goverment benefit vs working?

Recently I seen the reports about the unemployment rate were they actually said people are dropping out of the work force.

I have a good idea since I had a conversation with a temp hiring agency. They said that more and more people are not looking for work mostly younger adults. She found out that most of them only want to work a few hours so they don't loose their government benefits, that was not to shocking nor a surprise.

She also mentioned that a lot of people come in wanting a job that pays alot but they don't have any real skills. Currently in my neck of the woods there are pages of jobs listed every week, it's hard to find qualified people who can pass the standard back ground checks or drug screening.

I have seen a trend on this more and more that today's generation feel that we working people owe them something, they don't want to work but they want all the hand outs, and what they do get they still are not happy and want more.

I guess we taught this generation that the government will always take care of them and they don't have to work.

Personally I think all kids need to start at minimum wage, it's not ment to be a full time job, develop your skills and work your way up the ladder.

Get a job

In contrast the Bank of England has a 'deal' going on with our Gov.
If unemployment falls beneath 6.5% interests rates hike.
Therefore the government always maintain and unemployment level of at least 7%.

Whilst the Gov has spent 300 Million on Private Sector 'Work Programs'. (G4S, Wakenhut, Serco, Seetec)
In contrast there are only 2 million young unemployed in the country.
Marxist labour strategy.

Stop hating, and get educated.

a reply to: 19KTankCommander

It is a healthy response to keep all the money on the top and bleed every body else out. The system is so #ed up that people who are well educated and have experience say: I am not working for these crappy wages when some people get an incredible free ride parasiting thru the money/banking system. They destroyed the middle class. Why work you ass of at the bottom, being enslaved by feudal fascists who rule thru corporations.

Take care of the crap on the top that are bought up all politicians and create an environment where you get a fair pay for a fair amount of work. To hell with the economic enslavement.

a reply to: 19KTankCommander

Ah, the rantings of someone with a decent job, someone who's not struggling who is happy to surmise the situation of everyone else who is in a worse place.

What if I told you there are countless qualified people looking for decent (who have been looking), respectable jobs who would pass a drug test and who are happy to earn what they bring in?

Your post and thinking on the subject is full of blanket stereotypes and false assumptions. These things are just as dangerous as the fact that there are those who do game the system (when they could be working and earning more).

The old WWII-era model where everyone needs to work 40 hours a week simply doesn't make sense today. The only reason most so this is due to the power of the status quo/the position of those win the most money and power (what if I told you that many of these people don't work as much as some who bring in pennies on the dollar of what they make). According to you, these people all earned what they bring in. None of them were handed (inherited) businesses, none of them are horrible business owners -- they all earned it!

We are in the age of automation. There are far too many "paper pushers" and middlemen in the world simply because of the "most everyone is expected to work" attitude, 40 hours a week at that.

We should have a four day work week at this point, with the option for entrepreneurs and people who want to advance to work more during the other days (perhaps at their long-term goals or desired trades).

The model we're trying to live under at this point is a wasteful relic that leads to most having a poor work/life balance.

Except maybe for people like you who are comfortable enough to have the time to go online and call everyone in a more stressful paycheck-to-paycheck situation "lazy". Remember that many are dealing with things like medial-expense related borderline bankruptcy, etc.

Try to not be so judgmental. Turn off Fox News some days. For everyone who is lazy and trying to game the system there is a legitimate mother or father trying to get back into the workforce, who is qualified out the wazoo, who is discriminated against for staying home with their child for a year or two, or a business who wants to hire trial "interns" for up to six months for free (literally do a typically paid person's job for free for us for six months, and we will maybe hire you)...

Double post

I think people are done with this system that has been set up to enslave people. People want to live a decent life, and if working only makes them poor then they're not going to do it. People aren't gonna work for nothing. Living on minimum wage is a nightmare. After you get paid most of the money goes for gas and Ramen noodles. Who wants to live like that? Either pay a living wage or forget it.

a reply to: 19KTankCommander

I'd like to go one step further. Start at a job where you don't get paid at all, but there are high expectations and responsibilities... and do that at... let's say age 15. Get yourself a taste of life before you have to eat the whole thing.

If this work-path were required to even qualify for government benefits, that gives a reason for stepping up, and gives it while parents are still legally responsible for the upbringing of those kids. Kids not only get lessons in responsibility, but they get on-the-job training for... something. How many infrastructure, programming, community service, and data entry jobs are just not being done because they are too expensive to staff? Enter the unpaid internship!

Myself, I'm thoroughly in favour of government assistance... but it should require work. I'm in favour of employment insurance (in Canada, payment into employment insurance is mandatory once you start working), but there should be a reasonable expectation that if you've paid into it, you should be able to call on it in times of hardship (which is remarkably difficult and takes far too long in Canada... to the point where the two times I have really needed it in the past, I was denied repeatedly over the course of 8 months for various nitpicking reasons, or approved about a week after my 6 month "hiatus" finally ended... but at least I kept up with their reporting requirements and canvased the whole freaking country during that time). Even then, what you get out should be directly related to what you've put in.

I think our education system (US and Canada) shares a fair amount of blame for the situation. There's very little taught in school about how to live once school ends. This is easily within the responsibilities of parents, sure, but how are they supposed to know? They followed the same (maybe with older math, imperial system measurements (I started school after the metric system was badly introduced in Canada, so I'm not one of those), and more farm-training) system of education, and turned out... in debt, out of work, and desperate for someone to save them from it so they can retire and beat some enjoyment out of life before they die.

See? We're not setting a great example for today's youth. It's not like they see how we're all doing and say "I want that!" Can we really blame them for wanting to skip the Pit of Despair of real life?

I guess your to quick to judge your self, I have been working since. I was 12, just so my mother could have extra food for the week, I spent twenty years of my life in the military, I can remember my first pay day when it was only 211 dollars for the month, I work out doors 60 percent of the time turning wrenches, which was a skill I developed over time, I have not taken a vacation in over 15 years but do I live comfortable to some I do but to a lot others I don't oh and I don't watch Fox's news as you suggested, go to a temp agencie and ask questions.
reply to: AkumaStreak

a reply to: 19KTankCommander

It sounds like you earned what you have, and you have a lot to be proud of. Times change however, and there is an entire generation of overqualified people in the world atm who are competing for limited jobs. Companies are not loyal to their employees as they once were -- on the average vs. a generation ago that loyalty is almost non-existent.

For every kind of job you are talking about, where someone starts at the bottom, and moves up, there is someone goes who does not. And often it's not because they weren't eligible, it's just the outcome of a numbers game. Maybe the company goes under or does not grow, not everyone can be the CEO, the math doesn't work like that.

The circumstances today are a clusterfu$& for everyone. The path you saw for promotion/bettering your life has gone for many people from an American dream to a pipe dream. And don't just assume if these people don't believe, they don't deserve. Many are the product of a society that has failed them, the paths were simply not open for many of them -- things don't work out too often for people who deserved better/did play the game.

When I was talking with the ladies at the temp agency the local companies that want to hire are having problems with back ground checks and drug screenings , the ones that do pas don't have the skills need for the job nor do they want to do on the job training at a less pay rate for x amount of days,

If it was me and I had a family I would put my pride aside and get what ever job it was he'll I would go and pick trash up off of the roads if need be.
reply to: AkumaStreak

a reply to: Fylgje

This is a major problem. Our family has had one major breadwinner for maybe two years now, because we wanted a parent home with our son vs. dumping him off on someone else (and paying a huge portion of one person's salary to do that -- how does that make sense, when you don't even get to raise your own kid most of the time). The system is out of control today, in many places, both parents must have a good job to stay afloat (we are about 30 mins out of Chicago). People have already given up their social lives/health in many ways to meet the demands of modern jobs/careers, and now people feel punished for trying to have even one child, and to spend just a few years raising that child themselves.

For years now we've literally bled money/gone into debt just getting up in the morning, and being in this situation where she has a good job, and I have a so-so part-time job...

We have to move after a decade of trying to make this area "work out". With nothing to show for it. But we've prob. put 300k or so back into the community/a former home we lost money on/etc. And we will leave with nothing. Around half of the time we were here, I had a good job, and the other half, I did independent contracting, with the exception of two years home with our son. She had her job the whole time.

However, I am actually not bitter. Excited to have a new start/have my and my family's health. :-) Happy to move someplace more affordable and to stop being bled out financially.

There are a lot of people out there working part time at a job and they qualify for benefits, that is true. But the reason is not only what you seem to think OP. If they are working part time the employer does not have to supply them with benefits, including health care and vacation pay, retirement, and sick days, that they pay full time employees. On the other side of the coin, these people may qualify for healthcare from the government and also help with food costs and utility bills. Now this is how the system has seemed to go in this country. Don't blame it on the people collecting these benefits, it is out of their control sometimes. How would you like to be starving if you could only get a part time job because that is only what is available. For mixed reasons, a lot of the manufacturing jobs have left the country. Jobs that actually supplied the real needs of the population here. This is not China's fault, we let this happen. Many Economists knew this was a bad idea, but their concerns were ignored. Our country has been infiltrated by stupidity at the high levels of government.

Get used to it, I predict that in the next five years, most people will be either working part time or subcontracting of labor will be the norm. No laws presently protect subcontractors rights. Once you sign a contract for labor, you assume a lot of liability most times.

In a few more years, the entire 'working class' will be dependent on the government for survival.
The ACA was a major part of the long-term goal. I am flabbergasted that so many people are unable to see the forest for the trees!

Change in policy will not be an options in a few short decad; you can't bite the hand that feeds you without going hungry.
We may not be a 'prison planet', but America is on the fast track to becoming a prison country.

a reply to: 19KTankCommander

wow that sounds like some kind of paradise compared to were I live in england.

Public transport is so expensive that commuting more than a couple of miles away is pointless unless you've got a high paying job and getting enough money together to pay for a drivers license is impossible unless you've got well off parents that can pay for it.

Almost all the work here is seasonal and its not uncommon to have 400+ people applying for the same job. Alot of the unemployed here have either gone self employed or given up hope of ever finding a job.

Seeing people who have worked 20-30 + years of their lives sitting at home being consumed by depression because they have given up home of ever getting off benefits, its hard.

I lost my job a few weeks ago due to unforseen circumstances beyond my control and I am desperate for a job, minimum wage sounds wondefull because of government loopholes I have often worked for well below that.

I have had to sign up to government benefits, which I hate every second of especially because the way the system is set up actually makes it harder to get a job and they will stop your benefits for the most arbitary reasons and constantly cancel benefits by accident.

There are plenty of people here young and old desperate for work.

What are the issue with the Unemployment in England? is it lack of skills, migrant workers or immigrants? From my point of view in my neck of the world its society. Are we raising a generation of kids that don't want to work because they can get the government benefits, are we teaching them that its alright to be tied to the government, do they think the entitlements they receive are owed to them.

I believe most of us would do what we have to do to support our family's even if it means doing something that we don't like to do for a lot less than what we earned in the past.

Are we raising a future work force or entitlement babies?

a reply to: 19KTankCommander

Where I live the transport is all run by government protected monopolies which stops people commuting to better paid jobs and because of redundancies and high unemployment you have people with 30+ years experiance competing with kids just out of school and college for the minimum wage dead end jobs.

Young people here have a bad rep too but for every lazy kid theres 2-3 just trying to catch a break, unfortunatly they're all tarred with the same brush and because its so difficult to fire bad staff here no one wants to take the risk.

The kind of effort and determination it took a generation ago to get started on the career ladder of a good job is the kind it takes now to get a job flipping burgers.

Immigration often doesn't help but isn't the problem neither are migrant workers or lack of skills. The problem we have is an economy slowly imploding combined with government regulations that create and enfoce monopolies.

a reply to: AkumaStreak
Good post and so true. I remember how good things were in the 80's. Everything was flourishing because the economy and jobs market seemed pretty good. People were happy and played on the weekends with their toys. Now, I rarely see that. There's nobody camping on the rivers. There's hardly anyone cruising the back roads. Mostly what I see are poor, frustrated and tired people who are struggling just to live like a dog. Both parents working and still struggling. When we make out our bills we get sick. I can honestly understand why a lot of kids these days don't wanna work and want to live in their parents attics and basements. I was taught to work hard and play hard, which I did, but I cannot give my kids the same advice. I want my kids to infiltrate the system and destroy it, sabotage it at every turn.

Things just are not the same now as they were twenty, or thirty years ago. You're living in a dream world if you think just "getting a job" is easy and the answer to life's problems. Long gone are the days when you could just walk into a company off the street and say "give me a job" and they would. I live in the UK, and the system is completely set up to keep the lower class people out of work and struggling. People talk about "benefit scroungers" as if that even means anything at all. Let me tell you something about benefits. The UK Job Centre expect claimants to travel up to 90 minutes away from where they live to a job, and also expect you take ANY job offered or that you can physically DO. Now, this means that if you were offered a part time temporary job working one day a week, have to take a train journey that costs forty pound a day, for a few hours wage a week; which means that you end up much LESS well off than you were claiming benefits. And, also have other benefits slashed because you are now working. So, it is simply not economically worthwhile "taking ANY job" as people often like to claim with a holier than thou attitude. If you've got a partner, a child and you're struggling to live on benefits, you are NOT going to put yourself in a position that will make your family WORSE off. It's as simple as that. I understand that there ARE people who play the system, but the majority of people are NOT resigned to living on benefits because they want to. They are resigned to living on benefits, because they HAVE to.

The second major problem is that there are an incredible number of applicants applying for a very, very limited number of vacancies. Factor into this that the Job Centre want everyone's CV and job search details to be on website databases, you then create a new problem: that employers can easily just be ultra-selective and the amount of competition for each job is so vast that it is almost impossible for anyone at the bottom of the ladder to be in with any kind of chance of steady employment. Internet CV Libraries that the Government are SO in favour of ONLY benefit the employer and NOT the employee. By the way, I'm not saying that everyone who is on benefits is trying their utmost to get back into work (with the current situation as it is, can you blame them), but I know many, many more claimants that ARE actively searching. When I was out of work, I searched for and applied for jobs from eight in the morning to six at night, seven days a week and still didn't find work for well over a year. So I know damn well how difficult it really can be to get back on the ladder.

The problem is that the system is only designed to hit application quotas and NOT to help people get back into work. The reason I say this is because if you attempt to do ANYTHING to actually better your chances of getting a job, your benefits are instantly skewed. Get an internship somewhere for a couple of days each week? Good luck claiming benefits to be able to LIVE because they are gone. Go back into education in order to better yourself... Say goodbye to your ability to live. It's just all designed to KEEP people in a rut. When I was out of work for an extended period of time, I decided that the best route for me to take was get another qualification in the field I was interested in to appeal to potential employers by taking a quick, one year higher education course. Guess what? My benefits were stopped and I had to fund the entire course off my own back. Somehow, with a hell of a lot of blood and sweat, I managed it. But, is it any surprise why there are so many undereducated people who are out of work with no chance of ever improving themselves. A guy living on a council estate with a wife and two kids is not going to choose volunteering or education over his benefits, because he just CAN'T. It's not because he WON'T.

a reply to: 8BitOperator

That sums the uk jobseeking perfectly

a reply to: Fylgje

Yep. Work used to be a means to an end for most, the end game being time with family and friends, money for leisure/entertainment, etc. Take those things out of the equation, and the math becomes very different.

Now we have things like Facebook, which give people a false sense of social time (a little time at the end of a hard work week or work day), allowing them to have social interaction via blanket updates/non-personal-non-quality time together. Instead of pushing back and demanding that our employers back up (fighting for a good work/life balance), we compete against one another for declining standards of living...

I'll just leave it at that, or I'll start (continue?) ranting. Thanks for the post.