AIBU to feel middle-class luxuries have become increasingly out of reach?

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The kinds of things that one considers ‘everyday luxury’ now used to be actual luxury a generation ago. For example, going out for a coffee/ meal or to buy clothing was a rare treat or done because it was needed.

Nowadays everyone at every income level expects a real excess of consumption as ‘the norm’

Oh, I agree @Catsandcwtches

We also knew it at the time.

Most people aren’t middle class tbh. That’s just something the upper case want us to believe so we don’t come for them. We are all mostly little workers paid just enough to keep the wheels spinning.

I think people should learn to expect what they can afford. Going to university isn’t a big deal in 2026. It won’t afford you any specialist treatment. I have a friend who expects to be able to afford music lessons and dance lessons for all her children. Then expensive trips out at weekends because she works and they deserve it ? Why do they deserve it? If she can’t afford it she can’t afford it. Deserve it doesn’t enter the equation. I have to constantly bite my tongue.
There ia no point comparing our times to the generation before. If anything they were an anomaly unlikely to be repeated in our lifetime. Lower house prices when more women were starting to work for better pay. Families could afford more luxuries. Then houses started costing more because people could afford larger mortgages with two wages and so it snowballs.

You spent too much in those years. That’s when you should have been saving the most. Lots of people make the same mistake. They think they will always be in the same situation and don’t adequately plan for the future. I’m sure you’ll survive without organic chicken.

Make hay while the sun shines was coined for a reason.

It's always harder when you have young DC at home. When my DC were young I could rarely afford a coffee out and a piece of cake would have not even been something I'd have even considered. Now DC are grown and in their own homes I am far better off. I can afford little treats and to treat my adult DC and DGC too.

I agree which is why I buy almost everything in charity shops now. One of the local ones does 2 books for £1 and as long as you’re not looking for the brand new releases you’ll always find good paperbacks. My treat now is to pop to the charity shops for a browse (last week I got a seasalt dress and a monsoon dress with tag still on for £5 each) and then go to Waitrose for a few nice bits and get the free coffee as I have a mooch around.

Class isn't really about income, it's about educational achievement and social status.

Working class are those people who left school at 15/16 and do manual or semi-skilled jobs- childcare, factory work, council workers such as bin men, shop workers, manual labour like builders, gardeners, etc.= basically jobs that don't require a degree.

Middle class are usually degree educated professionals- doctors, teachers, solicitors, accountants and so forth. This a wide ranging group with varied incomes. You can move into this category from working class within a generation.

Upper classes are those with family with inherited and historical wealth and power- people with titles and ties to aristocracy. You can't join this class, you have to be born into it. You would remain upper class even if you lost your wealth and were destitute.

Then there are those that I think of as the underclass- those that have never worked for several generations, the long term unemployed benefit claimants, the criminal classes, the tax evaders, the professional shoplifters and petty thieves, the perpetually sick etc.

Isn’t it depressing that a coffee and a cake are out of your reach? For centuries a version of this has been the norm

It has never been the norm for the majority of the world’s population. 100 years ago houses didn’t have indoor plumbing or electricity.

If she can’t afford it she can’t afford it. Don’t confuse afford and justify. I’d want to have thousands in the bank before I’d be indulging in such unnecessary spending.

@ElleintheWoods what are you defining as a generation ago? I thought it was usually roughly every 25 years.

If so I remember as a teenager in the 90s buying clothes from my Saturday job wages. Other teenagers did the same then. My mum went shopping every Saturday too and often bought clothes. So not true that a generation ago clothes were a rare treat!

Unless you are thinking of generation ago having a different timeline?

You think buying clothes and cosmetics and having a coffee is a "middle class pursuit"?

Believe it or not, the lower orders do it too. They even have holidays and drive cars.

I find it really interesting that people want to chop up 'working class' into sub categories based on things like how received your pronunciation is and whether you have sugar in your tea. Retirees are working class they are simply retired workers. A lottery winner would be the rare exception of someone who (if they had worked or relied on benefits) would arguably not be working class anymore, as they would not need to exchange their labour to live. They find themselves in a position where they must learn from those who are not working class about how to keep their money working for them.

What I mean by the 'incomprehensible' difference is that the differences between someone on £26k and someone on £70k seem really big to most of us, but the difference between those two people and those who do not have to work to live is much, much bigger. This is simply something that doesn't occur to most people. Possibly because they're too busy working and keeping the world going. I do concede that people have these very set notions of how they can differentiate themselves from others by say their salary or how many times they got ripped off by a university, and that's a very human thing to do. But if you rely on the money you make from work to live, you are working class, believe me.

The middle classes always had to work too.

My family were very definitely middle class but my parents would never have spent money on coffee and cake in the 70s. In the 80s and 90s I would have coffee a lot in cafes but not cake too.

Think we'll only get that after a massive, painful, crisis,I'm afraud: we wont do it by choice,so it'll hurt much more

I mostly stick to eBay and get other stuff in the sales. I agree food is going up alarmingly. We have mostly given up meat, but fish is really dear now. I’m glad I can cook from scratch. But libraries and parks are still free and other free activities are available. My DH volunteers for a food bank and referrals are rising quite dramatically

Totally agree. Small things have dropped off our shop. We don't go browsing around shops for fun anymore. No more 'grabbing a candle' in the supermarket or even buying 'Who Gives A Crap' loo roll. Not paying a premium to wipe my arse anymore. Just can't afford it 😂

Working class are those people who left school at 15/16 and do manual or semi-skilled jobs- childcare, factory work, council workers such as bin men, shop workers, manual labour like builders, gardeners, etc.= basically jobs that don't require a degree.
Middle class are usually degree educated professionals- doctors, teachers, solicitors, accountants and so forth. This a wide ranging group with varied incomes. You can move into this category from working class within a generation.

You've missed an awful lot of the working population out there, you go from manual work straight to doctors, accountants etc. and professions needing a degree. How about admin, secretarial roles, accounts assistants, bank clerks, managers in general?

The requirement of a degree is a bit of a red herring too. When I was at that sort of age (late 70s), maybe one in 10 pupils went on past O Levels/CSEs. Of those maybe half went on to tertiary education. You could have many professional careers without a degree including administration, working in finance, general management type roles, nursing, IT, even many aspects of engineering you could work your way up.

Going back further, my mother was very much upper middle class - old family, girls all presented at Queen Charlotte's Ball (when the invitation list to be presented was very exclusive) before "coming out" type of thing. She didn't go to Uni (something to do with a world war). However she worked in banking and was a social worker for a while without needing a degree. So by your definition she was "working class", despite being very much born into the top echelons of middle class right on the edge of upper class.

Completely agree. About 10 years ago, i would think nothing of buying dior makeup etc or designer perfume several times a year. Splash out a bit more on going out clothes, buy designer bags and shoes mostly. Michelin restaurants and 5 star hotels. Now in our fifties, we have more income but less disposable and also started saving properly for retirement. I buy No. 7 makeup, clothes from h&m (which i love!) zara and M&S mostly. We are currently on hols in mainland Greece. We stayed in a 4 star hotel for a few nights, and we are now in a family owned 3 star hotel where we got a suite for £150 a night and it is stunning. Dinner last night, homemade for the family was 30 euros. Local wine is 5 euros in the supermarket and delicious. Holiday cost us £1400 for flights and hotels booked separately. £200 for car rental. I bought d&g perfume at the airport as my old mum gives me and my sister £100 for perfume when we go on hols as we help look after her and my dad. I would not spend £100 on perfume myself these days, just too much! Life is still enjoyable and in your 50s you wish you had all the money back that you spent unnecessarily. Definitely a case of not having same disposable income and not wanting to waste money any more.

A couple of decades ago was 2006, it was absolute boom times. On about 60K combined DH and I paid for 2 X childcare 3 days a week, mortage on a tiny 2 bed house in zone 2 and still had enough to holiday abroad, buy the odd thing in monsoon and maybe have a pub lunch and dinner out once a month each.- times were good.

I too am a hospital consultant and have paid Dd also going to med school this september to bake for the church/ theatre group/ colleagues when she had the time and I didn't, I also pay her to clean the bathrooms at home. Why is it ok to pay teenagers to wash the car/ cut the grass but not more female coded tasks ?

I wouldn't know as I didn't 'pay' mine to do anything.

Btw, what is a 'female coded task'? It's 2026.