“100k isn’t a big salary”

[cadburyegg]

I’ve just logged onto instagram and YET AGAIN a post comes up headed “100k isn’t a big salary, here’s why”. I’m so sick of seeing it. Most of us earn nowhere near 100k. I don’t spend my time moaning on instagram about how hard done by I am and there aren’t news articles about it. I don’t even feel like I AM hard done by. I feel lucky to be earning less than half that and to have a reasonable flexible job. I’m not going to the press saying poor me poor me because I don’t feel sorry for myself. Yet there seems to be shitloads of “awareness” posts about how shit it is for high earners and how it’s so sad they don’t have free childcare. I know people can have high expenses and I know it’s all relative and I’m probably overreacting but I seriously do not care anymore. It doesn’t mean the salary isn’t high. I’m so sick of seeing these out of touch posts. 🤯

Definitely, I earn a lot less than you but compared to when I was earning 10k less, under ten years ago, I felt rich for as bit, then your spending habits and living circumstances change (e.g. I rent a nicer place now because I’m earning more money) and all of a sudden you’ve not got that extra cash any more. I still feel lucky though because I remember those days when I couldn’t do the things I can do now (not be in my overdraft every month, have debts because I’d bought a bed for my child on tick etc, never put the heating on because you can’t afford it and so on). I think some people on here just have no experience of these circumstances.

You are being obtuse. £900 isn't identical to £908. Pretty similar though, or are we pretending we can't see that to try and make a straw man case...

When someone working barely over half a week, only earning £19k gets topped up to the point they take home just £1.8k month less than someone who earns £100k, then the "ohhhhh it's a fortune, oh how the other half live" needs to stop.

Earning £19k on reduced hours but being handed the same as someone actually earning a £60k salary is not exactly "poor me" and to be in that position, sneering at those "lucky" people having to work double the hours to actually earn a full £100k just to take home £1.8k a month more, is a bit of a piss take really.

If 100k is sooooo huge, then £1.8k less per month for working half the hours is huge too.

This is the crux of it really. I do agree that wages in general haven’t kept up with the cost of living but the most vital jobs in our society are the service, retail, sanitation, care and public infrastructure workers who keep the world running. They work harder than any pen pusher on 100k or more. And I say this as someone currently on 80k ish. The hardest I’ve ever worked was in a hospitality job on minimum wage. My job now does require some specialist knowledge but honestly it’s not hard to sit at a laptop all day. In my experience, how hard I work has had an inverse correlation to my salary.

Also can we have some robust data (not a daily mail article) from the people saying someone on min wage and benefits has the same take home pay as someone on 100k? Otherwise I’m inclined to think this is inflammatory bollocks. But even if it were true, the problem is not the people claiming what they’re entitled to, it’s the system that has made it necessary. Control house prices and raise wages to keep up with the cost of living and people wouldn’t need their rent or childcare paid for.

If you'd just care to scroll up, I've literally written out an example with numbers...

People moaning about the UC top ups don’t seem to understand that these jobs and the people working them are subsidised by the state because they’re (underpaid) essential jobs that keep society running, big business and corporations are just there to make money, they are not going to see patients in doctor’s surgeries or hospitals, work in food factory lines, do delivery jobs, collect the bins, teach and mind your children. I could go on but you get the jist.

Im out. Going round in circles with someone who is actually trying to justify £100k not being a huge salary (no words really) and also cannot see they are applying their own "how the other half live" argument with the thinly veiled benefits bash.

£100k not a huge salary....actual lolz.

Your example isn’t verified by actual data and sources though, you’re just plucking numbers out of thin air.

No one is denying that though.

Some hard jobs are definitely paid poorly. Equally, part time in a cafe is low wage.

It's the "£100k is such a fortune" brigade who don't realise that it's not uncommon to be on UC and have a take home that's the same as being on £60k. Which they'd consider a big salary too.

You can't ignore that many people receive a good chunk of "take home pay", just not as earned salary, whilst others work longer and harder to bank the same net effect.

I'm qualified in finance. If I ever found myself on my own, I'd be jacking this, and all the stress and hours in, to work a nice little job part time at the local farm shop. Less than half the hours, way less than half the salary, but really not that significant a difference in what will land in my bank each month.

Jesus wept.

Pop on to the actual benefits calculator and you'll get those exact numbers out. Those are the actual figures.

The source is the actual UC system rates.

Well it seems most people commenting on this thread are

I know! It’s bizarre.

That’s not strictly true but I suppose they could be somewhat helpful

We're not going round in circles.

Insisting that £100k is a huge salary, but £19k salary being topped up to the equivalent of a £60k salary for working half the hours is not, is your stance.

Is an amount of money only "huge" if it's earned salary?

So my £19k earned salary is paltry. And £60k is a big earned salary.

But £19k earned and being topped up to being on £60k, is still paltry because it's only the bit called salary we like to cherry pick, not the take home?

Well done you that’s a great achievement 👏

I was including you in this comment

I think it’s important to point out that it’s only people with children who would qualify for benefits (unless they were on PIP for a disability). Childless people wouldn’t get any benefits at all if they were on NMW.

I know 😂

The average full-time salary in the UK is around £37–38k, so yes, £100k is a high salary for most people. I think social media skews perceptions — it’s dominated by influencers who push a very materialistic lifestyle, where luxury and wealth are treated as the ultimate goals.

Personally, I don’t agree with that mindset. To me, what really matters is having enough to live without financial stress — being able to pay your bills and enjoy life in a way that brings you genuine happiness. Not everyone needs a high wage for that. My partner and I earn £70 between us because I work part-time out of choice. We're mortgage free. I feel like we're very lucky and privileged. But then I work for a charity where I see a lot of poverty. It really is personal perspective and personal opinions on what "comfortable" living is.

FFS, so sick of people's lack of any balance or perspective.

They're not claiming abject poverty, they're just pointing out the irony of earning such a "high" salary but having so little left after housing costs, childvare and bills. For working in a very well qualified and ridiculously stressful job, adding in long hours and likely a nightmare commute.

We're a "rentier" economy. All our land, much of our property and even monopoly utilities are in the hands of rich, detached investors, with no vested interest in the people of the UK. Yes that brings investment, yes it brings some prosperity, but it doesn't feel like it to the people in the hamster wheel. That's all.

You'd have to try it to see their point.

Talented, lucky and hardworking people earn a lot of money, newsflash. That doesn't go as far as they'd think. Get over it all of you.

I've already said your 60k example is high. "Happy to admit" i believe i said after your first woefully incorrect assumption i wouldn't agree that's high.

Interestingly I'm getting not even close (nearly £18k shy) to your £60k example when I put in your scenario/figures in a central London postcode (used London as we are assuming everyone on a £100k salary lives in London). I've done it twice just to check.

Or should I say "only" 18k shy given "just 1.8k less per month" was referenced earlier.

Ill say that again as its quite amusing to me to see ....."Just 1.8k a month less" 😂😂

(Now I'm out, again seeing there's not much point when someone actually says "only 1.8k a MONTH" like its spare change not worth getting out of bed for. If its even true which I'm 🤔 now I've looked)

Think you meant Newcastle or Blackpool (not Brighton). Anyhow, the point is the wouldn't have 100k job there.
The whole point is you don't get to mix and match.

For sure it’s annoying. But both it and you situation can be true.

if you’re living in London with 2 kids under the age of 4, it will surely seem like a pittance. If you’re living somewhere cheaper with no kids to support, then you can get by on a third of that.

When I worked, and I wasn't financially driven before I retired, but I did earn extremely well at c £600 per day in the late 1990s. I paid massive amounts of tax each year. When I had my DC, aged 43, I stepped back a bit to enjoy their childhood. I also hired a nanny for three days a week so I could go on working. When my D C was at FT school, nanny took a similar job with another professional working mum in the class below ours. Picking up the kids, feeding them after school and getting some homework done before the parents have finished their working day. And locally, probably helping out with the horses too.

It seems a lot but after tax,.ni, mortgage and other bills not much is left, and btw l don't earn anything like that