How Bloody Much?!

[Deleted User]

contribution based jsa is already limited to 6 months,after that jsa is means tested,smi is also limited to 24 months
add to this the fact that everybody except pensioners(many of whom get anything upto 100% discount)has to pay a council tax contribution,and of course we now have the new poll tax.. sorry bedroom tax
we used to tax the rich till the pips squeeked,now we penalise the poor,and the poorer you are the more you are penalised,its obscene

olly300

princeofpounds wrote: »

'payments to the unemployed' probably means just JSA.

I think most people, when they really think hard about it, realise that it's not so much JSA that's the big cost. It's things like Housing Benefit/LHA, council tax benefit, income support and the various disability payments.

All of which are paid in large part TO the unemployed but not FOR unemployment. Which I suspect accounts for much of the difference between the 'official' figure and the popular perception.

When you are on contributory based JSA you are not automatically entitled to all other benefits.

However if you are low paid i.e. actually work and live in an expensive area for example I live in London, you are entitled to some of these other benefits.

Finally you get disability benefits whether you work or not, as they are to pay for the extra help you need due to your disability. I know people who are blind, deaf and have mobility problems due to their disability.

One of the blind people I know had a series of guide dogs. The disability benefit was used to look after this dog. The majority of 20-30 somethings in rented accommodation in London would not want the additional cost of a dog while paying back their student debts. Now this person doesn't have a dog, they use more taxis to get around.

michaels

woodbine wrote: »

contribution based jsa is already limited to 6 months,after that jsa is means tested,....now we penalise the poor,and the poorer you are the more you are penalised,its obscene

Which is it? - the poor get income based JSA whereas the rich don't and therefore we penalise the poor?!

Is this one of those Tory arguments about a hand up rather than a hand out? If you have assets you have an incentive to get a job whereas if you don't you are kept in poverty by the availability of benefits?

BobQ

Generali wrote: »

We've had a few threads on here about people that get 'too much' welfare from the taxpayer via the State but how much is too much for an unemployed person/family/single parent who is able to work if they could find and were prepared to take a job?
....................... but people can't just rot on the dole.

I can appreciate some of the sentiments behind your arguments, but I think the problem is applying a fixed duration to the initial stage.

People are very different. Some people are very adaptable and have very transferable skills (something that everyone should try to do). When they lose their job will get a job in a relatively short period, they will be so keen to get a job that they will consider all sorts of types of job. At the other extreme, there are people who have spent thirty years in a job who struggle to find a job within their skill set and do not find it easy to re-train or take on roles outside of their comfort zone. In between there are people who to varying degrees are more or less flexible or have more or less transferable skills.

I am not suggesting that people who have skills with limited transferability or who are inflexible should be allowed to maintain this position and remain on benefits, just that a one size all approach is arbitrary. Personally I think that if someone is doing their best to get a job its wrong to start to punish them for failure based on an arbitrary time limit. If you do this you may incentivise them only to take cash in hand jobs or even turn to crime.

grizzly1911

woodbine wrote: »

that everybody except pensioners(many of whom get anything upto 100% discount)has to pay a council tax contribution,

I don't know any penioners who don't pay their full rate of council tax., allowing for those that have a single person discount.

Moby

Fella wrote: »

You're correct but don't play into their hands by calling it "the bedroom tax". That is a term designed to fool the general public into thinking it's a tax (it's not) & gleefully seized upon by Nulabor.

Nulabor have lots of form for falsely claiming things are taxes when they aren't. And even more form for claiming certain slight reductions in tax are "gifts to millionaires". Wheras any 4-y-old can tell you, taking slightly less from someone is not the same thing as giving them something.

In the absence of even the tiniest semblence of a coherent policy, Nulabor are relying 100% on spin & basically hoping the public are stupid enough to be fooled by it.

I see you drew out all the Daily Mail readers from their knitting to thank you. Nulabor is now so 1990's a bit like your views...behind the times, grey and reactionary!;)

BobQ

Fella wrote: »

You're correct but don't play into their hands by calling it "the bedroom tax". That is a term designed to fool the general public into thinking it's a tax (it's not) & gleefully seized upon by Nulabor.

Many years ago it was quite common for councils to levy a rent on council houses and then add an extra levy depending on how many employed people lived there. Nowadays they are charging a higher rent by assuming full occupancy and giving benefits based on under-occupation. Same difference really its still taxation.

Nulabor have lots of form for falsely claiming things are taxes when they aren't. And even more form for claiming certain slight reductions in tax are "gifts to millionaires". Wheras any 4-y-old can tell you, taking slightly less from someone is not the same thing as giving them something.

In the absence of even the tiniest semblence of a coherent policy, Nulabor are relying 100% on spin & basically hoping the public are stupid enough to be fooled by it.

You can hair split that these are "not taxes" but in reality they have the same effect to reduce disposable income. They are stealth taxes whatever you call them. a

I am not saying that New Labour did not do stealth taxes but the idea that they are peculiar to just them is looking through blue tinted spectacles.

One of the biggest stealth taxes we have ever had has been the National Lottery introduced by John Major. Another is inflation that erodes savings and income, which as I recall has reached double digits under past governments in my lifetime although never under New Labour.

The coalition has devalued the value of most index linked pensions by allowing the use of CPI rather than RPI which is a stealth tax on many pensions now and in the future. In contrast, student debts are still index linked to RPI as are rail fares and utility bills. Additionally, the reductions being imposed on Councils by the Coalition ( by capping budgets) are leading to loads of stealth taxes via increases in parking charges, fees, refuse collection charges etc). Then you have the Coalition's green tax on all of our utility bills.

Whether any of these stealth taxes should have been levied is a separate issue. But they are all a means of covertly raising money for the Treasury or ways of saving the Treasury money.

IzzyFreedman

This is just the start, more cuts will have to happen. This will put more downward pressure on rents and house prices as the high benefit payments that have been propping them up come to an end.

DervProf

IzzyFreedman wrote: »

This is just the start, more cuts will have to happen. This will put more downward pressure on rents and house prices as the high benefit payments that have been propping them up come to an end.

Wrong.

The tax saved will go to the rich, who will buy more property @ higher prices :beer:.

H McT.

A._Badger

Moby wrote: »

I see you drew out all the Daily Mail readers from their knitting to thank you. Nulabor is now so 1990's a bit like your views...behind the times, grey and reactionary!;)

Writes our man in the 1980's donkey jacket..