Thanks in turn for your feedback. The post was based on the information in your press release which stated (in relation to the figures that you cite): “This is a conservative estimate. If politicians were to remove benefits for people above the minimum income level defined by the Joseph Rowntree Foundation, that would save £44 billion per year.” But the broad point remains whichever figures you use – most of the people covered by your report need the benefits they receive.

I’m happy to provide further evidence on poor take up of means tested benefits – for example a recent study for the Department for Communities (http://www.communities.gov.uk/documents/communities/pdf/325108.pdf) shows that take up of Pension Credit between 2003-05 among those living in ‘high rise hardship and inner city adversity’ was 50.8 per cent. And among those who were eligible in the same group, rates of take up of income based JSA and Income Support were 71.3 per cent.

In addition, earlier this year the Government’s Child Poverty Unit concluded that: “Many poor families are not taking up all of the financial support to which they are entitled. For example, in 2006-07 between 100,000 and 180,000 entitled couples with children were not claiming Housing Benefit – worth between £240 million and £530 million. There are 400,000 children living in poverty as a result of families not claiming all the benefits and tax credits to which they are entitled.”If you’re interested you can download the report from here: http://www.dcsf.gov.uk/everychildmatters/strategy/parents/childpoverty/childpoverty/. Child Poverty Action Group, with a strong history of advocating strongly for the poorest families, are against means testing.

Given your interest in public spending efficiencies, you could consider the argument that universal provision, accompanied by higher taxes for those who genuinely are not in need, is a far cheaper way of achieving the goal of supporting the poorest. The cost of publicity and marketing needed to achieve high take up of every benefit we have, along with the administrative machinery necessary to facilitate it, would probably be a poor use of public money.

Best,
Nicola

If you read the report you will see the cut off threshold we use varies among different family types. This is because a larger family requires more income than a smaller one to achieve the same level of income. The thresholds are, for example, £40,000 for a couple with two children, £20,000 for a lone parent, and £15,000 for a single person with no dependents. These thresholds are all above the median incomes for their family types (and in the cases of families with children, well above). The JFR figures that you quote are from an annex, which shows how the estimate of the cost of middle class welfare would vary with different types of thresholds. To say that they are what the figures in the report is based upon is inaccurate and misleading.

Your comments would also benefit from a greater use of evidence. You cite a blog post that claims poor take-up of means-tested benefits in the UK, using old data from 2000. The more recent data from HMRC show that the take up of the Child Tax Credit, for example, is 90-95 per cent, so take up of means-tested benefits is clearly not the problem you suggest. Also, if there are problems with take-up then the solution should be to make means-testing work better (e.g., improve information and the understanding of entitlements), not to introduce expensive programmes that provide little benefit to those in need.