To think it’s crazy that National Minimum wage is £27k

What are the chances that a self-employed person earns the exact amount you can earn before being taxed? Wink wink.

Agree. Growing up our dinners were jacket potato, cheese, salad. Scrambled eggs. Fish once a week. Soup and bread for lunch. Never had a take away and I only remember going out for dinner to a restaurant for a very special occasion. We rarely had family holidays but we did have the odd day out to a national trust property or the beach. I would never ever have considered myself deprived in any way, I felt very well looked after and comfortable. I find expectations of a ‘normal’ lifestyle exhausting. I fantasise about living really simply, but no chance with my family and where we currently live.

@HardFuckingBird I agree with you but it's soooo hard not having the lifestyle that you feel everyone has! As a kid my family didn't own a car until I was 10 years old! No holiday apart from visiting grandparents in Wales until I was about 8 years old and after that it was UK holidays. Meals out or takeaways were for birthdays. But I dream of being a 2 car family so I can get around more easily with the kids and have better job prospects as my partner takes the car to work everyday so it's walking or bus for me! and i see friends on Instagram out for meals and drinks. ...my partner and I do a cheap pub meal on our anniversary and a nice meal for Xmas period. We have 2 young kids. Since becoming a mum I've really had to start learning to budget and it's hard! We earn just under 4 grand a month and doesn't feel enough for bills, rent, food, nursery. I feel like im scraping by with buying all the kids clothes second hand off vinted etc but when I look back that was normal life. ..and I didn't see my family as poor at all, we had a nice house that my mum managed to buy with her savings. Im still paying off my credit card from mat leave (which i did not budget for!). I dont think people are payed enough considering the cost of living but I do also wish that budgeting was taught in schools. Im only now learning to stop trying to chase other people's lifestyles. Sorry im rambling but I think of money and lifestyle every day at the moment. When kids are a little older I plan on going back to work full time as I have a better paid career while partner is on minimum wage....it's just about working out for now.

What is untrue? That poster is right. There are comparatively fewer pensioners in poverty than working age people and children.

No housing costs, using savings probably for the new cars?

ive jus put in for renting on right move

maximum was £1000, there is one page and they range from £500 - £800 a month for house shares. There is a one bed terrace place for £1000 nothing else

Then its £1150 for a one bed place and £1150 + for 2 bed

that will only get worse as rental houses in the priavte sector get harder to find, the price will escalate. Landlords will be advertising well over the asking price - as tenants can't offer more to secure the place, so instead landlords will advertise at £300/400 more than market value and then see what a tenant will offer them over market value. So house is worth £1350 a month - landlord advertising at £1650 and tenant offers £1450 - landlord accepts but hasn't broken any laws

I did inherit. £800 after the funeral costs.

That is where the problem lies

and it’s banks and landlords getting rich at out expense

whilst the narrative is that rich pensioners are hoarding the money / deflection of reality

it’s rich people of every generation that’s the real problem

ans have you ever considered what the biggest cost is for the nursery ? The mortgage or rent - not the staff wages. But the real value is in the staff not the building

Oh stop! You must think people are idiots.

Just 14 years ago, a 2 bed on my area was £600
Now it's nearly £1200
Now a bedroom in shared accommodation is £600 a month
That's ridiculous

people make a living from lip fillers, coffee shops, and car washes, they aren't unemployed

Inheritance, that’s where the money comes from. Wealthy family often means no uni debt, leg up onto the housing ladder (a farmer near us just build an extra house for their daughter.). Then the money that’s left, through trusts and various way to protect it from taxes. That injection starts the ball rolling of each generation getting wealthier. We however, will inherit nothing, poor parents overseas and poor parents here. Youngest in last year of uni so hopefully we’ll see some daylight next year!

whilst the unions needed to be brought to task - they were indeed crushed and now we are int he situation of them being crushed with low wages and many more millionaires and billionaires

far better to have found a middle ground so working people weren't living 40 years later in a hand to mouth crisis of low wages not able to survive without working benefits

I wonder just how many people complaining that NMW is unlivable will be paying for lip fillers, multiple streaming subscriptions, hand car washes and multiple £4 a cup coffees this week?

New cars, plural, on £20k per year, no credit?

What are they, Hot Wheels?

No, house prices increasing changes how much is left, not whether anything is left.

Obviously, but comparatively this pensioner generation is wealthier than the working. Nobody is denying that a small number of pensioners are poor

That was my husband's wage as a newly qualified train driver in 2001, he was classed as a high earner back then

This has happened generally. I am paid £32k, it's actually a skilled job. But the wage has been eroded so much over the last ten years.

That is untrue.

there are very rich younger people also - many who have had inheritance or money from parents

16% of pensioners are defined as living in poverty which is roughly the same a working aged adults with no children - even though the day before you retire should be your richest every day of life

ie it’s people of any age without children to care for who are richer not pensioners vs working people

its 25% of working aged adults with children
single parents fare worse unsurprisingly

not saying that’s good

just saying that to think it’s only a tiny fraction of pensioners who are very poor is setting generations against each other which isn’t helpful.

it’s having children to pay for that sets you up for relative poverty

It's house prices. With much higher house prices people are far more likely to leave an inheritance.

Orrrr the economy has changed and factory work is not as required plus when it is it’s completed by machines therefore less demand for workers and lower wages accordingly. I feel like this is the obvious reason.

I agree. There needs to be an uplift for the middle bands as well. The gap between what are often unskilled jobs and jobs in health care and education is getting smaller.

Me and my husband are self employed live on less than 25k a year between us we ve no mortgage that's the only reason it's doable

Want to know why it’ll change to 55% getting an inheritance…wealthy pensioners 😂