robert mugabe would be proud of cameron, bozza and osbourne, they are passing his kleptocracy course with flying colours…
…next module is serfdom and it’s uses…
…question is, what’s next??

* next after serfdom

Well how about less people, having less kids?!

But that would mean you’d have to do something about general immigration and massive Islamic child birth rates!

Can;t see hat ever happening!

This is an inevitable consequence of favouring spending cuts over tax rises in reducing the deficit: since spending on things like benefits and tax credits is weighted towards famlies with children, cuts to that spending hit families with children particularly hard. Obviously. Unfortunately, the sort of tax rises that would spread the financial burden of deficit reduction more evenly among households with and without children are ideologically off the cards.

Here’s a genuine question for our resident right-wingers: is there any earthly reason to think that a net rise in someone’s tax burden that results from a cut to benefits or tax credits is somehow *less* anti-growth than a net rise in their tax burden that results from a straightforward tax rise? And is there any reason to think that piling the burden on fewer shoulders, those of families with children, is less anti-growth than spreading it around? (E.g. we’re told it would be counter-productive to raise the net tax burden on every higher rate taxpayer by a few hundred pounds, by putting the 40p rate up to 42p, in order to raise £2bn; but’s it’s supposed to be OK to raise £2bn by raising the net tax burden on just those higher rate taxpayers with children by a few thousand pounds, by removing their child benefit. Why?)

Laughing Boy

“Well how about less people, having less kids?!

But that would mean you’d have to do something about general immigration and massive Islamic child birth rates!

Can;t see hat ever happening!”

Good grief – put two and two together, mate. If fewer people who already live here have fewer kids, we’re going to be *more* reliant on immigrant labour in the long term.

4. G.O.

This is an inevitable consequence of favouring spending cuts over tax rises in reducing the deficit: since spending on things like benefits and tax credits is weighted towards famlies with children, cuts to that spending hit families with children particularly hard.

Or to put it another way, when we had cash we could play around and help some people ignore reality. Now we are running out of cash, reality is intruding and those people who are not very productive will end up being poor.

Unfortunately, the sort of tax rises that would spread the financial burden of deficit reduction more evenly among households with and without children are ideologically off the cards.

Why unfortunately? More evenly? You mean people who massively benefit from other people’s productive labour would continue to do so under your scheme? Why do you think that is a good thing?

Here’s a genuine question for our resident right-wingers: is there any earthly reason to think that a net rise in someone’s tax burden that results from a cut to benefits or tax credits is somehow *less* anti-growth than a net rise in their tax burden that results from a straightforward tax rise?

Sure. Expectations. If we cut taxes everyone has an expectation that taxes will be low for some time to come. Investment looks sensible. If we increase taxes everyone knows that when the emergency has passed, taxes will remain high. It is therefore stupid to try to start a company or to invest. In the long run these expectations matter.

And is there any reason to think that piling the burden on fewer shoulders, those of families with children, is less anti-growth than spreading it around?

By paying less welfare we are not putting the burden on the poor. We are continuing to put the burden on the productive sections of society, we are just giving less cash to the less productive members of society. The burden remains with those who actually earn.

SMFS

For simplicity, let’s assume we’re talking about equally productive people here – mid-to-high earners making a net contribution to the tax and benefits system, but some with and some without children. We’ll save the debate about whether and how we should boost the incomes of less productive people for another day.

I take the view that the (net) amount of tax one pays should reflect one’s ability to pay. Ceteris paribus, people with dependent children are less able to pay than people without dependent children – i.e. someone on £20,000 or £40,000 who has dependent children is somewhat less able to pay than someone on £20,000 or £40,000 who doesn’t. Therefore I think the net tax burden on people with children should be lower than it is on people without children (who are on the same income). We could reduce their net tax burden in various ways – tweaking their tax code, offering them tax rebates etc., but as it happens we do so by paying a mixture of flat-rate and means-tested benefits: Child Benefit and Tax Credits.

“The burden remains with those who actually earn.”

Yes, indeed – but it has risen disproportionately for those who earn *and have children*. This is not about them continuing to benefit to the same degree from other people’s productive labour – it’s about them continuing to benefit to the same degree from *their own* productive labour.

“If we cut taxes everyone has an expectation that taxes will be low for some time to come.”

… and if we cut tax credits, everyone has the expectation that their net tax burden will remain high for some time to come. What’s the difference?

Let me put the question I raised @ 4 in a less abstract way.

Prior to this year, my family has been making income tax payments to the HMRC of around £6,000 a year. We’ve also been receiving tax credit payments from the HMRC of around £3,500 a year. As of this year, our tax credits payment has fallen to around £1,000.

Now – if that £3,500 payment had been recorded as a tax rebate, or if our tax codes had been such that we never paid that £3,500 in the first place, it seems to me that most Tories would be ruling out on principle any move to increase our net tax burden by £2,500 a year. That would “weaken work incentives”, be “a further squeeze on a middle-income family”, “stifle growth by reducing the amount of money in our pockets”, etc.

But instead, it was recorded as an item of Government spending. Therefore it’s fair game – it’s “a handout to scroungers”, “something we can no longer afford” etc. Increasing our net tax burden by £2,500 becomes perfectly acceptable.

Surely this is pure dogma? Surely there is no difference, in economic rather than semantic terms, between an increase in someone’s net tax burden that’s due to a reduction in “tax credits payments” rather than to a reduction in “tax rebates” or “tax allowances”?

Shit bring back labour they cut child poverty by a million and f*cked up the rest of us….. none of these bloody political parties could run a piss up if the beer was free.

It is time someone made the case for raising benefit payments. The rush to reduce the value and access to benefits has had zero positive economic impact and probably made things much worse than necessary.

It is the quickest way of getting money into the economy. I don’t expect it to be an easy political sell – 30 years of rightwing huffing and puffing about “spongers” has poisoned the well of common sense in this country.

But at moments of crisis like this someone has to stand up to all this stupidity and do stuff what works.

@6 – Except people like you, who are parasites, but can get daddy to get them a job.

“By paying less welfare we are not putting the burden on the poor. ”

Nope, you’re putting a burden on the rich for healthcare, social care and so on. Unless you abolish those as well. Wait, that’s precisely your goal.

As someone who doesn’t follow all the ins and outs of these arguments, it’s no surprise.
Child poverty is just normal for large parts of our society. It can’t really be any other way in a capitalist society like ours when it’s in recession.
A lot of new migrants and their children fall straight into the poverty trap, because they came here as asylum seekers or economic migrants, and life is always going to be tough at the bottom. Whether working for low wages, or living on benifits, like the African single mother of four children spoke of last night on the Channel 4 News.
Living in a council flat in inner London, how could they not be poor?
http://www.channel4.com/news/poverty-to-rise-and-income-to-fall-says-ifs

12. damon

Child poverty is just normal for large parts of our society. It can’t really be any other way in a capitalist society like ours when it’s in recession.

What do you mean a capitalist society? It is normal in any society. They are taking a relative measure. Although to their credit here they are also willing to consider an absolute one. Consider just one factor that could affect this – young people normally have more children than old people in the sense that most people have their children when they are young. But most old people get paid more than young people do. Most people get paid more when they are old than when they were young. Thus someone at 40 is rich compared to someone at 20. If you have your children at 20, you will be in relative poverty compared to when you are 40. Is that an injustice? Is that a sign society is failing?

A lot of new migrants and their children fall straight into the poverty trap, because they came here as asylum seekers or economic migrants, and life is always going to be tough at the bottom. Whether working for low wages, or living on benifits, like the African single mother of four children spoke of last night on the Channel 4 News. Living in a council flat in inner London, how could they not be poor?

Very easily. A lot of migrants start out in council flats but they do not stay there. They work their way out and up. We have a problem with the White underclass and some ethnic communities. They stay there. But most migrants do not. I am not sure how a single African mother will turn out. African-born children often do well at school so I suspect it will not be a trap for her. But who knows?

And what was remotely desirable or in any way beneficial to Britain to allow an African single mother with 4 fucking kids into the country?

What a bad joke.

And if she’s in boo hoo, nasty English people not giving me enough, ‘poverty’ she can always vanish back to her life of luxury in Africa. And take her benefit system draining kids with her.

Oh sorry…Not ‘liberal’ enough for yer.

I love the way that grumpy people say things like “sorry, not liberal enough for yer” as if it makes them some kind of rebel, instead of just someone who isn’t a liberal (but is it extremely grumpy).