… a baby.

Thats why I think the following should be done:

1. New unemployed get 10-12 weeks paid benefit at a higher rate than present.
2. After 10-12 weeks paid benefit this is changed to non-monetary support; directed food vouchers for fruit & veg, meat portions and limited luxury contributions (no alcohol or tabacco – one thing I dont agree with is state-mandated assisted suicide). This process could be administrated by the major supermarkets with the logistical infrastructure already in place & who would be happy to secure the business.
3. Future monetary awards paid as “stipends”, pre-agreed by a welfare officer for interview requirements, training etc.

I believe over-complicating the welfare system and showing it as the temporary support it SHOULD BE would have a much better impact on benefit abuse.

Z.

Let’s go back to the last sentence that Tim quoted:

“Not once has any of those young people been British.”

My girlfiend was doing this exact job when I met her. For a 37 1/2 hour week – that’s 5:30am-1:30pm(& getting changed on her own time) 5 days a week one of them on the weekend – after tax, NI,rent & travel to work costs she was left the enormous sum of £35. With that she had to buy food, clothing, laundry etc etc. Forget going out & entertainment. If she wanted those luxuries she had to do overtime or a second job.
That’s a competative wage in the catering industry.

If you want British kids to compete in a labour market that’s open to the third world then let them compete on a level playing field. By all means stop their benefits. But also abolish workplace discrimination laws. Let the law turn a blind eye if they want to beat up or kill members of ethnic groups who they feel might be after their jobs (or maybe just don’t like).
The reason that so many jobs are taken by immigrants is that for the immigrant it’s an improvement on where they’ve come from. If you want to incentivise British kids to take the same jobs you need the same incentives. Would you really be happy with that.

Ann Widdecombe’s TV programme was an attempt to do this, and I think she had an effect.

You sound like you are talking about instilling a ‘work ethic’…? Do you really think it can be done in 21st Century Britain?

I did hedge my comment with “it must at least in part…”.

Attitude is a factor in almost everything. Look at how Ezra Levant’s campaign of “denormalization” of the Canadian Human Rights Commissions is working – an important lesson in how to campaign, in my opinion. Levant is a conservative who is, without any compromise, winning his argument and his battle, and every (classical) Liberal and Conservative should be following his progress with interest.

The equivalent here is the concept of denormalizing the idea that it is acceptable to claim benefits when you could be working. Ultimately, that’s what needs to be done.

As to the impact of marginal rates on employment rates, we do not have to speculate; we have a large sample group of the population who are not entitled to any significant means-tested benefits and just pay tax/NI at normal rates (with a tax free personal allowance).

They are called married mums with a husband who works. 80% of them are in work.

As opposed to our comparison group, single mums, who face marginal rates of 74%-plus up to an average income, about 44% of whom are in work.

http://markwadsworth.blogspot.com/2007/10/google-search-effect-of-tax-on.html

Why? It must be at least in part a question of attitude. That’s why no purely economic fix, like a CBI, can possibly work.

Tim adds: Not quite. Incomers have to pay NI for a year before they can claim. At least, that’s what that article implies.

I see the unemployed splitting into two groups – those that won’t work and those that won’t work at the wages currently offered. I say screw the first group. Top up the wages of the second. So instead of paying people to be idle, we pay them to do a job that otherwise would not be done. We simply abolish all other forms of benefits. If people want money from the government they can go out and work like the rest of us.

There are people who are obviously sick but I might throw in a requirement that every local authority must find anyone who wants a job a job they can do. Ask the Churches to make work for the really hard cases. No doubt a few charities would do likewise.

Problem solved.