Child Benefit cap right or wrong?

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DCLane

Found in the Yorkshire hills ...
I used to claim Child Tax Credit but gave up when the payment came to £16.00 for a whole year. The amount of paperwork involved was ridiculous and they sent 2 copies of everything.

They've got my PAYE info and SWMBO's, as with every couple, so they could use that too.
 

Arch

Married to Night Train
Location
Salford, UK
We lose sight of the notion that Child Benefit is a (ummm) benefit for children and should be universal for children of rich and poor alike.

Means testing is demeaning and the extra bureaucracy will cost and introduce cock-ups, under-payments, over-payments, fraud, unfairness and perverse behaviour.


How is it demeaning to have to admit to earning £40k+ a year?

Time was, means testing was demeaning because it tended to be measuring whether someone lived on the breadline. Being deemed 'in need' had connotations of real poverty, which many people felt was like admitting failure.

Determining whether someone is very well off, or merely well off doesn't seem like a problem to me...

Mind you, I don't trust them to cope with the bureaucracy. I was just talking to my Mum, and she said she got three envelopes from HMRC on the same day last week, each containing a different tax code.
 

RedRider

Pulling through
How is it demeaning to have to admit to earning £40k+ a year?

Time was, means testing was demeaning because it tended to be measuring whether someone lived on the breadline. Being deemed 'in need' had connotations of real poverty, which many people felt was like admitting failure.

Determining whether someone is very well off, or merely well off doesn't seem like a problem to me...

Mind you, I don't trust them to cope with the bureaucracy. I was just talking to my Mum, and she said she got three envelopes from HMRC on the same day last week, each containing a different tax code.
Aye, you're probably right about the demeaning bit. Stretching it but perhaps people might still be demeaned by the inevitible loop holes, evasions and so on they use to claim the benefit??

I do think universality has plenty of positives about it. Maybe there's argument to make income support a universal benefit.
 
U

User482

Guest
So basically regardless of what you earn, you would like everyone to end up with the same amount of £.S.d. in their pocket at the start of the month.
A response so stupid, I'm only replying to say goodbye.
 
U

User482

Guest
That's true, probably more to do with the educated classes being more likely to moan over a dinner table about tax than go out and cause a ruckus in the streets.:whistle:
Or maybe it's because more enlightened people recognise that a person's worth isn't defined by their salary.
 

MacB

Lover of things that come in 3's
How is it demeaning to have to admit to earning £40k+ a year?

Time was, means testing was demeaning because it tended to be measuring whether someone lived on the breadline. Being deemed 'in need' had connotations of real poverty, which many people felt was like admitting failure.

Determining whether someone is very well off, or merely well off doesn't seem like a problem to me...

Mind you, I don't trust them to cope with the bureaucracy. I was just talking to my Mum, and she said she got three envelopes from HMRC on the same day last week, each containing a different tax code.

Ok, say rather that means testing leads to demeaning demarcations and it's just not needed. As in my example of free school dinners...make them all free and pay for it via taxation, or via a reduction in child benefit. The argument also ignores the fact that the child benefit normally goes to the Mother. Universality solves so many of the problems of existing systems, if combined with simplification, it has the potential to make the welfare state far more than a 'much begrudged' safety net. I know I keep referring back to a Basic Income but it fits and, if fully implemented, removes the massive beaurocracy and fraud that has built up around existing systems.

At the macro level we're just talking about replacing multiple benefit systems, riddled with loopholes, with one over arching benefit payable to all. The key to making it work is removing the link between benefits and income/taxation, so this is paid, regardless, and without being taxed. Therefore no matter what work you do, how few or many hours, it will only ever make you better off. There are no work v benefit calculations, no risk factor for taking work and it forms a permanent safety net that allows you to have a go at things. Anyone in work can validly claim that they are doing it through choice and thus it removes stigma attached to certain roles. It would also mean that all earnings were taxable, no tax free allowances etc. The studies that have been done show this increasing economic activity, general wellbeing and overall tax take. I would advocate further simplification of the taxation system so that everything is classed, and therefore taxed, as income. So no more inheritance tax, capital gains tax, etc, etc, it all just becomes income.

Overall you have one benefit payable from birth to death, one income tax payable on all other monies received and VAT/duties. There would be special needs exceptions, those with care issues to be met, etc. But this would be miniscule compared to the mountain of red tape and regulation currently in force. The simplification would make gaming the system far harder and easier to detect.

Another side effect could be, though I'm not certain on this, to remove the constant whining of people complaining about paying for things they don't want/use, paying for other peoples kids, other peoples illness and whinging that they pay more than their fair share. If you don't have/want kids that's fine, but I'm guessing that you will expect services and support to be available throughout your lives. By the time we're old and in need it'll be other peoples kids that'll be providing those services to us. As for paying more than your fair share, how many of us ever put a price on, or even acknowledge, our good fortune living in such a stable society with the opportunities we have? That doesn't come about by accident it's part and parcel of the whole deal and tax is the price you pay for that privilege.

Oh, and yes I'm certain that some people would treat a BI as a licence to never attempt to work again. So what? the research indicates it's likely to be a very small %age and you'd be more likely to see people taking breaks from work rather than stopping all together. As for the others, we already have that scenario and no amount of regulation and forced hoop jumping is going to change that.
 
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