To think that if you have servants you aren't middle class?

[uruculager]

"Tax breaks for hiring a cleaner could save middle class thousands"

www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/9073334/Tax-breaks-for-hiring-a-cleaner-could-save-middle-class-thousands.html

Is "middle class" now totally meaningless?

"Making?" Er, last time I looked employment was a choice

Ok, how would you feel about "having"?

I'm happy with it whatever I call them. As far as I'm concerned, creating jobs for people who want them is a good thing. I don't see why people are so down on cleaning. I have done cleaning, and I've done other work, and IMO cleaning is better than factory work, cashier work, telesales, call centre and working at the hand car wash. It's flexible, it's usually warm, you can watch TV/listen to music.

However, I think they can only be called staff/employees if you employ them full time (i.e. you are their employer). If they're just coming in for a few hours a week and have several other clients, they're self-employed and basically run a cleaning business.

I run a domestic service business - dogwalking - we enable people to go to work outside the home by taking care of their pets. My clients are mostly professional families who often have a portofolio of helpers to keep the home running, eg cleaners, ironing service etc. If this system came in, I'd use it to have a cleaner myself as I absolutely hate it. Don't mix the modern domestic service industry up with Downton Abbey please!
My clients treat me in a professional manner, as someone providing a service to them. I've been doing this FT for 9 years now, and have only once had a client who seemed to think I was some sort of servant.

erm - I don't have anyone to do any of that stuff for me. No cleaner, no nanny, no nothing.

my previous post stands. imo. 'servant' is a relationship / state of mind and not merely a label for someone who is employed to carry out domestic tasks.

oh, meant to add - members of my family do have servants.

My inlaws are Kenyan. They have servants. The women are called "The housegirl" and the males are called "The houseboy"

Never by their names, at least not when talking about them. They live in, they don't appear to have much of a life beyond being a 'housegirl/boy' and they are viewed rather dismissively.

that is a servant.

It leaves a very bad taste in my mouth tbh.

But it is how I know that people don't have servants in this country.

Well. Maybe the queen...

"We do not have servants - we outsource some of the non core operational functions"

LOL

randommoment - just love your phrase "portfolio of helpers"! Thanks!

OP are you reading the same thread as me? because I don't see anyone being 'ashamed' of hiring help round the home. I do see people objecting to your use of the term 'servants' because, as others have said, it's patronising in the extreme to the people who do the work.

But just so you know, I pay my cleaner £8 an hour. She had very little English when she came here to study, so cleaning or factory-type work was her only option at that time. Now her English is much better but she'd rather earn more cleaning people's houses than waitressing or bar work. She has a nice little business going for herself that supports her studies, and when she goes back home with the RG degree plus her entrepreneruial (sp?) spirit she'll do exceptionally well for herself. She's no more my servant than DH is my lord and master. She's brilliant and she'll go far.

Sometimes I even get someone to prepare my food for me, and squeeze oranges so I can drink the juice. I then go to the supermarket and buy it. I also rarely make my own clothes ( shrugs), even though my mum used to.

Sil lives in a country where its the norm to have a live in maid who doubles as a nanny. She gets paid a pittance and has the small box room in the house which is not all decked out. I would describe her as a servant.

In contrast I have a live in nanny. She earns £26,500 per year plus annual bonus. Afaik that's well above the national average salary, especially when you take into account she has no bills and I pay for all food - she adds whatever she wants to the shopping list and it gets bought no questions asked. She has a big double room which is decked out with hand made furniture, double bed, tv, dvd, hi fi etc plus her own ensuite. The quality of her room is no different to ours. Her nanny car is a top of the range luxury car, exactly the same one that we drive. She is my employee yes, but servant? no. Its a free world and if she doesn't like her job or environment she could/would get another one. Would you like me to sack my nanny so that there is one more unemployed person in the country?

In most countries (even in the rich developed western world), domestic labour is more usually akin to the type described by noviceoftheday in her first paragraph rather than her second.

Only in the UK, seemingly, have middle-class families the moral conscience to treat their nannies as they would treat a member of their own family.

This idea is brilliant IMO. My profession is tax, and by far the most tax is lost not through large corporate tax avoidance, but through the black economy.

So the Government 'gives' a tax break - which in this case would cost nothing because the majority of cleaners and domestic workers are paid cash in hand. In return it catches the tax on the cleaners and domestic workers

I have a cleaner (now does 10 hours a week) a gardener (2 hours) and a window cleaner. I don't consider this to be a class-related issue, and am puzzled as to how class comes into it.

It's hardly a "brilliant idea" - it's just copying what other countries have been doing for a long time.

Here in France you can deduct not just your cleaner, window cleaner, nanny, etc but also your personal trainer and children's tutors (and yes, we do/have done all of these!).

Novice you sound like a wonderfully kind and generous employer....

My Italian MIL was a servant when she first came over to England. She worked for a few families (lived in) and was expected to do all the washing , cleaning, cooking etc.

She was treated like a lesser person (not part of the family), was kept apart and ate 'lesser' meals and had (I think) a half day off on Sunday's....and very rarely a proper holiday. No benefits, rights, nothing...and a very meagre wage. In short she was exploited.

Only after working like this for 3 years (I think it was) was she able to gain the freedom to do whatever kind of paid work she wanted. Those were the rules.

Thank goodness things are generally different now!

uruculager why on earth would anyone feel ashamed to employ someone to do domestic work for them?

Are you saying doing domestic work is a shameful role or in some way degrading in its nature?

I dont see classes i just see people who earn a bit more money and have a busy life , so why not have staff although i dont think they curtsey to the Mrs these days

mrsjay - I have taken my DD (7) on playdates where a small non-talking person in a uniform scuttles up to the door and takes DD's shoes and coat off for her as she steps over the threshold. Deference is clearly visible!

WOW bonsoir I think of staff these days as a cleaning lady (not that i have a cleaning lady ) and maybe a gardener eeek how the other half live when they have l people scuttiling about , i think thats quite sad

Quite apart from any other issue (and there are plenty - financial, moral etc), I wouldn't be able to stand having small non-talking people scuttling underfoot all day! I'm always amazed at how people put up with it, but I suppose that you grow up with it and it is your version of normality...

If you have always had servants then you are used to it , but is there a difference between a servant and employing a cleaner or nanny ?

There's a big difference between lower middle class and upper middle class. It all comes down to where you keep your pot pourri. China, possibly decorative chamber pot or some other thing from car boot sale = lower middle class. Cut glass crystal thingy = middle middle class. Super little wooden box picked up from a divine and unspoilt little market you know just south of Marrakesh = upper middle class.

I really dont know how the other half live people round about me have cleaners because they work and either cant keep up or dont want to do the house work they will come in a few days a week , I dont know anybody with staff .

I liked the two phrases earlier down the thread - "a portfolio of helpers" and "outsourcing non-core operational functions" as I think they describe my attitude to domestic help just perfectly. I like specialised, professional domestic help - I have a really fantastic window cleaning company that does inside and out and all glass doors to an amazing standard, and only that; a shirt-ironing service, that irons them amazingly, and only that; a company that comes and spring cleans throughout, and only that; a tutoring service that only provides really high-class English tutors etc etc.

I don't like large volumes of cheap, unspecialised labour that does repetitive basic chores slowly and badly (the maid-of-all-work of yore).