Middle class people deciding to go on the dole ?

Big Gerry wrote: »

Someone could just declare themselves bankrupt or change their name and let the bank whistle for the mortgage payments.

If someone is on the dole there is nothing the bank can take from them.

They can get a court order to take a percentage of benefits, you' ll also lose any assets you might have. Same commitments ,less money to meet them.

As soon as the mortgage is paid off I am out of here. And that will be long before I hit 68 no matter what Leo and Pascal want.

A friend of mine packed in her job , hubby still works though.
Got sick of sitting on the m50 panicking about getting back to the creche in time, not seeing kids etc.
She minds a neighbours 2 kids , 1 is in school n collects him etc. Gets a few quid on the side from that. Nearly no difference in income, when factoring in creche, no tolls, less diesel n wear n tear.
Intends to go back at something in a few years.

monty_python wrote: »

For the past 7 years I have worked 8 months per year and willfully took 4 months off.
Some years I take the dole. Some years I go traveling.
Why should I spend my whole life working when I don't need to?? Fook that .
Bunch of slaves

Teacher?

The main problem for the middle class in Dublin is simply that too many people are trying to work in too small an area. What the f does that have to do with people being on the dole?

There isn't enough housing in greater Dublin and we lack an adequate transport infrastructure to bring people from surrounding counties where housing is reasonably affordable into the city. There are only three possible solutions to this:

• Increase the density of housing in Dublin city. This would require compulsory purchase orders on low rise parts of the inner city. Would also require the planning laws to be changed to allow high rise apartment buildings in the city centre. No government has had the balls to do either of these.
  
• Build a proper grown-up transport system e.g. an actual subway for city proper and light rail network reaching out into the surrounding counties. This should have been done long ago but is again something the parties don't seem to have the nerve to do as it is expensive in the short term and would also require compulsory purchase orders in order to build it out.
  
• Massively decentralize both private and public employment. This has been tried using various carrot and stick approaches, both with the civil service and with grants etc. to private industry to encourage relocation to other parts of the country. It largely hasn't worked, or hasn't worked to a sufficient degree. Of all possible solutions it is the least likely to succeed as it requires both individuals and companies to co-operate, something that is almost impossible to force them to do.

The logical solution is to expand the city outwards and upwards, build better transport links (not just another Luas branch line or other half arsed childish nonsense) and then do all of the things that other cities do to reduce congestion in city centers (e.g. congestion charges, having a subway for internal movement, etc.).

All of this is expensive. All of it requires a certain amount of short-term sacrifice both by the tax payer and by people who will be affected by construction etc. Certain areas would basically have to be bulldozed in order to do it - the sort of thing that cities like Paris and New York went through in the 19th and 20th centuries in order to modernize.

The problem is that with planning and infrastructure projects like this we only seem to think in the short term and are massively unambitious. We could have built a subway during the boom but nobody had the balls or foresight to push it through. I don't know if anyone else here has noticed but we live in a ridiculously wet climate. Having people standing around at bus stops and Luas stops is moronic. Dart stations aren't much better. Hence everyone wants to sit in their car to get to their job.

The commuter situation in Dublin is simply down to a childish refusal on the part of populace to support these measures and cowardice on the part of various governments to push them through. We're just reaping what we've sown.

Trying to blame people on the dole (!) for the craptastic situation of middle class commuters in Dublin who are squeezed between ridiculously high housing costs versus insane commuter journeys is a perfect example of scapegoating. If the dole and housing allowances were eradicated tomorrow it would do zilch to solve this problem.

bubblypop wrote: »

Friend of mine hasn't worked in 12 years, she is a single parent with 3 kids.
She has no intention of going back to work.
She would have to get a job paying about 100,000 a year to come out with the same money she gets now.
Hasn't paid a penny off the mortgage in 8 Years.
So, she didn't pack work in to go on the dole, but now she is on social welfare, she is better off then if she worked.

She's clearing close to 5k net a month as a single mother on benefits with three kids?

bubblypop wrote: »

Not far off it yeah, that includes money from the father also though.

Well maybe a grand less then that. But still not worth going to work for her

Can you quantify those figures ? The amount the father gives would remain irrespective of work or not. However I understand the amount given by the father is deducted from the single parents allowance ?

Having children shouldn't entitle you to be able to live off the state for nothing

Not much prospect for those children I'm afraid if their main care cover has zero ambition for her life

bubblypop wrote: »

Not far off it yeah, that includes money from the father also though

What has a stipend from her father got to do with benefits.

Also, now that's cleared - how is she clearing 4k net for her and 3 kids?