Welfare. Can we afford it?

[Beebo]

I don’t think we have a dedicated welfare thread. So let’s start one.

I suspect welfare will become a much more polarising debate as costs go up along with taxes. And the working population declines.

Apparently Europe has 9% of the global population, 27% of the GDP and 50% of the welfare bill.

It’s also seen as a draw for mass immigration from outside Europe. It’s probably one of the main reasons why Russia and Dubai don’t have immigration problems.

The argument is that welfare costs are dragging European economies down, and it is no longer affordable in an ever more competitive world. Yet the gap between the top and bottom has never been wider.

In the UK the welfare budget is around 25% of the overall budget, with pensions making half of that cost.

Are we too reliant on welfare? Can this over reliance get fixed by traditional politicians. Or do we just need a populist government to break the system and start again?

Breakdowns of costs here.

https://wheredoesitallgo.org/

 

[CXRAndy]

do we just need a populist government to break the system and start again?

Yes

 

[AndyRM]

Good site that, hadn't seen it before.

I doubt breaking the system would do much good, and if Reform got into power and were to try I suspect it would end pretty badly. They've done nothing to convince anyone with half a brain that they're anything more than a poorly run single issue party who only get air time because of Farage.

 

[bobzmyunkle]

In the UK the welfare budget is around 25% of the overall budget, with pensions making half of that cost.

Does welfare equal scroungers?
Bloody lazy, can't be bothered to get off their arses, pensioners. Let's put a stop to that for a start off.

 

[Beebo]

Does welfare equal scroungers?
Bloody lazy, can't be bothered to get off their arses, pensioners. Let's put a stop to that for a start off.

It means lots of things. Universal credit is paid to working families.
But the down side of any system is that a percentage of the population will always try to game it. That is just life.

 

[CXRAndy]

View: https://x.com/i/status/1996267664898248931

 

[bobzmyunkle]

It means lots of things.

Well exactly.
So was your 'can we afford it' a leading question to encourage wider debate about the many aspects?
If not you're just encouraging magaman and his ilk to spout their usual reactionary babble.

 

[briantrumpet]

Well exactly.
So was your 'can we afford it' a leading question to encourage wider debate about the many aspects?
If not you're just encouraging magaman and his ilk to spout their usual reactionary babble.

The easy answer is "yes". We are a hugely more wealthy society than we were 50 years ago. The hard political part is "how".

 

[Beebo]

Well exactly.
So was your 'can we afford it' a leading question to encourage wider debate about the many aspects?
If not you're just encouraging magaman and his ilk to spout their usual reactionary babble.

Im very much in the centre of politics. I agree that we can afford it, but at the expense of what else?
for every pound we spend on welfare we lose the opportunity cost of spending that pound somewhere else. The worry i have is that UK and Europe are just on a slow managed decline, and don’t seem dynamic economies at the moment.

there is an argument to be made that spending it on welfare is actually the best way to spend it, but I don’t hear many people making a good case of explaining this to the general public.

Pensions will almost certainly need reforming, as soon as one party grabs the nettle the rest will follow. But how do you tell someone like me, who has been paying in for over 30 years that they may not get anything out at the back end? Very tricky.

 

[Shortfall]

No we can't afford the welfare state as it stands and I'm including pensions. It's one of the reasons why we have an out of control.deficit, ever rising taxes and a 2 trillion plus national debt. At some point the bond markets will stop lending to the government at rates it can afford and then we will have to cut our cloth accordingly. I imagine that the sort of haircut we have to take will make Osborne's austerity budgets look like a picnic. But "tax the rich", 6th largest economy in the world, MMT, blah,blah, blah.

 

[Psamathe]

Does welfare equal scroungers?
Bloody lazy, can't be bothered to get off their arses, pensioners. Let's put a stop to that for a start off.

It means lots of things. Universal credit is paid to working families.
But the down side of any system is that a percentage of the population will always try to game it. That is just life.

I'm sure there are some (no idea about %ages) who don't deserve the help they get but in any large system that is always going to be the case and in solving the question of those not making the efforts expected we do need to remember there are vast numbers in desperate need of the help they get. That said I know of 2 people on non-pension benefits neither employed (for many many years), neither of whom make any effort to seek to do anything useful (even to themselves).

I do sometimes wonder about the possibility for people in the unemployed benefits to undertake some community service. Confess I'm not familiar with the system these days but seems a real waste for people to be sitting at home doing nothing when they could be contributing to society. Doesn't mean forcing them into manual or feee labour and there must be a massive range of choices to help they could be offered.

But I should emphasise I'm not familiar with the benefit system so the thought about voluntary work is not making a case that I believe, just thinking aloud.

 

[spen666]

"Welfare. Can we afford it?"

Depends what you mean by "welfare" and what you mean by "can we afford it?"
Without defining the terms there is little point in trying to debate it as everyone will have slightly different meanings for all the key things

 

[First Aspect]

This Friday's More or Less provided some brilliant context to welfare spending. The answer to the question depends on what category. I didn't know, but our unemployment benefit is pitiful compared to the rest of Europe, whereas possibly as a consequence our disability benefit spending is rather higher. We are also an outlier in changes since COVID.

I am coming to the view that it is the rate of change rather than the overall level of welfare spending that is the issue and that there is no reason why spending shouldn't be higher overall providing we spend less elsewhere.

I suspect (I don't know) that our neighbours just spend more everywhere and the difference is not made up entirely with taxation.

So, on balance it seems to me that unless we want to change our entire tax and benefit system to a facsimile of a other country's, we need to normalise the welfare spending to closer to pre-covid and possibly pre-GFC levels.

 

[All uphill]

IMO what we lack is any kind of rational non-party discussion about the country's priorities.

Where is the debate about health spending by age of patient for example?

We might decide to spend more on health promotion and less on treating the diseases of old age, for example.

 

[bobzmyunkle]

We might decide to spend more on health promotion and less on treating the diseases of old age, for example.

I've an idea - pay me to ride my bike somewhere warm for a month. I'm sure it would benefit the NHS long term.
Actually that would be poor expenditure. But there are plenty of examples e.g. gardening projects for mental health.