Child Benefit

Obliq

Tim Robbins wrote: »

Similar situation - we have 2. 3 would be too much of a stretch financially and it also irks me that some people pop kids out without really thinking about how they are going to provide for them. In many cases, they screw the system. Pretend they are on their own to get some support from HSE (which is about 20 times what child benefit is) and then live with the boyfriend.

Well, the reason I don't live with my boyfriend is that we can't afford to. I'm sure there are stupid people who take the risk of getting caught so as to avail of benefits but you can safely rule out rural dwellers anyway. People living this way here are routinely caught, as everyone knows your business and who is living with whom.
Perhaps all ye who deplore the "popping out of kids" will show some support for greater reproductive choice in Ireland then? It's certainly one of the reasons that I feel so strongly that abortion access in this country is a necessity. That and better sex education. And better access to education in general, so that more ambition to clamber out of the housing estates with massive unemployment rates is generated. I'm hoping you'd agree.

Dades

Obliq wrote: »

You can't know what choices these "mothers with squadrons of children from several fathers" have made. In my case for example, both times I went about having children it was while working and in both cases the fathers were working.

Obliq, your situation at most bears a passing resemblance to the situation I expressed in my post, however yours is clearly not the type of scenario that rankles with me.

Dades wrote: »

I absolutely agree. I don't begrudge anyone a family, but people who have several kids with no means to support them rankles with me, enormously.

In case it's not obvious my issue is with those having multiple kids in the knowledge that they cannot afford to feed/cloth/house them without relying on every benefit available from the state. I have every sympathy with those who have kids in good faith and fall on harder times as has happened most of us in recent times. (Even with those with mortgages, contrary to many in this thread...)

I just have to live with the emotional fallout of deciding not to have more kids out of responsibility, while knowing there are those out there milking the system and having multiple kids with little regard to their chances in life. Again - this doesn't clearly apply to you or yours.

Obliq

Dades wrote: »

Obliq, your situation at most bears a passing resemblance to the situation I expressed in my post, however yours is clearly not the type of scenario that rankles with me.

In case it's not obvious my issue is with those having multiple kids in the knowledge that they cannot afford to feed/cloth/house them without relying on every benefit available from the state. I have every sympathy with those who have kids in good faith and fall on harder times as has happened most of us in recent times. (Even with those with mortgages, contrary to many in this thread...)

Thanks Dades, I feel a bit better, but genuinely I'm ashamed of my position, as I'm sure are many others who fell on hard times. And there speaks the middle class. Really - how can you tell what type of scenario you're looking at when you spot a single mother with a bunch of kids? You may be looking at a woman who came from hard times and continues to live in hard times with no expectation or ambition to be otherwise. Is it her fault that as a child she may have had little encouragement to get a good leaving cert, go to college or do something beyond having kids on the dole? There are some who manage to pull themselves out of the rut they were born into, but not enough.
From our middle class positions (and I was born into it) it is very easy to say they should be better educated - but they're not. Where I feel ashamed to be living off of taxpayers like yourself, they don't, and why should they? I've worked with prisoners on remand who will tell you that they expected to get into crime, because their brothers did and there was nothing else on offer but drugs and risk taking. And that's true, for them. It has been convenient to ignore that there has always been an underclass in Ireland that the taxpayer funds, but now, people point the finger and say they've been given every opportunity so how dare they live that way. Have they f**k.

I just have to live with the emotional fallout of deciding not to have more kids out of responsibility, while knowing there are those out there milking the system and having multiple kids with little regard to their chances in life. Again - this doesn't clearly apply to you or yours.

My one regret about my post is that I can tell it's an emotional and difficult choice not to bring more kids into what is a loving home solely because of finances, and I'm sorry for that. Not the same thing at all, but not living with my boyfriend is crappy too, as me and the kids adore him.

The sentence you wrote "having multiple kids with little regard to their chances in life" tells it all though, in my book. I think they are doing exactly as their chances in life have dictated, with the exception of very few who are just educated enough about their situations to know they'll have to work their asses off from age 12 on, just to clamber out of the council houses where "milking the system" is the only ambition that abounds.

Dades

Obliq wrote: »

Thanks Dades, I feel a bit better, but genuinely I'm ashamed of my position, as I'm sure are many others who fell on hard times. And there speaks the middle class. Really - how can you tell what type of scenario you're looking at when you spot a single mother with a bunch of kids? You may be looking at a woman who came from hard times and continues to live in hard times with no expectation or ambition to be otherwise.

Of course you can't judge a person from a glance on the street, but I didn't intend to suggest you could. I was speaking figuratively about that certain category of parent I referred to in my last post.

Obliq wrote: »

Is it her fault that as a child she may have had little encouragement to get a good leaving cert, go to college or do something beyond having kids on the dole? There are some who manage to pull themselves out of the rut they were born into, but not enough.

It's nobody's choice to be born into an environment but surely having children is a choice they can make (or should make?)

I note this thread has gone mysteriously quiet. I sense some people beside me have slowly stepped backwards into the shadows.

Rev Hellfire

Obliq wrote: »

I think they are doing exactly as their chances in life have dictated, with the exception of very few who are just educated enough about their situations to know they'll have to work their asses off from age 12 on, just to clamber out of the council houses where "milking the system" is the only ambition that abounds.

But they're not exactly blameless either; our welfare state provides the means through training schemes & education for them to exit their environment should they so wish.

Dades wrote: »

I note this thread has gone mysteriously quiet. I sense some people beside me have slowly stepped backwards into the shadows.

Some of us have to do a bit of work every now and then or we'll be dossing on the scratcher as well

Bannasidhe

IMHO Child Benefit is an easy target - people like Michael O Leary can be used as the poster child (:p) for the cries of 'they don't need it', single mothers can be pointed to and tarred with the same sponger brush and the childless can complain that their taxes are supporting other people's children. And yes, all of these have some validity.

Against that, the fact is having children is not always a choice, many people who now need the few bob CB brings in (and let's be honest - we are not talking about huge sums of money per child here) had their children when they were in employment but their jobs have disappeared, or their net income has been so devastated by cuts in salary/levys/rising costs etc that CB now helps plug a gap in the family income. CB can mean the difference between heat or no heat for many families - not just the unemployed.

As a society we also need children - they will be the taxpayers of the future.



Does the child for whom CB is paid benefit from having heat? Absolutely.

Does all of the family? Absolutely.

Do people really begrudge that? - Some certainly seem to...

The real killer for people with young children (by which I mean 12 and under) is the crippling cost of childcare in this country - that is the debate we should be having. How do we reduce that cost?

In response to Robin's suggestion re: the elderly - I once acted as a research consultant for a strategic report for one of the Child Care Companies (county/city based NGOs which oversee the provision of childcare) and many grandparents are already undertaking childcare, but what was notable was that the housing boom drove many young couples away from the areas their parent's live in and out to commuter towns often a significant distance away. Logistically, it then becomes near impossible for grandparents to provide childcare.

I firmly believe that tax credits should be provided to offset the costs of childcare or some form of subsidy should be introduced to childcare providers. The current 'free pre-school year' is a joke. It consists of a few hours in either the morning or evening and is (imho) such a half arsed measure as to be pointless.

Dades

Bannasidhe wrote: »

In response to Robin's suggestion re: the elderly - I once acted as a research consultant for a strategic report for one of the Child Care Companies (county/city based NGOs which oversee the provision of childcare) and many grandparents are already undertaking childcare, but what was notable was that the housing boom drove many young couples away from the areas their parent's live in and out to commuter towns often a significant distance away. Logistically, it then becomes near impossible for grandparents to provide childcare.

This is a great point. My in-laws look after my pair three days a week (with one in Montessori). This option saves us a fortune. However the flip side is, we need to rent a family home somewhere in reach of them and the school, which places us in ridiculously high rent territory. A burden we've also taken on to get our kids into a particular school with a very defined catchement area.

Bannasidhe wrote: »

The current 'free pre-school year' is a joke. It consists of a few hours in either the morning or evening and is (imho) such a half arsed measure as to be pointless.

Also seconded. We pay "excess" hours fee which effectively make up the difference in what the government pay the school. Not to mention the *optional* classes you can pay for during school hours - which if you don't - means your child sits on it's own while her friends do jazz dancing, ffs.

professore

By this argument, why provide "free" education? Why provide "free" healthcare? Caring for everyone in society is one of the hallmarks of civilisation.

Having said that, child benefit should not be universal, in fact there should be no universal benefits, with the exception of a reasonable standard of healthcare.

Taking away child benefit from working parents will mean in many cases that one spouse will have to stop working. This will cost the economy.

Newaglish

Dades wrote: »

Also seconded. We pay "excess" hours fee which effectively make up the difference in what the government pay the school. Not to mention the *optional* classes you can pay for during school hours - which if you don't - means your child sits on it's own while her friends do jazz dancing, ffs.

To be fair, that's life. You don't always get to go jazz dancing as a child. There were plenty of trips and activities our family couldn't afford for me to participate in as a child and I survived just fine.

Newaglish

professore wrote: »

Taking away child benefit from working parents will mean in many cases that one spouse will have to stop working. This will cost the economy.

How, exactly?

Bannasidhe

Newaglish wrote: »

To be fair, that's life. You don't always get to go jazz dancing as a child. There were plenty of trips and activities our family couldn't afford for me to participate in as a child and I survived just fine.

I think Dades point was that these classes are taking part during school hours.

Tim Robbins

Obliq wrote: »

Really - how can you tell what type of scenario you're looking at when you spot a single mother with a bunch of kids? You may be looking at a woman who came from hard times and continues to live in hard times with no expectation or ambition to be otherwise. Is it her fault that as a child she may have had little encouragement to get a good leaving cert, go to college or do something beyond having kids on the dole?

No it is not her fault. Dad should be paying maintenance - not just the state. Also children have legal right to know who their Dad is. And it shouldn't be so easy to abuse the system. Then when people see other people struggling they would take genuine pity rather than thinking this person could be scamming.

The thing is if there was more DNA testing people would be outraged. But it would stop scamming and as I said in genuine cases people would have more sympathy.

Newaglish

Bannasidhe wrote: »

I think Dades point was that these classes are taking part during school hours.

Oops, missed that bit, sorry. That's stupid. Still, can't they sit it out and do extra religion instead?

Tim Robbins

Sorry just thought of something.

A few pages back people were saying "listen you bought in the boom you took the risk and all that". Sometimes, I find people who didn't buy in the boom can over simplify the decisions many people to make during the boom. They say things like "look it was obvious it was a bubble so I didn't buy".

However, the reality is if you buy a house in one respect you are always way better off than if you rent. If you fall into mortgage arrears you have a very slim chance of loosing your home and being kicked out on the street.

According to the central bank, 83,251 mortgages were in arrears of 90 days or more at the end of June 2012. But there are very low number of repossesions. I couldn't find stats for the same period but this article from the Irish times gives an indication.

So point is, you run into trouble you keep your home. Whereas if you rent, you miss 3 months rent you are very likely to be turfed out.

This might suit you better but in most cases (if you have kids in a school) moving is a pain in the *ss.

So, yes there may be many wise people who didn't buy in the boom. But if they ran into trouble with their job they could have been in a worse situation than someone who did buy in the boom.

Renters in this country get nowhere near the rights of property owners. This is why many people with Irish mentality always want to buy.

Zombrex

A point that is often over looked is the cost involved in actually assessing in detail who gets something and who doesn't. That requires more civil servants, it requires people with permanent jobs, who in tern have pensions, sick leave etc etc, it requires more data, more databases, more fraud protection etc etc

Often it is just easier and cheaper simply to give benefits out on a universal level and pin point specific areas of concern and fraud.

There is also the problem of creating a poverty trap, where as soon as you go over a particular threshold of earning you lose all your benefits, which actually puts you in worse poverty than you were before. IE if I take this €2,000 raise I'll lose €6,000 in benefits, putting me at a net loss of €4,000.

Generally means testing is to be avoided if possible. It is a good idea in principle, but the practice is often far from the ideal.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Means_test#Criticism

Yawns

Tim Robbins wrote: »

Renters in this country get nowhere near the rights of property owners. This is why many people with Irish mentality always want to buy.

It's not uncommon to hear of stories where it takes a landlord up to 3 years to evict a non paying tenant. If they evict them illegally then the renter can sue for damages.

robindch

Tim Robbins wrote: »

However, the reality is if you buy a house in one respect you are always way better off than if you rent. If you fall into mortgage arrears you have a very slim chance of loosing your home and being kicked out on the street. [...] So point is, you run into trouble you keep your home. Whereas if you rent, you miss 3 months rent you are very likely to be turfed out.

I suspect the reason for this is because AIB is 99% state-owned; IBRC, PTSB, NIB and so on, 100% (though BOI 16%). Any repossessions of what are effectively state-owned mortgages will therefore move a debt from one part of the state to another and turf a family out onto the street, incurring further state cost. Hence from the state's perspective, there's little point in repossessing properties.

While it's impossible to determine, it would be interesting to know the proportion of people who are falling into arrears in the fairly certain knowledge that they're unlikely to be turfed out.

Tim Robbins

robindch wrote: »

I suspect the reason for this is because AIB is 99% state-owned; IBRC, PTSB, NIB and so on, 100% (though BOI 16%). Any repossessions of what are effectively state-owned mortgages will therefore move a debt from one part of the state to another and turf a family out onto the street, incurring further state cost. Hence from the state's perspective, there's little point in repossessing properties.

Even forgetting about the crash, you can buy things like mortgage protection insurance. I have never heard of rent insurance?

When I bought my first gaf it was at the beginning of the dot.com crash. I bought mortgage insurance as well so knew I couldn't be turfed out if I lost my job.

While it's impossible to determine, it would be interesting to know the proportion of people who are falling into arrears in the fairly certain knowledge that they're unlikely to be turfed out.

I think a lot of people are renegotiating the terms. So, they can maintain their golf club membership. Getting accurate date is nigh impossible.

It's very easy to lie and be economical with the truth with banks.
You can move money around and get your in-laws to pay your golf membership.

pH

The whole mortgage situation and turfing families out of their houses is very "Irish" - regularly on the radio you hear someone saying that under no circumstances should a family be evicted from their house - but I guess if you asked them if that meant it should be illegal to sell a "mortgage" - i.e. a loan secured on property for a family home they'd look at you as if you were mad.

So like so much we all want it both ways, I'm not sure it's fair or possible - by all means let's abolish mortgages for family houses and see how our economy and housing market reacts - but the "Irish" solution - mortgages (secured loans) which the lender is forced to treat as unsecured is not a long term solution.

professore

Actually I don't see what this debate has to do with this forum? I'm surprised it wasn't moved somewhere like Politics or Irish Economy.

Dades

professore wrote: »

Actually I don't see what this debate has to do with this forum? I'm surprised it wasn't moved somewhere like Politics or Irish Economy.

It was a tangential debate from another thread that got moved into it's own one. Partly because we're happy to have a good debate about anything here, and partly because I have a vested interest in child benefit!

Tim Robbins

professore wrote: »

Actually I don't see what this debate has to do with this forum? I'm surprised it wasn't moved somewhere like Politics or Irish Economy.

We figured out there was no God a while back and have moved onto other subjects!

sephir0th

Zombrex wrote: »

A point that is often over looked is the cost involved in actually assessing in detail who gets something and who doesn't. That requires more civil servants, it requires people with permanent jobs, who in tern have pensions, sick leave etc etc, it requires more data, more databases, more fraud protection etc etc

Often it is just easier and cheaper simply to give benefits out on a universal level and pin point specific areas of concern and fraud.

There is also the problem of creating a poverty trap, where as soon as you go over a particular threshold of earning you lose all your benefits, which actually puts you in worse poverty than you were before. IE if I take this €2,000 raise I'll lose €6,000 in benefits, putting me at a net loss of €4,000.

Generally means testing is to be avoided if possible. It is a good idea in principle, but the practice is often far from the ideal.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Means_test#Criticism[

I agree with your first argument, an ROI assessment is necessary. I disagree with your second, a smart implementation could avoid poverty traps as you outlined. The complexity is a real issue though, I guess that's your main point.