OT It's another world out there

Is the minimum wage a wage that would support a family of four? This
assumes that the wife is at home and 2 kids are under school age of
course and it also assumes that council (or housing association)
accommodation is readily available where the person in question lives.

£7 per hour x 40 hour week = £280 before deductions. **** knows what
that would give take home pay and **** knows what the cost of housing
is in the area but in Bedford you'd struggle to find a 3 bedroomed
house for less than £500 per month if you wanted to rent and once
you've added on the essentials like council tax, electricity, gas,
water, second hand shoes for the kids beans on toast for tea etc etc
£280 plus child benefit doesn't go far.

The minimum wage isn't enough to encourage anyone to work and not
claim benefits. We live in a country where employers have the upper
hand and if you're not the sharpest knife in the drawer than you and
your family will suffer. I was lucky as a kid because my parents had
good jobs but I went to school with kids who went to bed in a jumper
to keep warm, that's still the case and it's shit.

 

http://www.antenna.nl/~waterman/gorz.html

 

No, I wouldn't want him foisted upon me but you need to recognise that
the Poles will live in shared accommodation to keep costs down and we
don't live in a country where families should live in one room and
share bathrooms & kitchens.

 

Using the patented Mavis Beacon "Hunt&Peck" Technique, Andy Bonwick

Oh, I've no problem with an acceptable level of income being made up by
benefits, none at all.

But I do have a problem with someone turning down the possibility of
work because he can still get his money without needing to.

 

http://www.listentotaxman.com/index...&taxcode=&period=52&ingr=280&Submit=Calculate

£14560/year gross, equating to net pay of £225.85pw or £978.69pcm,
assuming 52 paid weeks a year and a bog standard tax code. Plus any tax
credits, etc, on top.

Tbh, being agricultural labour, I suspect it's seasonal work so the 52
week calculation is miles out. **** knows how much overtime they need to
do to get the £25k quoted in that article.

My mrs does that, but she's a fucking freak cos at the same time I'm
throwing off the covers, opening windows, and ordering her to turn the
bastard electric blanket off.

 

I see your point. There are actually several houses a mere stone's
throw from where I sit typing, currently occupied by eastern European
(mostly Polish) workers, and I am aware of employers doing exactly
that. Even on my salary[1] I have to share a house to afford the
standard of living I'm enjoying, and it could be a lot better.

[1] Although basically an unskilled manual worker, I am in fact
salaried. Currently.

 

I'm glad you can see where I'm coming from on this one. It's not going
to change though because traditionally we expect to earn enough to
support our families at a higher standard than a lot of migrant
workers will accept.

 

I don't have a family to support. It's probably all for the best. I
would certainly feel I had to provide a standard of living at least
equal to that which I (perceive myself to have) enjoyed as a child,
and probably fail miserably.

 

"But are you happy?"

 

The Herefordshire agricultural economy would not function without migrant
workers. The nature of the soft fruit industry is that you need a large
influx of temporary workers for a fairly short time.

It's always been the same. When I was doing A levels I worked on soft fruit
farms with migrant workers. They were mainly from British travelling
families. They lived in wooden shacks or old caravans. Once the fruit
harvest was over they went back to collecting scrap metal or laying tarmac.

Today, the migrant workers are from E.Europe. They live in much better
accommodation. Yes, they share communal facilities but they have hot water
& electricity now. Most of them are students who also return to Poland etc
once the fruit harvest is over.

 

On the plus side, the former example did pretty much demolish the feudal
system and lead to the end of the medieval period. Historically
speaking, given the choice between that kind of progress or the
comfortable lifestyle of a Symbian developer, I'd go for the end of
indentured serfdom every time.

I do, however, share my living room with a four-legged animal, and I'm
not talking about the doris (or V - are we still doing that?)

 

Likewise, when I was doing A-levels and working part-time at Sainsburys,
a couple of times a week a double-decker bus of eastern european
fruit-pickers would turn up to do their shopping.

Going back a generation or two, when my mum was a nipper their summer
holiday was spent hop-picking. Short-term low-income migrant labour,
picking up a few extra quid where they could get it, is hardly a novel
phenomenon. Frankly, I'm happy to live in a time where you don't have
kids spending their summer holidays doing cheap manual labour, though at
7 quid an hour it sure as **** beats a paper round.

Kent, Hereford, Lincolnshire, it's all the same in the end.

 

This isn't unique to Unskilled workers, or poles... Google for
"Onshoring".

 

I think he should have *a* choice not to take the job, but after 3
months on the dole all further payments should be linked to an
equivalent number of hours community service, so that it becomes a
minimum wage job on limited hours.

The costs to everyone concerned will be no more, communities would
benefit, and those claiming would probably benefit too... The hours
wouldn't be too severe as to prevent attending interviews for a proper
job either.

Everybody wins.

 

I (naiively) thought that was actually the way things worked.

Go to the job centre, get a job offer, refuse it, get fucked off. Seems I
was wrong.


--
Beav

VN 750
Zed 1000
OMF# 19

 

I'm almost in that situation myself (going to bed in a jumper), but that's
because my wife is fucking HOT and doesn't like the heating being on EVER in
the bedroom.

I'll have to seriously give her future some thought now that it's turned
bloody cold.


--
Beav

VN 750
Zed 1000
OMF# 19

 

This afternoon, during a meeting, a colleague had his S60 phone in one
hand and my S40 in the other, comparing how long it took for each to do
something as simple as display tha main menu.

If the results were scientifically valid (and, if last week's "Phil vs
the rationalists" thread was anything to go by, lets not go there) then
odds are that a Symbian-powered plague would just about be working out
what a rat is, let alone decimating (!) western Europe 700 years ago.

On a completely unrelated note, just cos I fancy throwing it into the
ring, I think Pierre Pinoncelli is my new hero. What a prize goon.

 

Well going off some of the fucktards *we've* managed to find over the years
who aren't worth a wank when it comes to working for a wage, no I wouldn't.

It's bad enough when they "say" they want to work, let alone when they say
they don't. The old phrase "You can't get thee staff" is, unfortunately,
very true. (Well it is for semi/unskilled workers)


--
Beav

VN 750
Zed 1000
OMF# 19

 

Caravaners, they're getting everywhere these days.



--
Beav

VN 750
Zed 1000
OMF# 19

 

Those who can, do.

Those who can't, seem to turn up when I'm interviewing.