Is everyone rich?

[Led921900]

Is it just me or is everyone minted? I think I’m the only one of my friends bar a sahm who isn’t on over £100k?! We were talking about kids free hours and we seem to be the only family able to qualify, everyone else earns too much.

My partner earns £38k and is by far the lowest earner I know.
I come from merseyside, it’s not like any of us come from money.

When did everyone get so rich?
And yes I’m totally jealous!

I live a very modest life, but l am rich in time for myself, and the fact l am fit, health and good mental health which is priceless.

Healthy.

This.

I have a friend who has everything on finance all looks very fancy and he think he’s the bees knees earning “lots” of money. Turns out I actually earn about £20k more than him…

I have around 7 close friends. 5 of them have husbands who earn over £100k and they all roughly earn £50k.

I think income disparity is hard to really understand. My area is a mix of people with lots of money (inherited wealth, lawyers, architects etc) and people who are totally at the other end, on benefits, minimum wage jobs. I don't see many in the middle - possibly only the teachers I know. In my household we have one high earner and one on NMW.

I don’t know any of my immediate circle of friends/colleagues on anything over 60K. DH and I earn only 54k between us and consider ourselves comfortable (but DD is 18 so no childcare costs) and our mortgage is only £670 a month.
It’s all relative.

Plus I take the 6 figure salaries on here with a pinch of salt sometimes.

I’m always bemused by these comments, you need to have the earnings to get the credit. It’s not the 80s any more.

We all went to the same grammar school in the north west. All working or lower middle class backgrounds. We were the “swotty” group I guess but still seems odd I’m basically the lowest earner as one of us doesn’t earn over £100k!

Or you could read the first line of my post.

”You don’t need to be “rich” to not qualify for help with childcare etc.”

The threshold for free childcare is even lower! I was simply showing more examples of how you don’t need to BE “rich” for others to THINK you are “rich”.

Only you’re wrong - child benefit is not child care.

And the threshold for childcare is much higher.

I never said child benefit is childcare! I’ve read my post upside down and back to front. I CANNOT see where I’ve said child benefit is childcare 🫤.

You said:

You don’t need to be “rich” to not qualify for help with childcare etc. The thresholds are low. DH and I had joint income of £70k with a SE London mortgage and two dependant children but no child benefit because most of those earnings were his (I worked part time as one of the DCs has special needs).

The thresholds for no help with child care are way higher than £70k, but then you talk about child benefit. Not child care. They are not the same thing. And the post is about childcare. Not child benefit.

Then you said:

The threshold for free childcare is even lower! I was simply showing more examples of how you don’t need to BE “rich” for others to THINK you are “rich”.

Which is again not true.

How on earth do you know how much people earn? I haven’t a clue what my friends earn. I could hazard a guess at some such as teachers and doctors and some i know will earn a lot but I wouldn’t be able to put a precise figure on them. Most of my friends are Directors of, Heads of, Partner, Consultant but those are just titles, their salaries could be anything from £50/60k to up to a million. Some I could guess, some I haven’t a clue

Because there was a conversation about not being able to access free 30 hours childcare which means she knows all their minimum salary.

My sisters salary has to be published as part of her companies accounts. All executive compensation is. My other sister and two of my friends were having a chat about not being able to get 15 hour + funding as they earn too much, then one chatted about her pension contribution workaround. I don’t know how much they earn but that means their net must be over £100k.
Booooo lol.

Yes. Large pension payments are a common way to reduce your taxable income, particularly at the thresholds.

In my experience both half of a couple tend to have 'equivalent' jobs rather than the man earning loads and the woman earning a lot less.

I'm not and apart from my ex and his mates nor is anyone I know.

Erm, far from rich here but very far from poor, thankfully. I earn above the national average, so that’s great, but my partner is retired.

@JaninaDuszejko I can't work out if that's a dig or not. 🤣

I always hear how a 6 figure salary is in top 4% but same as you, all of my friends are on that amount. Lowest is about £120k so unless we have the same friends, there must be something not quite right about the stats?!

We probably have a combined income of around £50,000 a year and live quite comfortably in a five bedroom house in south London. My husband is retired and I'm gradually reducing my work hours, although I'm not planning to retire completely for another couple of years. We bought our house about 30 years and paid off the mortgage a few years ago.

House prices have always been high in our area, and it was a major struggle to make ends meet when we moved to this house, especially as I was six months pregnant at the time and the house was semi derelict😆. My husband was earning a good salary at the time, but we went without a lot to be able to afford the house and renovations, and i was a stay at home Mum for several years, but it was worth it to us.

I meant to say that I don't know anyone who earns over £100,000 a year, apart from a friend of my daughter's

The stats are right, look around you, who is teaching in schools, caring for you in hospital, cleaning , driving delivery vans, delivering thr mail, working in a supermarket, policing our streets, staffing shops, repairing the roads, staffing the military, what do you think these millions of people earn?

This! I used to work in this area. It's so common for families to have 2k+ mortgage payment, 300 for one car, 400 for the other. 5k credit card each and then a consolation loan. And that's a conservative estimate. Many people have lost sight of debt

Most of my friends seem to have at least one earner per household who earns £100k+. I don't really understand it as I presume only a tiny amount of the population earn so well. None come from wealthy backgrounds or went to private school. A couple do freelance "consultancy" - I couldn't tell you what in. One owns their own business, which they worked hard to build up. A couple are in IT. DH and I are teachers so although not exactly low-paid we definitely seem to be the "poor" friends.