Economist Explains A Major Problem With The Winter Fuel Allowance Reform!
ฝัง
- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 20 ก.ย. 2024
- A benefit of cutting the winter fuel allowance is that it will save the government over £1.5 billion. However as economist, Mariana Mazzucato, pointed out when she appeared on Newsnight, the saving may be wiped out as somewhere else has to pick up the cost.
Join this channel to get access to perks:
/ @maximilienrobespierre1
Patreon - / maxrobespierre
Amazon - amzn.to/2QoRauj
Facebook: - / maximilienrobespierre1794
Twitch - / max_robespierre
Merch - maximilienrobe...
Twitter - / maxfrobespierre
Buy Me A Coffee - www.buymeacoff...
#winterfuel
#costofliving
#pensioners
Credit: BBC
![เขามัทรี - เอ็กซ์ ศุภกฤต - จอนนี่มิวสิค [ Official MV ]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/AS9ufKuQIVs/mqdefault.jpg)
“It costs less to educate a child than to put them in prison.”
Well said!👏👏👏👏
Word of the day, externalities, this is why having homeless on the streets is MUCH more expensive than housing them.
Mariana Mazzucato is brilliant, love her.
The best reaction imo was Mariana's response when the interviewer jumped in with the inevitable question that paralyses politicians: "how are we going to pay for it?". The response: it's NOT like a household budget or an individual. If only Starmer and Reeves would learn that and INVEST rather than imposing austerity.
Starmer and Reeves work for the neoliberal billionaires. If they step out of line, the billionaire-owned media is waiting to destroy them - and British voters believe the billionaire-owned media.
The Tories cut the asylum processing budget. The cost of housing an ever increasing queue now far exceeds what was saved by the cut.
Tories need to cut costs, so they can channel it to other Tories and their donors!
every £ taken away from normal people is a win for the Tories
but asylum processing pays civil servants, while hotel barracks gives money to landlords
Tory priorities...
@@markwelch3564 . A tourist hotel in Killin , Scotland was near to bankruptcy. It was bought by Indian investors , who immediately registered it as an asylum hotel.
All the slash and burn policies cost in the long run. The benefit system is a perfect example of that. It would’ve been cheaper just to leave sick and disabled people alone rather than building a massive, expensive bureaucracy to keep the boot of the state on the neck of disabled people, killing thousands in the process.
Respect. Tories laid the groundwork , with their divisive meanness and messing around with pensions in general. And solidifying complacent selfishness. It's all about looking after number one and sod the rest. No such thing as society, except when you need looking after yourself.
Nobody ever mentioned the deaths caused by austerity. Yes more help is needed
The optics on this are terrible. What an unnecessary mess.
What is Starmer thinking?!
The problem is that he isn't. Too busy trying on his new suits and as far as seeing into the future is concerned his new glasses have obviously failed. Starmer has gone right down in my estimation.
It a mess and not thought about
Tough decisions.
But for some reason they didn't have the safety net high enough.
And there's a lack of spin and positive bull crap. Which we didn't want but now we just get the bare facts.
Inflation down, growth stable, strikes settled etc etc overall things will get better long term is what they are thinking.
I can remember in 79 one of the first things that Thatcher did was to sever the earnings link to the state pension relative to working age incomes. This resulted in a significant decline in state pension over time and a spike in poverty among the old and vulnerable. So much so that when sha was sacked and major became PM in a particularly cold winter there were 20,000 access deaths and many more thousands hospitalised due to hypothermia and cold related illnesses.
Edwina Curry was the health minister at the time . Her advice to the elderly was " wear extra cardigans" while she was having her heated indoor swimming pool extension built onto her windmill luxury home .
Thatcher is and always was the media darling...2nd only to the Queen. Untouchable and not to be overly criticized by anyone, especially if they point to her and Reagan in America for the problems we have now!
@@GhengiskhansmumShe protected Savile and gave him a knighthood, access to all the vulnerable people he wanted, and countless meals in Downing Street and Chequers.
Yet you would think Starmer had done all that, to read the comments of the Tory sheep.
@@neilgodwin6531 Is that the same Starmer who was DPP and failed to prosecute Saville when he was alive....
It wasn’t just her indoor swimming pool getting heated.
Er...certainly NOT in Scotland! Still referred to by many as "That B**ch Thatcher!" @@Ghengiskhansmum
A Common Sense Approach Well said Mariana ❤
So you agree Labour are wrong.
@@davidhooper1767 Yes, if they run the same policies as Tory, they'll always be wrong.
If they would actually do left-wing politics they wouldn't be wrong
A very sensible lady who knows what she's talking about. Actions usually have consequences, it's a fact of life. This cutting of the Winter Fuel Allowance for many pensioners will mean an increase in admissions to hospital in winter, this plan simply hasn't been thought through. Already it's been admitted the effect of doing this hasn't even been calculated, which is ridiculous. This reminds me of the idea of scrapping the Car Tax disc around 2014, which has actually ended up costing money, as more people didn't bother to tax their vehicles, as there was a good chance they'd get away with it and, in most cases, they did. Etiamted loss to the Exchequer, around 3 years ago, was a total of £90 million.
It's the same reason that austerity accelerated and augmented the difficulties the UK faced.
But it sure did help black rock et Al to maximise their profits. And they are the think tank advisors and the troika of eu who advised we bail out the banks.
dont forget, a life worth nothing....in the UK
to get this, they had to leave the EU and ECHR...
because no Brit have the right to sue any UK government!
14 years of Tory austerity has not led us to growth, so why do the Labour party think they can fix the economy with yet more austerity? Investment is the answer not more cuts.
Pensioners in a cold home also at risk of Bronchitis, pneumonia and heart attack
A stitch in time saves nine comes to mind.
For want of a horse shoe nail cones to mine. And it is easier to get a camel through the eye of a needle.
@@Padraigp "You can lead a horse to water, but a pencil must be lead."
@@stephenwalker2924 that's a spelling phrase. It doesnt mean anything other than there are two ways to pronounce the word lead. You didn't understand the assignment did you.
Why did the tories raise the pension from 208 to 221.00 per week knowing full well that this does not meet the criteria for pension credits. They fully knew the blame will go to labour who will have to reform it so those who are intitled get it
🤨 don’t act like “Labour” (LINO) are blameless in this.
@@DissociatedWomenIncorporatedYou're missing the point. Tories tried to look like they were helping pensioners, pure gaslighting, I know, I tried to claim Pension Credit. No one on full State Pension can claim it
@@neilgodwin6531 yeah, they mishandled everything really badly
Labour could simply move the pension credit threshold. Even something as thick as Rayner could work that out.
This is what I've been banging on about. The policy is pure Tory knowing the price of everything and the value of nothing.
Cut to save has never worked - a decade of austerity proved that out, just like organisations that cut to save generally enter decline as a result why they think this is different on a Country level is beyond me...
Massive generalisation. Ever heard of half rations ?
@@californiadreamin8423 by 'half rations' do you really mean starvation rations?
@@SheilaBloom. No I don’t.
I used to work for KwikSave stores, they were doing really well, on the road to 1000 stores, biggest in Britain. Then a new CEO took over, slashed the part time staff (youngsters working after school), queues at busy times grew, where there had been no queues previously. People went to Asda, and the chain soon collapsed.
Short term cost cutting, leading to thousands of jobs and stores lost
@@californiadreamin8423This isn't WW2.
Those in the know know she is absolutely brilliant. Sadly, she is ignored by the corrupt idiots looking for the next set of free glasses, Arsenal tickets and dresses. Have I mentioned how brilliant she is, see the interview she gave Owen Jones, an absolute masterclass in explaining how we’ve gotten ourselves in absolute mess.
what she is saying is The scrapping of the fuel allowance is the government being penny wise, but pound foolish.
Thanks very much Max.
As if pensioners know how to claim their state pension, winter fuel allowance and bus pass, but when it comes to claiming pension credit they are baffled. Reeves is gaslighting pensioners by saying Labour are encouraging the take up of pension credit, suggesting that this is because pensioners don`t know how to do it. Of course there are some like this, but the vast majority are just above the pension credit threshold and can`t claim it for that reason. In fact, every single pensioner who receives new state pension is above the pension credit threshold so is not entitled to pension credit and consequently winter fuel allowance.
Always liked Mariana, her books make for great reading to break down the illogical household budget thinking of recent times.
“The cost of inaction is greater than the cost of action” is a great macroeconomic quote!
its make sense to normal people, Tories are not normal, or they wouldnt be called Tories!
Means testing winter fuel payments makes sense on paper, in isolation. I know multiple pensioners who have automatically received it but definitely do not need it. However, individual household budgets are nuanced, and the fear of debt will undoubtedly lead to people sacrificing their health.
Personally speaking I'm paraplegic and in type 2 respiratory failure. I've had double pneumonia before and almost lost my life. Despite the considerable risk to my health, I still put off having the heating on until its freezing weather. Its an awful position to be in.
I'm one if those pensioners who will lose the WFA and, in all honesty , its not a problem. What is a problem is the forced acceptance- WFA is paid regardless- of government charity. I don't want nor do I need £200 charity, give it to those that do.
The problem with means testing rather than universal social security is that it creates stigmas, a 'them' and 'us' society.
You surely know the right-wing attacks on the unemployed and disabled, stigmatised and derided because of their circumstances.
Universal social security is best.
By the way, stop calling a payment received from the government charity or a 'handout'. It just reinforces the right wing narrative. Call them entitlements. Businesses with more money than you have no objection receiving tax breaks etc.
@bluegec8721 precisely! My uncle donates his to the local food bank. He tried to refuse it but the government insisted he had to have it. Bizarre!
Switch off to save money ?? How can it be switched "OFF" when it is too expensive to switch ON in the first place .
How many billions did the UK give to oil and gas companies as subsidies?
Absolutely Spot on Mariana ! 👏♥️
Labour have had 14 years to craft the winter fuel cuts and this is the best they can do?
Regardless of what political party is in power, it is always, always, the elderly, women, children and the vulnerable that suffer the most, and are hit the first and hit the hardest..
Politicians do not care about poor people.
Goverrnment budgets are different from households. They can create money without creating debt.
There has never been any optimism in the U.K. for the last 14 plus years...
The 850,000 who have not claimed pension credit should be helped to do so and the government should make it clear the income at which they consider pensioners do not need fuel allowance
The whole mess of pension credits needed reform anyway . Better to go after the non tax payers ( non doms ) and corruption ( PPI ) to swell the coffers towards the missing billions
Austerity doesn't work. Shrinking economy, massively increased borrowing and a greatly reduced quality of life is all that Austerity has achieved.
Oh my god, did I just hear some economic literacy? In 2024? Feel like I've spent 20 years walking in a desert to finally find a drop of water.
She is so right.
The biggest problem with this policy is that the government chose to target vulnerable, poorer people first rather than a wealth tax
Well said Max! .. 👍
I`m annoyed that there`s a lazy generalisation in comments regarding this topic (in other YT posts) that pensioners voted for the Tories - maybe in the south of England but not in Scotland - and that they somehow deserve to lose the entitlement; winter comes sooner here and lasts longer, very often much colder too, so our elderly suffer disproportionately!
As for "rich" pensioners - by whose standards? What passes for rich in today`s ruined economy?
I've said it before, but pressure needs applying on the energy companies as well, they're the ones profiting from the high "costs", they need to be told to supply elderly folk in need with the energy required to stay warm without charging an excesive amount for it, we already have so-called "social tarriffs" for things like broadband and mobile (primarily used to get people online for accesing the universal credit system), and we used to have one two decades ago for energy too, this is what is needed, my supplier (Octopus Energy) has offered assitance in response to the cut, so other energy companies NEED to follow suit...
A windfall tax on profits would easily pay for WFP
I think while you're receiving 10's of thousands of £ clothing benefits, you should look carefully in the mirror before cutting others' benefits.
You can't maintain something unfit for purpose max it needs reforming so there's no restrictions on pension credits
"give the richest cohort in society MORE untested benefits" 😂
Anyone who spaffed their paycheck and thought the state pension would cover them is getting exactly what they budgeted for.
I don't want to bail them out.
Hi Max and all here.
This is the underlying problem with all these sorts of decisions. The people deciding on the cuts can pat themselves on the back about the saving which has been made in one area because that's easy to calculate. The knock on costs in other areas are much more hidden and therefore don't need to be worried about. And that doesn't even take into account the extra misery inflicted on those people who end up in A&E with hypothermia and the extra waiting times they create for other patients.
She is one of the best around and rarely gets circulated and Labour should listen to her yet persist to think they know far better, and we need to obliterate the notion that the state is like a household with a tight budget when a state is nothing like that.
It's like saying we can't afford to fix the roof
You can't afford not to
I hate to be morbid but what can't we afford? Boris happily chose to sacrifice them during COVID and nobody really cared.
@@AvocadoAfficionado I think a lot of people cared deeply....
Pretty standard first order and second order consequence analysis, I'm actually surprised at how short-sighted Labour's approach to this policy is
The effects of the cut haven’t been thought through 🤦🏼♀️
The flap of a butterflies wings
Another blow for Labour voters.
Society is a charity case.
Most people are put in a precarious situation so that their government and community can take advantage of them for as long as physically possible.
One question is who's bright idea was this, obviously someone in the ivory tower who does not have a clue how the world works.
Stating the bleeding obvious I would have thought.
Why did we not hear Esther McVey say this when she was the Minister for Common Sense ?
Because she doesn't have any
evening Max...it's not about a few quid here or there for me, it's an utter kick in the teeth to all the working people who created the "labour" party in the vain hope of a better life for all...this is not just being taken off us pensioners...it will NEVER be reinstated....NEVER
A saving of £1.5b, probably make 10 x that taxing bp and shell
You can tell the level of economic illiteracy that exists when she says the government isn’t a household and can just spend the money and the host is confused as to where that money will come from thinking it has to be found or borrowed.
This point came up in Parliament, before the vote.
As people forgot the introduction of warm banks. Also about pensioners riding buses all day to keep warm.
That isthe Irish government see it.
Also free travel for pensioners keep them active for a long time.
Also pensioners in Ireland have a free ( means tested) mobile phone
It allows independent living for much longer, knowing help is just a phone call away.
If I had a euro for every time my 95 year old mother phoned me over the TV not working I would be rich. It was usually plugged out by her or someone else.
Pennies, can indeed save £pounds.
Camp out in council offices, they are always nice and warm, and you are paying for it.
Well said Mariana you talk so much sense.
Absolutely spot on. Mussicato knows what she is talking about. You have to approach things as systems thinking. If the Labour Govts top priority, as they have said quite rightly, is growth, then have a systems approach to how you are going to do that. What you don't do is just accept some narrow Treasury pet obsession and blindly implement it.
The winter fuel allowance is really not that big on an individual level.
This is a valid point but talking about this policy in some kind of cost benefit framework is utterly obscene. The impact assessment says people are going to DIE ffs.
Well said!
I am sorry are we now say that the only reason pensioners end up in hospital in the winter is because of cold?
No. Nobody said that.
It's as if the stupidity, into which the Tories sank, has rubbed off on the Labour opposition.
Just shows poor old Rachel hasn’t got a clue what she’s doing . And another thing Fiona Bruce should stick to fake art .
My mum has been banging on for years that her mates and her never need the winter fule payment, they have pensions and often give it to charity. Its means tested now so people should receive it if they need it. Lets make sure the people that need it apply for it, go check on your neighbours!
Too many see other benefits as charity. They will not apply for them. They see the pension as an earned right.
My friend has a very small pension from teaching for less than 10 years. It takes her over the Pension Credit boundary. She has waited 6 years for orthopedic surgery. She cant afford heating, never mind private care
WFP was made universal for good reasons. Have those reasons changed?
@@lat1419 To keep pensioners happy it should not be an additional benefit. It should be an integral part of the pension system. And the amount you get should be means tested. Not if you get it or not.
@@redshift3 Yes, the Triple Lock means that pensions increase much faster than other benefits. In April this year the State Pension went up by £900 while energy bills are expected to be around £100 higher this winter compared to last winter. Anyone not getting the WFP (£200 or £300 if over 80) will have £600-£700 more money this winter than they did a year ago.
Mazzucato with the great takes as always.
I am not even sure that kind of cut will cover the cost of means testing itself.
14 years of tory cuts. The greatest shift in wealth from the middle classes to the richest in society ever seen in our county. Suddenly journalists care. Hmmm . I wonder why.
Nice to hear Fiona Bruce being put back in her box.
Unintended? Surely they thought it through. 😂😂
Mariana Mazzucato is bang on the money ❤
Maybe that's their plan.. Streeting's aim is to privatise as much as the NHS as possible, and this will drive pensioners towards it.
Could this be the plan anyway? To give out more NHS contracts to private companies.
I wonder what the government has been doing whilst media has had their claws out with this? Maybe I haven’t got use to Conservatives not running the country?
On a separate note, happy to see the old guillotine intro is back... 😁
This whole issue is about perception rather than reality. Labour have been left a diabolical legacy and have been set up to fail. Mariana is right to point out the difference between household and government spending. Trying to do more with less is extremely difficult, if not impossible. The Tories left us with incredibly high borrowing, after pledging to reduce it to zero in their first term - that was austerity. Labour have followed the same path, pledging to stick to the fiscal rules. They may gain some credibility in the markets but the scale of the problems faced by public institutions and services are vast, and Labour will only get criticism from the right wing press and social media.
That the dail fail prefers to complain about the winter guel cut than it does about children in poverty.
I wholly refute that any person should end up in hospital for the sum of £25 per month. People in the UK pay their bills monthly and the fuel cap is lower this winter than last winter. In April these people will gain over £40 per month.
As Mariana inadvertantly pointed out, it's cheaper to educate the pensioners ...
Not much spent on your own education, obviously.
More people claiming pension credit too means they then get winter fuel payment so double whammy
What about the £25 extra cold weather payments?
A Voice of Reason ❤
Pensioners get lots of money to pay for their heating, bills and food each week!
218.15squid each week without including any money for housing costs and council tax
Why are people still banging on about the cut when they ought to be covering the topic on how to help people!!
I'm afraid that some sacred cows will have to be sacrificed. The triple-lock will rebalance matters next April. The much more devastating frozen allowances (£23.3 Billion this tax year) hardly get a mention........
Been posting about this since they announced it.
He's not a good leader lets be blunt, Johnson was terrified when he took over as Leader
but the PMQs he always seemed to miss the spot.
The way this could be a massive win is actually making the WFP unnecessary.
GB Energy is the key they need to link with an Eco friendly provider to offer a social tariff
the other companies would drop prices at even the plan they could argue then the WFP is not needed at all.
It does raise huge questions about the BBC they are just savage, its somewhat ironic they argue they need high wages to keep the "best" Laurak is the best? One lesson Labour has to learn from this the media are never going to give them a break, Think Gordon Brown as PM
he farted in the wrong direction and it main news for 24hrs. He walked right into all this shambles and they need to ask themselves was it worth it.
. . . . .And that is why it is also a good idea to create money and pump it into society (and not the banks like last time). Which was touched on in the original clip but soon glossed over.
Why is it called a winter fuel allowance? It’s just a tax free bung. Might just as well call it a bingo card allowance or a gin allowance. Or maybe cruise spending money.
Starmer hasn’t a clue
Dare I say it that he’s worse than Sunak ?
Problems of internal devaluation at macro scale are related to problems of cost leadership at micro scale. Theory of Constraints says factors to be managed are: cost, inventory and throughput. Cost leadership creates unintended costs. Inventory has a lower bound. Therefore optimisation should focus on throughput.
I take her point but perhaps transferring to the normal pension would have been smarter where the better off would be taxed?
But let’s say then the government is like a household then… why would a household borrow from one bank that’s going to charge 3x more on the interest rate rather than another bank that will be charging 1/3 of the rate? Well that’s the PFI that the government always uses, when they don’t have to, because the government has its own bank, but somehow it’s only when benefiting the social fabric of the country they always have to cut, but when it’s for the private financial sector that’s them making good investments…
Yes, and has been pointed out by the guy on a different bias, the many new labour MPs are inexperienced so this causes further strain on them. U-turn would be a good option here, they will get slated but it's the best option..
Pneumonia is more likely and that leads to death after endless antibiotics and relapse and antibiotics and relapse and then dead. Takes a long time too and the person is usually needing oxygen supplies in a hospital or transporting to a Care home
"If people choose not to put the heating on after several above-inflation increases in the state pension then that's their choice." Peter Lamb Labour MP
I'm sorry, but does that sound less like Labour and more like the nasty party? Or has Labour just become the new nasty party, when you have Wes Streeting calling standing up for hungry kids" showboating"?
Disgraceful the lot of them.
And because it is at its root discrmination, singling out one part of the population, it has created a division and all the talk merely strengthens that division. Discrimination does not help the country. But I guess if you are relying on private donors, you don't care about the country anyway.