To work or not to work,that is the question

Well just going by what you have shared here, that doesn't seem fair to me. In New York state they have regulations for that type of thing. You can't just sit back and collect money from the state. They have programs you have to go through to learn how to find a job and they have requirements that you have to meet where you show them proof that you are at least looking for a job each week. They also have a limit on the amount of time you can collect assistance, I think it's 5 years. Maybe other states don't have things like that. In some families it doesn't make sense for both parents to go to work. Like in my family I am a stay at home mom. Money is tight sometimes but we don't get any help and if I worked my whole paycheck would go right to daycare. So for me there is no point. If we had to I would go to work and work the opposite shift from my husband so that we didn't have to pay daycare, but we don't need to do that right now, my husbands paycheck covers everything we need. If those people could do something like that and are just choosing not to, or if they are really taking advantage of the situation, that's wrong. But it's hard to say really without reading the article on my own and knowing everything about their individual situation. As far as the state of their houses, I don't think that really has anything to do with them being on or off welfare assistance. Some people are just messier or lazier than others. I personally don't think that whether or not somebody gets assistance has any bearing on how clean and tidy their house is.

Sounds to me as if the newspaper this story was reported in fell foul of stereotyping. There are many self supporting families who live no better than vermin and many families surviving on state benefits who live in spotless homes and behave with decorum and grace. I've often felt that one of the problems with the British welfare state is that it offers little encouragement to move on. Once one is in the position of the welfare claiming family in the story, it is very difficult to go out and find a job which will match your income. I really can't blame those who continue to claim benefit rather than work when there is little financial incentive to do so.

I have loads to say on this but I will try to keep it to a minimum!! I feel really strongly about it because there is a family close to us who having recently had a baby claim for her being a single parent when she is not and he works whilst she stays at home - the flat is a mess and they have lots of money which enables them to leave the baby with grandparents pretty much every weekend and also soe weekdays so they can either go out or just rest at home. Myself and my hussband work two full time jobs and yet don't have enough to go out all the time and I know that grandparents will help out but more than twice or three times a week jsut so they can go out drinking is ridiculous if you ask me!! They wanted the child in the first place and if they truly cared they wouldn't go out as often - it works out that the fatehr hardly ever sees the child aswell which just infuriates me!! Grrr! Anyway yes the balance is definitely not right and sorry for the rant but had to explode on this when I read the discussion!! lol

It would always depend on how the person would like to work on their behalf it is not because the Government are helping them they will not work at all and just leave it to the Government while other families are only a little of the income but they manage their life in good well..... so it is matter of how responsible the person is and hard work is also important.