The attraction of a music festival is perhaps bewildering. Sure, the atmosphere of watching a live band perform in front of a huge crowd is fantastic. But for this pleasure, we each pay a not insignificant amount of money spending a few days in unhygienic conditions amongst other germ carriers, sleeping in discomfort and having to queue 20mins for the privilege to pee in a contagious plastic box.
This is notwithstanding that I have succumbed to the allure.
Why?
Because there is a certain charm in living like common people. At some level, that image of a carefree and somehow happy existence, where every day brings a new adventure and doesn’t start with an alarm that shrieks at Silly A.M., is irresistible. The festival on a sunny day resembles a happy hippy camp free of routine and restrictions and responsibility. Can you pee standing up? Great. Pick a bush.
The allure of being poor and living a rock bottom existence with nothing to lose is a glass full of optimism. Nowhere but up. High risk, high reward. Nothing to lose so let’s risk it all. After all, only fools and horses work.
Compared to the hooky antics of Del Boy and Rodney, Britain today presents a rather sad story. The brothers lived a hand to mouth existence that survived only on their creativity to identify goods (sometimes faulty and/or illegal) that could be bought cheap and sold less cheap. They were poor but proud. They certainly gave nothing to the government - they evaded VAT and income tax. How much would they have contributed any way? But critically, they expected nothing either. Their self supported lifestyle was a boot strap model of entrepreneurship where failure was acceptable. They had courage and they were not lazy.
Last week, flicking channels mindlessly got me to stop at a Channel 4 documentary interviewing a 30-something girl who lived on benefits. They were helping her find a job to get her off benefits. Surely going to work every morning, contributing and having a purpose in life is good for any one’s self esteem?
No. This one didn’t want to do this, that or the other. Most things were boring so why should she? She wasn’t destitute. Our taxes were paying for her to stay at home. She eventually thought working in a care home might be nice and comfy. But she didn’t like cleaning up after old people and the kitchen was a bit dull. She went home instead.
Welfare is the second highest category of expenditure within the UK’s public spend at 17%. Health and Pensions top the table at 18% each. It’s no surprise that the government is trying to reform each of them. We can argue about the way they are going about it, poor communication, misguided changes, but it is undeniable that changes need to be made.
The minimum wage for an able bodied worker above the age of 21 years is £5.93. An 8 hour, 9-5 job, 5 days a week leads to an annual gross of £12,334.40.
The government today is proposing to limit universal benefits (housing, living, child, etc) to £26,000 p.a. equivalent to an hourly wage of £12.50
While the private sector average annual salary is £21,000.
And the public sector average is just under £26,000 (and notably, higher than the private sector).
Today the Opposition and various sympathisers are raising cry that the proposed Welfare bill with the cap at £26,000 and various other restrictions that limit unemployment benefits, etc, will make many people homeless through not being able to afford their current urban residence.
Reality is that, while there are many who deservedly receive benefits due to disability, age, etc., there is tremendous wastage due to the structural incentive created by the state to not work. Individuals are self selecting the optimal outcome for themselves by choosing to not work. The type of individuals falling into this category are such as described in this BBC report
Minimum wage has to more than double in this situation for individuals to be incentivised to work. Working for less than £12.50, is the sub optimal choice and these individuals are making the smart decision by choosing not to.
Now I don’t expect that the Welfare State is going to reach a stage any time soon, where this inefficiency is entirely corrected, but as the government is trying to do today, we can attempt to make some improvement. In the meantime what the rest of us dumb taxpayers can do is fight the hard fight to encourage common people to make the bad decision and get a job.
The allure of being poor and living a rock bottom existence with nothing to lose is a glass full of optimism. Nowhere but up. High risk, high reward. Nothing to lose so let’s risk it all. After all, only fools and horses work.
Compared to the hooky antics of Del Boy and Rodney, Britain today presents a rather sad story. The brothers lived a hand to mouth existence that survived only on their creativity to identify goods (sometimes faulty and/or illegal) that could be bought cheap and sold less cheap. They were poor but proud. They certainly gave nothing to the government - they evaded VAT and income tax. How much would they have contributed any way? But critically, they expected nothing either. Their self supported lifestyle was a boot strap model of entrepreneurship where failure was acceptable. They had courage and they were not lazy.
Last week, flicking channels mindlessly got me to stop at a Channel 4 documentary interviewing a 30-something girl who lived on benefits. They were helping her find a job to get her off benefits. Surely going to work every morning, contributing and having a purpose in life is good for any one’s self esteem?
No. This one didn’t want to do this, that or the other. Most things were boring so why should she? She wasn’t destitute. Our taxes were paying for her to stay at home. She eventually thought working in a care home might be nice and comfy. But she didn’t like cleaning up after old people and the kitchen was a bit dull. She went home instead.
Welfare is the second highest category of expenditure within the UK’s public spend at 17%. Health and Pensions top the table at 18% each. It’s no surprise that the government is trying to reform each of them. We can argue about the way they are going about it, poor communication, misguided changes, but it is undeniable that changes need to be made.
The minimum wage for an able bodied worker above the age of 21 years is £5.93. An 8 hour, 9-5 job, 5 days a week leads to an annual gross of £12,334.40.
The government today is proposing to limit universal benefits (housing, living, child, etc) to £26,000 p.a. equivalent to an hourly wage of £12.50
While the private sector average annual salary is £21,000.
And the public sector average is just under £26,000 (and notably, higher than the private sector).
Today the Opposition and various sympathisers are raising cry that the proposed Welfare bill with the cap at £26,000 and various other restrictions that limit unemployment benefits, etc, will make many people homeless through not being able to afford their current urban residence.
Reality is that, while there are many who deservedly receive benefits due to disability, age, etc., there is tremendous wastage due to the structural incentive created by the state to not work. Individuals are self selecting the optimal outcome for themselves by choosing to not work. The type of individuals falling into this category are such as described in this BBC report
Minimum wage has to more than double in this situation for individuals to be incentivised to work. Working for less than £12.50, is the sub optimal choice and these individuals are making the smart decision by choosing not to.
Now I don’t expect that the Welfare State is going to reach a stage any time soon, where this inefficiency is entirely corrected, but as the government is trying to do today, we can attempt to make some improvement. In the meantime what the rest of us dumb taxpayers can do is fight the hard fight to encourage common people to make the bad decision and get a job.
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