Benefits for the well off

[lindyloo]

in reply to the person who mentioned how the new budget is going to affect us personally- well, in my case it will probably finish me off, as i have made every economy i could over the last year, and just scraped by. ( and i dont smoke drink or go on holidays or evenings out- its just me and my animals) as a self-employed person, i am going to get hit with added vat on my business rent, then the owners of the premises will deduct the extra vat on every item i sell, plus the commission they take on my sales. i will also be clobbered with the extra deisel increase, and i will not be able to hike up my prices to reflect the increase, as they are not necesities- and i am competeing with wealthier sellers who will keep thier pricing as it is now. and at the same time every single item of food, utilities and service will go up by the vat increase. so, speaking as a working, poorer member of humanity, i think this new budget is going to be the finish of me. the new tax increase is meant to make us 200 odd pounds better off per year? ha ha-that must be before we have to buy food, fuel etc. ! the budget has been made by rich and upper middle class people who dont have a clue what life is really like for a lot of people in the uk.

[jackie j]

and why not build some really affordable housing, run by councils and not housing asc.; that would create jobs and stop the councils having to pay out for private rents ie housing benefit- was anyone else shocked when they announced that as a spending cut, they are capping the amount of weekly housing benefit at £400 a week-- i ask you, what are they housing them in- buckingham palace? and who is "benefit"ing from the high rents they pay out- a certain type of private landlord

The rents down here are really high, one of my sons pays over £700 a month for a small two bed terraced house. Another one pays £364 a month for a one bedroom flat, he has a sitting room, kitchen and bathroom he is on on the third floor. All bills are extra for both of them. My sister pays over £700 for a nice two bed flat on the ground floor of an apartment block.

[Caro]

Lindyloo, I have to disagree with what you're saying. you can't just broad brush everything.

jackie i, i think the problem with the person i was talking about is that the local council takes off so much against the rent. but i agree with everything you say in your posts. the government parties are all saying that the welfare system needs a radical rethink, but they really just wheel out the same old stuff, and as you say , the rich get rich and the poor get poorer.

What do you base this on? I've just used the BBC calculator and OH and I will be £1800 per annum worse off.

yes there are scroungers, but i think most people are just doing the best that they can do in the situation they find themselves in- and not everyone is created equal; we dont all have the same gifts and strengths. and i dont think the problem is benefit system being too generous, i truly think the problem is that the wages are too low. the entire financial world is out of kilter on a very basic level.

Higher wages leads to higher spending, leads to high inflation, leads to higher costs, leads to boom and bust cycle all over again - all the numbers settle, just higher up and we've now priced our goods out of the global market.

back to my theory- if the top ups were paid to companies, not only would it be easier to admin, but it would cut a lot of cheating as well.

The cost of the admin would merely be passed to the businesses having to implement the system. And it wouldn't cut cheating - there are many unscrupulous employers out there. And as a self-employed person, I'm surprised you think employed people should all suddenly be earning more. And how long before people decided that company A had nice profits therefore it shouldn't be getting the top-ups? So a healthy business with a good idea and a decent profit, suddenly discovers its wages bill has gone up by 20% and it's making losses. The whole thing is just unworkable.

and why not build some really affordable housing, run by councils and not housing asc.; that would create jobs and stop the councils having to pay out for private rents ie housing benefit- was anyone else shocked when they announced that as a spending cut, they are capping the amount of weekly housing benefit at £400 a week-- i ask you, what are they housing them in- buckingham palace? and who is "benefit"ing from the high rents they pay out- a certain type of private landlord.

Not really. The councils owned really affordable housing - and sold vast stocks of it to housing associations in a bid to raise capital and save money. So, the private landlords didn't benefit from this and the councils saw it as a money saving exercise, so why would they reverse the situation now?

i definately think that the rich should have to make more cuts than the poor, because, it has to be said, some of the salaries they command are obcene, and i was brought up to the standard that with position and priveledge ( top of the pile) comes responsibility, and that includes doing as much as you can when the going gets tough. and of the rich people i know- yes i know those too- the last couple of years has hardly made a dent in thier lifestyles.

The rich are making more cuts - their NI has gone up, income tax has gone up, up goes capital gains tax. As I stated before, OH and I will be £1800 per year worse off on income tax and NI alone. And we're not rich! Just middle income.

i am going to get hit with added vat on my business rent, then the owners of the premises will deduct the extra vat on every item i sell, plus the commission they take on my sales.....

.....! the budget has been made by rich and upper middle class people who dont have a clue what life is really like for a lot of people in the uk.

I really don't understand your VAT comments. You won't suffer increased input tax at all - you claim it back. And why are the owners of the premises touching any VAT to do with you at all? They should charge rent & commission, full stop. If you have collected the VAT from customers, it is illegal for you to pay it to anyone but the taxman!

As for your final comments, I'm fed up with people villifying those they perceive as middle class. To be blunt, I'm a net contributor to our country's finances, not a net receiver. I'm not bleating about this. So why do people resent me, or make huge, sweeping comments which are blatantly wrong? I don't even resent paying into the public purse.

Rant over

[SarzWix]

Whilst I can see where you're coming from Caro, and agree with some of it, I think you're possibly taking what lindyloo was saying about wage in the wrong way.

I think (and I may be wrong) lindyloo is questioning why some jobs are so undervalued that the gov't has to top up the wages of someone working a 40 hour week to enable them to live. And this is not to enable people to live in the lap of luxury - our income is about 21,000 and that won't change at all even if/when the OH's hours go up because the tax credits will go down. Now, on the one hand, this is something to be grateful for, because the gov't ensures that we are able to survive on a very low wage, but on the other - why is it that even working full time, in a worthwhile job, income doesn't go above the level of what is considered the minimum needed to live? While someone who works in a bank can earn twice that? Why are the people who take care of our elderly not considered as worthy of a middle income as the people who take care of our computers? This is what lindyloo is talking about when she's talking about a higher mandatory minimum wage, I think. And fundamentally, it's society and its ideologies that are all wrong, and it will be a long time (if ever) before this is even considered.

So endeth my midnight ramble...

[kirsty b]

Just done the budget calculator too and based on what I and OH are earning now it says we will be £400 per year better off. Hold that against increases in cost of living, we may be a little worse off/break even I reckon.
We'll definitely have to be disciplined with our money at any rate.

However in 3 months, I will be giving up work to become a student nurse (not a mickey mouse job, and your training is on the understanding you will work for the NHS for AT LEAST 1 year post qualification) and will be entitled to the NHS Bursary. While better than nothing it will mean my OH and I will take a loss of nearly three grand a year. But we will manage - its a case of having to and it will be worth it in the end.

And as for comments about cuts in the NHS 'letting people die' is a bit simplistic really. And as someone who works for the NHS, and plans to for a very long time to come....I just plain disagree with the tone of that comment. Care of the dying is every bit as important as care of the living.

Perhaps I shouldn't reply to threads late at night on the @rse end of a not-so-briiliant day

[zazen999]

I've just done the budget calc and I will be.....



No better off but no worse off.

[lindyloo]

caro- yes, i can claim vat back on rent and and direct levies of vat charged on me by the propietors where i trade from, but only 40% of the things like deisel etc, the same as every other self employed person. the problem is- if i cant sell my stuff at a higher price, i dont have the money to pay the price hike, which would then enable me to be in a postition of claiming it back- ie if i dont earn enough i will be out of business- i cant live on paper ( vat return)

of course i want people to earn a wage fit to live on- its common decency, and, if the general population has enough to live on, they can then spare some to buy things from me!!

so higher wages force up the cost of living and inflation- ho hum- is that what has happened when a certain proportion of the population has huge saleries and bonuses , and the housing is touted at inflated prices??? well- i think it is time the little person was able to catch up. the gulf is to wide.

and caro, i am not vilifying the middle class, i am of the middle class by background, and there are a lot of nice genuine people out there. and in fact , i am not judgemental of people at all, however they get thier money. i am of the persuasion that as humans we do the best we can do in the set of circumstances we find ourselves in, so i dont look down on anyone, even if i dont agree with how they get thier money. my standards are in how they threat people and animals. it is the system which i think is wrong, and the gulf which is too wide; why shoud a man (?) who works 40 hours at a mind numbing, backbreaking job, be worth so much less than someone in a suit, sat behind a desk? its not morally right, and i have all of my life stood up for the underdog.

sarz wiz- yes, that is exactly what i am saying.

and actually it is the reason why i am self employed- if anyone is going to exploit me at a low income, it is going to be myself,, not a business who cant afford to pay it's employers a living wage.

and to be honest, i think you are looking it the issue in a sweeping way, which suits your position. the reason the experts are saying we need reform, is that we do- and reform breaks down to mean re- FORM as in take it apart and redo it a DIFFERENT way. not do it again in the same old way that suits a few people. to be honest, i question why you are so against a wage top up being paid to employers. is it because, you dont want to have to go cap in hand to the gov., and ask for help? thats what a lot of decent people, of whom i know loads, have to do.

and i am sorry but the fact is we are living in a totally false economy, and it does have to change, and people have to question why it hasnt worked, and they have to take it apart and change it at a fundamental level, not apply the same old methods as a plaster, and shuffle the same old figures around yet again- it hasn't worked, it doesn't work, and it won't work in the future either. and i for one like to think for myself, and out of the box.

[Snadger]

My kids are grown up mow, but family allowance was only payable on the second child initially, but is now payable for all children, methinks?. What is or was that about then?
I always thought family allowance was always payed to the woman in the family because certain men wouldn't tip up there pay and at least this gave her something.
The amount is so paltry, and times have changed somewhat that I have no idea what it's supposed to be used for these days?
I would have thought that abolishing this benefit and utilising the money to help the people who most need it would be a sensible ploy? Or am I missing something here?

[pigletwillie]

Perhaps if you earn more than the national average you shouldnt get benefits at all, this will then free up money so that income tax can start at 10k lifting lots of people up a bit.

[Hilary B]

Why are some jobs undervalued? well maybe because they don't produce enough income to the employer to cover the cost of employing someone to do it!
If a business can increase its pre-wage profit by £8 an hour by empploying an extra person, then the maximum 'cost of employing' that extra person needs to be under about £7.50, and the actual wage is not the whole cost, because the employer hands over a lot more NI than comes out of the wages (that is why NI for the self-employed is so high, they are paying both lots).
By the time you've also covered any auxilliary costs, the amount the employer can AFFORD to pay won't be much over £5.
If it is illegal to emloy someone at under £5.50, that job simply won't happen. It is small businesses that get the worst of this problem, because they may need 'half-an-employee' for some time in order to grow from a 1 man business to a 1-and-an-employee business.

[lindyloo]

but how can anyone live on 5.50 an hour? to be honest i think the waging rules are made by businessmen, for businessmen. and when we think of firms like tesco ( which i often shop at) who pay minimum wage, or just over , and yet make billions in profit, i think there is something wrong. aldi, for example is a successful grocery, but even 5 years ago, the checkout operators there were earning £10 per hour. if the government topped up the wages at source, via taxes or n.i., the firms could pay a living wage. i also cant help but wonder what the business propietors consider to be thier living wage, as opposed to what the employees are worth to them

back to high rents- just want to mention that my brother and his partner rent an old garden shed, which has been lined out with plasterboard, and has 1 bedrm, 1 living rm. with kitchen "space" attatched, and a loo so tiny you can sit on the loo and shower at the same time. no garden, and it costs £695 per month + council tax. they both work full time, and they are struggling to make ends meet, after they have paid the rent.

[lindyloo]

sorry - i am on my hobby horse again-just want to add also; why do they tax earnings at ( whatever it is going to be now -£ 7,695 ?) when several years ago, i read that the line at which poverty is defined in britian is £12, 000. and that was several years ago now! i often wonder why all government parties seem to encourage people to reproduce; my brother in law swears it so they have future votoers loyalty, but i am sure it is to ensure an ongoing supply of cheap labour, keeping industry and polititians happy for future generations to come.

[Hilary B]

Most small businesses that employ people, the owner gets a LOT less than he pays his employee. He probably doesn't even work out how many hours he does, and may well actually be getting about £3 an hour by the time he's paid all the csts of running the business (not including the exhorbitant NI payment demanded of the Self-Employed) His wife (or her husband) may also be getting paid a tiny amount for doing whatever odd tasks are needed, in a lot of cases this actually comes to less than £1 an hour for time actually spent.
Businesses are in business to make an income, and if the minimum wage means that the employer will be worse off employing an extra person, they simply won't bother doing it.
If society wants to ensure people are getting a living wage, then it is society that needs to make it viable, not the small business-owner; he (or she of course) is not set up to be a charity.

[SarzWix]

Nobody is saying that the small business should foot the bill Hilary. lindyloo is saying that the Gov't should pay companies the difference to top up wages where required, rather than administering a thousand and one different benefits. I can see flaws in her plans, but bankrupting small businesses wasn't one of them...

[chris]

<snip>

The idea of spending £68 a day shocks me a bit! Does that include bills? We've had to make £70 last this whole week, including fuel, dinner money and food, and there's 5 of us, plus 4 pets!

</snip>

Sorry about the late reply..

Yes, it is extremely shocking. Our average c/c bill is ~£1k/month (we use a Tesco Clubcard Credit Card - and buy everything on it, then pay it off at the end of the month.. then use the club card points we get for days out, holidays, etc.. it works well for us as we have a direct debit instruction to pay the full amount off every month.

However, for some reason - this year our c/c bills have been a lot higher. Really pulling in the reigns now, as chomping through an *extra* £1k per month on top of our usual bill is rediculous.

It doesn't include bills - we pay these as and when they come through the door (never been a fan of payment plans - not sure why..)... which makes it even more crazy. Looking at the statements, there's no lage purchases, just small things - which scarily add up to that amount.

We're trailing a £20/week budget now, to drop the c/c bill right down.