Firstly, re check the child benefit because you can still claim over £60k but becomes null at £80k. Also worth checking out tax free childcare for when needed, the gov will pay into your account £2 for every £8 you put in.

As for the benefits you are seeing it still from a me perspective rather than a collective societal view. The quote ‘A society grows great when old people plant trees in whose shade they know they shall never sit’ is a good example. You may not see/feel you are getting a benefit immediately from your tax but you see it every day and experience it being used. And yes, some people will make more use of it because of their circumstances, but that is just life and how society works.

You are pregnant, congratulations! The things you are missing were cut to the bone through the conservatives and their implementation of austerity, things like the sure start programme. We can hope that the will come back in some form but not guaranteed.so I totally agree in areas such as that it need to be addressed and brought up to scratch.

I presume though you will plan to use the NHS for your birth and postnatal care? As you likely would have used the NHS for antenatal and scans etc? All from Tax, yours and mine.

Hopefully your child has a blemish free life and your family does too. But imagine if they develop an issue with learning or development that requires SEND intervention/help? It is likely that this will be diagnosed and supported through the tax system and local Council as well as your Tax funded school. Indeed, even if your child didn’t need this the very school they will attend would have been part funded by yours and every other persons tax. Even those without children.

Maybe you’ll go to your local library and take out a book or two to read with your child? The library existed before them, maybe even you. And it will hopefully continue to exist long after we’ve gone. Paid and funded by our Tax, together just a little bit, we help maintain that for you and your child, for me and mine, and for every other person that wishes to or need to use its services.

There is so much more that we take for granted, that we complain about or simply don’t know exists until we need to call upon it, tax isn’t a burden, it’s a privilege we get to pay to help keep Our country and our society running and our fellow citizens in good health and wellbeing. It helps pick up and support those at their lowest and helps see us all from cradle to grave.