Mass Homelessness Soon?

[Annie Bynnol 612]

6 hours ago, Anna B said:

...

 

One person's wage is no longer enough to keep a family, but the government appear not to recognise that fact, in spite of being quite happy to take tax and National insurance off both workers, not just one of a couple. Surely this must be some sort of discrimination?  

 

...

Discrimination!

 

People fought long and hard to win the right to be treated as individuals and equals and not as a dependent in a marriage.

 

Working class women have always had to  work.

The late 40s and 50s vision of the husband always earning enough to provide was a TV dream for most.

Women were often barred from many jobs and careers by Government, employers and trades unions, and often burdened by large families. Two world wars and industrial depressions forced Government, employers and trades unions to remove these barriers only to demand their reintroduction.

 

The man received the "tax allowance", they both paid the "income tax", he paid the full National Insurance", he paid the "works" pension. There was usually no choice or advantage in doing otherwise.

She usually received no statutory redundancy pay, or sickness or unemployment pay, she got no state or works pension in her own right. The working widows got even less.

 

 

Edited February 13, 2021 by Annie Bynnol

[Anna B 1,414]

11 hours ago, Annie Bynnol said:

Discrimination!

 

People fought long and hard to win the right to be treated as individuals and equals and not as a dependent in a marriage.

 

Working class women have always had to  work.

The late 40s and 50s vision of the husband always earning enough to provide was a TV dream for most.

Women were often barred from many jobs and careers by Government, employers and trades unions, and often burdened by large families. Two world wars and industrial depressions forced Government, employers and trades unions to remove these barriers only to demand their reintroduction.

 

The man received the "tax allowance", they both paid the "income tax", he paid the full National Insurance", he paid the "works" pension. There was usually no choice or advantage in doing otherwise.

She usually received no statutory redundancy pay, or sickness or unemployment pay, she got no state or works pension in her own right. The working widows got even less.

 

 

In those days, women had a choice of paying 'married women's' national insurance, which was considerably less than the man's. 

They now have to pay the full amount, exactly the same as their other half. They also now have had their pension age hiked by 6 years to the same retirement age as men, 66. 

 

To then not allow them UC when they need it IMO is diagraceful. It needs to change. I'm surprised no one has taken the government to court to test this out.

Equality should mean any spouse, male or female, should be equally regarded.

[Annie Bynnol 612]

12 minutes ago, Anna B said:

In those days, women had a choice of paying 'married women's' national insurance, which was considerably less than the man's. 

They now have to pay the full amount, exactly the same as their other half. They also now have had their pension age hiked by 6 years to the same retirement age as men, 66. 

 

To then not allow them UC when they need it IMO is diagraceful. It needs to change. I'm surprised no one has taken the government to court to test this out.

Equality should mean any spouse, male or female, should be equally regarded.

Women had a choice or was the choice imposed?

Before 1977 employers actively discouraged employers women from paying a full stamp- as they would need to contribute more. It was the man to which all the paperwork was addressed to and could override the wishes of the woman.

The depressing inequality in pay put pressure the on the woman to pay a lower rate and take more more money home.

Many women employed in family businesses never saw the accounts which would have shown that they were not having a beneficial stamp payed- this continued for decades.

It is a fundamental human right that people are individuals.

 

Universal Credit does no depend on sex, a couple makes a joint claim based on the  household circumstances and is paid out as income for the household.

However UC has not reduced the discrimination in aspects of family and working life that the carer is subject to.

 

UC can be divided in certain circumstance and a 50:50 split of payment is actively being investigated.

Child Benefit is still paid separately and is not affected by Universal Credit.

 

 

 

[Anna B 1,414]

I'm not sure if women originally had a choice. You're right that women were always encouraged to rely on the  'man of the house' for their needs, and there was a lot of pressure on women not to work. Husbands often would not allow it (yes, really...) There place was in the home.

I know by the time I was at secondary school my mother had a small part time job and only paid the woman's stamp, and consequently got a very poor pension, (I think it was in the shillings rather than pounds.) She always told me to go and pay for the full stamp, rather than the married woman's one, which I did so I had a choice (I started work about 1969.)

Women still didn't have equal pay at that  stage, and weren't allowed in certain occupations, or had to leave when they got married or had children. They certainly weren't allowed to join work's pension schemes, nor were they very likely to climb up the greasy pole via promotions in their chosen field, these  jobs were considered to be for the (male) 'breadwinner' of the family.

 

Now a lot of these women are losing out at both ends; poor discriminatory working practices and low pay in the early working years, and then old rate pension but also extra years added on at the end. (I'm one of them. I worked out I had lost roughly £40,000 in pension.) So equality hasn't happened for everyone, even though things are much better today.

 

Back to Universal credit: the bottom line is it isn't enough, even to get by on if you have little in the way of savings to fall back on, and a large sector of the population don't. 

It particularly angers me that the much of the population were totally duped by propaganda and lies into believing the unemployed were feckless  spendthrifts living the life of Riley on generous state handouts. Thus allowing the Tories to make substantive cuts, which are now tipping people into hunger and homelessness.

Yet for some reason, the middle classes who are now having to avail themselves of benefits, find they are unable to get them, or the amount is not enough to live on, yet still they prefer to blame the poor, the immigrants, asylum seekers etc rather than put the blame where it should lie, at the door of the Tory government who made the rules in the first place.

This is going to become a far more pressing matter when the furlough scheme ends.

 

 

[Annie Bynnol 612]

5 hours ago, Anna B said:

I'm not sure if women originally had a choice. You're right that women were always encouraged to rely on the  'man of the house' for their needs, and there was a lot of pressure on women not to work. Husbands often would not allow it (yes, really...) There place was in the home.

I know by the time I was at secondary school my mother had a small part time job and only paid the woman's stamp, and consequently got a very poor pension, (I think it was in the shillings rather than pounds.) She always told me to go and pay for the full stamp, rather than the married woman's one, which I did so I had a choice (I started work about 1969.)

Women still didn't have equal pay at that  stage, and weren't allowed in certain occupations, or had to leave when they got married or had children. They certainly weren't allowed to join work's pension schemes, nor were they very likely to climb up the greasy pole via promotions in their chosen field, these  jobs were considered to be for the (male) 'breadwinner' of the family.

 

Now a lot of these women are losing out at both ends; poor discriminatory working practices and low pay in the early working years, and then old rate pension but also extra years added on at the end. (I'm one of them. I worked out I had lost roughly £40,000 in pension.) So equality hasn't happened for everyone, even though things are much better today.

 

Back to Universal credit: the bottom line is it isn't enough, even to get by on if you have little in the way of savings to fall back on, and a large sector of the population don't. 

It particularly angers me that the much of the population were totally duped by propaganda and lies into believing the unemployed were feckless  spendthrifts living the life of Riley on generous state handouts. Thus allowing the Tories to make substantive cuts, which are now tipping people into hunger and homelessness.

Yet for some reason, the middle classes who are now having to avail themselves of benefits, find they are unable to get them, or the amount is not enough to live on, yet still they prefer to blame the poor, the immigrants, asylum seekers etc rather than put the blame where it should lie, at the door of the Tory government who made the rules in the first place.

This is going to become a far more pressing matter when the furlough scheme ends.

 

 

An excellent summary.

 

[kidley 48]

My wife worked at Whitbreads in the sixties, she paid full stamps then, and carried it on through her working life, some didnt  i think they (the woman) said oh i will live off my husbands pension, my wife now enjoys around £180 pw state pension irrespective of how much money either me or she has.

Woman did have a choice whether to pay full stamps or not in the sixties. 

[Annie Bynnol 612]

51 minutes ago, kidley said:

...

Woman did have a choice whether to pay full stamps or not in the sixties. 

Nobody has said otherwise.

- some like your wife not only paid full stamp to start with but continued to do so.

- some reduced their stamp when they got married

- some took time off work to raise children and were left with a reduced pension.

- some did not work again and paid no stamp.

 

For those retired today at 66 the maximum full pension will be £179.58 (in April).

People will need 35 full years of full contributions.

Women with children getting Child benefit for under 12's can get National Insurance credits which count towards the 35 years. Other benefits also entitle claimants to National Insurance credits.

 

Part time and temporary work may not count towards a full year even if stamp is payed.

Armed forces, emergency services, council, government and many other workers will get less as they have "contracted out". Please ask your nearest Tory, firstly why, secondly why this pension cut affects those with the lowest incomes, those who bring up children, those to whom it was not explained to adequately and those unrepresented in the work place, thirdly why was it done to help the finances of the Chancellor and business.

And as 'Anna B' implies, Governments do not honour the contract they made with people who pay "National Insurance"-the tax that keeps on taking without giving.

 

 

 

 

 

 

[kidley 48]

16 hours ago, Anna B said:

I'm not sure if women originally had a choice. 

 

11 hours ago, Annie Bynnol said:

An excellent summary.

 

 

 

my post is in relation to your reply above .

[Cyclecar 24]

A lot of the foregoing posts are polemics. Various governments have tinkered with the state pension system, and state benefits, blowing off steam will not solve the question posed at the start - will there be an increase in homelessness? Can I post an allied situation:

 

In the present difficult environment, folks are being laid off, facing redundancy, having reduced income, etc. This can result in finding it difficult if not impossible to meet rental payments, so they fall into arrears and as this has been with us for some timea arrears accrue, £600 pcm at nine months = £4,500 and so on. There is a moratorium on evictions (quite rightly).

 

The property may be owned by a small private landlord. Dennis and Doris put their savings into a couple of modest houses and financed the rest by way of commercial mortgage. The rental income covers their repayments, leaving a modest surplus. In time these houses will provide income in their retirement, etc. Dennis and Doris are not swivel-eyed capitalist lizards, just ordinary folk trying to invest for their future. No rental income puts them in the mire as well, their mortgagor may offer an instalment holiday (unlikely with commercial), if not they can accrue arrears as well, which knackers their credit rating. So they probably have to tip in their savings, or similar. 

 

When things recover, they will ask their tenant to make good the arrears, probably by increasing the rent. But at £50pcm it will take over 7 years to recover their £4,500. What if the tenants want to move? And in this city there is a ready demand for decent housing at reasonable cost. Should D&D cut their losses and evict, with the incomers paying £700pcm? 

 

Moral maze...........

[Anna B 1,414]

11 hours ago, kidley said:

My wife worked at Whitbreads in the sixties, she paid full stamps then, and carried it on through her working life, some didnt  i think they (the woman) said oh i will live off my husbands pension, my wife now enjoys around £180 pw state pension irrespective of how much money either me or she has.

Woman did have a choice whether to pay full stamps or not in the sixties. 

Yes they did, but I was referring to my Mother's generation (born 1925.) She paid the women's rate and regretted it but I don't know if she actually had any choice in the pre war years. When that choice came in I don't know, only that she advised me to pay the full whack so the option was there in the 60s. I paid the full rate. 

 

However, I still missed out on the new pension payment rate which came in about April 2016, by 3 months, so I am now permanently on the old rate of about £130 a week for the rest of my life, losing me approx £40,000, but I still had to work until I was almost 63 to get a pension. And I believe the retirement age is going up again, to 68, in 2026, which believe me takes some doing, depending on your work and the physical and mental strain on your body. In my experience older people get tired much more quickly, (though of course there are exceptions) and they are going to find working till that age very difficult. The  excuse for putting up the retirement age was because 'we are all living longer,' but that's not true either. Some of us might be living longer (even that figure is going down) but Richer people live longer than poorer ones. always have, probably always will, and that gap is widening, as is the number of healthy years people have which varies enormously, and I deplore the current propaganda trend that likes to say that people who get ill have no one to blame but themselves because of their chosen lifestyles; luck is a large part of having long lasting good health, 

but if the government can pass the blame via a nice bit of propaganda, they will.

 

So yes these are the sort of conundrums that face people. As Cyclecar says, it is a moral maze.

But in case people hadn't noticed, the world is not fair, all people are not equal, and we're not all in this together. 

The system is very much rigged in favour of the already privileged and against those that are most vulnerable. We had a brief golden age when the welfare state made opportunity and equality more possible, but that is going, going gone.

 

Homelessness is the tip of an enormous iceberg that's forming under our feet. We desperately need a global rethink on how we are going to proceed in an ever more difficult and complex world. 

Edited February 14, 2021 by Anna B

[Anna B 1,414]

21 hours ago, Cyclecar said:

A lot of the foregoing posts are polemics. Various governments have tinkered with the state pension system, and state benefits, blowing off steam will not solve the question posed at the start - will there be an increase in homelessness? Can I post an allied situation:

 

In the present difficult environment, folks are being laid off, facing redundancy, having reduced income, etc. This can result in finding it difficult if not impossible to meet rental payments, so they fall into arrears and as this has been with us for some timea arrears accrue, £600 pcm at nine months = £4,500 and so on. There is a moratorium on evictions (quite rightly).

 

The property may be owned by a small private landlord. Dennis and Doris put their savings into a couple of modest houses and financed the rest by way of commercial mortgage. The rental income covers their repayments, leaving a modest surplus. In time these houses will provide income in their retirement, etc. Dennis and Doris are not swivel-eyed capitalist lizards, just ordinary folk trying to invest for their future. No rental income puts them in the mire as well, their mortgagor may offer an instalment holiday (unlikely with commercial), if not they can accrue arrears as well, which knackers their credit rating. So they probably have to tip in their savings, or similar. 

 

When things recover, they will ask their tenant to make good the arrears, probably by increasing the rent. But at £50pcm it will take over 7 years to recover their £4,500. What if the tenants want to move? And in this city there is a ready demand for decent housing at reasonable cost. Should D&D cut their losses and evict, with the incomers paying £700pcm? 

 

Moral maze...........

What if Dennis and Doris' tenants can't afford to pay more weekly, never mind with the added burden of paying back arrears?

This is going to be all too common too. Don't forget Universal Crediit generally does not cover all of the rent payment anyway. So yes evictions are going to rocket.  But Doris and Dennis aren't out of the woods either, particularly if they are still paying a mortgage on said rental houses. Nevermind the loss of the £4,500 debt, they may well find it difficult to find dependable new tenants at all as their particular demographic might all be in the struggling catagory with insecure jobs etc.

Doris and Dennis may also now be in debt, and the only people willing to take the houses off their hands are the big companies who can ride the losses, but they only pay the minimum because there's now a glut of buy- to- let on the market. Their companies grow and the bottom drops out of the buy to let market for the small guys. The big companies want more money from the houses they bought for a song and start to gentrify the houses, and put the rents up accordingly. 

Doris and Dennis now have to rely on their state pension which doesn't cover their costs, so they too begin slipping down the ladder and into poverty. 

 

Homelessness can be catching....

[Cyclecar 24]

Fair comment.