To think £31500 pa is less than average wage?

[Elderwand]

That's it, I work as a nurse in the Nhs, I'm 33. , just thought at this stage of my life I would be earning more. (unhappy & bitter) have 2 young DD, So career change at the mo would be difficult.

Think I read that median household income in the UK is 32K. OP you are above average national wage, but if you consider the wages of "educated and skilled" workers, you are probably slightly below average wage for your age. New graduates, for example are getting around 30K (top graduates in the City are getting up to 45K).

New graduates are getting 30K?

On which planet? The one where more than 75% of them have some sort of job? Or the one where there aren't loads of them on internships where they are reimbursed travel costs but not actually paid?

In the NHS
" Most new graduate jobs on the NHS (Band 5) have the standard minimum starting salary of £21K - £22K (+ inner/outer/fringe London cost supplements which ranges from an extra £1000-£6000 a year). " from a recruitment agency.

These are above the national quoted "average" salary for new graduates of £16k- £18K don't know where that £30K comes from....

New graduates get 30k? Lmfao

Some might...
sobs into 18k generic didn't even need a degree. To do this job payslip

I have decided to write a novel and become a gazillionaire

It will contain vampires, bondage and terrible writing with flat and hopeless characters who depend on men.

Who is with me?

Perhaps if you read a broadsheet instead of the tabloids you would have caught the story last week on new starting salaries for graduates. The main range seemed to be 26K-32K, sorry if I mislead you but rounding to 30K. You need to get out more peeps.

Ha ha, it you who needs to get out more, my friend.

30k. Fuck me.

Some of us do read the broadsheets.....

"The AGR's blue chip average for this year £25-£26K? based on a poll of firms including consultants Accenture, retailer Marks & Spencer and bank UBS ? is higher than the figure for all graduates. A survey by a government agency finds the average salary for all first-time graduates working full-time ranges from £17,720 to £23,335."

The FULL average including those working part time is £16K-£18K.... the average including the poor unfortunate 30% with NO job is of course even lower.....

The average for new graduates starting in investment banking in London is however £38K...

About 20K average according to the government survey (includes under-employed graduates working full-time in retail). About 25K at a blue chip. And about 38K to start in investment banking. Sounds like pretty close to 30K for a proper graduate job to me. In the SE anyway.

I'm the same as yellowraincoat. I'm on 13.5k. Everyone assumes coz I'm on so little I'd be getting benefits. No, I'm not entitled to any and not sure I'd want them anyway.

Depends - 23K would be closer to the actual average of "full time posts which were advertised as requiring a degree" but we can argue statistics all day - I like statistics...

Only 45% of graduates last year went on to professional level jobs straight from uni (or within 6 months of leaving)- so ok maybe higher than £25k for those - i.e. the minority.....

Richteas, there is no way that 30k is anything like the average for a graduate position.

20k + 25k + 38k divided by 3 might look like around 30k, but only if you discount the fact that very few people work in investment banking, that loads of graduates take jobs in pubs etc and that there is very much a fashion for people doing internships where they earn nothing.

Rich teas you sound utterly charming.

I could read the broadsheets but i like all the nice pictures in the sun.

Anyone who says "read the broadsheets" just makes me laugh, actually, as if they think reading The Guardian is some sort of sign of intellectualism.

Wot if I spread my sun out nice n wide?

Ah no - 'twas in the Telegraph - don'tcha know.... I prefer The Daily Mail..... the Sun is just a little too small to cover the bottom of the guinea pig hutch... (and it would feel wrong for them to poop on ladies boobies ) the Telegraph a bit too pompous big so I sneak peeks on-line..

Elderwand- sorry if I missed something but you're a part rime nurse earning 31500?! Is this even possible? And YABVU to moan about it.

Richteas, there is no way that 30k is anything like the average for a graduate position.

Could not agree more.

When people get out more, as you suggest, Richteas, they'll see that £30k as an average graduate starting salary is utter bollocks.

It's either you who needs to get out more, or you know full well it's bollocks and you're being disingenuous.

The more money you make, the greater your outgoings and therefore the more likely you are to be in debt. Therefore, ones salary is almost irrelevant.
My aunt was a single mother with four children and earned about 24k a year until she retired. She now owns three properties (no mortgage) and has a decent pension. Many of her peers who earned much more, are either still struggling to pay their mortgages or are in debt.
One has to be sensible with finances and live slightly below your means, so that you are able to cope with any problems which may arise, eg ; redundancy, unemployment etc.

I hate this idea that because you have more money, your outgoings must increase and therefore salary is irrelevant. What a crock of shit. No-one is forcing you to spend more money, you spend more money because you start thinking "mmm that Waitrose looks nice" even though Asda has been fine for you for years.

Someone on 30k doesn't have the same financial pressure as someone on 15k. They just don't, because they might be as skint, but they can more easily cut their spending.

Yellowcoat- let me clarify my post- I actually agree with your sentiments. Some people just spend more than they need to and that is why they have higher outgoings. I can afford to shop in Waitrose, but choose to shop in Lidl.
This means that at the end of the month i am better off.

Someone on 15 K wil be raking in TC and other benefits to the extent that, especially if they have a load of kids, they'll have far more disposible than someone on 30K with no benefits.

Oh yeah, DEFINITELY, just raking in the benefits, fucking drowning in them.

FFS, some people are so bloody ignorant.

Yellowcoat - someone on 30k can have same financial pressures. My rent in London for a 1 bed flat is about £1,250/month. Clearly I couldn't have afforded that on 15k but similarly someone earning 15k in another part of the country may have lower rent payments. I actually commuted from somewhere when I was on my current salary where my rent was £525/month for a place double the size so a huge difference. Unfortunately my commute costs were more than my rent then.

I struggle to see how the average graduate salary can possibly be 30k. I graduated in 2005 and most of my friends are earning maybe a little more than that now - some much more, some much less.

I used to earn just a smidge over 15k in my last job, which I started straight from uni, then didn't have a pay rise for 5 years. Then pro rata for part time after DD was born. I got tax credits, about £10 a month. Then I was made redundant, and they change the tax credit threshold, so our combined household income (and they count child benefit as income) was about £10 over the threshold, even though I wasn't earning. Thanks for that, government

Now I've been lucky to get a job that's paying much more like what I should be earning (22k), for my qualifications and skills, and we're still short of cash. Our outgoings have gone up, because I'm having to travel further to work and because I'm having to start repaying my student loan, as well as the credit cards that got me through redundancy.

But at least I don't have to get any more in debt now. Even though we don't have that much spare cash, I feel a hell of a lot more comfortable now that my money runs out about 3 days before pay day, rather than the 2-3 weeks it used to!