How do middle-class people attain those lifestyles?

[YourPoisedFinch]

Young professionals on 30k a year, multiple holidays a year, parties, concerts, outings etc. ... how do they afford it?

60k today is the equivalent to 48k 5 yrs ago & 32k in the early 00s

When was that? Graduate intake wages seem to have risen rapidly over the last year or two.

My son started at one of the biggest UK insurers a couple of years ago when graduate starting salary was £32k - last year it was £36k and for this Summer's intake it's going to be £40k. They've had to increase it due to low take up and lack of applications as there are so few suitable applicants - basically those with a First degree in a STEM subject.

One of his Uni flat mates who did a year in industry, so now a year behind, has got a graduate job with a big 4 accountancy firm starting this Summer with a starting salary of £40k.

@YourPoisedFinch fintech - my company is fully remote (but I'm in London) Seeing your latest update it's pretty autism friendly too if you go into the software side of things.

I thought the point of big 4 is if you work hard you level up quickly, and a lot of the money is in bonuses (appreciate this may be incorrect, just my assumption/what I've heard!) ~ you can get way more than 32k as a starting salary with a masters in economics (I have hired people in client management for 60k with that kind of background for a previous company) but realistically you need to be able to interview well/have good references to back you up.

Why would you say they are middle class?

Moneyed yes. Guy nowt to do with perceived class.

£32k for big 4 is low but depends what sector/job area you are in. Although if you weren’t meeting expectations that may explain it somewhat as you wouldn’t have been getting the decent pay rises or promotions. Generally, the ones on the high salaries will be the high achievers.

The vast majority of school leavers do not go to university. I believe it is around 40%. And I think then only around 70% of those actually graduate.

All the statistics are actually out there if you want to look for them.

What interests you? It doesn’t have to be directly related to economics, if that’s no longer your passion. But there must have been a reason you chose economics: can you make any sideways links?

I’m a (long ago) History grad. I started my career as a research assistant, moved into business support, from there into corporate services, then into corporate governance and company secretarial via a Law conversion supported by my then employer. I’ve worked for think tanks, charities, housing associations, law firms, the civil service, for a trade body, for an investment bank and in reinsurance. It’s been a chequered decade and a half, but I wouldn’t change any of it, I’ve never had a job I disliked. I got here by being open minded and not boxing myself in with the idea that what I thought I wanted to do at 21 should guide the rest of my life.

Just look at the data and stop making assumptions.

Your argument seems to amount to saying that the majority of young people leave university and end up working at Tesco-type jobs. If that is the case, we are in serious need of a national debate on this. You suggest that it is less than the majority of the young who work in "professional" hence why the median salary across the country does not apply to them. There is all kinds of problems with this view that it will take too much time to address.

Suffice it to say that London is arguably a good sense check on professional salaries as high wage earners are heavily concentrated in that area. Even then, the median salary is below £50k.

You could look at it in another way, consider what salary makes up the top 5% or 10%. Consider the number of people that amounts to. That again will show that this idea that many young "professional" people earn considerably more than £30k is not borne out by data.

If the trend is that the majority of young people are not professionals, fast forward that trend a decade, 2 decades down the line, and this country is done. It would be a nation of highly educated, poorly paid, people who are not professionals.

And just how there are people moaning that they have much more responsibility and aren't seeing wage growth in the same vein as those in their company on minimum wage people in higher paying industries are also grumbling about their wage vs the graduates.

My DS 24 earns 46 k (;asset management, not London) and 10k a year running a small business.

Couple - Total take home 4k a month ( student loan )

I can Easily imagine them with 1k a month spare

• 1.5k housing and 1.5 k for standard bills, food and transport. They will walk a LOT , use the £3 buses. Smaller than average home is smaller than average bills. No childen

Based on DD ( who gets holidays and gigs on way less than 30k a year )

they can cut each others hair or use student cutters. They rely on parents Christmas and birthday gifts for clothes , use charity shops and swap with each other. Second hand is the norm. For environmental reasons as well as cost

a party can be a bottle of wine and a posh party will have a cheap takeaway with some mates - not a MN feast with various spirits and champers and every guest bringing wine plus chocolates and flowers for the host - find it funny that you see parties as a lavish lifestyle- even with no money you can have a few friends round to watch the telly and have a laugh together !

A holiday via Ryanair and a B&B or hostel out of peak times isn't going to be more than a few hundred and they will walk the area and eat cheaply not search out the "best " places to eat and things to do - a day at a beach can cost nothing

Concerts - many start at £30

But with a grand a month spare they could afford a Glastonbury one month and reading the next

DS goes on a lot of holidays, they are very cheap though, cheap flight and hostel or a lot of them sharing self catering place. He goes to Glastonbury most years as it's better value than single gigs.

OP, instead of worrying about what others are doing with their lives, focus on your own.

You can't compare yourself to someone with different circumstances, or who may have had a leg up in life due to family wealth. You'll only end up miserable.

If you are looking for advice as to career routes, that should have been your question.

it was in 2023, in manchester

£30k is the minimum expected in your twenties when you graduate. I think it’s higher now? B4, MBB, IB (or anything Financial Services tbh), Law etc. all pay significantly more than £30k post-graduation traineeships. May pay more during the traineeships too. Even the Civil Service pays more than £30k on Fast Stream (or non-FS HEO). £30k is not an aspirational salary, it’s the basic minimum.

Well you’re unlikely to get the high salaries until much later on in the civil service. Are you planning on applying for the fast stream? You’re more likely to get on faster doing that rather than standard civil service entry.

@YourPoisedFinch - my son would fit this, although he's on about £8k more than that and lives in London- has GF earning similar and they have 3 earners in a 2 bed, 2 bath flat-

They don't have big holidays, more quite a few 3-5 day breaks, don't do all inclusives, don't have kids ( late 20s) bills shared 3 ways. She also works for large theatre group so they get a lot of cheap nights out

nah big 4 in manchester was on 32k

I think even teachers start on a little more than £30k

What do you mean by "did not get in"?

Getting into most industries involves starting at the bottom, spending hours trawling the internet/ harassing recruitment agencies, putting in many, many applications, attending a lot of interviews, taking feedback to refine your technique and keeping on going.

Let's be real, the reason why most of us don't have high paying, glamorous jobs isn't because the jobs themselves are really hard, it's because the competition to get into them was so fierce, the entry levels are poorly paid, long hours, and often toxic, and a lot of people (me included) cba with it to begin with, or started and then gave up.

If what you aspire to is a glamorous job in banking, then start applying for that.
If you'd rather have a stable, comfortable job in the CS, then apply for that instead.

I can see why you were asked to leave. Although I should’ve specified London was the location, not Manchester or wherever else.

I think family background pays a significant part in this, whether it’s having parents who can pay your uni fees (so no debt), pay your living expenses (no need to work so you can focus on studying), let you live at home after university but don’t charge rent because they don’t need the money, can give you a house deposit so you can buy a nicer house/ have lower mortgage payments, or in the example above give you generous amounts for birthday and Xmas money - it my family it would have been £20-50 birthday cash and I would have been pleased with that.

Entry this year though will be higher, and those that do well will have their pay rise quickly. To be honest of you want to get somewhere and have a high salary you need to put the work in, do the hours and also potentially be prepared to move to where the decent paying jobs are.

Well my view is that due to 20 years of cheap mortgages and tax breaks, the BTL market boomed which caused the housing market to vastly outpace inflation….

nah accountants only get £50k after 3 years qualifying