You and Coach don't know what you are talking about re child benefit.
Actually I do, but nevermind you go on with your subjective and baseless evaluation.
It was first introduced as the Family Allowance after WWII when the Welfare State was created based on Beverage's recommendations. One of the main reasons it was introduced was to ensure money was paid to the mother to ensure the father didn't get his hands on it and spend it down the pub (still as good a reason today as back then). The other main reason was to try and make sure children were not raised in poverty. The reason it is a universal benefit (so well off people get it as well as the less well off) with no means testing was also down to Beverage who thought all benefits should be universal as means testing always introduces a very high marginal tax rate for those who earn just enough to lose the entire benefit.
Agree
Now no doubt the pair of you think child benefit and perhaps other benefits should not exist at all
Nope.
but if you do that is because not only do you not understand child benefit you don't understand the concept of the Welfare State either.
Oh I understand perfectly the concept. The application, however, is another matter
It is not, as the Daily mail would have you believe, designed to be some sort of spongers paradise but something we all contribute to and will all benefit from at different stages in our lives. This is also why Beverage wanted any benefits available to be free from means testing. The logic being if you receive a benefit, such as child benefit, it should not decrease or vanish once get a job that earns X amount because if it did then why bother getting a job that hits you with a stupendous rate of marginal tax?
Agree with this too.
This idea is based on the key fact that the Welfare Sate is something everyone takes out of as well as pays into throughout their lives. It gives you a stake in the system because it is not as you seem to believe something you alone pay for just for the benefit of others. You too will benefit from it at some stage (if the Tories do not succeed in wrecking it completely). Maybe not via child benefit if you do not have kids but through the NHS or help if unemployed etc.
And here we have the KEY issue. Whilst there is absolutely nothing wrong with that aim (and I actually agree with a lot of it), in REALITY there are those that
put in a lot, and
take out very little.
The real issue are those who put in VERY LITTLE and take out a helluva lot more. The benefits scroungers (not the geniune cases) being the cases in question.
Then we have the issues of people who have paid into the system for years, only to take a break from work and then be told they do not qualify for certain benefits.
What the Welfare State is not supposed to be is a means tested safety net. No doubt that alternative appeals to the greedy and selfish "I am all right jack" brigade but if they only thought about it for a minute they would realise they are part of the system (in a beneficial way at some point) as much as anyone else.
I agree with the sentiment.
So what the government is doing by including child benefit in the proposed benefits cap is completely undermining the principles under which it, as part of the Welfare State, was conceived. Less well off people are gong to lose it while a family on a joint income of £80K will keep it. You could not get further away from what Beverage envisaged if you tried.
Times have moved on and we as a society cannot afford to pay for the Welfare State in it's current format. The cheats and scroungers have seen to that.
As to child benefit being a benefit at all in that why pay people for having kids, it is there to help prevent child poverty (which goes out of the window with the benefits cap) and also to enable people to afford to have kids (a good thing with an ageing population). The fact well off people get it is because as I said, they are also part of the Welfare State and so are getting a little bit back for their contributions as is only right and proper.
This is all very well and good, but the real thrust of those of us who argue against people exploiting the system is not child benefit at all, it is the other benefits that cost a fortune.
It is a triumph of right wing propaganda that people get so incensed about benefits and benefit fraud when by the governments own figures it (benefit fraud) is exactly 1/10th of the amount of money lost to uncollected taxes (£1.5bn compared to £15bn per year). That is tax actually owed to the tax man but not collected, not tax legally avoided due to clever tax lawyers.
Actually the cost of benefit fraud is more like £3-5bn. The costs of uncollected tax, more like £40bn
Both are not mutually exclusive, so what's your point again?
