Tax Credits

dktreesea

mwpt wrote: »

Sorry, I lived in a very poor country for several years. I know what real poverty looks like. I just can't quite bring myself to feel the gut wrenching amounts of grief that the left would have from me for minor cuts to a pretty generous social service, providing a quality of life that is far above what most of the world could ever dream of. The amount of venom the left generates in this country (my adopted country btw) leaves me completely dumbfounded at times.

I'm not sure the purpose of welfare here is just to alleviate poverty. If it were, then we wouldn't have over crowding, sub standard housing, homeless people with neither shelter nor income, and a whole host of other ills that welfare should take care of.


Instead providing generous money to the poor is a way of keeping them in their place. By making them dependent on the state, the state has greater control over them (the sanctions regime, for instance) and the fact that they have access to money (provided they are not sanctioned) helps the middle and upper classes, or should I say the moneyed classes, feel safe.


It means the relatively well off don't have to act, don't have to take responsibility in the "Big Society" way Cameron would like to see in action, for the plight of their fellow man.

CLAPTON

dktreesea wrote: »

I'm not sure the purpose of welfare here is just to alleviate poverty. If it were, then we wouldn't have over crowding, sub standard housing, homeless people with neither shelter nor income, and a whole host of other ills that welfare should take care of.


Instead providing generous money to the poor is a way of keeping them in their place. By making them dependent on the state, the state has greater control over them (the sanctions regime, for instance) and the fact that they have access to money (provided they are not sanctioned) helps the middle and upper classes, or should I say the moneyed classes, feel safe.


It means the relatively well off don't have to act, don't have to take responsibility in the "Big Society" way Cameron would like to see in action, for the plight of their fellow man.

once scotland is independent, the SNP will turn the money tree on and every single scot will have a 4/5 bed house with a nice garden: all maintenance, gas, electricity and furnishing will be provided free from th money tree and no-one will need to work.

antrobus

dktreesea wrote: »

...Instead providing generous money to the poor is a way of keeping them in their place. By making them dependent on the state, the state has greater control over them (the sanctions regime, for instance) and the fact that they have access to money (provided they are not sanctioned) helps the middle and upper classes, or should I say the moneyed classes, feel safe. ....

Or, if you were being really cynical, more inclined to vote for whichever party promised the continuance of this largesse.

Bread and circuses.

dktreesea

CLAPTON wrote: »

once scotland is independent, the SNP will turn the money tree on and every single scot will have a 4/5 bed house with a nice garden: all maintenance, gas, electricity and furnishing will be provided free from th money tree and no-one will need to work.

They'll have to ask the deer to move over then, because the only place there would be decent land for such largesse is North West Scotland.


There are places in Scotland where it is possible to be able to afford to buy a 4 bedroom house with freehold land on a NMW FT income.

Moby

mwpt wrote: »

Sorry, I lived in a very poor country for several years. I know what real poverty looks like. I just can't quite bring myself to feel the gut wrenching amounts of grief that the left would have from me for minor cuts to a pretty generous social service, providing a quality of life that is far above what most of the world could ever dream of. The amount of venom the left generates in this country (my adopted country btw) leaves me completely dumbfounded at times.

You cant claim any special experience of what poverty looks like. Many people have experiences of poverty including in different parts of the world. This is about how a policy is introduced and is also about the distribution of wealth and resources within this country at this time. He got it very wrong. Regarding generating venom.....it depends where you stand doesnt it? I see the right as generating discord and promoting a culture of blame in which people are quite happy to judge others. This thread is full of such commentary.....its Government by division.......its all about hard choices......etc etc.......which are fair as long as the consequences are experienced by someone else.

antrobus

Moby wrote: »

....which are fair as long as the consequences are experienced by someone else.

Wouldn't that be pretty standard rhetoric for the left? Aren't they always promising some wonderful great leap forward in government spending to be paid for by some magic tax on someone else?

Generali

Moby wrote: »

You cant claim any special experience of what poverty looks like. Many people have experiences of poverty including in different parts of the world. This is about how a policy is introduced and is also about the distribution of wealth and resources within this country at this time. He got it very wrong. Regarding generating venom.....it depends where you stand doesnt it? I see the right as generating discord and promoting a culture of blame in which people are quite happy to judge others. This thread is full of such commentary.....its Government by division.......its all about hard choices......etc etc.......which are fair as long as the consequences are experienced by someone else.

You may not like it very much but people don't need to be encouraged to take these stances you dislike so much. The majority opinion is that welfare is too easy to get and too generous.

mwpt

Moby wrote: »

You cant claim any special experience of what poverty looks like. Many people have experiences of poverty including in different parts of the world. This is about how a policy is introduced and is also about the distribution of wealth and resources within this country at this time. He got it very wrong. Regarding generating venom.....it depends where you stand doesnt it? I see the right as generating discord and promoting a culture of blame in which people are quite happy to judge others. This thread is full of such commentary.....its Government by division.......its all about hard choices......etc etc.......which are fair as long as the consequences are experienced by someone else.

The thing with the left is that you attribute to malice as a first point of call. Most people who believe austerity is necessary and/or voted conservative most likely believe it is necessary for the long term well being of the entire country, not just the bottom 10%. But it also includes the bottom 10% long term.

You have three choices regarding these people.

1) They are correct. In which case, all the venom the left generates against them is wrong.

2) They are incorrect, but believe they're correct for the right reasons, and actually mean well for everyone. The venom the left generates against them is extremely unhelpful and I believe toxic.

3) They are correct/incorrect but don't really care which because they just dislike the poor. You can bash these guys as much as you like.

Out of all of these options I think (3) must be by far the minority, yet reading all social media commentary by the left, you'd think it was by far the majority.

And btw, I don't claim to have special experience regarding poverty. I'm just one of many billions who have seen real poverty first hand, not the faux UK poverty claimed by a reduction in benefits to a person working part time such that they still earn more than my teacher partner who works all hours of the day and weekend.

gadgetmind

Pennywise wrote: »

Social engineering at it's worst.

Oh, the irony!

dktreesea

Generali wrote: »

You may not like it very much but people don't need to be encouraged to take these stances you dislike so much. The majority opinion is that welfare is too easy to get and too generous.

But surely that's to be expected? The vast majority of working people don't receive any direct welfare, including tax credits. Someone who gets to the end of their year, receives no welfare and has paid income tax of, say, £6k is hardly going to be overjoyed at the thought of the family next door working 24 hours a week and netting more than them.


Even if these people have had children in the past, a lot of them will not have benefited very much from child tax credits, if at all, because they were only introduced 12 (? someone correct me if I'm wrong) years ago. Even when they were introduced, a lot of working people with children might have only got £10 a week from them, due to their earnings.


Welfare is meant to be "just in case". So we all pay for schools, the NHS, the roads, the police, the fire department, on the basis that we may want to use their services at some point, but until we do, we don't directly benefit from that spending.


"Just in case" you can't get work isn't the same as "just in case" you only fancy working a few hours a week/can't be bothered to work hard enough in your business so it supports you/would rather go on the sick than work.