Roughly when did one salary stop being enough to comfortably sustain an average family?

[keswickgirl]

I realise there won’t be one exact year of course. All I know is that my dad bought a very nice 4 bedroomed house on a headteacher’s salary in the early 90s, my mum didn't work and my sister and I had very comfortable childhoods. UK holiday every year and abroad every few years. Pets, dancing, swimming, piano, tennis lessons.

30 years later, it’s such a different story. Roughly when did things change?

I don’t remember it being so bad in the early 2000s, my friends started having kids in 2010 or thereabouts and it was really noticeable, along with a change in birthday party expectations. It’s a relatively recent change I think as social media has really come into it own.

My mum always worked , but we had a good lifestyle- private school, nice holidays. Plenty of my friends also born in late 1950's/60's were stay at home mothers as their own mums had been. Council house rents were reasonable and secure even in London. My DH at the time earned well so we were able to buy, but lots of our friends didn't. Council housing being sold off in the 1980s was the beginning of the end of one parent remaining at home being the norm due to increasing rents and instability of tenure owing to uncertainty around mortgage rates.

There were many jobs where women weren't allowed to work once they got married. There were also societal pressures. Your personal anecdote doesn't outweigh the overall statistics.

I'm not sure if they still existed in the '70s, we were abroad, but I know that large employers, usually manual work like factories and so on, used to have on site nurseries because I went to one as a child.

The marriage bar for most jobs ended in the 1950s

1973 in Ireland. But primarily in middle-class jobs.

Around 00's, when house prices started going up so dramatically. Prior to that it was common for a single professional to own their own basic home (one or two bed, one bathroom). Now there is no chance, even a couple would struggle.

Married women were only allowed to work in the Civil Service after 1946 in the UK. My parents married soon after this and my DM gave up her secretarial job, only going back to work once my DB and I were at secondary school.
When did your parents get married?

Exactly.

There were many working class jobs, like cleaning, laundering, mending, bar work, shop work that had no marriage bar. Women who took in washing or cleaned for other people probably wouldn't show up in records because informal employment is hard for the State to capture.

Now there is no chance, even a couple would struggle.

Thats entirely dependent on where you live surely, there are many areas near me where a 1/2 bed flat would be very affordable on a single professional salary.

Where I live an average house has gone from around 300k to close to 1m. My own house has increased by almost 1m in 10 years (on paper anyway). It's ridiculous. Even if my DC is successful, they'll struggle to own their own home without any help from us

As an example @Jellycatspyjamasmy aunt who is single and just turned 65 had her own home on a fairly low wage. She paid off that home and then invested in another property and later sold it. Her house is mortgage free (simple house, 2 bed) and worth around 800k and she also has 1m in the bank from the other house she sold. Shes always kept that basic job. This would be unheard of now.

As I said, it entirely depends on where you live. Not everyone lives in the south/south east of England.

I’m in Scotland, my closest city has over 300 one bedroom flats for under £150k - totally within reach of someone on one salary. No one is arguing house prices in some parts of the UK are wild, but it’s not true to say there’s no chance of a couple being able to buy a basic home. It depends on what they’re buying and where.

My point was about the disparity of buying a house in the same place 25 years ago to now. Why should we have to move further and further away to be able to afford to live.

Just had a look a low band HT salary in 1999 was around 30k, and an average house cost 76k.

It’s all very regional.

In 1999 DH was earning 26k and I was earning 21k, we bought a really nice house for 62k up North which was a lot for this area, 2 bed terraces were still going for 19k at that point. Some assume all of the North is cheap everywhere, it is not. The house is now worth around 350k much cheaper than DH home town in Surrey where it would be close to a million, the Southern coastal town I was raised in it would be 500k, those 19k terraces are now 200k. Pick up our house and move it to the award winning village that’s just under 2 miles away and it would be another 100k minimum. So in 1999 it was doable easily where we live. However I remember the house next door selling for double what we paid for ours in 2001. For our area that was the huge hike.

I’m probably a bit older than you OP, but had a similar family set-up in the 80s. It would be quite rare now, which is sad

Def by mid 80’s.

People forget that although houses were being snapped up for £40,000 in the south east, mortgage interest rates were at 17%.

By 1997, interest rates were between 5-10% but that same house was valued at £98,000

Absolutely spot on.

I grew up in the 70s and 80s on a solidly working class council estate in London. Looking back, all the mums I knew worked. Most were married, a few single. They all worked. Dinner ladies, cleaners, machinists, shop workers, hospital workers, in offices. Mostly part time to fit around school and nursery hours. Or evening cleaning or pub work so that Dad or older dc were home to look after the younger dc.

Lots of Nans looking after children. Living nearby or within extended families. The only women who didn’t work were those with very small babies.

Dads worked on the trains, buses, as postmen, lorry drivers, chefs, hotel workers etc.

My grandmothers and great grandmothers also worked. The concept of women not having to work and families being fully supported by one salary is very much a solidly middle class one as demonstrated by the discussion over the salary of a headteacher.

That depends on your age, and maybe location. My parents were ar school in the 1950s and married women weren't teachers.

Because the population has been growing exponentially since then, and we’re in a mobile, global economy. Meanwhile the planet’s wildlife has been decimated.

Procreation has consequences.

As I said before. House prices are ridiculous. I can’t see it carrying on at this level - a crash must be on its way…..

We bought in the late 80s for 60k, £54k mortgage on two pretty average salaries - I was 19 years old and we borrowed 3 x our joint earnings. We have improved the house over the years and it is now worth around £575k. Unextended it would still be around £540k. A ridiculous amount for a terraced house! We wouldn’t be able to get a mortgage to buy our own house on our current joint earnings! We would need someone to lend us well over 5 times our earnings to buy this house now and we are not in an expensive area!

My dad’s wage allowed my mum to stay home while I was primary age (80’s). She started working part time when I was secondary age (90’s).

I managed to home ed my eldest children for a while (00’s) while my ex worked full time and I had a part time job around his. I’ve been a single parent since 2011 and I couldn’t have managed without tax credits which was the equivalent of someone bring in a part time wage on top of my full time one.

I think the attitude of society has plenty to do with it too. When I had my eldest children on the early 00’s you could still be a single mum on IS until the youngest child was 12. Now mums of babies are considered slacking if they aren’t back in the work place by time baby is a year old.

Your dad had a good job. My mother worked from the 60’s when they bought their first house.

Well it wasn't the 90's- a headteacher's salary is also not typical- I noticed more and more Mum's of friends going to work in the late 70's, and it picked up pace from there.