How worried are you about the economy?

[Howworriedarewe]

DH and I are low-medium earners. We have two young DC and are able to save a wee bit at the end of the month, typically goes to home repairs or towards a modest self-catered/camping holiday in the UK. We are certainly feeling the pinch of COL these days and I haven't many corners left to cut. I've been considering picking up a bit of extra work, something I can do on weekend evenings when we don't have to arrange extra childcare. Costs are just piling up and I now feel anxious even when I receive my paycheque! I just know it's going to go too quickly. We haven't turned the heat on yet and it's 15 in our house. I've got the DC in thick pyjamas and winter duvets.

How are others coping? Are you doing anything to prepare for further increases in COL? I do tend towards the anxious but it feels like even reputable news sources are ringing all sorts of alarm bells.

I'm 55, with a "professional" job. For the first time in my life i have to watch the bank account in the second half of the month. It's unnerving, I expect my earnings are on a downward trend now too

I am very worried & we have a decent income. Life is going to keep getting more & more expensive imo & taxes are only keep going up.

I feel like I should be saving more because the goalposts keep changing eg uni costs, pension changes but it’s too hard to save more.

I’m concerned as we haven’t felt the full brunt of the Iran war yet. I, too, find I’m now having to watch my bank balance carefully during the second half of the month and am worried what things will be like in the depth of winter.

Yes, I’m looking at energy tariffs and comparing to what we spent just a couple of years ago and I just can’t believe it. It’s an awful feeling. We’ve never lived luxuriously but i’m really frightened now. Both DC have bdays coming up, as well as Christmas! I’ve been in the habit of setting aside a few quid each month but the prices these days are mind boggling.

Yes very very fed up and worried
I think we can see from riots across the EU that these pressures are not solely on us in the UK but mindless zelots like ed milliband and net zero really concern me.
We should be looking at everything from a balanced perspective putting the citizens of the UK first.
With the tremendous issues facing us I wonder whether a war government maybe better for now
Cross party.
I don't think this gov undertsnds the economy and business leaders have been crying out for the gov to help but they have only hindered which makes things much worse.

another worried one here. Both me and DH have insecure jobs and are not looking forward to the budget.

Yes I’m worried, my husband and I run a IT consultancy business together and we’ve lost our client and can’t find another at the moment , it’s the first time in 15 years we don’t know what to do, AI is changing our sector and the consultancy market is quiet so no job plus the COL and economy I’m terrified about our future, we are living on savings but they will run out soon

Thank you, I’m sorry to hear so many of you are also struggling. It’s just so stressful. 💐

very worried - UK debt is at £3 trillion for the first time in history and monthly interest for September was £10.9 billion.

@ShanghaiDiva this sounds terrible, but can you explain more what it means?

The govt spends an enormous amount of money paying interest on the debt rather than funding public services. To continue to service this level of debt the govt can increase taxes or reduce public spending on NHS, education, defence etc- tough times whichever option you choose.

I’m 10/10 worried. Our economy structure is totally unsustainable in my opinion. With the AI job losses looming, I dread to think what things will be like in a year, maybe two. Private business will embrace the full force of AI at the earliest opportunity, knocking jobs out of the private sector. The public sector won’t embrace it nearly as quickly and the burden of public sector workers will just grow as a proportion. It’s dreadful.