Evaluate the effectiveness of government policies in reducing inequalities amongst disadvantaged groups.
The government has introduced a variety of policies that are aimed at disadvantaged groups in order to reduce inequalities. These policies have worked to a varying degree.
The Universal Credit has been introduced recently to simplify the benefit system and replace specific payments such as, Jobs seekers Allowance, Income Support, Child Tax Benefit, Housing Benefit, Working Tax Credit, and Income related Employment and Support Allowance. This new benefit aims to encourage people to work for more hours, move into work and make people better off if they are working. This payment would have a big impact on the society, as the government believe that 3.1 million households would be entitled to more benefits. On the other hand, it has been argued that as a result of Universal Credit 2.8 million households would be entitled to less. To claim the Universal Credit, there are no restrictions in the number of hours the person works per week. However, the amount of money the claimant’s gets would drop gradually once they began to earn more. This is effective, as people won’t lose all their benefits right away. Furthermore, the Universal Credit is paid monthly therefore effective in terms of getting people to become more responsible for themselves with spending their money on longer terms. However, some people argue that this approach could push a lot of claimants into debt, as a result of spending all the money within a short period of time. Also the cap on Housing Benefit could cause people to move into poorer areas. This would have a huge impact on families with children as they could live in bad conditions or in dangerous area.
Therefore some people can argue that although the Universal Credit although might simplify the benefits system, it could create more problems and issues in our society in terms of housing and into debt.
One group in society at a clear disadvantage is women. Women are more likely to be single-parents who are often caught in the low – paid, part – time work and are paid the minimum wage. The minimum wage was first introduced in April 1999 and had the aim of increasing the income of the one million workers including 78% of women in low-paid work. The current minimum wage of £6.51 per hour for those over twenty one is on the highest increase since 2008 and the government claim that over one million people will see a pay rise of up to £355 per year due to the above inflation change. This suggests that the minimum wage is an effective policy in lowering wealth inequalities for disadvantaged groups such as women. However, the living Wage Foundation has argued that the National Minimum Wage does not reflect the cost of living and believe minimum wage should meet the higher living wage of up to £10 per hour. In 2010, of 3.5 million employees paid less that £7 per hour, two - thirds were women and one - third was men.
This therefore shows that the minimum wage does not reduce the inequality of gender pay gap for women because many women are still trapped in low paid work and are supporting families on a minimum income.
Tax Credits are a means-tested state benefit that provides extra money to people responsible for children, disabled workers and other workers on lower incomes. There are two types of Tax Credits – Child Tax Credits and Working Tax Credits. People may be eligible for both of them depending on circumstances. The amount you qualify for also depends on your circumstances and your household’s income. Similar to other government policies, there is argument as to whether it is effective or not. Reasons to support the effectiveness of the Tax Credits is that this benefit has lifted lots of lone parents and families with children out of poverty, an increase income in poorer households allows the family to afford everything they need to live a basic life. Tax Credits helps boost people’s money depending on the wage they receive and how much money they have to pay each month which ensure that no family is living in absolute poverty. Tax Credits have proved to work in some ways as there are fewer children now that live in what would have been called poverty a decade ago. On the other hand, Tax Credit could be portrayed not to be effective as the targets set by the government to end child poverty by 2020 looks “unattainable”. Those who qualify for Tax Credits are people who work sixteen hours of more, although even though this boosts their income, it does not entirely help as it is based on what you earn, so therefore the problem actually lies with low pay (despite there being a NMW). The UK child poverty is still above the EU average.
This shows that tax credits have been useful to a certain extent as many families have been lifted out of poverty, however, it does not solve the problem of low pay.
Overall, it could be argued that these three policies have attempted to improve the financial situation of disadvantaged groups by increasing pay and simplifying the benefits system, however it is broadly accepted that the issue of poverty will not be resolve in line with government targets.