definitely be cut after the next election no matter who gets in so it will be taken care of.

So what do we do about everyone else in the benefit system? We need to bear in mind that we have too many old people and too many people on low wages which is making up 64% of the total benefit bill.

This is during times where we now have 5 million unemployed and only 400,000 job vacancies. These are frightening times. So what is the best thing to do?

- Removing benefits totally is a bad idea because crime goes up and less money will be circulating through the economy. We will in effect, be a third world country over night. It would be a very sad day if this ever happens and I suspect, it would result in a civil war if MPs, bankers and top management still appear wealthy in comparison.

- As the pensioners are the biggest group of benefit recipients, we could cut pensions. Actually, this will definitely be on the cards after the next election as David Cameron has already mentioned this.

-The next biggest group receiving benefits are the low waged but the government can't raise the minimum wage because they need to be low to help companies survive the recession. Housing is also too expensive but we can't lower house prices drastically because our banks may default. So there is nothing we can do about this group.

The other groups have already had a lot of cuts made and are now on the breadline.

However, I have already mentioned many ways where we can cut money elsewhere ie. foreign aid, MPs expenses etc etc if this is what you want to see.

However, to get the economy going again, we also need to bring housing prices down to sensible levels in a controlled way. This will hugely help our young, our benefits bill and ensure we remain competitive in a global economy.

But more importantly, we need investments to create growth but we are not seeing hardly anything so far. Even investing in nuclear power stations and new housing would greatly help our situation.

The reason we need investments and growth is because this is the best way to create jobs so that people can work and pay into the system rather than being sat at home and receiving money from the state.

Forever

grizzly1911 wrote: »

Yes



That is the key solution in the long term or perhaps culling of the anyone classed as of no further use.

I sometimes wonder if the benefit haters would actually like this