Poverty rate among working households in UK is highest ever

potatolord · 27 May 2021 at 11:47

I am resisting the temptation to go through a load of ONS data...

I'd be interested to see how this plays out by region.

Freakbro · 27 May 2021 at 11:49

Uther said:
Because a lot of working people are also on benefits perhaps. I'm sure there's a crossover point where it absolutely isn't worth getting out of bed in the morning to go to work.
edit. Just looked at Universal Credit, when you work and claim they take 63p in every pound you earn off your UC. Can't blame people for not bothering.

I knew someone was going to reply with that after I posted

Of course yes, we have in work benefits, but the recent posts seemed to be talking about the completely unemployed.

The whole point to UC was to provide a tapered benefit to make it worth working, rather than the cliff edge of benefits previously that really did discourage people either enetering or increasing the amount of work done. But everything I've heard about UC makes it sound like it hasn't worked either :-/

PlacidCasual · 27 May 2021 at 11:51

D.P. said:
you obviously don't understand statistics so ypur opinion on the definition of relative poverty is meaningless

Fair challenge misread median as mean, should have taken more care. I'm, still not convinced the 60% of median income is a useful measure.

Puzzled · 27 May 2021 at 11:57

Energy prices are going up this year, as are many other household costs. Its only going to get worse sadly.

potatolord · 27 May 2021 at 12:00

PlacidCasual said:
Fair challenge misread median as mean, should have taken more care. I'm, still not convinced the 60% of median income is a useful measure.

Only for a given value of "useful".

I'm not sure how much regional disparities cloud the usefulness of a national figure. i'm not clear whether that is in the calculation there.

I didn't see a link to the source report in the article- typical Guardian, really...

PlacidCasual · 27 May 2021 at 12:17

https://www.ippr.org/files/2021-05/no-longer-managing-may21.pdf

Minusorange · 27 May 2021 at 12:31

robfosters said:
Smoking is a good example. A pack a day smoker spends nigh on £310 a month on smokes. I have no sympathy for smokers who plead poverty. £310 could buy you a months worth of good food and children’s clothes.

There's a big issue seller outside our Aldi everyday, I've spotted them a few times trying to hide out of sight having a sly smoke, I'm just left shaking my head

In my opinion poverty is 90% down to poor lifestyle choices and people trying to live beyond their means, it can be solved but requires effort

413x · 27 May 2021 at 12:33

This is the ongoing issue isn't it.

If you have a minimum wage job and want kids it's absolutely better to get on benefits.

Which means you have kids being brought up in that environment. Where people who work but on the average/low salaries get punished most.

This must be really shifting demographics. I mean it really puts pressure on that middle rung to not have kids. Or out kids off.

Be interesting to see if this is what it's happening

Hagar · 27 May 2021 at 13:01

Mainly down to Gordon Brown gerrymandering the tax and benefits system and all he did was create a massive benefit economy that is hard to row back from. Companies did used to pay living wages but when a large proportion of household income was in "in work" benefits "in work pay" dropped back so that people had to rely on these benefits to live.

It may have been with good intentions but it was a **** up.

Pipe & Slippers · 27 May 2021 at 13:03

Minusorange said:
In my opinion poverty is 90% down to poor lifestyle choices and people trying to live beyond their means, it can be solved but requires effort

My OH, a lifelong Labour supporter, worked @ CAB for 8 years followed by a 4/5 years for 2 national charities, and she came to the conclusion that there are many folks who, for whatever reason, just can't function in society. How high a %age that represents, I don't know

I heard a shocking story from one of her friends. She was doing a pilot scheme to help families identified at some sort of risk (I think it was a government initiative of some kind). 5 days a week she visited the same family. The routine was arrive @ 7:30, get the 2 kids out of bed, get them dressed and fed, and off to school by 8:45, and then chuck yesterday's clothes in the washing machine so the kids had clean clothes for the next day. All the while the mother was sat in the kitchen, smoking, and looking out of the window. The father was sat in his boxers and a vest on the sofa, playing on the xbox, also smoking. After that she's sit with the parents (if they were talking to each other) and try and help them plan the rest of their day in terms of shopping, cooking, cleaning, managing their money, paying their bills etc. She'd leave by 10. After 10 weeks the support stopped because nothing was changing. The parents were quite happy to let her do the kid stuff and breakfast in the morning and listen to her advice for another hour or so, but apart from that, they didn't want to change. What did they do during the day? Window and smoking for her and xbox and smoking for him. She felt like she was providing free home-help for them, while her own kids were getting themselves up, fed, and off to school without her - she thought it was only rich people who had a nanny for their kids!

How do you help people like that? Throwing more money at them is not the answer, but neither is providing massive levels of v expensive support, so you are left with muddling along as we have been for years, because there are no easy answers

[I realise this is all slightly off-topic]

LeMson · 27 May 2021 at 13:17

MadMossy said:
The issue is the housing costs and general expenses are going up at an alarming rate, yet incomes are not.

The average single person on minimum wage working part time, has zero incentive to work longer hours, the income they receive from part time work ~£750 a month, and the benefits they receive through universal credit ~£350 a month is just too good. Instead of working 20 hours a week, they would need to work 40-50+ hours just to offset the money they get through benefits, in reality they are worse off as they lose their family time. Would someone rather work 2-3 days a week and spend time with the kids, or work 5-6 days a week and rarely get time to see their kids. Financially they will still be in the same position.

Whats the solution to that though as there is no easy fix. Remove benefits then you plunge millions of people into severe poverty? Lower housing/living costs won't solve the problem either, just move the goal posts, higher wages? That will just force the living costs higher.

UC is 400 a month, it goes down as you earn upto that 400. Or have I ballsed up my UC claim cos I'd love to be able to claim the full amount whilst earning 750 on top ^_^

explicit4u · 27 May 2021 at 13:20

Pipe & Slippers said:
How do you help people like that? Throwing more money at them is not the answer, but neither is providing massive levels of v expensive support, so you are left with muddling along as we have been for years, because there are no easy answers

[I realise this is all slightly off-topic]

Well providing massive levels of expensive support is the answer, it just appears to be unpalatable with the current electorate. The irony being that it's infinitely more expensive to let social problems like this pass from generation to generation, than it is to invest in the solutions to the problems.

danoliver1 · 27 May 2021 at 13:23

Why is it the people who can't afford to have kids seem to have the most?

Minusorange · 27 May 2021 at 13:25

Pipe & Slippers said:
How do you help people like that?

Universal basic income, you get enough to live off, want more ? Get a job, don't want to work ? tough ****, no extra safety nets from breeding

You need to break the toxic cycle, that's how you help them by not helping them

Means tested pregnancy licenses could be a thing too, prove you can look after yourself and can afford a child before being allowed to have one, otherwise it's down to the forced abotion clinic, yes it sounds harsh but it's clear there's a lot of people who lack the responsibility/intelligence to make these choices for themselves and bringing up children in these toxic environments is borderline child abuse to be honest

Ayahuasca · 27 May 2021 at 13:28

Minusorange said:
Means tested pregnancy licenses could be a thing too, prove you can look after yourself and can afford a child before being allowed to have one, otherwise it's down to the forced abortion clinic

I hope that's satire, pretty grim if people still believe in this kind of government intervention.

Minusorange · 27 May 2021 at 13:32

Ayahuasca said:
I hope that's satire, pretty grim if people still believe in this kind of government intervention.

So allowing idiots to breed and let their kids starve is a better alternative ?

explicit4u · 27 May 2021 at 13:32

Minusorange said:
Universal basic income, you get enough to live off, want more ? Get a job, don't want to work ? tough ****, no extra safety nets from breeding

You need to break the toxic cycle, that's how you help them by not helping them

Means tested pregnancy licenses could be a thing too, prove you can look after yourself and can afford a child before being allowed to have one, otherwise it's down to the forced abotion clinic, yes it sounds harsh but it's clear there's a lot of people who lack the responsibility/intelligence to make these choices for themselves and bringing up children in these toxic environments is borderline child abuse to be honest

The first part of your post helps create those toxic environments.

200sols · 27 May 2021 at 13:34

Minusorange said:
Means tested pregnancy licenses could be a thing too, prove you can look after yourself and can afford a child before being allowed to have one, otherwise it's down to the forced abotion clinic,

I'm going to invoke Godwin's law and say this sounds a bit Nazi like.

Minusorange · 27 May 2021 at 13:34

explicit4u said:
The first part of your post helps create those toxic environments.

Evidence, because there's been relatively few trials of a Universal basic income in an actual meaningful sense

Benefits create these toxic environments but a UBI is different to benefits

Minusorange · 27 May 2021 at 13:38

200sols said:
I'm going to invoke Godwin's law and say this sounds a bit Nazi like.

Not really, Nazi would be euthanizing the parent too