The government’s unrelenting welfare reform and budget cuts are going to hit families hard. We can protest (and rightly so!), but that doesn’t mean anything will actually change while the Coalition is in power.
However, what we can do it make best of the situation. One way to do this is to change the way you work – if losing child benefits and child tax credits will hit your family too hard, put pen to paper and see if reducing your hours will kill two birds with one stone – give you more work-life balance, and save you money you would lose from the cuts, and in tax.
If you find that reducing your days will actually bring you more money, and your employer is in agreement of it, then those days you aren’t working are a great opportunity to look into starting your own business, or taking a course that will help leverage your earnings in the future.
There is a lot of support available to help you start up your business – www.motherswhowork.co.uk is full of helpful resources to help you on your start-up journey. You can also speak with Business Link (www.businesslink.gov.uk) to be put in touch with your local enterprise, where you can speak to or meet someone face-to-face to discuss your needs, and help you get your business off to the right start.
If you’re unsure about how reducing your hours will affect your take home pay, then use the tax calculator at http://www.taxcalculator.co.uk/ to calculate the next financial year’s tax – this will also give you a chance to factor in any pay rise you may be expecting.
