I'm shocked... I mean, how could this be? Gradle-to-grave is Britain's proudest achievement, the Beveridge Report sacred and the NHS just sexy!
Incredible and dystopian long-read in the WSJ today
Well, it is sort of sad when reality hits and it turns out a large state doling out stuff for peeps was bad for everyone involved. ... whatever you subsidize, you get more of etc.
Catherine Wieland got on Britain’s welfare rolls in 2021. With a history of emotional trauma, she was too anxious to go outside or carry out simple tasks like washing herself, she told the government. Soon, she was receiving about £700, or $1,000, a month in disability benefits. And, it turns out, going outside quite a bit. Using a taxpayer-subsidized program for those with disabilities, Wieland paid a small deposit for a free BMW, which she used to regularly visit the hair salon, dine out at restaurants, attend a Brighton pride parade and visit an amusement park.
Naturally, among other disgusting ways of defrauding others (#1586994, #1588312). I'm certain she's a boomer, too.
"According to court reports in her fraud conviction, she also flew to Cancún, Mexico, where she posted pictures of herself ziplining and riding a quad motorbike."
Disability payouts are no longer just for those most in need; they have become a financial crutch for a large swath of the population as wages stagnate and prices rise.
Well, Wieland doesn't seem to be lacking/suffering from stagnating (real) wages.
Some seven million people—more than 10% of the population—now claim at least one or more sickness or disability benefits. The numbers are growing fastest among working-age people who should be powering the country’s economy, surging more than 60% in the past six years to 4.7 million from 2.9 million in 2019. Not including healthcare, the country will spend more than £100 billion this year on all types of welfare benefits for the sick and disabled, about a third more than defense spending.
"Many of the newer disability claims are for mental-health issues like depression, anxiety and ADHD, which can be harder for the government to verify than a physical disability. Between 2017 and 2025, disability claims for cancer doubled. But benefits claims for all psychiatric issues surged fourfold."
Beautiful. Made-up payments for made-up "diseases." Great; love it.
Read these sentences... and then ask yourself why Britain (or Britons!) doesn't work anymore.
One benefit, created to help those with disabilities be more mobile, allows people to give up part of their welfare cash handout in return for a new car every three years. It now accounts for around one in every seven new car sales in the U.K. Among those who got new cars last year: 40 people whose primary medical condition was tennis elbow, 50 with wheat intolerance and 320 with dyslexia, according to government figures.
"It’s also a litmus test of a pressing question facing the West: Is it possible for political leaders to rein in spending on ever expanding welfare states?"
No, we're all fucked.
The U.K., like its European peers, is caught in a vicious cycle. Its spending is surging thanks to an aging population, greater defense needs, a costly green-energy transition and the swelling bill for welfare and debt interest. But its income is mostly flat, with weak economic growth.
Yeah, I mean: all of the above are self-imposed, deluded nonsense. #1593563 You can just choose differently.
U.K. borrowing costs are higher than any country in the Group of Seven, recently hitting their highest level since the 2008 financial crisis. A slow but steady exodus of wealthy Brits leaving for tax-friendly locales like Dubai has shown there are limits to how much the government can keep raising the tax burden, which is already at its highest level since World War II.
Enjoy. The. Decline. #1592172
In 2025, then U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmer announced plans to tighten eligibility requirements for sickness and disability welfare in a bid to shave £5 billion a year off government spending by 2030. The backlash was so sharp Starmer abandoned the cuts. [...] Starmer was later ditched by the Labour Party, replaced this summer by the telegenic Andy Burnham, who has also pledged to deal with welfare—but not through what he calls “crude cuts.”
Just like weaning the filthy boomers off Social Security is entirely, completely-demonstrably out-of-the-political-question, it's completely pointless to try and get the welfare queens off gov benefits. Man, just bring on the UBI already and get it over with.
Fuck... yeah, the entire piece is worth reading. For a brief overview of your declining Europoorean future, here you go!
The problem for the British state is that the pool of people who could claim PIP is huge. A government survey published in 2024 found that a quarter of working-age Brits could be technically classed as disabled. The financial incentives to claim are significant.
If they are classified as being too sick to work and also claim PIP, that increases to around £2,000, tax free. If you work 40 hours a week in a minimum-wage job in the U.K., you take home £1,880 a month after tax.
On this, America is doing something similar with its thriving tech and finance hubs vs its forgotten flyover states and the Rust Belt.