Tax Credits

Moby

mforr64 wrote: »

Moby - Benefit Street producers - Love Productions - Sky - Rupert Murdoch - ENLIGHTENMENT! Don't you just love the Internet!

Reading material at the moment "The Establishment & How They Get Away With It".

I know!:)......you're on stoney ground on this forum though! Most are right of Ghengis Khan in their politics. I like a good fraca though!

mforr64

CLAPTON wrote: »

give us a narrative of what you think a family should receive who

-one works 24 hours per week on minimum wage job
-one is stay at home
-they have 3 school age children
-their rent is 500 per month
-their council tax is 35 pm

what do you think their take home pay should be ?

Hi CLAPTON - I know it to be far more than what we get at the moment. The SAHP isn't considered in the equation - you don't get any extra for them. You must obviously know someone in this position. Their cut off point is about 38K with 3 kids. (I really shouldn't keep mentioning these figures as they are misleading - someone earlier thought we got 32k + tax credits - dream on). They must take home £8500 a year. So probably get topped up by 20k/25k depending on area they live in with the caps. Some of that will go towards paying HB & CTB so it is not all cash. The children will eventually grow up so it is short sighted & they will regret living this lifestyle. I could be a SAHM, get an extra 4K a year and hound you all on this forum!

CLAPTON

mforr64 wrote: »

Hi CLAPTON - I know it to be far more than what we get at the moment. The SAHP isn't considered in the equation - you don't get any extra for them. You must obviously know someone in this position. Their cut off point is about 38K with 3 kids. (I really shouldn't keep mentioning these figures as they are misleading - someone earlier thought we got 32k + tax credits - dream on). They must take home £8500 a year. So probably get topped up by 20k/25k depending on area they live in with the caps. Some of that will go towards paying HB & CTB so it is not all cash. The children will eventually grow up so it is short sighted & they will regret living this lifestyle. I could be a SAHM, get an extra 4K a year and hound you all on this forum!

The issue is how should the benefits system be structured so that t a family is better off working than not working or only working part time.
I take your point about the longer term when the children leave home but many people won't consider that.
If earning 8,500 working part time in a low skilled job, means you end up with nearer 30k take home, there is little incentive to work longer hours or improve your qualifications etc.
Whats the incentive for their children to bother to apply themselves at school if they think they can simply for mum and dads example.

zagfles

Moby wrote: »

I think you are right ......but they do tend to keep stum in the pub....wonder why?:rotfl:

Down the pub they're far more likely to join in political conversations - it's not like FB where you can just scroll past all the political rants and join in conversations on far more interesting stuff, like cats being scared of cucumbers and whether it's cruel to test it on your own cat! There's only so much "pretending to send an important text" you can do!

I love political debates down the pub. Reminds me of my student days, taking the p*** out of socialist workers and militants, often without them realising! But these days I've noticed most people are far more reasonable face to face than they are on FB, they'll regugurtate whatever the latest leftie trending picture/slogan/cartoon is on FB but when actually discussing the issues they'll usually either show themselves as far more moderate than they appear on FB, or else they'll show themselves to be totally clueless. But mostly the former.

The funniest one was some idiot having an argument that benefits are far too low to live on, yet when I asked him what people should get (I gave a specific example) it was actually lower than the amount they'd get! I told him this - he didn't believe me. But, being sad enough to know approximate benefit levels off the top of my head, I was certain he was wrong so asked him how much he wanted to bet. He chickened out. But it shut him up, especially as whenever he did try to speak everyone made clucking sounds :rotfl:

mwpt

mforr64 wrote: »

Thanks for your reply Mark. I really didn't mean to upset you. Thanks for the name calling. Long time since someone has referred to me being silly. Anyway call me what you will, I shall still sleep well tonight. Yes I agree - I don't like George Osborne, what is the problem with that?

I thought your post was silly, I have no idea about you as a person. Forums remove a lot of the personal element of conversation yet we all retain the ability to easily be offended (obviously myself included). So I do apologise if you feel that I'm belittling your situation or any person who really survives off tax credits. I'll just say it again that I find it unfair that someone can do less work but receive a higher income in benefits than people who work full time jobs. That shouldn't be seen as a nasty view, surely that just makes sense? I'll leave that statement at that because I think I've explained all my views in other posts.

Btw, I'm actually all for a world where none of us *has* to work long hours. I'd love it if technology reached a point where energy was almost free, the basics were almost free and we could choose something we enjoyed doing and do it part time. Not close to that yet though.

I think we may have met briefly a few years ago on HPC when you were Mark Weston. Another equally time wasting forum for those who wouldn't say boo to a goose if they were bring spoken to directly. Never mind - I'll be back at work soon. It always intrigues me how some of you can post back so quickly on here after a response. What kind of busy jobs and lives you must have - at least I've got an excuse at the moment.

Yup, that was me. Banned!

Also, you shouldn't presume to know about my employment situation

mwpt

Moby wrote: »

So why did he withdraw it....surely a man of principle would have fought for it! It was political expediency of the highest order! Many politicians do it but lets at least call a spade a spade!

Yes, of course it was.

gadgetmind

mwpt wrote: »

Btw, I'm actually all for a world where none of us *has* to work long hours. I'd love it if technology reached a point where energy was almost free, the basics were almost free and we could choose something we enjoyed doing and do it part time. Not close to that yet though.

Yes, we all want "post scarcity" but it's going to take a lot of work to get there, and I don't mean everyone on 24 hours a week on minimum wage.

kinger101

Moby wrote: »

So why did he withdraw it....surely a man of principle would have fought for it! It was political expediency of the highest order! Many politicians do it but lets at least call a spade a spade!

Agreed. He's kicked it into the long grass waiting for UC to come in (when the flack will be aimed at IDS). He's shown he has not a man of principles. He wants to be PM, so can't do anything that might upset someone. Even though former Labour chancellors have acknowledged the tax credit system isn't fit for purpose. All that was needed was a few tweeks to ensure that the reductions in tax credits overlapped more with the increase in the minimum wage.

He's now has less credibility than Ed Balls IMO. I'm sure there are some unfolded towels somewhere he should tend to.

CLAPTON

kinger101 wrote: »

Agreed. He's kicked it into the long grass waiting for UC to come in (when the flack will be aimed at IDS). He's shown he has not a man of principles. He wants to be PM, so can't do anything that might upset someone. Even though former Labour chancellors have acknowledged the tax credit system isn't fit for purpose. All that was needed was a few tweeks to ensure that the reductions in tax credits overlapped more with the increase in the minimum wage.

He's now has less credibility than Ed Balls IMO. I'm sure there are some unfolded towels somewhere he should tend to.

when the minimum wage rises to £ 9 per hour, our friend with 3 kids and doing 24hr per we will see a rise in earning of 2,500 per annum approximately
to maintain his current take home of about £30,000 the taxpayer will still be contributing about £19,000

do you think that is appropriate?

dktreesea

zagfles wrote: »

Very true. I know people of all sorts of political persuasions, all of them really nice people without an evil bone in their bodies.

But the only ones who post about politics on social media are the left wing ones, others just ignore them mostly because they know that if they dare to disagree they'd get called stupid or selfish, though in a much politer yet perhaps more patronising way! So they don't bother, they let them rant and ignore them when they post about anything political. And the other lefties will agree and they'll all agree how evil the Tories are etc etc.

The really funny thing was seeing them express complete shock at the election result! "But who voted Conservative, no-one I know support them"! :rotfl:

Yes, I remember that. I was watching Cameron in his constituency and he looked a bit glum, like he was expecting another hung parliament. Watching from Scotland a few of us thought his pessimism at the time seemed a bit bizarre. If Scotland weren't prepared to vote either for the Labour Party or the Liberal Democrats, we couldn't see the English (way more conservative than the Scots) voting them into power.


Perhaps he was afraid of losing ten or twenty seats to UKIP?


Mind you, women who might vote Conservative with Cameron heading the party might not be so inclined if George Osborne was aiming for Prime Minister. His handling of anything with figures involved makes me think he doesn't really understand accounting, let alone economics.