More money working part time than full time? Am I going mad?

cattermole

Er no where have I said that?

fed_up_and_stressed

cattermole wrote: »

My stereotypes as you call them, why are they so different from anyone else's stereotypes?

They are based on real people with real lives......

It isn't a claim about American companies owning a lot here, it is a fact. Google Western Power Distribution and you will see they are owned by the Pennsylvania Power Company as are most of our Power Distribution companies..

Uk big six power supply. companies

Name of firm. Parent Firm Country of Parent Firm
British Gas. centrica. UK
Edf Edf. France
E.onUk. Eon Germany
Npower. RWE. Germany
Scottish Power. Iberdrola. Spain
SSE. SSE. UK


Nope not 1 american firm there....

Now for the distribution side ..to make it easier I've put ALL (2) american firms in bold

..... Nope no strangle hold there either ...

Uk Power Networks - approx 8 million customers (hong Kong based companies are the owners)
Western Power Distribution approx 7.7 million customers (subsiduary of PPL american company).
Scottish Power Energy Networks (subsiduary of Iberdrola Spanish company)
Northern Power Grid Holdings (based Newcastle Upon Tyne Uk)
Electricity North West (owned by long-term infrastructure funds managed by Colonial First State Global Asset Management(a member of the Commonwealth Bank of Australia Group) and by JP Morgan Investment Management Inc.
Scottish Hydro Electric Power Distribution part of SSE (Uk owned)
Southern Electric Power Distribution part of SSE (Uk owned )

fed_up_and_stressed

cattermole wrote: »

Clearly spending a year in the States has had a major influence on you.

I really hope this Country never ends up as uncaring and materialistic as the States

Definition of Racism- according to oxford dictionaries..

the belief that all members of each race possess characteristics, abilities, or qualities specific to that race, especially so as to distinguish it as inferior or superior to another race or races:

cattermole

That would be Americans (who are the race) not the States.

It is the system i.e. State I was referring to rather than the people many of whom are absolutely lovely and very caring as is any nation of people.

Sorry if that caused any confusion.

I meant the State was uncaring and materialist towards its people. Which is not the same thing as saying all Americans are uncaring and materialist of course they are not.

fed_up_and_stressed

cattermole wrote: »

That would be Americans (who are the race) not the States.

It is the system i.e. State I was referring to rather than the people many of whom are absolutely lovely and very caring as is any nation of people.

Sorry if that caused any confusion.

I meant the State was uncaring and materialist towards its people. Which is not the same thing as saying all Americans are uncaring and materialist of course they are not.

Then why did you write the States ? You were previously accused of saying that people from the US were uncaring and materialistic but didn't deny it until I have accused you of Racism.

I'm sorry but I don't believe you did a typo and were Refering to a "state" you have made various racist comments in the post .

Original post

cattermole wrote: »

Clearly spending a year in the States has had a major influence on you.

I really hope this Country never ends up as uncaring and materialistic as the States although in my life time that has started to become more of a reality.

I too went to the States in my youth, it had the opposite affect on me, so I guess we all draw on our own individual experiences. Through the Thatcher years Americanisms gradually crept in, small things at first but I noticed them. Now they practically own everything in this country from Asda, B&Q to our Power distribution.

I thought I had a successful career ahead of me I was quite a high flyer in my day. But that all changed when my first child was born severely disabled and our lives changed forever.

It took me into a world that I really had little or no experience of before and I've made many friends from all walks of life that I would never have met otherwise but the main thing it taught me was nothing ever can compensate anyone for having a severe disability or live limiting condition, no amount of money can do that. Anything that can make people's lives better makes us a better Society than the US will ever be.

Money also cannot necessarily buy the care you need either, that relies on caring people who work for very little often on NMW.

I do however agree that CTC were a mistake but you cannot force people to take a drop in their standard of living just like that and in particular when there is such a shortage of work.

I believe we value money far more than we do people many of whom do a lot for others for very little and that is very sad

I fail to see how a comment of

cattermole wrote: »

Anything that can make people's lives better makes us a better Society than the US will ever be

can be anything but Racist.

cattermole

So if you substitute US for North Korea (extreme example) that is racist is it?

Believing you have a more caring system is not being racist!

Anyway this has gone totally off topic - probably my fault!

If you want to debate it further quite happy to do so in DT if you want to.

FBaby

I'm not saying either people don't do exactly as you say regarding working as few hours as they can in order to claim benefits, I know this is correct. That they would be no better off if they worked full time. So I think that would follow those who say they can't afford Life Assurance would still say they couldn't afford it. (Whether they can or not is another discussion).

What I am saying is that the "system" has caused it.

That the reality is there are very few jobs to be had. So even if the system changed overnight there would not be enough hours to go around that is the reality.

You have the sytem and you have those who abuse it because they can. You are those who consider it an opportunity, you have others who are aware of what they would get under the system, but appreciate that it is not a long term solution to their lives.

As for the few jobs around... they are jobs...for those who are prepared to accept that they need to adapt to the need of the job, not the job adapting to their needs, ie. flexible arrangements, friendly working hours and a good salary...all this whilst lacking qualifications, experience, and commitment. Getting a goodjob is not a due, it is something to be earnt.

As for your rambling about the States, which started from my comment, I actually don't agree with their welfare system at all. That doesn't mean that living there opened my eyes on many things that changed my ways and life, and that I was able to experience this because my parents were able to afford it. I expect it would have been the same if I'd gone anywhere else.

Prothet_of_Doom

And the reverse of this situation is the Benefit trap, where it's not worth the hassle getting out of bed in the morning.

When I was made redundant 5 years ago, it was clear that if we used our savings to pay off the mortgage and I went from £32K to NMW on 20 hours a week, and we sold one car we'd be pretty much quids in. If we had a few more kids it would keep us going to retirement.

Fortunately, nobody is going to give a minium wage job to a Chartered Engineer, and so I went self-employed.

I think for the OP, the quiestion you need to be asking, is how can we both work part time, whilst building up joint or 2 separate businesses. In any case. How can we both earn more?

Morglin

Excellent post, and very true. :T

We can all be paragons of virtue, until something, unforeseen, goes wrong, in life.

Anyone seeking advice should extrapolate the actual advice and ignore all the judgement calls from 'armchair warriors'.

One life is not the business of anyone else.

Lin

SnooksNJ

cattermole wrote: »

That would be Americans (who are the race) not the States.

It is the system i.e. State I was referring to rather than the people many of whom are absolutely lovely and very caring as is any nation of people.

Sorry if that caused any confusion.

I meant the State was uncaring and materialist towards its people. Which is not the same thing as saying all Americans are uncaring and materialist of course they are not.

The confusion is you made a blanket statement that the States is uncaring.
If you said Kim Jong-Un is not a nice person I would agree with you. But there is a difference than something like North Koreans are uncaring and materialist because of a retail store built in the UK.