Is / have the white working class becoming more benefit dependant?

[Wildcat]

I live in a country where there is no social welfare so people do what they can to earn a living.

People do anything and everything rather than starve.

Way too many fit and able people in the UK don't care about work because they can get their beer money from the dole.

 

Yeah because we so want to emulate an economy where children have to scavenge through rubbish to survive.

 

http://humanurbanisation.files.wordpress.com/2007/02/collectors-of-waste-in-a-shanty-town-from-jakarta-in-indonesia.jpg

 

[Tony]

That's what having decades of dictatorship and a state centered economy and does for you. Isn't it shocking?? It reminds us that individuals are important and pre-eminent, not states and authorities.

[upinwath]

Yeah because we so want to emulate an economy where children have to scavenge through rubbish to survive.

 

http://humanurbanisation.files.wordpress.com/2007/02/collectors-of-waste-in-a-shanty-town-from-jakarta-in-indonesia.jpg

 

 

That isn't the point.

The point is so many people in the UK are able to work but can't be bothered.

If there wasn't any dole available to those who don't try to get work, simple cut it off.

 

As for the rubbish dump, I was in one just a couple of weeks ago and know far more about how they work that someone who simple googles a couple of search strings.

 

EDIT - I see you're in Shiregreen so I must apologise for my above. That who town is pretty crap so you do know what it's like to live in rubbish.

[upinwath]

PS -Told you I'd been.

Just be happy to admit I know more than all you lot put together.

 

[xenia]

I agree with much of what you say, I suppose i take a historical perspective on this in that, in the past labour has moved with the jobs available, for instance a great deal has been said about the minig communities and the damage done to them by the closing of collieries. It seems to me that these communities were by there nature transient, and that once a colliery closed the population would move.

 

Certainly the people who created these communities came to the area from all over, for instance I know of one which was populated by Irish and ex Cornish tin miners.

 

It seems to me that the benefits system now traps people in these, effectively dead, communities and any motivation to move is cancelled by the lack of availability of suitable housing in areas were labour is needed e.g. the South East.

 

I do appreciate that my earlier comments seem a little simplistic, but I do believe that to start to solve this problem drastic action must be taken.

 

Unfortunately part of the problem is immigration and in order to address it steps would need to be taken that are, on the face of it, racist. For instance, the creation of free or very low rent accomodation, possibly in pre fab type buildings in the south east could be offered to British only on the basis that they were prepared to work. Equally subsidised or free transport to and from these homes could also be provided.

 

I believe that once people were working they would aspire to improve their lot and would, through work, see that their aspirations could be met.

 

I do appreciate the sensitivity, but surely the employment and betterment of British people, loyal to the UK and contributing, Is better than the employment of migrants who naturally are motivated to send earnings home rather than spend their earnings here and whose loyalties are at best divided.

 

I realise that I may be branded racist, I hope not, in my heart I do not think I am. Nor do I think the solution is easy, it is very hard and may be impossible. None the less we should discuss, argue and seek progress.

 

 

 

That's a superficially compelling solution, but its the politics of soundbites.

 

Affordable housing already exists in areas of manpower shortage, that's where the people who dont want to work already live.

 

Is ending the dole really possible? What would 3 million people taking to the streets in protest be like? Swelled in number by working people, students and others who would never support such a draconian proposal.

 

Ending immigration, this is always the easy answer, stop the flow of foreign labour and suddenly native Brits will fill the shortfall. But is that really true?

 

Are native Brits available in sufficient numbers to cover shortages, particularly in skilled and semi skilled occupations?

 

We may well be able to find a few hundred to don a donkey jacket and patrol construction sites at night, or harvest Norfolk beetroot, but often they're lacking motivation and are an unattractive prospect from an employers point of view who obviously want the most effective workers for the lowest cost.

[upinwath]

The problem is easy. People have become too hard to please because they're mollycoddled way too much.

Norman Tebbitt famously told people to get on their bikes to find work.

At one time, and not that long ago, that would been the normal thing to do.

Now it's wait for something to pop into your lap because the state owes you a living.

[Green Web]

The singling out of white (as a corolory of race) is the subtle racism.

 

You don't think that's a dig? Really, you think it won't offend anyone who reads the Guardian to be stereotyped as worshiping everything BME? You know it's an insult, that's why you said it. The subtle racism is here again as you feel the need to mention minorities.

You could have started the whole thread without reference to the guardian or skin colour at all, you might have been taken more seriously if you had.

 

Do we? Any numbers to back that up about the long term unemployed/never employed and whether they're white or not?

No, I can't see that it's obvious at all why skin colour matters to this discussion, can you explain?

 

Yes you do as explained, extremists refuse to believe their cult is ever wrong, Guardianists have "white guilt" indoctrination, and the EDL have “white superiority' indoctrination, both movements are very divisive, must clarify though, the fashionable Guadinaists Cult unless they're protesting is very peaceful and do mean well, which can never be said about the EDL specimens.

 

Regarding folk not using certain words because of their sensitivity,

until now never thought anybody was stupid enough to believe in this PC madness, talk about Politcal Correctness gone mad over the top.

 

How do you have a discussion about a certain race been disproportionately more reliant on benefits, 'feeling 'ghettoised / victimised' without ever mentioning words such as 'racism' 'minorities' addidas ' jobs 'white' chav 'culture' council' 'welfare' etc? Which drugs do you use?

[lazy gator]

While ever people are being paid more in benefits not to work they wont. the labour party created a false economy by paying people to work shorter hours (tax credits, child care housing benifit etc) there fore making the job figures look better than they are. Far too much free stuff and dependancy on the state to provide every thing in this country has made the working class lazy.

[Cyclone]

Yes you do as explained, extremists refuse to believe their cult is ever wrong, Guardianists have "white guilt" indoctrination, and the EDL have “white superiority' indoctrination, both movements are very divisive, must clarify though, the fashionable Guadinaists Cult unless they're protesting is very peaceful and do mean well, which can never be said about the EDL specimens.

 

Regarding folk not using certain words because of their sensitivity,

until now never thought anybody was stupid enough to believe in this PC madness, talk about Politcal Correctness gone mad over the top.

 

How do you have a discussion about a certain race been disproportionately more reliant on benefits, 'feeling 'ghettoised / victimised' without ever mentioning words such as 'racism' 'minorities' addidas ' jobs 'white' chav 'culture' council' 'welfare' etc? Which drugs do you use?

 

Obviously not the same ones as you.

 

If you want to talk about a white minority being more reliant on benefits than other ethnicities then that's fine. But that wasn't the thread you started, nor am I aware of any evidence to suggest that you'd be right.

[Frank Sidney]

The problem some working class people suffer in gaining work is not that easy to solve. It's a bit of a racist thread though to be honest. Why separate white working class people from those of a different ethnic background. Imagine the outcry if the thread was about black working class people?

 

I wouldn't blame anyone for not working for rubbish wages in a dull pointless job. Who would? I know some will comment that they'd "flip burgers" if they had to. But how long would you do this for when you could have the same basic standard of living for staying at home. Would you do it for 30 yrs and have no real gain?

 

We put the cart before the horse in arguments like this. The reason we have people dependent on benefits is because the jobs on offer to such people, are, in a word, garbage. We don't have any real jobs available. No construction. no industry, no manufacturing, no training for young people, apprentiships? There's nothing really worth working for, for some people.

 

No doubt these "feckless oafs" should get some education and improve their chances? Nobody can afford that any more.

 

So I don't blame anyone for not working for nowt, i wouldn't in their position.