Disability sucks. I just thought you should know that.
It’s sometimes painful, always inconvenient and inclined to bite gaping holes out of your self esteem. Most people are pretty reliable: they get up in the morning, go to work or school during the week and kick back on the weekends doing activities they enjoy once the daily maintenance tasks (literal and financial housekeeping etc) are complete. However once you are disabled, you are no longer ‘most people’.
Supposedly the most damaging aspect of Disability is isolation. Sometimes this is physical – when a disability limits your ability to get out of the house; other times it is social – when you are so busy meeting the additional needs of your condition/illness/injury that there simply isn’t time or energy left to maintain relationships properly.
As a society we are at least beyond the stage of say the 1930s where those with disabilities were considered “socially dead” and restricted to a role of utter dependency and silence by the conviction that physical handicap was somehow a sign of intellectual damage.
What I’ve personally found most isolating about being disabled has been the change from working full-time to relying on benefits. As a benefits claimant I’m “politically dead” and restricted to a role of utter dependency and silence by the conviction that the source of my income is somehow a sign of moral damage. Once you rely on welfare you’re no longer ‘most people’.
IF I’M A WELFARE QUEEN, WHERE’S MY CROWN
Thanks to SL I had unprecedented access to a senior politican last week. Vicariously of course, but then these days most of what I consider my “life” is experienced vicariously, either online or through friends. You’ve read her piece David Cameron Visits Brasenose? Well that was MY question she was kind enough to ask.
I though it was important to ask because the question itself reminds policy promoters that their rhetoric effects real people. The idea that people commonly fake illness or injury to go “on the sick” isn’t in itself new, I ran into it personally ten years ago as my mobility declined and I started my grand tour of neurologists: my landlady decided that I was too young to be really disabled and evicted me. Unfortunately this story has been used deliberately as a tool to silence criticism of the welfare reforms forced through over the last two years, particularly the abolition of Incapacity Benefit.
It’s hardly coincidence that the government has been rolling out a massive national advertising campaign against benefit fraud during the same period. The BBC’s “Saints and Scroungers” series which followed the work of fraud investigation departments – three convictions an episode for thirteen episodes – simply offered a new placement for the same government advertising. So much for editorial independence.
Now you wont find me defending dishonesty or denying that benefit fraud exists, what I will question however is the differing treatment people receive and assumptions made about their character based on the source of their income. The creepy 1984-style “we’re closing in” adverts made a point of emphasizing the surveillance powers available to both local authorities and the DWP. The Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act that gives them the right to covertly follow and photograph suspects and commandeer their banking and utility records, was passed into law with barely a whimper in 2000 as an anti-fraud/anti-terror measure. It only aroused popular criticism when the same powers were used against parents gaming the “catchment area” system for school admission.
If it is acceptable and desirable to use this level of surveillance in the fight against benefit fraud why aren’t these powers available to the Inland Revenue when investigating tax fraud? Why is self-assessment considered an acceptable basis for a tax return but an unforgivable invitation to fraud when the application is for a disability-related benefit?
MORAL HAZARD IS FOR POOR PEOPLE
This double standard isn’t imaginary, though it doesn’t tend to get much coverage beyond left leaning publications like The Guardian .
Research earlier this year conducted by the Fabian Society and the Joseph Rowntree Foundation asked people to estimate the social cost of benefit fraud relative to that of tax evasion – and their answers misfired by an order of magnitude that was laughable.
The majority thought benefit cheats cost more than tax evaders; in fact benefit fraud is estimated by the Department for Work and Pensions to cost £800m a year, while personal tax avoidance was thought to be running at £13bn.
This misconception is more troubling than assumptions about middle-class honesty: if the taxpayer is thought to be broadly honest, while society’s net recipients are all crooks, then clearly that will have an impact on our readiness to pay tax and support even the most modest redistribution.
It’s hard to argue that fraud is only a minor problem when the latest DWP estimates for 2008/09 suggest that £3 billion of total benefit expenditure was overpaid due to a combination of fraud and error… unless you also notice that this constitutes only 2.2% of the overall benefit bill. [The fraud estimate for Incapacity Benefit in isolation is only 3.5% - the lowest of all the continuously monitored benefits - while Pension Credit is put at 5.1%. No mass public condemnation of rorting wrinklies seems imminent but perhaps they’re saving that for when the pensions crisis really bites.]
Not that the Guardian hasn’t joined most of the press in drawing a very long bow over the applicant failure rates for the new Employment Support Allowance (ESA) – now replacing Incapacity Benefit – in the course of its first year. Despite their Society section having one of the best articles describing the intricacies and contradictions of the new medical assessments, it didn’t stop political editor Patrick Wintour attempting to apply ESA failure rates to migrating IB claimants without considering IB failure rates …
More than two-thirds of applicants for a new sickness-related benefit are failing in their claims, suggesting many of the 2.6 million existing incapacity benefit claimants will be forced on to a lower level of benefit when they are assessed over the next two to three years…
Overall, the research found only 5% of those seeking ESA were thought totally incapable of being ready for work and so entitled to the full benefit of £108.55. A further 11%, thought potentially capable of work, were put on a rate of £89.80 a week, and were expected to co-operate with efforts to ready themselves for work. A third of the initial claimants dropped out before completing the claim, and a further third were seen as fit for work.
… but at least the broadsheets acknowledged that the whole definition of “fit to work” had been changed. At the tabloid end of the spectrum, editors were a bit clearer about the message these results sent to them..
75% ON SICK BENEFITS ARE FAKING
LABOUR’S failure to crack down on scroungers has let three-quarters of incapacity benefit claimants get away with faking their illnesses.
- Daily ExpressJust one in six incapacity benefit claimants ‘is genuine’ as tough new test reveals TWO MILLION could be cheating
- Daily Mail
HEAD, MEET DESK
At the time ESA was launched I wondered why the government was needlessly duplicating the cost of privatized medical assessment in setting up a whole new benefit when they could have simply used the receipt of Disability Living Allowance to determine whether an IB claimant was genuine or not (DLA has had privatised medical inspections for over a decade and is paid alongside most income benefits to meet the additional costs of care and/or transport incurred when you’re disabled.)
Even if the numbers were still too high they could restrict eligibility further by dropping out those who only received the lower-rates of the two components… but that would have been validation of one of the benefits it has since turned out they were also planning to scrap (a fact not openly admitted until ministers changed their minds).
Though impressed by some of the Conservative moves towards openness about their priorities, I find Mr Cameron’s agreement that politicians need to be more careful with their statements to be somewhat disingenuous. Politicans are very careful with their statements. These are carefully scripted by an army of special advisors… take this choice nugget from Theresa May, the Shadow Secretary of State for Work and Pensions.
The Government needs to get to grips with Britain’s benefit culture and radically reform our welfare system. It’s hardly surprising that so many people spend their lives on benefits when in some cases they can get as much money from benefits as many people earn in work. Things really have to change.
Hard to argue with that one as most people would agree that people who work should end up with more money than people who don’t, but the solution is left carefully unstated.
The Right hear, “The unworthy poor are receiving too much money. Cut their benefits!”
Libertarians hear, “Low income earners are paying tax too early. Raise the personal threshold over £10,000!”
The Old Left hear, “The minimum wage is too low. Raise it with new legislation!”
The New Left hear, “The minimum wage is too low. Raise it by restricting low skilled immigration!”
This is why you hear so much about the problems and so little about the solutions when parties are campaigning. The problem alienates no-one whereas the choice of solution may.
I’M THE KIND OF POOR ALFRED DOOLITTLE WARNED YOU ABOUT
The Conservatives recently published a cheeky little league table that “ranks constituencies according to the proportion of working-age adults receiving incapacity, lone parent or jobseeker benefit”. 189 of the 200 seats with highest rates of adults on benefits for being incapacitated, unemployed or single-parents are held by labour, only 4 by the conservatives. It was accompanied by the Theresa May soundbite I’ve just mentioned. Though the right wing press cheerfully pounced on the idea that Labour was in power thanks to the “Welfare Vote”, actual Conservative statements seem to have left this very carefully unmentioned.
Here’s a tip: if you genuinely think a particular selection of the electorate has control of a particular seat, it might be a good idea to not insult them during the runup to a general election. If not, then you have no right to use the association with them as a smear against your political rivals. This ‘nod and a wink’ politics is extremely annoying. A smear inferred is no less a smear, particularly if not especially, when it’s against you as a person.
If Mr Cameron really believes that there is a “welfare vote”, then how about publicly acknowledging the electoral significance of that section of the British electorate in receipt of State Benefits in a positive way? After the party conference rhetoric where Tories claimed to be the “party of the poor” I’d rather hoped this would be the new direction they were taking but that might be the residual middle-class expectation of fairness showing.
I receive benefits because I can’t work full-time not because I lack the education, intelligence or skills I had when working full-time as a journalist (though sure, the ability to walk and remain upright is pretty much a goner at this stage). I may be overweight and live in social housing but the accent is unmistakeable.
UNIVERSAL SUFFRAGE IS A BITCH AND SO AM I
SL always says that her “libertarian exception” is compulsory voting. Having grown up in Australia she has decided that it discourages politicians from demonising any particular minority group by making them pay at the ballot box and that it is unfortunate this mechanism isn’t available in the UK. But Britain got rid of Census Suffrage and the property qualification in 1918 for men and 1928 for women, so I’d like to end my post with this timely reminder for Mr Cameron and other politicians of whatever party.
We listen.
We remember.
We vote.
58 Comments
I think it’s worth pointing out that the sister advert to the one in the post is even creepier:
The Tories (and Labour) have made much of their pro-family policies, but it is now well documented that penalising benefit recipients for moving in together and thereby forming a stable relationship actively harms children and discourages family formation.
There is a mountain of evidence linking stable two-parent relationships with positive outcomes for children and many ancillary positive ‘spillover effects’ or ‘positive externalities’. These include lower crime rates, a major free-up of the property market, fewer people living alone, better educational outcomes for children, increased male responsibility, lower unemployment and lower rates of domestic violence.
(NOT TO MENTION THE SAVINGS IN HOUSING BENEFIT & COUNCIL TAX BENEFIT ON A SECOND PROPERTY – ADMIN DEM)
Much of this research is ably summarized by Patricia Morgan in ‘The War between the State and the Family’ (2007).
Being pro-family involves being pro ALL families, you pollies, not just the ones with the right accent.
Recently a report from Australia noted a huge spike in the number of people on disability benefits. Our government will probably adopt the same attitude as Britain.
I actually heard this from people who work in Centrelink and have seen evidence of it. There has been a quiet government policy of shunting people off to disability. The reason is obvious: lowers unemployment numbers and the upfront cost of helping these people is regarded as too high. This is the wrong attitude. For example, if I remember correctly, some studies have indicated that in relation to the unemployed the State is better off spending money to prepare them to get back to work rather than just keeping them at subsistence level. Yet here in Australia the Jobnetwork is a joke, an incredible waste of public monies.
There is a continuum of sorts there. If you’re unemployed long enough, as the stats show, you are less likely to gain employment. Something else happens though, you become a problem. Unemployed people have some idea of the psychological impact of disability but they have one great hope: they can still escape.
Over the long term individuals in these situations literally lose the ability to try. As one Australian study found, being unemployed for as little as 12 months can seriously erode the habits that make working life possible. Working life patterns are so stylised, these are designed for production not people; let alone disabled people. If you look at the criteria regarding employing disabled people, in Australia at least it is still expected that the disabled person is the best person for the job. Now this is just too often unrealistic, disabled people can’t be expected to fit into roles that were designed for able bodied people and even more significantly very poorly designed for able bodied people. That is an absurdity.
There is an enormous amount of research on societal attitudes to the disabled. As I have disabilities I decided some years back to look at this research. That may have been a mistake, it was extremely disheartening. The only consolation I could take from that research was that it vindicated my own perceptions of my experience and contradicted those who stated it was all my problem. Well that’s the problem with some types of brain damage, you just can’t get some things right no matter how hard you try. The other problem is most people are completely incapable of appreciating such matters.
I’m tired of seeing doctors, I’m tired of my eyesight going south so many times in my life and often when I was working hard and productively at things I really enjoyed. The last time has left me much more vulnerable, I can only see in one eye and I’m scared of pushing myself because I know the vision can’t take that much stress.
I’m tired of trying to explain to Rehab what is going on because they are often too ignorant to understand and after 3 dealings over 4 years with the Rehab service in Aus(CRS) I have come to the conclusion it is better to avoid them and go it alone. They even bundled me off for a psychiatric assessment, hoping for a diagnosis that would allow them to justify pensioning me off. Big mistake, the final comment by that psychiatrist was one of complete clearance and a warning this chap was very smart and probably just made you lot look foolish. The CRS really hated that, the psychologist there even wanted to get another opinion! Ironically, incredibly, as the research on facial disfigurement shows, there is a distinct tendency to label such people as being dishonest, insane etc etc. The psychologists at the CRS knew nothing of the research whereas the psychiatrist had done that research as part of his internship. And when he knew what I knew he knew I was way ahead of those dills at the CRS.
Sorry for the long rant but I wanted to point out that even the very people who were supposed to help me, and “qualified” psychologists no less, were expressing the very same prejudices that the research makes abundantly clear often slips below our awareness radar.
Disability numbers are going to keep increasing for one simple reason: modern medicine and obstretics is very good at keeping people in a much better state of health; albeit with reduced productive capacity. This rise may plateau at some point but to give you an example: there is a clear relationship between a host of child and adult
psychological and physiological pathologies the rates of which are markedly elevated in premature babies, difficult pregnancies, some types of illness(leukemia and adult “chemo brain” in adulthood). As modern medicine keeps improving, the numbers keep growing. I am an example of that, if I had been born 10 years earlier I would be dead.
This matter is a moral and legal minefield.
Sorry for the rant.
This just came up on the News. Why don’t they send out Centrelink forms with a picture of Julie Andrews? Here comes the nanny state.
Dole will be held by Government to avoid recipients wasting it
http://www.news.com.au/business/money/story/0,28323,26397915-5017313,00.html
I’m not sure what use universal suffrage really is to stopping the oppression of minority groups. As long as you’re a small enough minority group, or your group always votes the same way, then your vote won’t make a difference to any politician anyway, especially if they can gain votes by marginalizing you.
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I’m also always surprised at how wide spread this type of marginalization is yet how hypocritical it also often is — everyone seems to love listening to how young single mothers (or whoever else) take benefits, for example, but if someone else subsidizes my heath insurance, pays for the education of middle-class kids, or pays often reasonably well off people to buy houses (like me — and no I really didn’t need the money at all), it’s all fine (and legal). I think it’s just a human tendency to enjoy blaming others for the world’s problems.
To be honest Conrad, I’m not sure how minor a minority we are. Too many to pay for but too few to worry about electorally? Maybe, but then why the snark about the “welfare vote” controlling Labour seats?
Based on the Australian measures, how long will it be before benefits are paid in supermarket vouchers like asylum seekers receive, with the added tweak of being invalid for alcohol, confectionery or fatty food (because we’re all lazy lardarses of course).
You want to know how I spend my money? My spreadsheet: let me feed you it.
“Based on the Australian measures, how long will it be before benefits are paid in supermarket vouchers like asylum seekers receive, with the added tweak of being invalid for alcohol, confectionery or fatty food (because we’re all lazy lardarses of course)”
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Looking at today’s paper, here probably not very long.
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Luckily my middle-class welfare (which I consider far less reprehensable than money given to people that might actually need it) won’t have any stings attached.
Same story, surely?
{mutters}…first against the bloody wall…
There has been a large rise in Oz in the number of companies choosing to go into bankruptcy to clear their debts, then resurrecting themselves a short time later. They leave their employees and creditors in financial trouble and avoid tax liabilities but I doubt we’ll ever see any demonising “closing in” style adverts about these folk.
Keep on fighting DEM. I’m glad you have someone like SL as a friend.
Gee, it’s much easier to talk about reforms to welfare policy when it is abstract rather then when you are dealing with actual individuals.
From the above – current government policies to deal with disability (and even long term unemployment) suck. Demonising benefit recipients sucks. Public attitudes to benefit recipients (fueled by annoyance at paying so much tax?) sucks. Middle class welfare sucks. Politicians suck. Did I miss anything?
Can I just throw out the LDP policies for consideration – replacement of the currenrt welfare system with the unconditional negative income tax, which combined with the removal of minimum wages and deregulation of the labour market removes the institutional barriers to the unemployed/disabled seeking some sort of work. And unconditional – so cheats is not a concept any more. Oh, and abolition of all middle class welfare, and significant tax cuts.
Downside – probably the benefits are lower then for current disability payments? The other half of the policy at the last election was to hand over delivery of services for the disabled to private charity, funded initially (and potentially indefinitely) by govt payments/vouchers. But this evil uncaring part of the policy was hard to sell and got scrapped. So for now we’re stuck with poorly provided public services instead.
And that is part of the problem, because a government bureaucracy is never going to do this well – they are services that would be better provided by well resourced community groups. But I don’t see how to get to there from where we are now, with the poor yet expensive government provision of services crowding out the community alternatives.
Anyway, enough. I’ll keep reading the thread.
The spike in the number of Australians on the DSP, occurred during the Keating recession. Rather than saying, “there are now tens/hundreds of thousands of you unskilled/semi-skilled men and women over the age of 45 who will never, ever get a job again” and offer some solution, the government quietly transferred a huge swathe of them onto the higher-paying DSP. The Howard government finally addressed the issue about ten years later.
John
I agree totally with your last point about the “other side” of great advances in medical technology. This feeds into a theory of mine, that Darwin’s theory of evolution is becoming largely redundant, because homo sapiens have – or at least are – learnt how to trick/frustrate/transcend it.
DEM/John
One thing I found quite disgusting with Phase I of Rudd’s stimulus package – which I otherwise totally endorsed – was the omission of people who were unemployed and receiving unemployment benefits (Newstart).
Why were the unemployed ignored? Because they are not politically organised. The trade-unions are their enemies. One reason for this of course, is since the late 1990s, unemployment in Australia has dropped significantly, and the amount of time spent unemployed dropped sharply.
Unlike people with permanent/chronic disabilities or the elderly (who will never be otherwise), most people when they lose their job would not be thinking this was going to be a long-term condition, so the last thing they would of is organising politically.
Unfortunately, the elitist Leftist psychology fixates on “advocating on behalf of” the unemployed. This is the 21st century Left’s inheritance from Leninism; that the non-mercantile bourgeoisie must do the bidding of the proles.
But when a welfare advocacy groups comes out with a statement or media appearance by its six-figured salaried “CEO” politicians see only 1 vote on the line. These groups need to mobilise all unemployed people.
I hate to say, but “god helps those……”
The figures on the bottom-line of various forms of bludging on the public purse are well-sniffed-out DEM.
One of the issues in this is how to make best use of the capabilities of those on welfare, particularly those who have unpredictable courses to their problems. Employers (business, and to a slightly lesser extent, government) have a problem even using the resources in the population properly (see rising graduate underemployment… using a degree to work in a coffee shop).
So… with an inability to make best use of even “interchangeable production unit” resources, that can turn up 9-5 every working day, how the hell can we expect the management classes to deal with people who aren’t fungible. who have day-by-day variance in energy availability, who are assymetrically talented?
Lots of talented folk, for one reason or another, cannot find “proper” work that uses their talents. And the standard employment models are obviously unable to use the talents of the population as a whole. If there /are/ huge numbers of folk on welfare (or merely underutilitized), it says more about the macro-level human resource usage capabilities of the society than it does about the attitudes of those on welfare.
Hi All,
The American media piece about the “Haves” marching on the streets to ensure the “Have nots” cannot get an adequate pension, hospital, medical and dental service seems to be moving to other countries.
Here the unemployed figures are being rigged by stating someone working approximately 2 hours per week is not unemployed. If they have decided to go back to school and try to get a higher education because there is no work in their socio-economic areas, then they are not unemployed.
Job placement companies are paid by the government to put you in employment but there is no follow-up.
There is a lot of exploitation of young people. So much so that you can sympathise their reluctance to find a job.
AS well, older workers when they are employed are expected to work much harder to prove they are still an asset. If they work at the same pace as a normal worker then they may lose their job and find it difficult, as “They are getting too old”.
A fallacy as they, over their working life, usually have gained skills and experience that is not yet available to the younger worker.
Employers will take them on as they can get a subsidy and when that runs out they become unemployed again and so it goes on.
I am retired (well they tell me I am); at 77 I work many long hours as a volunteer community Advocate. Problems that are brought to me and there is nothing being done about demonstrates some of the issues.
For example, a student is perhaps studying a course in the retail trade and it includes 3-6 weeks work experience.
OK. No problem so far?
Well read on.
I have been contacted several times where the students ask me if it is right for them to be working up to 10-14 per day and receive a token perhaps $15.
When I have spoken with them that if you consider a school day as a normal 8-hour day then there has to be provision as to how this should be paid.
Ok you might argue that they are on a course and should not be aid.
Let us accept that concept. However, what about the 2-4 hours above the school day.
This should be paid.
Now the problem is that the government has not followed this through properly.
Should the student be paid at standard rates or for the purpose of the exercise will the school day be considered as a work day>
If it is, then the student may be entitled to penalty rates, superannuation, holiday leaving and/or loading, etc.
Then the next question is the student covered under WorkCare.
The answer as far as I can see if that the student is not covered under WorkCare, as they are students.
The employer will not cover them for “work experience” as it increases its WorkCare Costs.
Therefore, the student is likely to be “Stuffed” to use a good Aussie term and also exploited.
As I am retired, I suggested that they go back to the college and tell the teacher what has happened.
The response???? You are lucky to have the opportunity to gain experience. If you do not like then there are other young people waiting for the opportunity.
The government, the college and the employer is not interested in straightening the issues.
Young trainees have reported similar experience to me. If they complain to their job placement caseworker, they are likely to be told the same thing.
Can you wonder at the attitudes of these young people who face “Mickey Mouse” training schemes that will never improve their chances of employment? It pulls down their self-respect and self-esteem.
This has come about through Thatcherism and a mentality of Master/Servant, with the servant not receiving any respect.
When I retired, the government was getting rid of the officers who were responsible for the development of industry training, administering and monitoring it. Quality Industry was becoming unpopular as industry was lobbying government to be allowed to train people for their own requirements.
This meant very limited training and a lot of the training was not transportable therefore you could expect a person to be studying these education courses over a long period in order to accomplish a reasonable qualification.
I spoke up against it stating that within 2-3 years industry would be approaching me to complain about the lack of skills and experience and the “Mickey Mouse” training.
That is exactly what happened but then the government had dismantled the infrastructure and it is too costly to rebuild as our population is not large enough and is spread over an area larger that the total of Europe and Britain.
Companies are now applying to government to bring in skilled and experienced labour. If the government had any collective intelligence it would tell them NO, train our citizens, but that is not happening. Britain found Thatcher’s ideas did not work and I believe have reinstated the industry-training programme again. I believe you call it Guild Training.
I had better not rant on any more.
I seem to begin a short discussion that turns into a novel
Regards.
Actually, modern medicine doesn’t so much keep people on disability pensions who would otherwise be dead as increase the productive capacity of those with problems who would otherwise be bed-ridden or requiring lots of care by other humans.
(Washing machines, internet, etc, all decrease the energy required to look after yourself).
The problem is that even a highly skilled person who has to “take it easy” has almost no opportunity whatever… imagine someone with the skills of a senior manager but the capacity to work 20 hours a week, say 4 days 5 hours each. What chance of a job using those talents? None. Hence, unemployed (with no chance) or disabled (doesn’t rack up unemployment figures). While this might be an extreme example, it certainly illustrates that sometimes those on disability (or unemployment) could have more talent and more will to work than many of those that call them bludgers.
So, is there a way that human capital available to a society can be used more efficiently? (I happen to think there is, but it’s a very lefty remedy). Personally, I reckon it’s easier for the politicians to blame the resources that society wastes rather than their own inefficiencies at managing those resources.
From DEM’s evident skills, and statements of difficulties, it MAY be that a smart society could say… “great English skills, sense of humor, able to work 10 hours a week (my guess) from home… how about proofing/subbing textbooks” or some other thing suited to DEM’s skillset, for appropriate “bonus” to make the benefits livable. But such activities, population-wide, would show up the current inadequacies of human capital usage… and the powers-the-be don’t want to admit such failure.
(DEM, if I’m wrong about your skillset and likes, could you put forward an idea of how you think you might be assisted in finding a place where your above-average skills and below-average work capacity could be used, and how this might be done for others.)
As for me… great data modeller, (some apps running in agencies without significant change or maintenance 20 years after I wrote them), but with approx 50% work capacity. There will be other enterprise-level-skilled folk out there, and pooling that talent, maybe allocating those skills around different agencies or worthy non-profits, would be very useful to society as a whole.
This is a great post DEM. Will comment in further detail once (a) marking abates and (b) our main PC is fixed and I’m not typing on this silly laptop.
Tim@9:
Can I just throw out the LDP policies for consideration – replacement of the current welfare system with the unconditional negative income tax, which combined with the removal of minimum wages and deregulation of the labour market removes the institutional barriers to the unemployed/disabled seeking some sort of work. And unconditional – so cheats is not a concept any more. Oh, and abolition of all middle class welfare, and significant tax cuts.
Which sounds very workable and would tackle the worst disincentives of the “benefits trap” but would require a fundamental change in the way we order social and economic policy. It seems very alien to the average bloke in the street (if I can put it that way), whereas raising the personal tax threshold in conjunction with welfare reform makes sense in the existing order.
Incapacity Benefit was the last contributions-based benefit in the UK. In order to qualify you had to have worked long enough with a high enough wage to pay National Insurance to a particular level. This was a workers benefit: someone who’d been long-term unemployed or become ill/disabled as a child or before they’d finished university simply didn’t qualify.
Despite this it is now widely accepted that those on IB are workshy bludgers, with scare stories of young people faking illness or injury straight out of school to dodge the dole queue and get that extra £20 a week, despite this being patently impossible. You could qualify for Income Support that way, but never Incapacity.
With common public attitudes of the kind that demonise people for receiving benefits they’ve actually paid for, how on earth do the LDP (or Citizen’s Income people in the UK) propose to ‘sell’ a policy that gives people free money “to go surfing with”, even if that’s only a few thousand a year?
If you’ve come up with a cure for reciprocal altruism, do share because I’m sick to death of this worthy/unworthy poor crap.
Dave@15:
The major problem for me is not lack of assistance, it’s active hindrance. I could probably write the occasional freelance article for pocket money … but under DWP rules I would be then classed as “self employed” and ineligible for benefits. It seems possible to dodge this problem using a complicated legal structure such as a limited company or disabled person’s trust (research skilz: I haz them!), but that involves an expensive amount of legal toe-tapping to research and construct that I can’t really justify at the moment.
Even with that in place, benefit rules would currently allow me to keep the princely sum of £20 a week (with the additional risk that the authorities decide this is evidence that I’m “fit to work” and cancel them entirely). Above £20 a week, my earnings would be docked pound for pound FOR EACH MEANS-TESTED BENEFIT. Because my IB is topped up with Income support and I also get housing and council tax benefits for my accommodation that means I lose £3 for every £1 I earn over £20 a week. (The reason people on benefits laugh when the rich bitch about paying 50% income tax is because we’re already subject to it at close to 300%.)
I did work it out a couple of years back and there’s no actual financial point to me working until I start earning about £160 per week, which will never happen on part-time hours unless I’m somehow offered a non-executive directorship with a City firm – thank you, I’d love a paperwork-based, problem solving job that pays £20,000 a year for a fortnight’s work. I could DO that! However back in the real world on minimum wage… well you’d have to be mental to risk your benefits for effectively no reason. Personal pride may give you a warm glow but most prefer to be able to pay for central heating.
In wider society we need part-time work to pay and for flexible working to become the norm rather than the exception…
… and then I’d like world peace.
Ah yes, high effective marginal tax rates, how do I love thee. Not. The worst aspect of progressive taxation is that in the name of soaking the rich, it finishes up soaking the poor.
On /why/ people might be callous, there was an interesting research article just out from Harvard Business School which I briefly review here. “Priming” people with exposure to luxury goods (and I’d ad, perhaps priming by advertising) makes it more likely that callous (or possibly even nasty) decisions are made, and unfortunates are not considered.
(Thinks…. “Aspirationalists” watching Harvey Norman ads for plasma TVs)
DEM,
Most libertarians in Australia are connected to or at least sympathetic towards a political party called the LDP. This is from their policy platform:
“The government must not have any right to order a particular activity to occur on a property, such as the allowance of breast feeding or the construction of disabled toilets or access facilities. These are matters of choice by property owners.” http://www.ldp.org.au/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=1161:property-rights&catid=101:policies&Itemid=290
We can only hope and pray that filth like these people never become serious political players.
(Again I exempt SL, who IMO doesn’t really fit into the libertarian category).
Crap. Spamulated yet again. Is it my bad haircut or my singlet and thongs that are the problem?
DEM, I did not know of your personal situation. I would have, I suppose, had I read the about us section since you started posting.
I found the post very sad. I will write a very short companion piece pointing people to it.
On /why/ people might be callous, there was an interesting research article just out from Harvard Business School which I briefly review here. “Priming” people with exposure to luxury goods (and I’d ad, perhaps priming by advertising) makes it more likely that callous (or possibly even nasty) decisions are made, and unfortunates are not considered.
The people who make these social policies are surrounded in relative luxury. Hmmm ….
You can’t claim that welfare payments and ‘Tax Evasion’ is the same thing. Tax is levied on those who earn money and that money is then given to those who don’t earn money. I understand that those who live off the earnings of others may want more, however those providing the largesse probably feel that they have donated enough. I don’t know your personal situation however I believe that there are very few people who are completely incapable of earning some income. Perhaps they should just get used to making do with what they have.
Mel and everyone, I have just had to let a pile of people out of the spammer. Basically, LE’s main computer is cactus (and it’s the one with all her blog stuff on it) and she’s having to use her laptop (which doesn’t have anything blog-related on it). This means I’m often the only one around to fiddle with the bloody spammer on this thing.
All I can do is apologise to you all and promise that we are doing our best to get everything sorted out.
On television and property crime (and general acquisitiveness): This phenomenon is well documented, but has nothing to do with advertising and is simply strongly correlated with the introduction of television, in the US, UK and (now, for the latest version) India. Basically, as television is introduced (always patchily, across a region, thus constituting a natural time series experiment), property crime increases as people are exposed to things that they do not themselves own. In the UK, this was first noted when people were watching such benign shows as Dixon of Dock Green, and the only television available was the BBC (no adverts). The same phenomenon pertained in India, where for a long time the only television station available was Doordashan, India’s version of the Beeb (also no adverts).
There is also a strong correlation between watching television (of any type, even the most well-meaning and educational) before the age of 4 and lower test scores on things like SATS and IQ tests.
However, in parallel with the rise in property crime was also a considerable drop in domestic violence and spousal murder. In India, those regions that are thoroughly saturated with television (including cable) also have much lower rates of sex-selective abortion. Because the Indian phenomenon is so new, it has been possible to do analyses not only on a region by region basis, but on a street by street basis, controlling for such variables as income and caste.
On India: see Emily Oster and Robert Jensen, ‘The Power of TV: Cable Television and Women’s Status in India’, Quarterly Journal of Economics, forthcoming.
On television and crime: see Steven Levitt and Matthew Gentzkow, ‘Measuring the Impact of TV’s Introduction on Crime’ (working paper) and ‘Preschool Television Viewing and Adolescent Test Scores: Historical Evidence from the Coleman Study’, Quarterly Journal Of Economics (2008).
In other words, property crime and greedy people are a pain in the arse, but dropping the spousal murder rate and domestic violence (always very hard to shift using other methods) can be counted a very large social good.
I don’t know your personal situation however I believe that there are very few people who are completely incapable of earning some income.
This is completely missing the point. Most people who can do some work wish to work. It may surprise many to know that that only a small minority of people on welfare are bludging. The idea that people enjoy living on welfare is laughable. The experience is demeaning and invariably involves struggling to meet the requirements of being able to live in this society.
Tax evasion is a far worse than receiving welfare because the former is breaking the law. We hear plenty of whining about welfare recipients, now tell me often you hear about tax evasion. Answer this: who is worse, the welfare recipient or the tax cheater?
“You can’t claim that welfare payments and ‘Tax Evasion’ is the same thing. ”
.
Yes, because one is legal and the other is not and one is supposed to go people that need it and the other is stealing from the state. There’s lots of differences.
.
“I don’t know your personal situation however I believe that there are very few people who are completely incapable of earning some income.”
.
Actually, I believe the opposite, there’s lots of people out there. For example, if you add things like rates of serious psychological problems and serious injuries/diseases together you will already have a few percent. If you have a stroke and can’t understand speech, for example, it’s going to be hard to work. Similarly, if you have psychosis it probably won’t be too easy either.
You can then add groups like single young mothers of multiple children, serious drug addicts and so on. Good luck to you if you can think of ways to get these guys to work (and what to do with their delinquent children when you do).
Once you remove the institutional barriers to employing people on a non-traditional basis (part time, shorter hours, whatever) you create a business opportunity. And if there are people out there with skills to offer, and they’ll price them somewhat below the market rate for a conventionally fully able full business week worker, then those people will be employed. Which in the long run leads to yada yada yada eco 101… But in a strongly regulated labour market, you’re never going to see those people given a chance. Why would employers bother?
Sorry Mel, but you’ll have to elaborate a little more. I’m afraid this particular “filth” didn’t quite pick up what was so obviously objectionable in that particular quote. Sure, i’m deficient when it comes to left wing outrage (my own personal handicap, if you will, holding me back from meaningful participation in the life of the inner city latte left), but I don’t get it.
I’ll share with you a story from a community meeting I was at on Monday night, In my little country town, (pop. 804 last time they bothered to change the sign). We’ve been talking about funding the much needed renovation of the local hall, particularly the toilets. We lined up volunteer workers, the materials were to be supplied for free, your fair dinkum community working bee like they used to have when we were kids.
Unfortunately, some idiot submitted development plans to local council rather then just going ahead and doing the work. Now, well, our $5,000 budget project has come back to us with a $150,000 pricetag, and a full quarter of the interior hall space to be taken up with disabled access ramps. Oh, and the town doesn’t actually have anyone in a wheelchair. (We did have one bloke in a chair when I was growing up, but he died.) So the upshot – no hall renovation any time soon. But all justifiable in the cause of government telling filth how to live their lives. And of course there is never a backlash attached to these things.
I actually come from a place that still has a community. We rally around to help those in need deemed “deserving” in a way that would make the inner city left sneer into their designer coffee, despite the destruction of civil society perpetrated by a hundred years of big government. Sure, it could be better, more inclusive, involve more access ramps, but on the other hand it reacts pretty quickly and pretty well to local needs in a way dictates from Sydney and Canberra never can. But then, what would filth like me know?
Tim, I’d be tempted to go ahead and do the work anyway. What are they going to do? Lock up the local Rotary Club holus bolus?
Thanks for that, Tim. I accept what you are saying but the LDP and the blow flies that hang around libertarian blogs think major shopping centres etc shouldn’t be required to have wheelchair access. That sucks.
Also, Tim, I live on an acreage in country Vic and I know red tape is an effing hassle. I recently went ahead and chopped down some gum trees rather than pay the council fee for a permit (approx $200) and the mandatory arborist report (approx $150-$250).
Sorry about everyone being stuck in the spambulator! Was at parents doing marking. Main PC is kaput – will see what can be done for it.
I have a slight disability, namely a degree of spastic diplegia because of my premature birth. I remember once having an argument with a friend of mine. I was trying to explain that there were some things that I just can’t do very well. My friend’s reaction essentially indicated that she thought I was just “lazy” and lacked willpower. I spent my entire childhood being criticised by stupid primary school teachers who had a similar view, telling me I was lazy, and if I simply practiced I’d walk properly. (Actually it took an operation to cut and lengthen my achilles tendons to do it, so there).
I think sometimes people have real difficulty imagining how disability might affect what you can and can’t do. They’ve never been unable to do something themselves. I’m lucky – I can do almost everything I want to do these days most of the time. Others can’t.
People should have some compassion. We can all be disabled through accident, disease or birth.
It came to me recently (and I don’t suppose it is a new idea, just new to me) that the trade-off between free markets and government regulation is about the present versus the future. Whenever the government regulates to interfere with the efficient allocation of capital, it is (hopefully, Ruddian stimulus school halls and fences not withstanding) to create a current benefit, at the cost of future growth and wellbeing. And the alternative, advocating for more free market, is to increase future capital accumulation at the expense of benefits to be satisfied now.
Now it takes a lot of wheelchair access and disabled toilets to create a noticeable drag on the economy. Which is one of the reasons arguing against them, even on principle, allows for easy vilification of the free-marketers. And I’m not really unhappy about living in a society that has wheelchair access in supermarkets. Or that banned smoking from pubs.
But on the other hand, now the changes have been made, we’re probably not going back. You could legalise smoking in pubs again and they’d be forced to limit it to one room or lose the majority of their customers. (How the hell did we ever put up with the smoke?). Likewise, major shopping centres are unlikely to go back to building wheelchair unfriendly supermarkets, just becuse they can. Whereas it’s a real drag on community halls wanting to do a spot of renovation.
So – cut to the chase – if the government could be relied apon to only do sensible things that improved welfare and didn’t create big drags on the economy, nobody much would have a problem with government, But it doesn’t really work that way, and with deadweight loss from government tax and spend at least 40%, and government spending around 50% of the economy, not even taking in mandated spending of private money on things like access ramps, we’re talking about the loss of over 20% of GDP. It isn’t nothing.
Jim Belfield @22: I found the post very sad. I will write a very short companion piece pointing people to it.
Thanks Jim, but don’t be sad. Be annoyed. I know I am.
Mel: yes, that kind of “pure” libertarianism has it’s problems and though most people who’ve had any contact with a local authority planning departments would love to see the entire system abolished (which admittedly would save money) I think that a good argument for some kind of centrally imposed minimum infrastructure standard isn’t indefensible. After all, the law doesn’t demand that people cease and desist all racist beliefs but it does impose a minimum standard of behaviour by criminalising violence or threats of violence regardless of whether they occur in the public or private sphere. LDP “clause 4″ in the making, I suspect.
Stephen Williams @24:
You can’t claim that welfare payments and ‘Tax Evasion’ is the same thing. Tax is levied on those who earn money and that money is then given to those who don’t earn money. I understand that those who live off the earnings of others may want more, however those providing the largesse probably feel that they have donated enough.
My post is not about the levels of welfare it’s about the assumptions made about people based solely on the source of their income. The simple fact that tax is pooled means everyone is living off the earnings of others including yourself. Unless you’re living off the grid womble-style your council tax for example, isn’t enough in itself to pay for someone to collect your rubbish each week. It’s only through economies of scale that local councils can provide the roads, rates and rubbish services the entire community enjoy, so you too are enjoying the fruits of other people’s labour. Also, people who don’t work are still paying tax – no one can avoid VAT – often they are actually paying more than those who work when it is considered as a proportion of their income. If you want to make an argument about the social/financial/moral value of “net contributors” over “net recipients” you’ll need to be more specific with your language.
And I didn’t liken the benefits system to tax fraud, I likened benefit fraud to tax fraud.
A tax return is an application for a refund of taxes (in the form of a lump sum) paid to the government up front in the form of income or consumption taxes. A benefit claim is an application for a refund of taxes (in the form of a supplementary income) paid to the government up front in the form of National Insurance payments.
The comparison is accurate.
I think one of the principal sources for the kind of negative attitudes my post examines is the redefinition of welfare from a social insurance scheme to a form of charitable giving: hence your telling use of the word “donated”.
Language is important for shaping attitudes and expectations. “Social Security” for example, no longer exists – we now have only a “Department for Work and Pensions”. Is this an unimportant distinction?
Entitlement – the fact of having the right to something – is now a dirty word, and in public debate a “sense of entitlement” can NEVER be justified or genuine. Without it however, I am then forced to become the humiliated object of an absurd anthropological dominance ritual – and required to perform appropriate levels of “gratitude” – simply because I had the the bad luck to catch a virus that tricked my immune system into eating my peripheral nervous system. This is what will make me one of the “worthy poor”.
Yet it is exactly this kind of stigmatisation that the creation of the Welfare State was meant to eliminate!
I don’t know your personal situation however I believe that there are very few people who are completely incapable of earning some income.
There are always going to be a proportion of the population who are going to be economically inactive at any given time – some permanently, some for varying periods depending on things like childrearing, unemployment, disability and/or rehabilitation. VERY few will be so for their entire lives but you’re never going to eliminate it entirely and trying too hard risks very negative knock on effects. In the original Freud Report, (before the author defected to the Conservative Party) the Labour government seem to have set the acceptable rate at 20% of the working-age population pretty arbitrarily. Given the demographic problem we have, I seriously doubt that this is a reasonable goal until after the babyboomers have died off.
And as I pointed out in my earlier comment @17 : a lot of the problem with being on benefits is not being unable to earn money, but being unable to keep it when you do.
here are always going to be a proportion of the population who are going to be economically inactive at any given time
Invoking the precious normal distribution, I have argued that no matter what society there will always be a certain percentage of people who just don’t function properly in that society. Is it their fault that they society there were raised in does not provide them with the opportunities for to earn a living? It can be but assuming it always is has no justification.
ADHD is a good example of this, its presence has increased massively since 1950 but this may relate to the changes in society from that time to the present. In animal studies there is even a linkage between cesarean birth and potential anatomical precursors to ADHD, very interesting given the increase in cesarean births:
from one research piece but I’ve seen others:
“These findings provide evidence that perinatal insult in the form of Cesarean birth with or without anoxia alters the dendritic development of PFC and hippocampal pyramidal neurons and to some extent also of NAcc medium spiny neurons. They also suggest that perinatal anoxia can alter the neuronal development of key structures thought to be affected in such late-onset dopamine-related disorders as schizophrenia and Attention Deficit Disorder”
AND
“The main results show statistically significant increased risk for ADHD associated with several factors such as low birthweight, young age of the mother at the time of the child’s birth and Caesarean section,
Diabetes 2, a condition which imposes enormous health costs, is booming and if the evidence is believed this increase is arising from current dietary habits. However, there is also evidence that the risk of this condition is in part at least related to the experience of the grandparents. Epigenetics, fascinating and new field of genetics.
A recent study found that the risk for this condition, given equal obesity, increased massively from the lowest decile for some persistent organic pollutants to the highest. There is a wealth of data highlighting the relationship between diabetes 2 and POPs. See
http://care.diabetesjournals.org/content/29/7/1638
Research is continuing to elucidate that many chronic conditions have associations with factors that the individual has no control over. This is particularly true of in utero exposures to various toxins, the obvious ones being alcohol and tobacco smoke.
If a person incurs a disability the causation of which may be directly related to the environment their society has created, who is responsible? The person, the society? We can rarely know the answer to the question because we can rarely specify causation.
I don’t think people with disabilities should expect to live the good life economically but they should be able to live an acceptable life. They should be given every opportunity to contribute to society but instead are often shunned by society.
Let’s take a hypothetical, assuming it can be demonstrated that a person’s disability is the direct result of the practices of a society and the environment it creates, why should that person be relegated to the bottom of society?
A moral minefield but let’s not bother with the subtleties, let’s just demonise the disabled.
Crikey, DEM, Belfield took me back. At school I was often called Belfield simply because there was a prominent local squatting family of that name!
I do get annoyed, angry, with what I see as injustice, My difficulty at the moment is that I perceive there to be a systemic problem that cannot easily be addressed because people don’t see it.
I suspect that you will see my companion post – http://belshaw.blogspot.com/2009/11/deusexmacintoshs-i-am-not-underclass.html – as wishy washy and perhaps it is.
My position on the need for change is part ideological, more practical.
By happenstance, over the last three years I have had a fair bit of contact with the social housing system in Australia. The system is broken, but that’s not the fault of the people in it, officials or tenants.
The only real weapon that I have at a personal level to bring about change is my writing.
There is remarkably little good writing on social welfare issues. That which does exist lives in silos.
We need more writing from those who are experiencing the system, more from those inside the system.
Just have to say Dave Bath’s comment #15, (along with the original post) is great.
Personally I can relate to these issues – being ‘undeserving poor’ and on some form of welfare for over ten years, yet highly skilled, adept and generally shocked at the incompetence of many in the paid workforce.
My incompetence is not having the physical stamina to perform for 40hrs a week – which is obviously a much greater sin.
To be a valued member of society using my skills and knowledge for even two days a week would be bliss compared to being on welfare – and as David put it so well, society isn’t setup to maximise the potential of the population.
The difficulty in finding flexible employment which is not a full time job is endemic. It also applies to people like myself who are looking after young children. It’s often presumed women want to get back into the workforce full time (I suspect those who make the policy cannot imagine a woman wanting to do otherwise).
If you consider our welfare system as a system of incentives, then the incentives are all wrong. There should be incentives for people with disabilities to work as much as they can, rather than be penalised if they do work.
And, linking into comments made by Dave and John, you can’t blame people for responding to the incentives governments have set up. I sometimes get the sense that people criticise single mothers on a moral basis – but single motherhood arises in part because of the way that the incentives are set up. The way benefits work, you’re often financially better off being a single mother than you are being in a relationship. And if you’ve got no other meaningful option in life, and the government will help support you, why not have kids? You really can’t blame people for responding to incentives. And of course, there’s no incentive for the father to do anything to support the mother or the child. One day (as SL knows) I’m going to write a monster post on this.
Anyway I don’t think the answer is to demonise welfare recipients. We need to think of ways that might work better but still protect and support those in society who need it.
What an excellent post and commentary. I have just returned for a month’s leave in the UK (sand internet) so it is hard for me to get my mind around any issue at present, particularly one as important as the one you raised DEM
sand = sans, my computer skills may require more grit and determination it seems.
Crikey, DEM, Belfield took me back. At school I was often called Belfield simply because there was a prominent local squatting family of that name!
Whoops! Sorry about that Jim. Seems I have an advanced case of foot-in-mouth disease on top of everything else.
Not all all, DEM. I actually felt nostalgic!
I am on a DSP and try to do as much as I can
using anti-inflammatoies both capsule and injections plus diapam for muscle release and am treated like I am not even trying I tried to catch a tonne of steel grid from 3.84 mtres in 1985
thanks from Dave
True story from yesterday. A friend of mine who is on disability pension called me up to tell me he’d gotten engaged. But he didn’t sound as excited as he ought to have done. When I prodded, he said he was concerned because if his fiancee moved in, he’d lose all his disability pension. His condition wouldn’t change or anything. So the incentives were designed either for him to put off moving in with his partner for as long as possible, or to lie. There was a disincentive for him to form a stable normal relationship. What a stupid system.
Maybe my earlier, unposted comment, was too rude, so I’ll approach it from another angle.
DEM, I disagree with your headline. You are [a member of] an underclass. You could describe it as an outerclass, by reason of social exclusion, but that’s really a distinction without a difference.
So far as your complaints are concerned about demonisation and how unpleasant it is to be a welfare recipient – well yes, that’s what being part of an underclass feels like.
If your intent is to say “my underclass is different from the other underclasses” or “I’m not like those other awful members of the underclass” – well, that’s a different argument, though the latter was what got my hackles up a bit in my original (unpublished) comment.
The hackle-raising was a result of internet humour fail, I suspect Marcellous. The mention of my class background was tongue in cheek, but also accurate. In terms of education, habit, accent and culture I AM indeed still middle-class… I just have that “genteel poverty” thing going, due to the source of my income.
I have yet to give up opera and go out happy slapping. I have never in my life lived on a sink estate. I may live in social housing but I am not an anti-social neighbour. My idea of a good time is not alcohol, cigarettes and a Sky television subscription. I am not socially excluded. I use this example not to claim superiority over those who do and are, but to point out the fallacy of making assumptions about the nature and interests of people based entirely on them receiving welfare.
The demonisation I have detailed is justified by claiming that that people who receive benefits are inherently less honest than the wider population. This has no basis in fact. The same range of human nature – honest/dishonest, lazy/industrious – will be present in those who work as those who do not. Demonisation of ANYONE based on the source of their income is unfair when it’s the basis of a joke; entrenching it as the basis for public policy is discriminatory and legally insupportable.
“Everyone knows” lawyers are all dodgy sharks, so perhaps as a barrister you should be subject to a mandatory tax audit on an annual basis? Would you consider it appropriate for YOU to be subjected to a program of covert surveillance and financial intrusion on the basis of an anonymous complaint by a losing client or snubbed solicitor, or would you feel entitled to the same civil liberties and expectation of privacy as any other citizen?
You’re a lawyer, Marcellous. Like cases need to be treated alike.
If there is an underclass, it cannot be defined simply by receipt of benefits.
Well, there you are, DEM. I think we are really in agreement about demonisation of welfare recipients once the hackle-raising has been overcome.
As to “like cases,” barristers in Australia are subject, or so we have been led to believe, to at least a running of a slide-rule over our returns to see that they comply with the ATO’s expectations of a normal profile of expenses to income, though obviously this won’t catch income which is simply not disclosed unless the expenses are as a result disproportionately high.
I agree that there is generally little likelihood of covert surveillance of a barrister as a result of an anonymous complaint, but that’s because there is little call for one. It’s not the state’s interests which come into play at this point generally, though if in fact the matter were a criminal one there could well be covert surveillance. Otherwise, a complaint is necessarily about a specific matter and so an anonymous complaint has little meaning. Once a complaint arises, the obligation of a legal practitioner to co-operate with the investigation is pretty onerous. (Even if the complaint is not sustained, practitioners may be sanctioned for tardiness or non-co-operation in the investigation.)
The subject matter, it is true, is rarely the barrister’s private life, but that is inherent in the source of the complaint and the nature of the regulation. Welfare recipients, however, are entitled to welfare by reason of their private circumstances, so necessarily there must be some investigation of them.
I do hate the image in the ads (especially the one linked by SL) of a nation of dobbers. That’s soooo unAustralian, but then, we are a nation of convicts after all!
As for those ads about “3,000 investigators,” well 3,000 isn’t very many, really, when spread between however many million welfare recipients, is it? My feeling is that the ads are to gratify the working – and taxed – poor (who are probably those who envy and resent welfare recipients most keenly and are ready to be seduced, as all the UK seems ready to be, by the Conservatives) and, to an extent, terrify and deter tempted or tempted would-be welfare recipients.
Incidentally, we know and perhaps there is an increasing recognition at present that moral hazard isn’t just about poor people. Tax compliance is the least of it, and not really a very good example of moral hazard, since it’s really just a question of honesty and compliance. A better instance would be “too big to fail.”
As to your last comment: underclass is a very loose and contextual term. There isn’t just one underclass, but in terms of considering sources and amount of income, dependence upon the state and participation in the labour market, then benefit receipt does define, roughly and of course with exceptions for the fortunate or the favoured (eg, especially, the aged and recipients of non-means-tested benefits), an underclass of sorts. The proof is in the pudding: the very demonization of which you complain. Maybe that’s circular, or maybe you are one of the exceptions, in which case (as they always say) “you have nothing to fear.” (irony alert there, just in case it’s not obvious)
Actually, there are now more than 3000 investigators in the UK if you think that everybody is now investigating themself when making a phone call to social services. They’ve got a “stress analyzer” of sorts running, looking for “liars”, and quite a few people have lost benefits without just cause.
“The computer says ‘NO’” as “Little Britain” would have it.
It’ll take a bit for me to dig up the article, but I think it was about 6 months ago….
Oh, just found it….
http://balneus.wordpress.com/2009/02/17/science-journals-commercial-censorship-law-and-social-security-benefits/
The software was tested by academics and considered extremely dodgy, but the manufacturer took them to court to suppress publication of the research.
“The UK has already stopped 300,000 pounds of payments based on this machine that performs no better than a coin-toss according to the academic research”
according to Nature New (doi:10.1038/news.2009.99) and it was feb, not six months ago.
I don’t see how, Marcellous. You seem to be saying “demonisation is fine – that’s how you know you’re an underclass love”. I’m saying it’s offensive, unjustified and unacceptable and in becoming an established part of public policy risks undermining the basic legal precept of everyone being equal before the law [yes, that's exactly the direction we've also gone with anti-terror legislation but I think that's wrong also]. It would mean having different laws for different classes of people which is supposed to be impossible in our system.
I was thinking more in terms of a complaint about your financial life, Marcellous. Barristers are self-employed and presumably subject to all those small business regulations and tax schedules (VAT in the UK etc) like any sole trader. Your tax return will be more complex than most and more like a negotiation with the Inland Revenue, but it is also based on your personal circumstances – how much you worked, where you spent the money and how much tax you pay and/or are refunded.
Are you really comfortable with the local tax office having the power to paw through your PERSONAL bank accounts, household utility and credit card bills on the sole basis of an anonymous phone call alleging that you’ve been fudging your VAT to pay for a Porche? I doubt it. You’d expect anyone who is seizing your financial records to have justified their case in front of a magistrate or another legal authority and acquired a warrant before they even ring your bank.
My point is, that you wouldn’t tolerate for a second being subject to the kind of unfettered intrusion that I’m potentially subject to as a benefits claimant. We’re not talking about proper criminal investigation – that’s an entirely different issue with carefully controlled powers and procedures, PACE et al – we’re talking about a licence to snoop on the flimsiest pretexts (like a database match that shows two claimants in different parts of the country have the same name – yes it might be one person claiming twice… OR it’s just two people with the same name. That one came up in Saints and Sinners).
To requote from my post:
Am trying to remember the name of those Sydney barristers who got prosecuted for not paying tax AT ALL for years…
No, not much call for anti-fraud measures tackling tax avoidance at all.
If I could just point out that doing this in the case of welfare recipients often finishes up costing as much or more than making the actual welfare payments. As Tim commented aways up the thread, it is in all our interests to come up with a welfare system that eliminates the category ‘cheat’; vast bureaucratic oversight doesn’t do that very well, alas. This is how we reach the absurd situation where countries with universal, non means-tested welfare (France, Sweden) finish up with lower welfare bills than countries that means-test (like Britain). Yes both Sweden and France have scaled back the welfare state — no-one can afford to keep paying this much at current levels with the Boomers going through the pipe — but the evidence is that universal provision is much cheaper.
Also, on people dodging tax: benefits recipients in this country would be able to get away with something similar for six months, tops.
DEM
1. There was an irony alert. I never said demonisation is fine. I just said that demonisation was a symptom of being an underclass. The difference between us is perhaps that I’m a Marxist without a belief in the inevitability of the progressive dialectic. I believe in classes but don’t think people are to be blamed for the class they are in whereas you seem to believe that members of an underclass are bad and want to say that you are not a member of an underclass because you are not bad.
2. First of all (I’m talking about Australia here but I doubt if the UK is much different), on the tax front, you have to submit a tax return. If you don’t, you will (eventually) be chased up for one and prosecuted for not submitting one. Once you have submitted one, or in some cases even if you don’t, the tax office can make an assessment – if that is done in the absence of a return you can bet that it will be pretty high, though usually the tax office prefers first to prosecute for not putting in a return. If the local tax office chooses to audit me on my return, then it can plough through my accounts because I will have to produce them, and so far as they are reliant on records derived from my personal bank accounts (well: I’m a sole trader, so they are just my bank accounts) I will have to cough up those records. If I don’t, any expenses I claim will fail. If it is a question of my receipts, then you are right, there isn’t an automatic licence to snoop without my knowing (at least, I don’t know of one), but there is an irresistible power to snoop should the state so choose.
There is a distinction, for what it is worth, in that in the case of tax the state is talking about taking money from me (albeit that I have an obligation to tell it the truth to enable it to do so) whereas in the case of welfare benefits the state is auditing the entitlement to money it has paid or is paying out.
3. I don’t think it is a question of what I would tolerate or am comfortable with or not: like you, I would be lumped with the law, whatever it was.
Funnily enough, people who wish to disguise receipts generally don’t bank them, but if the tax office decides to take an attitude to them, the surveillance can be and often is pretty comprehensive. The tax office also has other powers, such as making its own assessment of your income or GST [=VAT] liability, which will pretty soon oblige you to produce your private information if you think you can prove a lesser figure.
[Incidentally, when I drive it is a 1999 VW Golf hatchback. It is not in any way a vehicle for which I claim any kind of tax deduction or expense. At present the locks on both the front doors are broken and if I want to lock it I have to climb in through the boot to get back in. Just thought you might like to know.]
4. As to licences to snoop, you don’t need any licence or warrant to do quite a lot of surveillance of somebody in the manner suggested by the advertisements, and if there is a crime suspected, a warrant will generally be issued without your having any chance to oppose it. That’s the same for everyone.
5. I can remember the names of some of those Sydney barristers. There was Mr Archer, and Mr Stevens and Mr Cummins, and your links have helpfully reminded me of a few more. That’s why the tax office runs a slide rule over our tax returns. However, just to say there are other people who should be investigated (and of course, these people were investigated eventually – that’s how they got caught) isn’t really an answer to the question of whether welfare recipients need to be investigated.
6. However, I agree with SL (as you will see from the comment that seems never to have seen the light of day) that wholesale investigation of welfare recipients isn’t cost-effective.
7. An anecdotal aside: On the last occasion I went as duty barrister to the Downing Centre in Sydney (I do this 4 or 5 days a year; it’s a voluntary, ie unpaid, commitment) I represented a single mother who had understated her income to Centrelink and was consequently overpaid $7.5K or so over 2 years. She was only caught as a result of data matching with her bank account. You may or may not be happy to hear that although a conviction was recorded and an order made for reparation (I unsuccessfully resisted that on the grounds that the state has ample administrative powers to garnish her income and she has negligible assets) she was given a good behaviour bond and no other punishment.
8. (This is more at SL) I actually don’t think it is possible to come up with a welfare system which eliminates the category “cheat” even though I think that there is an argument that it is about as meaningful as “queue jumper” in refugee law. For one thing, the welfare system is always so mean that some people have little choice but to cheat (if they can) if they are caught in its toils on a long-term basis. If you are long-term unemployed and a private tenant, you simply cannot live other than quite miserably – ie, in a rooming house full of schizophrenics and alcoholics – on what the welfare state allows you – at least that’s the case in Sydney. That sounds an awful lot like being a member of an underclass to me.
No, what I’m saying is that being a member of an underclass is not proof in itself that you are “bad”, therefore demonisation on the basis of belonging to said underclass is wrong. I am NOT an underclass… I am an individual and you can’t make generalisations about my character, motives or behaviours simply because I’m on welfare. You can’t make them about anyone else on welfare either. My position is consistent.
Demonisation is a symptom of any ‘out-grouping’ process. Targets can be any class of people, not just those with less financial or social power. The bourgeois were successfully demonised in communist cultures because they had MORE financial and social power. German Jews were demonised in Nazi Germany despite being fully integrated throughout society at all levels. These two are examples of what can happen when casual out-grouping becomes institutionalised by the state.
Hence SL’s question: in what way is creating this out-group addressing the actual problem of having a welfare system we can’t afford to pay for?
So I guess you must get a bit irritated when people generalise barristers as dishonest, overpaid, self indulgent people who give nothing back to society and have a serious ‘luxury brand’ fetish. (I once had a temp job in Ian Callinan’s chambers. Can you tell?) Hold that feeling, it’s making my point.
You don’t like it when it’s done to you. I don’t like it when it’s done to me. The difference is that while we’re both subject to this kind of “natural” demonisation in casual conversation between individuals (in the pub, say) there isn’t a co-ordinated campaign of political rhetoric and advertising designed to legitimise YOU as a target.
So why the hell should I have to put up with it?
You guess wrong. Stereotypes about lawyers don’t particularly upset me: I expect them. But in the context of your argument which at that point became an argument implicitly about me your Porsche point warranted a response.
Of course, we’re all individuals [cue Life of Brian] though across populations we’re probably less special than we like to think [cue: Avenue Q, if you've seen it].
I’ve already said that I think the out-group demonisation about welfare recipients is mostly huff and puff to gratify the working poor – a bit like tabloid law and order campaigns really. The state can’t possibly target all welfare recipients, it just isn’t worth it, but they want to make people think they do. For one thing, the only real way to contain welfare abuse is to internalise compliance in the subject population – that will get the averages down even though it won’t deter the bold, shameless, reckless or desperate. It’s pathetic it’s done and because it’s been given to the advertising wallahs to do its even more pathetic.
Yes, you can get indignant about it – I don’t like it either though I guess my response to it is less personal, but my starting point about whether you are part of an underclass doesn’t seem to me to be affected by the rightness or wrongness of such demonisation. I’m not even sure if I agree that we (leaving aside distinctions between the UK and Australia) have a welfare system that we cannot afford (on reflection, I think we have a welfare system which we don’t spend enough on), as opposed to a welfare system that taxpayers or national insurance contributors (really the same thing because the contribution is government mandated and compulsory) would like to pay less for.
PS: would you mind undoing the italics after “Avenue Q”? They’re a bit exhausting if they persist to the end of the comment.
Done, Marcellous…
It was not personalised, I said “a” porsche, not “your” porsche. I could have used a second home on the beach or a B&O media-system in my example (the latter would be my personal object of luxe lust, I have no way of knowing where your personal preferences lie) THE POINT was someone making a bogus report about a dodgy tax return. I’m hardly going to complain about crass generalisations made about me and then do it do you, am I?
I am (still) not an underclass, I’m a free (wo)man!
Australia seems to be well ahead of Britain in terms of the affordability of the welfare state. The private provision of pensions through superannuation was tackled decades ago, with the result that you won’t have the pensions crisis the UK is facing in the next couple of decades when workers paying in National Insurance will each be supporting three pensioners. The medical system is financially more sustainable as patients are expected to contribute towards the cost of their care and the private insurance market actually works – whereas the NHS is still entirely free to patients, takes a big chunk out of GDP to sustain and private health care only covers private hospitals, not serious NHS care (other than dental). Australia also seems to have started their welfare reform measures earlier, eg. sending single mothers back to work a lot earlier, tightening unemployment eligibility and disability pension levels. UK Labour’s mismanagement and dishonesty (off balance sheet accounting means most of Blair’s much vaunted Public Private Partnerships – used to fund billions of infrastructure work – appear nowhere. Not in the public accounts or those of the private companies involved) meant the country was in debt BEFORE the financial sector bailout. Now the UK is so far in hock even the gilts have been downgraded. Not only can we not afford the benefits and pension system in its current form, we can’t actually afford the NHS or education system either.
DEM
I know this is going to make me look like a troll, and it’s probably only just us two here now, and I’m promising myself to leave the Uxxxxxclxxx issue alone, but you know I can’t let this “can’t afford” stuff go through to the keeper [yuck! sporting metaphor].
“Can’t afford” is such a rolled-up judgment – that is to say it masks a whole lot of variables. Can’t afford because there is not enough money (in whose pockets?)? Can’t afford because wanting to spend the money on something else? – lots of people think they can’t afford the opera but will readily spend more on a night out at the football. Then, since money has a time aspect, the same questions have to be asked as a question of credit rather than money. And don’t think that economists answers about these things, even though they are based on a view of systems rather than individuals, don’t still have assumptions about all of these things built into them.
Finally, I know in England everyone (especially from the right) likes to whinge about “UK labour’s mismanagement and dishonesty” but I’m not sure if “off balance sheet accounting” quite makes out that charge.
Should be “economists’ answers” of course.
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