Family on 28K earn 907 euro per week

goingforgold · 2 Oct 2011

Did anyone see the artice in today's Sunday Times. It was supposed to highlight how much families on welfare are better off than those families who have one person earning.

However I was shocked to see that a family of two adults and four children earning 28K (540 euro per week gross, 460 net?) per annum with one spouse working come out with 907 euro per week. How is this possible? Even allowing for the fact that maybe one unemployed spouse may get JSA of 188 euro per week, it still doesn't add up. Throw in children's allowance (144 per week for four children). Still doesn't add up. Not sure they were including children's allowance anyway.

Anyone care to enlighten me??

(before I pack in the job, and tell the wife to do the same )

ClubMan · 3 Oct 2011

If a newspaper is going to cite such examples then the least they could do is outline how the bottom line figures were arrived at. Otherwise one might remain a bit skeptical.

There was another extreme example case cited here, in the media and by some politician recently (might be in LOS?) but again no specific details were provided. Even Joan Burton admitted that SW may not have full figures for individual/family claims in all cases.

bren1916 · 3 Oct 2011

Perhaps they alluded to the fact that someone may have to earn 907 gross in order to come out with the net figure that the family receives?

(might pack up the job meself )..

Brendan Burgess · 3 Oct 2011

Here is the article

Documents to be released this week will show there is no incentive for unemployed parents to take a job paying €28,000 a year, thanks to the high level of welfare benefits.

The Department of Social Protection has found that a family on this wage earn just €89 a week more than if they were on social-welfare benefits.

Responding to concerns that the welfare system is discouraging people to take up employment, the department researched two scenarios, comparing an unemployed couple with four children with a similar household where one parent was earning a salary of €28,000. The total weekly income for the unemployed family was €818, while the working family earned €907.

This does not take into account the fact that the working family would have to pay rent. The unemployed family would have most of their rent covered, through weekly supplement payments of €230. It is this payment that causes the income gap to narrow sharply.

Without the rent supplement, the unemployed family would get €588 a week, almost €320 a week less than the working family.

The department’s figures do not include work-related costs, such as travel or clothing, or the value of a medical card.

Rent supplement has been identified as one of the key barriers to some people taking up jobs. If a person on the Live Register accepts a job offer of more than 30 hours a week, they automatically lose all rent-supplement payment. In the case laid out by the department, this would be a loss of €996 a month for the unemployed family.

Thomas Byrne, Fianna Fail’s spokesman on public expenditure in the Seanad, said the figures show the need for reform of the welfare system. “Rent supplement is a huge problem,” he said. “It’s creating poverty traps where it’s not worth people’s while to go to work. I know Labour did a lot of work on this in opposition, and I look forward to the government making changes to rent supplement entitlements.”

Joan Burton, the social protection minister, has been hinting at such reform in the budget.

Sources in the department say she is considering the transfer of the rent supplement scheme to the Department of the Environment, where it could be run by local councils.

This would let local authorities charge a “differential rent” based on a percentage of the family’s income. “It would prevent the scenario we have at the moment,” said the source.

Last week Jimmy Harte, a Labour senator, claimed one family in Dublin was receiving €90,000 a year in welfare benefits. Harte suggested a cap similar to one implemented by the British government.

ClubMan · 3 Oct 2011

Strange that SW don't publish the details of their research on their own website?

http://www.welfare.ie/EN/Press/PressReleases/Pages/default.aspx

Guest105 · 3 Oct 2011

ClubMan said:
Strange that SW don't publish the details of their research on their own website?

http://www.welfare.ie/EN/Press/PressReleases/Pages/default.aspx

and why would they do such a thing, sure they would be in undated.

goingforgold · 3 Oct 2011

It's easy understand where the unemployed family get their income (well easier anyway). But how do a family with one person earning 28K get 907 euro per week? They have no childcare costs either. A couple with 4 children would need to be earning at least 100K gross to be better off when you factor childcare costs into the equation. Childcare for 4 children = 500 euro per week. 100k income (2 x 50K) = 1400 eur per week. 1400-500 =900 euro per week.

Why do we bother?

From welfares website it staes that a family with 4 children is entitled to 60% of the difference in their earnings and 824 euro per week through the Family Income Supplement (FIS) scheme. So in the case of a 28K salary that would be 60% of the difference between 500 euro and 824 =195 euro. Total income therefore 695 euro net.

So not sure where the other 212 euro comes from? Maybe unemployed spouse is entitled to JSA?

Also other benefits like back to school allowance and medical card may be availed of.

Family on 28K earn 907 euro per week

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