To be pissed off at BIL's and SIL's money issues?

[DSM]

Lets's begin this with the story - this is about DP's Brother and his wife.

DP and I are both low earners (both

Bearbehind - I work 9-4 every day except Friday when I finish at 2. I work those hours to fit around childcare, if I worked longer, it wouldn't be viable, to afford the extended childcare.

I could tell them to 'shut up' but I am not that rude.

If you want to give me a reasonable way to gain some useful qualifications, without stopping work, then by all means, please do! I've never seen an evening class yet that would give me any sort of qualification that would lead me into a wonderfully high paid career. I looked into open university previously, again, I would need to spend at least the first year on an access course. But please, I am open to suggestion.

Saying that, you seem to have confused the issue a little - I am not downhearted at DP and my earnings. I am merely pissed off that his rich (or very soon to be rich) brother moans about his 'poorness' to us.

Most people have actually got the jist of this, and have agreed IANBU to be pissed off about it.

I am merely pissed off that his rich (or very soon to be rich) brother moans about his 'poorness' to us.

I don't think you can stop them being annoying - but they are winding you up and you can change that.

No, I am there for 33 hours but we have to take an hour unpaid lunch every day.

Sorry, sorry but I had to stop reading to comment on the above for a second. This isn't a full time job. A full time job is 35 or more paid working hours. Lunch breaks don't count.

If you counted lunch breaks in my job then it would be 40 hours not 35. Lunch breaks don't count. At 28 hours you are doing a 4 day a week job opposed to a 5 day a week full time. So you are part time.

Sounds to me like the BIL was a soliciter for a while and worked his way up to earning £140,000.
Then he decided to side step into become a barrister (where the money is higher and the career ceiling is higher) but needed to do a pupillage, where they get given a "grant" of anywhere between £12,000-£65,000 - the larger firms offering the higher of this range.
So BIL was a soliciter on a good wage and is now completing additional training in a pupillage with a "wage" of £50,000. If he is already working for the firm it isn't unrealistic for them to give him work straight out of training.

Will he be getting £80K of work a month? No. Only the top top top barristers (1 or 2 in the country) earn this. It is likely that he told a white lie - the firm will be getting £80K a month for his work and he will be paid from this.

But his salary would increase significantly once he'd completed his pupillage.

This is the only logical explanation for BIL career.

OP could have just said, she's given enough details anyway.

Yes your job is a 0.8 for 28 hours, so PT . Those who work FT get paid for 35 but are physically in the office for 40 (an hour for lunch). You can get a job paying more 9k ft with basic qualifications , you don't need to study for 4 years + to improve on this but it will depend where you live and what other skills you can offer.

Some people are just tight bastards - usually people who don't give a shit about anyone but themselves. You invite people for dinner and you all drink - you make sure there is enough wine for everyone especially if people are coming a long way and are having to stay in a hotel.
My BIL and SIL are the same- earn tonnes, have loads in the bank and after we travelled 600 miles with a car packed to the gunnels with baby stuff for them , they took us out for lunch and then BIL refused to pay.

However the answer is simple. Next time they start- you just say to them they have no idea what being hard up actually is and that you find talking about money really upsetting. That should stop their crassness if they have any empathy at all.

Dear brother & SIL, I love you all to pieces, but when you only have one home that you rent and don't own, when you both have to go out to work and when (insert other major parts of your life here) then talk to me about being skint. You have a definite idea of when your idea of skint will end - I don't. Now can we change the subject please? Then ask them about something else to change the topic of conversation and stop any awkward silence..

The children is usually a safe bet to change it to. Every parent will talk about their children.

They will be totally oblivious to what both of your ideas of being skint is. I know my parents do. They spent so long being poor, they are stuck in that mentality.

X post tobias!

OP, I don't think you need to be rude to stop this cyle, when they say how skint they are just say 'I know, can you imagine how much we feel the pinch given our earnings' and leave it at that. They'd have to have a pretty thick skin to continue the conversation.

If they do continue it, word your thoughts more strongly, their thick skin can obviuosly take it.

Doing no more than moan about it on here isn't going to change anything.

I do think they are being unreasonable but unless you do something about it what was the point in the thread? Did you just want to be told they ABU and be happy you were right?

I also think you like exaggerating both ends of the scale a bit for effect though.

I still think it is absolute bollocks that BIL will earn £900k straight out of training, even if he is a barrister, but you have chosen to accept that as gospel.

Likewise, you said you work 'long hours' and work full time, whilst I understand why you work the hours you do, they are neither long, nor full time.

And as I and others have said, it does not take 6 years of full time education to improve your skills to allow you to earn a higher salary. A higher salary does not have to be 'a wonderfully high paid career' just more than you currently earn.

My job is classed as a full time job. I do a few hours a week less than most other people, because I have flexible working to allow me to work around school times.

But yeah, sure I will just go and find another job. Never thought of that

If there are jobs that I can do, that will take me on with no qualifications, and allow me flexible working, then I must be looking in the wrong place.

God MN can be a bloody patronising place sometimes.

I love the fact that the BIL and SIL are "crass" but the OP is not for posting all of their private affairs on an internet forum. An internet forun she knows her SIL is on.

All with enough detail to be easily identifiable.

i honestly dont get how people can be annoyed at other people feeling like theyve got no money!

The thing about qualifications is that you can improve yourself and your CV in your own time.I have a friend who has done courses from home and then qualifications in bookkeeping, Adobe Creative Suite (Photoshop and Illustrator) and now writes a blog, runs a creative business, and grosses about £12K a year from that. She also works full time. She has to do a tax return and pay out from that, naturally. Her work is done in the evenings and is leading on to much bigger things already. She makes her own opportunities, they come with connections to others and that is one route into making hard cash these days.

I don't buy that you have to go and do a degree and that's how you'll make money. There are more ways than that. It takes time and organisation but these things are out there to learn, sometimes just for the price of a book and the acceptance that you'll be doing your work after the kids are in bed.

pepperI absolutely agree. It's how I got the job I am in now - it's not well paid, granted, but it's better than minimum wage shop work I did for 10 years.

I personally studied the field I am in (it's a creative industry, not an academic one) and did enough work to get into the place I am now. I was able to quit my last shitty job, after doing evening and weekend work for this company to prove myself. It's not well paid, and never is unless you own your own business, which is the very long term goal, but that needs capital which we simply don't have just now.

Anyway, point is, you are right.

What's bonkers here is the fact that a family member invites you over for dinner at 7.00 pm when you live over 100 miles away.

What about going for lunch with the whole family and then driving home afterwards? That way, you won't need as much wine, as you won't want to drink so much and you wouldn't need to book into a hotel.

Also, once your BIL gets this fantastic, well-paid job, perhaps he'll need a PA? In this computer age, you can work from home 100 miles away.

And also, also, 29 hours per week paid work is classed by the Census people as full-time.

Bastard already has a PA

I agree - we were a bit put out too, but initially we'd offered to all go out for dinner (halfway) and they'd said they couldn't afford it. They invited us, we thought that was kind so we went.

Next time, we shall suggest lunch.

Ah, so BIL is a bastard now, despite having the foresight to make a short term sacrifice in order to attain a higher salary in the long term.

I think this thread is more about jealousy than you are willing to admit.

I'd missed the bit about you knowing your SIL uses MN. If she read this thread I'm sure you'd have more to worry about than them talking about their financial burdens.

If I found out a relative of mine had posted such personal and identifiable information on a public forum, whilst moaning about me and calling me a bastard, I'd never speak to them again.

Oh FGS, that was obviously lighthearted. Theres a bloody winky face after it, jesus!

Yeah, she does use MN. She might see this. I hope not, and I haven't said his profession for that explicit reason (though lots have people have guessed that it is ina barrister. It isn't, it is really, really specific and by typing it, I might as well be typing his name)

Then would you not be better off going 'yes, yes, a barrister' because now when SIL reads this she's going to know it's a highly specific profession and put two and two together....

Unless that's a double bluff, in which case, fair play.

Eh, yeah in hindsight that probably would have been a better plan

I've actually asked for this thread to be deleted because there is a lot of info, but I don't know if MNHQ would reply to the email address I set up MN with? I haven't used that address in years..

Contact them again and ask them to PM you here.

If you want to give me a reasonable way to gain some useful qualifications, without stopping work, then by all means, please do!

two words - Open University.

You can complete a degree or similar and need no previous quals

I would need to spend at least the first year on an access course

Nope. OH is doing a history degree straight off and he only has 2 gcses

Poor old OP

She never did say "AIBU to be really jealous of BIL's income?" She says she's cheesed off with the way he pleads poverty and demands that she spend more than she can afford. Obviously, BIL & SIL are tightarses and she is not BU - so half the thread's decided her OP was what she didn't say, and are still having a go at her!

I do think you need to tell 'em, though, DSM. Broken record :)