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Source: (consider it)
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Thread: Purgatory: Welfarism
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Doc Tor
Deepest Red
# 9748
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Matt Black:
quote:
Originally posted by Doc Tor:
quote:
Originally posted by ianjmatt:
1. Because it is morally reprehensible to take money off the state when it can be earned.
2. The point of these proposals is to make sure that work always pays more. If that is achieved, and my post is assuming that, then my post is most certainly not bollocks.
If I agree with point 1, how does that square with working tax credits? I'm working, yet still I'm not earning enough to be as well off as I would be on benefit, so I have to go to the state for a subsidy because my employers can get away with not paying a working wage.
Or possibly they can't afford to pay you a decent wage - as is the case with me at the moment as an employer. So exactly how do you propose that cash-strapped employers pay for a higher minimum wage?
Why should you expect the state to bail you out?
If the work needs doing, sorry, but you have to actually pay someone properly to do it. That means you have to charge properly for it. That means your clients, who presumably need the work doing by a solicitor, have to pay properly for the work.
That's why it's called a 'job', not volunteering'.
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Doc Tor
Deepest Red
# 9748
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Matt Black:
Which 'person on benefits' would you like IDS to look at? There are many different levels and types of benefit. Who should be IDS' 'Man on the Clapham benefits ominibus'? And you still haven't said how this proposed hike in the minimum wage is to be paid for.
At the risk of double posting...
£5.93 an hour. 48 hour week, £284.64 a week. £14,800 a year. Before tax. That's slightly more than half of the average wage. A veritable King's ransom indeed.
The employer pays for it. Not the tax payer.
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Forward the New Republic
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Matt Black
Shipmate
# 2210
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Posted
Yes, the solution is either that we all have to put our charges up - which is inflationary and so tends to wipe out the value of any increase in minimum wage - or we can't employ as many people, which feeds unemployment. So, which do you prefer - higher inflation wiping out the increase in MW, or higher unemployment? And, while we're asking questions, hands up all those who want to pay higher solicitors' fees for moving house so that unemployment comes down?
[cp - again, how do you propose the employer pays for it?]
[ 12. November 2010, 08:42: Message edited by: Matt Black ]
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"Protestant and Reformed, according to the Tradition of the ancient Catholic Church" - + John Cosin (1594-1672)
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Boogie
Boogie on down!
# 13538
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Posted
While my son was unemployed - and I am very grateful that it was only for a few months - he receieved £50 a week. He was living at home and didn't *need* the money, only using it for petrol and evenings out. Should he have received it when he wasn't in need? I don't know.
I do know that I have worked full time for 32 years paying taxes and this is the first time any of us have drawn the dole - so I don't feel too bad about it TBH.
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Garden. Room. Walk
Posts: 13030 | From: Boogie Wonderland | Registered: Mar 2008
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Doc Tor
Deepest Red
# 9748
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Matt Black:
Yes, the solution is either that we all have to put our charges up - which is inflationary and so tends to wipe out the value of any increase in minimum wage - or we can't employ as many people, which feeds unemployment. So, which do you prefer - higher inflation wiping out the increase in MW, or higher unemployment? And, while we're asking questions, hands up all those who want to pay higher solicitors' fees for moving house so that unemployment comes down?
[cp - again, how do you propose the employer pays for it?]
Matt - I have to assume you need another cup of coffee. Make it a strong one.
It is not inflationary to pay someone £5.93 for every hour they work. That's such a pitifully low rate (£10/hr gets you the average wage), I could reasonably argue it's actually deflationary.
I'm aware of the disbursements that need to be made during a house move. I'm also aware that when the conveyancing market was deregulated, there was yet another race to the bottom. The one time we bought a house (we're still living in it), we ponied up Proper Solicitors' fees to have the job done right. So yes. *puts hand up*
When the blokes who service my boiler and gas fire come round, I brew up, they get to work, we chat for a bit (I've known them for years - they came with the house, so to speak), they make sure we're not going to die horribly or freeze to death in the forseeable, and I pay them £80 for about 45 mins work. And they've bloody earned it.
If - and this is a big, personally costly if - we actually believe that work should pay, and we're fed up with people being better off on benefits than they are in a job, then we have to pay people properly. If we're serious, it will cost us more, but we'll pay gladly because it's important. Otherwise those who sound off about this are just a bunch of hypocrites.
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Matt Black
Shipmate
# 2210
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Posted
On that, I agree completely; if I was a French lawyer, I could charge about 7 times the amount I charge here for pretty much the same amount of work. In a more economically stable time, your scheme would have a much greater chance of working, but how do we persuade people ATM to part with more cash when they've already got less of it in their pockets? If I increased my fees right now, that would be commercial suicide - clients would in the main go down the road to El Cheapo Conveyancing Factory LLP in droves.
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"Protestant and Reformed, according to the Tradition of the ancient Catholic Church" - + John Cosin (1594-1672)
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Doc Tor
Deepest Red
# 9748
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Matt Black:
On that, I agree completely; if I was a French lawyer, I could charge about 7 times the amount I charge here for pretty much the same amount of work. In a more economically stable time, your scheme would have a much greater chance of working, but how do we persuade people ATM to part with more cash when they've already got less of it in their pockets? If I increased my fees right now, that would be commercial suicide - clients would in the main go down the road to El Cheapo Conveyancing Factory LLP in droves.
It's difficult - but it's *not* the minimum wage's fault. I genuinely forget which stripe of government put the deregulation through, but it's just another example (as if we needed it) of the unfettered market causing more harm than good.
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Forward the New Republic
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Matt Black
Shipmate
# 2210
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Posted
So should the Law Society and SRA combine to create a Scale Fees cartel, like we had prior to (I think) 1985? In what way would that be competitive and not inflationary? (I actually like the idea in reality, but I can see those two obvious problems with it.)
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"Protestant and Reformed, according to the Tradition of the ancient Catholic Church" - + John Cosin (1594-1672)
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Doc Tor
Deepest Red
# 9748
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Posted
Are you honestly suggesting that solicitors being able to pay minimum wage rates to staff is inflationary? People don't move house often enough that it gets included in the RPI like bread and milk...
It'd be better if the conveyancing factories were held to the same standards as solicitors. In the same way that accident claim factories should be. (Again, when I got run over, I had a Proper Solicitor handle my claim. I'm like that.)
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RadicalWhig
Shipmate
# 13190
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Posted
Just a small insight.
A few years ago I sold a property in Luxembourg. In Luxembourg estate agents' fees are fixed (I'm not sure whether they are fixed by law or by some sort of industry-wide agreement) at 3%. That's a massive fee, considering there are estate agents in the UK who will change 0.5%, or even a fairly small fixed fee. But the upside is that, not being able to compete on low price, they were forced to compete on high quality. Price fixing, in this case, drove up standards, quality, and (I suppose) overall well-being. There was a race to the top rather than a race to the bottom.
Price fixing is also part of the reason French bread is worth eating compared to most of the rubbish that is passed off as bread in the UK. The price of a loaf was fixed according to its weight, so bakers had to compete on quality and not on price.
Bring back the guilds. (Don't worry, I'm only half serious).
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Radical Whiggery for Beginners: "Trampling on the Common Prayer Book, talking against the Scriptures, commending Commonwealths, justifying the murder of King Charles I, railing against priests in general." (Sir Arthur Charlett on John Toland, 1695)
Posts: 3193 | From: Scotland | Registered: Nov 2007
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Matt Black
Shipmate
# 2210
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Posted
You may be onto something there.
DocTor, no, solicitors on their own increasing their charges won't affect inflation much, but apply the same principle across the board and it will tend to have that effect.
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"Protestant and Reformed, according to the Tradition of the ancient Catholic Church" - + John Cosin (1594-1672)
Posts: 14304 | From: Hampshire, UK | Registered: Jan 2002
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blackbeard
Ship's Pirate
# 10848
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Doc Tor:
..........IDS, if you're reading this, you're contributing to this situation, and it's wrong and stupid. If you want work to pay, then tot up the amount a person gets on benefits a week, divide it by 48 (or even 40) and then add 10%. Make it so that no job pays less than that. Move the tax allowances so that no one pays tax on the first 10k they earn, and do something about NI. Integrate it into the tax system properly, please.
You make it sound so easy.
And this a variant on what every UK government has tried to do over the last umpteen years, and in each case has failed miserably.
Maybe it's not so easy.
(Or maybe every government over the last umpteen years has been terminally stupid.)
I'm still left with a suspicion that you are pinning hopes on minimum wage legislation. Matt Black explains more clearly than I can just why this won't work. Or maybe you have a scheme which will work - if so, please say how ...
I don't want to sound like the Daily Mail, and I'm not applying for a job as Telegraph leader writer. I'm aware that we (and every other nation under the sun, even if the French do it better) has a desperate problem with real people in real distress, and I'm enough of a crazy optimist to consider that careful logical thought might help ...
... and I wish IDS every success, even while I may have reservations about his approach.
Posts: 823 | From: Hampshire, UK | Registered: Dec 2005
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Marvin the Martian
Interplanetary
# 4360
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Doc Tor:
Are you honestly suggesting that solicitors being able to pay minimum wage rates to staff is inflationary? People don't move house often enough that it gets included in the RPI like bread and milk...
You're being a tad disingenuous here. It wouldn't just be solicitors putting up their prices, it'd be everyone. Shops. Public transport. Pubs. Clubs. Restaurants. Cinemas. Everyone would put their prices up in order to finance the extra wage bill.
Now, you might say that's all well and good, and we as consumers should be paying the full whack for what we buy. But consider the people this scheme is supposed to be helping - the ones on minimum wage. They will be getting more pay, sure - but when they come to spend it they will be paying the same inflated prices as the rest of us. They won't see any real benefit, or increase in their purchasing power.
And it's purchasing power that really counts, not how much money you have. It doesn't matter if you have £5 or £500 - what matters is how much you can actually buy for that amount. You're better off having £5 in your pocket with bread costing 50p than having £50 in your pocket with bread costing £6.
And then there's the folk on benefits, who will also have to pay the same inflated prices as the rest of us. Which would mean that either they would be poorer in real (purchasing power) terms, or benefits would have to increase to keep pace with inflation - thus ensuring that the situation remains exactly the same as it is now.
But maybe you could write a law that says employers aren't allowed to raise prices to compensate for the increased wage bill. That would solve the purchasing power problem, but of course it would mean a lot of employers being unable to cover their costs through sales and going out of business. Or sacking staff to equalise the budget. Either way, unemployment goes up.
Simply increasing the minimum wage is a lose-lose situation. Either the inflationary effect means there's no real change for those on minimum wage (the rest of us are worse off, of course, but then I guess we don't count), or unemployment goes up. That's why, since the introduction of the minimum wage, it's always been percieved as being too low.
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Hail Gallaxhar
Posts: 30100 | From: Adrift on a sea of surreality | Registered: Apr 2003
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Doc Tor
Deepest Red
# 9748
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Matt Black:
You may be onto something there.
DocTor, no, solicitors on their own increasing their charges won't affect inflation much, but apply the same principle across the board and it will tend to have that effect.
*needs to get on with work!*
I don't think it will. Many, many other factors - raw materials, weather, exchange rates have a far greater impact on inflation than the labour cost of what we buy.
Seriously, if I buy a box of 80 tea bags for £1.50, how much of that do you think goes to pay the wages of the people who actually grew the tea, packed it into crates, sailed it here, drove it to the packaging plant and then on to the store? It'll be pennies at best - paying them a few pennies more isn't inflationary.
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Forward the New Republic
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Matt Black
Shipmate
# 2210
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Posted
I need to get on with work too, otherwise even more clients will desert me!
But see what Marvin has said - much the same as I've been arguing: the extra money you're asking for has to come from somewhere so either it's inflationary or will increase unemployment in the present climate
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"Protestant and Reformed, according to the Tradition of the ancient Catholic Church" - + John Cosin (1594-1672)
Posts: 14304 | From: Hampshire, UK | Registered: Jan 2002
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Marvin the Martian
Interplanetary
# 4360
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Doc Tor:
Seriously, if I buy a box of 80 tea bags for £1.50, how much of that do you think goes to pay the wages of the people who actually grew the tea, packed it into crates, sailed it here, drove it to the packaging plant and then on to the store? It'll be pennies at best - paying them a few pennies more isn't inflationary.
It is, because the company will simply add the extra pennies onto the price. Instead of a £1.50 box with the employees getting (say) 5p, you'll have a £1.55 box with the employees getting 10p.
But, as each individual employee's share of that extra 5p is tiny, the increase in their earnings is less than the increase in the price of the box. The employees are now less able to buy the box than they were to start with.
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Hail Gallaxhar
Posts: 30100 | From: Adrift on a sea of surreality | Registered: Apr 2003
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dyfrig
Blue Scarfed Menace
# 15
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Posted
Just log it as "Admin", Matt. Or "Research".
quote:
Originally posted by Doc Tor:
Seriously, if I buy a box of 80 tea bags for £1.50, how much of that do you think goes to pay the wages of the people who actually grew the tea, packed it into crates, sailed it here, drove it to the packaging plant and then on to the store? It'll be pennies at best - paying them a few pennies more isn't inflationary.
You forget, Doc, that business sometimes use factors that don't really cause them difficutly to raise prices - decimalisation, VAT rises and the like usually also led to business adding a little bit more on, on the assumption that no-one would notice and couldn't do a damn thing about it. When VAT went up from 15% to 17.%% in the early 90s, my nearest record store bumped it's £6.99 albums up to £7.15* as a first step, and pretty soon thereafter they went up to £7.29/£7.49 - so an actual rise of 2.2% in the total cost of the product due to the tax rise became a 4.1% rise to the consumer. Ever wondered why consumer fuel prices go up whenever there's a hike in raw fuel costs, but never seems to go down at the same rate? Even if raising the minimum wage didn't actually cause a major rise in total commitments, I suspect the business community would happily use it as an excuse to raise prices.
* One of those bizarre snippets that lodged in my brain - I noticed it when the price of "The Drill" by Wire went up after the VAT change came in.
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"He was wrong in the long run, but then, who isn't?" - Tony Judt
Posts: 6917 | From: pob dydd Iau, am hanner dydd | Registered: Apr 2001
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Doc Tor
Deepest Red
# 9748
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Marvin the Martian:
quote:
Originally posted by Doc Tor:
Seriously, if I buy a box of 80 tea bags for £1.50, how much of that do you think goes to pay the wages of the people who actually grew the tea, packed it into crates, sailed it here, drove it to the packaging plant and then on to the store? It'll be pennies at best - paying them a few pennies more isn't inflationary.
It is, because the company will simply add the extra pennies onto the price. Instead of a £1.50 box with the employees getting (say) 5p, you'll have a £1.55 box with the employees getting 10p.
But, as each individual employee's share of that extra 5p is tiny, the increase in their earnings is less than the increase in the price of the box. The employees are now less able to buy the box than they were to start with.
So let's say that the overall cost of the box goes up by 5p. The result of that is everyone involves with the process gets 5p, divided by the number of workers (let's say 5, to keep the maths simple). A penny per box. Let's shift a thousand boxes a day, because people like tea. That's a thousand extra pennies a day, or £10. Or £70 a week.
Should cover an extra 5p on a box of tea bags, even if, like me, you really love tea.
And even though I should be writing a book instead of being on here - how much do you think an author gets paid? If my publisher sells a copy of one of my novels for £7.99, how much of that - as the creator of the work - do you think I get? How much do you think I should get?
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Forward the New Republic
Posts: 9131 | From: Ultima Thule | Registered: Jul 2005
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dyfrig
Blue Scarfed Menace
# 15
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Posted
Depends who you are.
If you are the famous book writer Dan Brown, then you're clearly a very savvy businessman who has managed to get lots of people to buy very bad books.
If you, on the other hand, Simon Parke, you may be a little odd but worth reading.
![[Big Grin]](biggrin.gif)
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"He was wrong in the long run, but then, who isn't?" - Tony Judt
Posts: 6917 | From: pob dydd Iau, am hanner dydd | Registered: Apr 2001
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Marvin the Martian
Interplanetary
# 4360
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Doc Tor:
Should cover an extra 5p on a box of tea bags, even if, like me, you really love tea.
Well yes, if tea was the only thing that increase you'd have a point. But when they're added to everything those 5p increases really do add up.
quote:
And even though I should be writing a book instead of being on here - how much do you think an author gets paid? If my publisher sells a copy of one of my novels for £7.99, how much of that - as the creator of the work - do you think I get? How much do you think I should get?
I have no idea. How much does it cost the publisher to actually do their part of the process? How many staff do they have to employ? What are their overheads? How much of the price has to go to the staff/overheads of the shop that actually does the selling? Add in a little profit for the shop and the publisher (it's only fair) and what's left should go to you.
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Hail Gallaxhar
Posts: 30100 | From: Adrift on a sea of surreality | Registered: Apr 2003
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Doc Tor
Deepest Red
# 9748
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Marvin the Martian:
quote:
Originally posted by Doc Tor:
Should cover an extra 5p on a box of tea bags, even if, like me, you really love tea.
Well yes, if tea was the only thing that increase you'd have a point. But when they're added to everything those 5p increases really do add up.
Even accepting that wage costs would be passed straight to the consumer (which they're not), the amount of a product that is 'wages' is miniscule. See below.
quote:
Originally posted by Marvin the Martian:
quote:
And even though I should be writing a book instead of being on here - how much do you think an author gets paid? If my publisher sells a copy of one of my novels for £7.99, how much of that - as the creator of the work - do you think I get? How much do you think I should get?
I have no idea. How much does it cost the publisher to actually do their part of the process? How many staff do they have to employ? What are their overheads? How much of the price has to go to the staff/overheads of the shop that actually does the selling? Add in a little profit for the shop and the publisher (it's only fair) and what's left should go to you.
Okay. The economics work something like this: the bookshop (or Amazon, or whoever) will take somewhere in the region of 35-50% of the cover price. The publisher will take the rest: the author will earn around 5-10% of the cover price, depending on the book format (hardbacks earn more, paperbacks less) - unless the book has been discounted by either the publisher or bookseller, in which case, it's 5-10% of the net. So out of a £8 book, the bloke what wrote it gets between 40-80p, less if it's on the 3 for 2 table.
I'm not pleading poverty here (though most UK authors earn below £2000 a year, if anything at all), but paying 11,12 or even 15% wouldn't destroy the publishing industry.
But most places work like this. If I cough up a tenner for 'OMGWTF 3D', the usher who rips my ticket in two and points me to the right screen isn't getting even 1% of the entry price.
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Doc Tor
Deepest Red
# 9748
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Posted
I should add the physical cost of the book: for a mass-market paperback, printed in any quantity: less than £2, probably less than £1, depending on the print run.
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Forward the New Republic
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Marvin the Martian
Interplanetary
# 4360
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Doc Tor:
Even accepting that wage costs would be passed straight to the consumer (which they're not)
Well they've got to go somewhere. Where else are businesses going to put them?
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Hail Gallaxhar
Posts: 30100 | From: Adrift on a sea of surreality | Registered: Apr 2003
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ianjmatt
Shipmate
# 5683
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Posted
Publishers explanation of the costs etc:
PPB (Print Paper Binding) for a B format paperback is about £1 average (based on a 3 - 5K print run and 192 pages). The average sales in the 1st year for all paperbacks if 3K units.
Cover Design is about £350 - £500 (or about 15p for a 3K print run).
Typesetting about £500 (15p also)
Proofreading - 1p per word - £600 for an average book (20p)
Acquisitions Editor - assuming a salary of £30K and 20 books a year (£1500 - 50p)
Copy editor - same (50p)
Marketing (£1 per projected unit sold)
This doesn't take into account sales costs, infrastructure, support staff, office costs, tax, benefits & employers NI) etc. However, this is a base cost of £3.50.
If the book has a retail cost of £8.99 it would be sold for an average of 45% so that would mean an income of £4.94.
Royalties are usually paid on net value now (since the collapse of the Net Book Agreement) at around 13% for the average author. This would be 13% of £4.94, or 64p.
So, £3.50 and 64p = £4.14 which leaves 80p to cover all other costs, produce a profit and finance expansion.
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You might want to visit my blog:
http://lostintheheartofsomewhere.blogspot.com
But maybe not
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Moth
Shipmate
# 2589
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Posted
All I know about writing books is that its bloody hard work for very little money. At any rate, my allegedly successful textbook probably pays me about 10p/hour!
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"There are governments that burn books, and then there are those that sell the libraries and shut the universities to anyone who can't pay for a key." Laurie Penny.
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Afghan
Shipmate
# 10478
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Posted
I suspect that increasing the minimum wage is somewhat inflationary. People at the bottom end of the income spectrum tend to spend proportionally more of their income so you'd be pushing demand up.
But... it wouldn't be so inflationary that they wouldn't be better off in real terms. Only people at the bottom of the scale would be earning more. So the overall proportional increase in demand would be less than the particular proportional increase in their income.
You'd have to factor in the damping effect of the inflationary pressure you create but it doesn't make it impossible.
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Credibile quia ineptum
Posts: 438 | From: Essex | Registered: Sep 2005
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Doc Tor
Deepest Red
# 9748
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by ianjmatt:
Royalties are usually paid on net value now (since the collapse of the Net Book Agreement) at around 13% for the average author. This would be 13% of £4.94, or 64p.
13%? Blimey.
*phones agent*
Yes, margins are tight all around. A friend of mine is waging a campaign to have the 3-for-2 table banned. But the fact remains that as the creator of the work sold, we see little of the cost to the consumer - as it is, mostly, in every other sector.
As to where business finds the money to pay for a little extra on the minimum wage... ooh, let's try freezing the big salaries at the top so that the drones can buy more soma. Apparently there's a recession on: the executives are hardly going to bail, are they?
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Matt Black
Shipmate
# 2210
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Afghan:
I suspect that increasing the minimum wage is somewhat inflationary. People at the bottom end of the income spectrum tend to spend proportionally more of their income so you'd be pushing demand up.
But... it wouldn't be so inflationary that they wouldn't be better off in real terms. Only people at the bottom of the scale would be earning more. So the overall proportional increase in demand would be less than the particular proportional increase in their income.
You'd have to factor in the damping effect of the inflationary pressure you create but it doesn't make it impossible.
But you've also got the problem of the people who were earning at the grade above ie; round about the new minimum wage will want a pay rise too - and the people above them and above them etc...
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"Protestant and Reformed, according to the Tradition of the ancient Catholic Church" - + John Cosin (1594-1672)
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mousethief
Ship's Thieving Rodent
# 953
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Posted
So wherever the minimum wage accidentally happens to be, NOW, is the best place for it to be? Or maybe we should lower it to optimize ... something?
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This is the last sig I'll ever write for you...
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NJA
Shipmate
# 13022
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Posted
Why oh why do all on sickness benefit get an extra £20 per week?
I can understand if a few do because they need to get taxis into town or they need a special diet of expensive foods, but for the rest, the great majority, isn't it just a joke at our expense?
People on SB stay at home more, go to fewer interviews, job schemes etc.
Are there any doctors in the house thaty can give their angle?
I know depressed people genuinely feel they cannnot work, and they may well be right, but does that mean they need an extra £20 a week seeing as they have less expenses than a person actively seeking work?
[ 12. November 2010, 22:25: Message edited by: NJA ]
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Afghan
Shipmate
# 10478
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Matt Black:
But you've also got the problem of the people who were earning at the grade above ie; round about the new minimum wage will want a pay rise too - and the people above them and above them etc...
Yes. There is inflationary pressure. But it's pushing from the bottom. If I'm just above the new minimum wage I can probably push for a raise... but I can't push as hard as someone who was below the legal minimum. If I'm way above the legal minimum, it's not that much ammunition at all when I go into my pay review. I think the overall effect is to disproportionately enhance the wage of those at the bottom.
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Credibile quia ineptum
Posts: 438 | From: Essex | Registered: Sep 2005
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Doc Tor
Deepest Red
# 9748
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Matt Black:
quote:
Originally posted by Afghan:
I suspect that increasing the minimum wage is somewhat inflationary. People at the bottom end of the income spectrum tend to spend proportionally more of their income so you'd be pushing demand up.
But... it wouldn't be so inflationary that they wouldn't be better off in real terms. Only people at the bottom of the scale would be earning more. So the overall proportional increase in demand would be less than the particular proportional increase in their income.
You'd have to factor in the damping effect of the inflationary pressure you create but it doesn't make it impossible.
But you've also got the problem of the people who were earning at the grade above ie; round about the new minimum wage will want a pay rise too - and the people above them and above them etc...
Did it happen when the minimum wage was introduced? There was some chatter about it before hand, but I can't remember it being a factor afterwards.
(If I was being pious, I'd remind folk about the parable of the workers in the vineyard, and how they were all paid the same whenever during the day they were hired. And Jesus' response to the complaints...)
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Forward the New Republic
Posts: 9131 | From: Ultima Thule | Registered: Jul 2005
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Sioni Sais
Shipmate
# 5713
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by NJA:
Why oh why do all on sickness benefit get an extra £20 per week?
I can understand if a few do because they need to get taxis into town or they need a special diet of expensive foods, but for the rest, the great majority, isn't it just a joke at our expense?
People on SB stay at home more, go to fewer interviews, job schemes etc.
Are there any doctors in the house thaty can give their angle?
I know depressed people genuinely feel they cannnot work, and they may well be right, but does that mean they need an extra £20 a week seeing as they have less expenses than a person actively seeking work?
It's £20 more than a pretty mean figure in the first place!
If you want justification however, then while we're lucky in Britain to have an NHS that is free at the point of treatment, £20 is the cost of about three prescription items. If you are 'on the sick' for any length of time you will probably have to attend outpatients clinic and transport costs more besides.
So their expenses are different, but rarely less than those in work.
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"He isn't Doctor Who, he's The Doctor"
(Paul Sinha, BBC)
Posts: 24276 | From: Newport, Wales | Registered: Apr 2004
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Jahlove
Tied to the mast
# 10290
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Sioni Sais:
[QUOTE]
So their expenses are different, but rarely less than those in work.
Also, people at home are having to pay for heating and lighting which they wouldn't if they were out at work.
The point of the Disability Premiums, is, as sioni points out, to cover the extra expenses that sick people tend to incur. If you're on the new ESA benefit, the lower rate (for single people) is actually £13.65 and then there's a higher rate (for which you need to be getting DLA middle-rate care, i.e. really very unwell) of £53.65. If you're on sickness-related Income Support, there are premiums of £28.00; £53.65 and £13.65 again, depending on reaching certain criteria. There is no longer any such thing as *Sickness Benefit*.
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“Sing like no one's listening, love like you've never been hurt, dance like nobody's watching, and live like its heaven on earth.” - Mark Twain
Posts: 6477 | From: Alice's Restaurant (UK Franchise) | Registered: Sep 2005
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redderfreak
Shipmate
# 15191
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Apocalypso:
What I wonder is why (on this side of the pond, at least), we have a cohort of folks rolling in inherited wealth who, though they could easily sit back and clip coupons for their daily bread, INSIST on working thereby keeping jobs from others.
Is there a moral difference between living off Daddy's (or Mummy's) pile and living off state largesse?
There are 23 millionaires in the British government. I don't know how many of them are living off their parents' money. But it bothers me that they are making decisions about public services that they don't need to use themselves, such as welfare benefits, education and health.
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You know I just couldn't make it by myself, I'm a little too blind to see
Posts: 287 | From: Exeter | Registered: Sep 2009
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Josephine
Orthodox Belle
# 3899
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by blackbeard:
No employer is going to pay more than the labour is worth.
They do it all the time. Unless you believe that the labor provided by the average CEO is worth more than 1000 times that of the average worker. Especially given that, a decade or two ago, that gap was far, far smaller.
Link.
If corporations would cut their CEOs' salaries in half, they could easily pay the rest of their employees more. But the CEOs' salaries, at least in this country, are set by a gang of CEOs that serve on each others' boards and set each others' salaries. Their salaries don't have to do with the value they provide their employers. They're set by the value they provide to their peers at other companies.
I'm not sure why that's not viewed as a form of fraud.
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I've written a book! Catherine's Pascha: A celebration of Easter in the Orthodox Church. It's a lovely book for children. Take a look!
Posts: 10273 | From: Pacific Northwest, USA | Registered: Jan 2003
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Boogie
Boogie on down!
# 13538
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Josephine:
If corporations would cut their CEOs' salaries in half, they could easily pay the rest of their employees more. But the CEOs' salaries, at least in this country, are set by a gang of CEOs that serve on each others' boards and set each others' salaries. Their salaries don't have to do with the value they provide their employers. They're set by the value they provide to their peers at other companies.
I'm not sure why that's not viewed as a form of fraud.
You are SO right about this. I can't think why it could be thought that
anyone might be worth such salaries.
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Garden. Room. Walk
Posts: 13030 | From: Boogie Wonderland | Registered: Mar 2008
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mousethief
Ship's Thieving Rodent
# 953
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Posted
According to an article at the NYT, Wall Street bigwigs are going to pay themselves $1.44 BILLION this year in bonuses. Fucking wastes of carbon.
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This is the last sig I'll ever write for you...
Posts: 63536 | From: Washington | Registered: Jul 2001
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Garden Hermit
Shipmate
# 109
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Posted
In good old Reading, unemployment rate about 2%, we have lots of jobs in the Care Industry with the aged, the mentally ill, the incontinent and those with Learning Disabilities.
The pay is minimum wage plus 25p an hour Thames Valley weighting.
Pax et Bonum
Posts: 1413 | From: Reading UK | Registered: May 2001
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ianjmatt
Shipmate
# 5683
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Posted
I come from pretty ordinary stock, went to a 'bog standard' comp and now earn what I think it a decent wage. However, I don't own my own home and have spent considerable periods really hard up.
However, I find the level of class and income envy that is heard nowadays pretty disgusting. Since when does being rich ever disqualify someone from making decisions. I would be terrified to have the average person I see in the job centre making decisions in cabinet. I would rather have people who have had a decent education orbeen successful in their careers (such as David Laws). Besides, people are there because they were voted for.
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You might want to visit my blog:
http://lostintheheartofsomewhere.blogspot.com
But maybe not
Posts: 676 | From: Shropshire | Registered: Mar 2004
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Doc Tor
Deepest Red
# 9748
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Posted
I don't think it's 'income envy' to question whether a footballer on £9 million a year is worth 360 times that of someone working for the average wage.
I think it's a sane, rational question about the rightness of an unfettered market and the nature of the dignity of labour.
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Forward the New Republic
Posts: 9131 | From: Ultima Thule | Registered: Jul 2005
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Angloid
Shipmate
# 159
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by ianjmatt:
Since when does being rich ever disqualify someone from making decisions.
It doesn't, necessarily. But you have to question how much someone like that understands about the pressures on someone who is struggling to survive on the minimum wage or on benefits. I doubt if any of their advisers are employed for their sensitivity or experience of such problems.
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Brian: You're all individuals!
Crowd: We're all individuals!
Lone voice: I'm not!
Posts: 12927 | From: The Pool of Life | Registered: May 2001
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Boogie
Boogie on down!
# 13538
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by ianjmatt:
I come from pretty ordinary stock, went to a 'bog standard' comp and now earn what I think it a decent wage. However, I don't own my own home and have spent considerable periods really hard up.
However, I find the level of class and income envy that is heard nowadays pretty disgusting. Since when does being rich ever disqualify someone from making decisions. I would be terrified to have the average person I see in the job centre making decisions in cabinet. I would rather have people who have had a decent education orbeen successful in their careers (such as David Laws). Besides, people are there because they were voted for.
You don't need 'income envy' to see gross injustice.
I was in the higher tax bracket for quite a few years and still consider myself very well off. But some incomes simply go beyond reasonable.
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Garden. Room. Walk
Posts: 13030 | From: Boogie Wonderland | Registered: Mar 2008
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Jahlove
Tied to the mast
# 10290
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by ianjmatt:
I would be terrified to have the average person I see in the job centre making decisions in cabinet. I would rather have people who have had a decent education orbeen successful in their careers (such as David Laws).
Besides, people are there because they were voted for.
... by these apparently terrifying average persons
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“Sing like no one's listening, love like you've never been hurt, dance like nobody's watching, and live like its heaven on earth.” - Mark Twain
Posts: 6477 | From: Alice's Restaurant (UK Franchise) | Registered: Sep 2005
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Sober Preacher's Kid
Presbymethegationalist
# 12699
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by mousethief:
According to an article at the NYT, Wall Street bigwigs are going to pay themselves $1.44 BILLION this year in bonuses. Fucking wastes of carbon.
AIUI the rot started in the 1980's with the advent of the hostile takeover. Before then Wall Street and the publicly-traded companies that used its services were actually a pretty sleepy place. CEO's were expected to be managers, technocrats who kept the company going or the delegated representatives of entrenched owners who wanted the company to continue and keep paying dividends, which often amounted to the same thing. They were paid as such, employees who had reached the top, but still employees. They had long tenure and as long as they didn't drive the company into bankruptcy, they'd retire from it.
After hostile takeover, buyouts and other capital-gain extraction methods came on the scene the role of CEO's changed. They were expected to be value-maximizers, short-term value maximizers. Instead of Chief Technocrat they became Chief Owner's Agent, frequently owners themselves. They were either freebooters themselves, taking over other companies or fended off corporate takeovers. They were paid to play high-risk, high reward games with capital. Their focus was Wall Street instead of entrenched owners and employees. Their tenure was usually five years or so. That's when pay started to spiral out of control as companies jockeyed to have the best pirate on their board.
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NDP Federal Convention Ottawa 2018: A random assortment of Prots and Trots.
Posts: 7646 | From: Peterborough, Upper Canada | Registered: Jun 2007
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mousethief
Ship's Thieving Rodent
# 953
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Doc Tor:
I don't think it's 'income envy' to question whether a footballer on £9 million a year is worth 360 times that of someone working for the average wage.
I think it's a sane, rational question about the rightness of an unfettered market and the nature of the dignity of labour.
'Income envy' is empty rhetoric the rich use to shame us while they rape us.
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This is the last sig I'll ever write for you...
Posts: 63536 | From: Washington | Registered: Jul 2001
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Porridge
Shipmate
# 15405
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Posted
Ooh! Ooh!
*Jumps on horse at sight of one lantern in church tower*
Yells "Class warfare is coming! Class warfare is coming!"
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Spiggott: Everything I've ever told you is a lie, including that.
Moon: Including what?
Spiggott: That everything I've ever told you is a lie.
Moon: That's not true!
Posts: 3925 | From: Upper right corner | Registered: Jan 2010
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Sioni Sais
Shipmate
# 5713
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by ianjmatt:
I come from pretty ordinary stock, went to a 'bog standard' comp and now earn what I think it a decent wage. However, I don't own my own home and have spent considerable periods really hard up.
However, I find the level of class and income envy that is heard nowadays pretty disgusting. Since when does being rich ever disqualify someone from making decisions. I would be terrified to have the average person I see in the job centre making decisions in cabinet. I would rather have people who have had a decent education orbeen successful in their careers (such as David Laws). Besides, people are there because they were voted for.
David Laws, yes. And look how long he lasted! But what in the name of all that is holy has his boss, George Osborne, ever done? I don't want to disqualify anyone on the basis of income or origin, but those born to social advantage and higher incomes are disproportionately over-represented in Parliament, which makes you wonder at the objectiveness of any government policy.
A few more people from ordinary backgrounds, plus some from the dole queue would help in the HofC, especially as many of those you despise for being on the dole could give messrs Cameron, Osborne, Cable and co a run for their money.
It's just occurred to me how contradictory it is to propose schemes to cut benefits when a greater number of people will be affected. Wouldn't it make sense, if on really wants to target those who make a career out of living off the state, to do so when unemployment is at its lowest? What basic factor have I missed here??
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"He isn't Doctor Who, he's The Doctor"
(Paul Sinha, BBC)
Posts: 24276 | From: Newport, Wales | Registered: Apr 2004
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Jahlove
Tied to the mast
# 10290
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Sioni Sais:
[QUOTE]
It's just occurred to me how contradictory it is to propose schemes to cut benefits when a greater number of people will be affected. Wouldn't it make sense, if on really wants to target those who make a career out of living off the state, to do so when unemployment is at its lowest? What basic factor have I missed here??
it's aka as Reign of Terror, sioni
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“Sing like no one's listening, love like you've never been hurt, dance like nobody's watching, and live like its heaven on earth.” - Mark Twain
Posts: 6477 | From: Alice's Restaurant (UK Franchise) | Registered: Sep 2005
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Anglican't
Shipmate
# 15292
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Sioni Sais:
A few more people from ordinary backgrounds, plus some from the dole queue would help in the HofC, especially as many of those you despise for being on the dole could give messrs Cameron, Osborne, Cable and co a run for their money.
IDS has been made redundant at least once in his life (and I don't mean when he was sacked as Tory Party leader).
Posts: 3613 | From: London, England | Registered: Nov 2009
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