Please sign This petition Ian Duncan Smith to live on £53 a week.

Dunroamin

mazza111 wrote: »

Actually, those under 25 and on assessment rate of ESA get this amount too.

Thanks for the correction.

That's normally quite short term isn't it?

Dunroamin

clemmatis wrote: »

I'd hardly call commenting here on the points in the Guardian piece "engaging" with him.

I know almost nothing about him, I admit.

I gathered that.;)

I tend to think that it's best that show biz types stay out of politics though.

Dunroamin

Morlock wrote: »

Unemployment is an intentional consequence of capitalism, it keeps the workforce keen, prices down, and ensures low wages for all. Full employment would be a disaster for a capitalist society, and in any given capitalist society it will never happen.

And yet we had comparatively full employment throughout my youth, under both flavours of government; weren't we a capitalist society then?

Dunroamin

leveller2911 wrote: »

Why? what incentive is there for a boss to pass on some of his/her profit to their workforce when they can keep for themselves.There are good business role models such as the John Lewis group but they are few and far between IMO.

I agree with regards to a "Liveable wage" being amiguous but bringing down the cost of living would benefit all in Society.I'm actually in favour of many of the benefits cuts but at the same time Government should be investing in training a skilled workforce and they are failing dismally imo...

Bit off thread topic

Although I agree with some of what you're written, no government invests in training when there' high levels of unemployment because it just doesn't make practical or economic sense. You invest in training when there are jobs unfilled because of a lack of skilled workers to do them.

guilds

Dunroamin wrote: »

I gathered that.;)

I tend to think that it's best that show biz types stay out of politics though.

Try telling Geldof that;)

mazza111

Dunroamin wrote: »

Thanks for the correction.

That's normally quite short term isn't it?

Depends on whether it gets done right or not. For my dd it was over a year because of the mess that ATOS made of it. So as you can imagine it was quite a struggle. In theory, it should be 13 weeks, when/if things are done properly.

Jennifer_Jane

mazza111 wrote: »

I have evidence that he's married to inherited wealth. Why would he live on £53 (although I still don't know where he got that figure) when he has a millionaire wife?

So is it possible that he lived on the breadline before he met his wife? Your post indicated you didn't believe that he had lived on the breadline, didn't it.

I agree with you, though, I also don't see why he would live on £53 a week (the figure was the one given in the press and on the petition that he should be made to live on that sum to show he can). He has a job.

A BBC reporter asked him if he could live on £53 a week. IDS said that if he had to he would do.

nannytone_2

does it matter?
he has already proven that he is capable of lying, by misleading everyone about which university he attended.
once someone is caught in a lie once naturally leads to people being suspicious of everything they say

leveller2911

Dunroamin wrote: »

leveller2911 wrote: »

Although I agree with some of what you're written, no government invests in training when there' high levels of unemployment because it just doesn't make practical or economic sense. You invest in training when there are jobs unfilled because of a lack of skilled workers to do them.

Government policies are reactive ,maybe they should be in front of the curve instead of always being behind it.

If they invested/incentivised the private sector to expand the skills set of the workforce with regards to new technologies etc we would lead rather than follow the rest of the world.It makes sense because you then have a skilled workforce in employment paying taxes. We don't even invest in training when there are jobs unfilled, we encourage increased immigration, you only need to look in the NHS where they travel the globe looking for nurses etc.Successive Governments want their cake and eat it.They want the tax receipts but don't want the expense of training people.

Morlock

Dunroamin wrote: »

And yet we had comparatively full employment throughout my youth, under both flavours of government; weren't we a capitalist society then?

The post-war economy was very different to the free-market economy that emerged during the 80s. Post-war, full-employment was on the agenda, but high rates of employment pushed prices, inflation and interest rates up. The emerging free-market, economic theories of the 80s recognised that, full-employment policies were abandoned and unemployment became an essential mechanism of economic control.