So the UK's Social Security Bill is out of control....
The UKs social security bill is forecast to be £303.3 bn next year 2024 to 2025 (!)... well actually £319 bn if you don't nominalilse it..... JESUS!
But some of that is (relatively) untouchable... namely the state pension. It'd be a potential next election loser if Labour got rid of the treble lock so let's disregard that...
It breaks down roughly thus...
- £137.4 bn on the state pension
- £137.4 billion on working age and child welfare, that includes UC
- £90bn on disable people
- £35.1 bn on housing benefits...
In terms of number of claimants (not including the state pension), stats are available here
Something fishy about Personal Independence Payment...?
I mean honestly I've seen this in my job, there are so many people milking this....
NB PIP isn't means tested, and there's no data on who is claiming it in relation to benefits or whether they are working.
I just feel it's highly unlikely we've got almost 2 million people more people suddenly genuinely eligible for PIP over the last 6 years. These stats are enough to make me suspicious!
What could we cut...?
Besides the pension and proper disability support I think everything else is up for slashing....
- Housing benefit seems like an easy win.... slashing that wld be painful but ultimately it would bring rentals down!
- UC could be a decent target at least once mechani
sms for getting people into work are place, such as effective child care. - And a we cld cut out a lot by dealing with fake PIP claims, which I've seen my fair share of in my job roles!
Hypotheticals on staffing benefits reductions...
I guess there are two staffing approaches to tackling the welfare Bill...
- Employ more staff to do reviews
- Employ more staff to write AIs to do reviews.
I mean the later is more human and quite cost effective....
Pay someone £30K a year and task them with axing £100K in benefits a year... money back!
That'd mean one person would have to remove around £400 in benefits per household per day - if they cld do one review per day working 5 days a week for 48 weeks a year.
NB obvs that one person on £30K a year would require some support so the pay-back wouldn't be that great, they'd need some IT back up and some management, but I imagine one manager could handle a few dozen staff and IT support a lot more than that.
NB - the upper daily living PIP award is £440 a month, standard around £280. So that £400 figure a day could be easily met by targeting the most egregious cases of PIP fraud, there are plenty.
One extra DWP caseworker per year, doing just one successful review a day could save the country £100 000 a year.
100 extra could save the country £10 000 000
1000 extra could save the country £100 000 000
But we'd need 10K extra employees to cut £1BN a year off the welfare bill at this rate.
A quicker closure rate....?
TBH I doubt if a caseworker could close more than one case a day, not if you wanted to build evidence and do it throughly.
Maybe AI could do it quicker....?
Or we need more joined up thinking...
Some way of making these benefits PAY for themselves... I'm not sure what that would look like, but ATM it's just not sustainable, and especially unfair for those earning just above that benefits threshold....
Just thinking out loud!
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Is it possible to find out how many of those benefits are to people in work?
I'm not sure they even have data on that, they certainly don't for PIP...
Looks like something like 40% of UC claims are in work benefits - basically subsidising whoever owns Asda these days.
Isn't it Walmart anymore...
I've been thinking more about data gaps these days...!
It was those two brothers but one of them got too involved ... I think they may still own it, can't remmber now.
Yes, re data gaps, I think the whole thing needs to be more nuanced. People typically on long-term benefits are there because it suits the economy one way or another - if the economy expands they'll get work, but when it shifts they'll be thrown out of work again.
Re in work benefits - many people are working more than one job and still having to claim benefits. It's one thing saying people must work but there have to be sustainable jobs there - the gig economy is no good for people who are trying to settle and have a family (and we need them to do that).
Re PIP, I think there need to be overlays of concentrations of claimants mapped against areas of deprivation and (poor) health outcomes. I can imagine the patterns we'll see. I really don't like this punching down, it's all whitewash and very little, if any, substance.
We certainly need more intelligent solutions going forwards... the problem is claimants are such an easy political target! Of course it may also be false economy... just adding onto the health bill.
What are housing benefits or what do they include? Like subsidies for gas, electric etc?
NO it's just rent!
Balancing the books is hard, but so is dealing with fake claims it seems. I've heard that more is lost in unpaid tax than in benefit fraud, so both sides need looking at. Labour do need to look after those who really need it if they are to get another term as it will take years to really fix the mess they inherited.
So true, I think it's A LOT more is lost in unpaid tax. Fair point! Also there's billions of unclaimed benefits per year.
That too. The papers will complain about 'benefit scroungers!', but less about the rich avoiding tax. There has to be some balance in what gets lost and how many people you need to fix it. We shall see if AI makes a difference.
At least we don't have someone taking a chainsaw to the civil servants like the other side of the pond.
This quote from the Bible and St. Paul:
Simple times, not working = not eating... and I'm not a super religuis man
It's an issue as old as civilisation!
UC is a killer, and feeds the lazy club free money. Few years ago when I was running a training course for some new starters in one of my cost centres I happened to mention that once production was in full swing there was a likelihood of moving to a continuous shift system.
I did this so as to explain the effect of shift working on the body's system, sleep patterns and overall health.
Now, the plant manager had failed to mention shift work during the recruitment process (why I have no idea but he didn't last long, there's the door boy, close it on your way out).
This created a stir amongst about the employees to the extent that 15 out of 50 if I remember correctly jacked the job in, citing that earning extra money with shift enhancement would " affect their benefits", Fucking lazy arsed low life types.
No ambition, no want to get on in life just suck the lifeblood out of the system
"Ask not what my country can do for me, but what I can do for my country" JFK.
Another rip off scheme is the "Blue badge scheme" do not get mestarted on that, I shall await for another day!!
https://www.reddit.com/r/Economics/comments/1jahngm/so_the_uks_social_security_bill_is_out_of_control/
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UK, is it true that UK is just months away from getting doomed?
I think that may be a slight exaggeration!
But it still says a lot about the current situation