Fun Online Polls: Garage conversions and "the bloated welfare state"

The results to last week's Fun Online Poll were as follows:

What do you see more often?

An integral garage converted into an extra room - 88%
A spare room converted into an integral garage - 12%

This ties in with my general observation of the world around me; I'd like to add that for every downstairs-room-converted-to-a-garage which I've seen, I've seen about ten integral-garages-converted-into-an-extra-room, if we could factor that in, the ratio between the two might be much, much higher.

Thanks to everybody who took part as usual.
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Dave Scotland left this highly inappropriate comment: "If we build more homes the nig nogs will come and fill them in no time."

Even if that were factually correct, that's not much of an argument, is it? You might as well say "There is no point improving our education system, as a load of foreigners will just come over here and send their kids to our schools", or "If we improved the NHS, then..." or "If we got crime down, then...".

If we take this Home-Owner-Ism to its logical conclusion, the government would be perfectly justified in allowing the country to go to wrack and ruin as a kind of poison pill defence against immigrants. Enforcing some kind of sensible immigration system is just one of many things which the government ought to be doing.
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I've been busy this weekend updating the workings on page 2 of the Citizen's Income Trust's pamphlet. Unsurprisingly, replacing the entire welfare and pensions system and various income tax/NIC reliefs like the personal allowance/primary threshold with a universal Citizen's Income/Citizen's Pension (set at current Income Support/Pensions Credit Minimum Guarantee rates) is as affordable now as it ever was, and that's before we factor in Laffer Effects.*

But one thing that is surprising is how much is spent on working age welfare. I've included just about everything you can think of: Income Support, JSA, ESA, Incapacity Benefit, Child & Working Tax Credits, Child Benefit, SMP, SSP, student grants and loan write-offs, other bits and pieces**. Remember that a large chunk of these (a third?) are paid to working families.

Can you guess what percentage of UK GDP they add up to?

Guess here or use the widget in the sidebar.

* Let's assume the revenue maximising income tax rate is 50%, in that case the benefit withdrawal rate which minimises the cash cost of welfare (or maximises the amount of welfare clawed back through means testing) must also be 50%. Current overall withdrawal rates for most household types are about 80% on anything up to a median sort of income.

** But not severe disability benefits or Housing & Council Tax Benefit.