to be getting a bit fed up with squeezed middle bashing.

[rosieposey78]

Ie those single income families with an income of 50 to 60k who are apparently moaning about the loss of £20 per week. If that is a problem they have made wrong financial choices or are bad with money etc etc.
Well we are almost a single income family who has lost child benefit. Some £50 per week. No proble with that. We just have to be a bit careful but we can cope. We do however pay loads on fuel. Dh has long commute and live in fairly expensive area so no we are not rich and do not avoid paying our dues. We opted out of child benefit.

[mrsjay]

I just want to say I know other people with lower incomes struggle too I am not pleading poverty or anything

[OneStepCloser]

soontobe, that would be one hell of a commute.

[Retropear]

Another one seething over the CB,it's the total unfairness that gets my goat on top of feeling it.

[MrsHowardRoark]

My DP's job only exists in London and we live outside to pay cheaper rent. His commuting costs are £4000 a year and he never sees us because of the long hours.

I would love to know how we could save money living where we are.

All of this just makes people look inwards and fight with their friends and neighbours. Meanwhile, companies evading tax costs more than the whole bloody benefits system.

[noisytoys]

Me and DH are close to £50k joint wage now I am working full time. We pay £700 mortgage (on a small 1.5 bed flat) and £1200 childcare. The wage is soon eaten up and we are just as poor as when I wasn't working!

[Retropear]

Alongside the fact Boris thinks we spend it on filling our imaginary wine cellar and ski- holidays.The very same Boris who doesn't even know the price of bread and thinks that funny.

Oh and the fact that shiny Dave thinks designer flour and bread makers are the norm.

Not.a.blardy.clue!

[valiumredhead]

What really riles me is when DC tries to make out that 40k is a lot of money when in fact that probably didn't even pay his school fees. Not. A. Clue.

[SoonToBeSix]

Yes certain jobs involve living near or in London but by no means all . To suggest that you cannot earn 50 k plus outside London is rubbish.

[Wallison]

£40k is a lot of money. I suppose what riles people about the term 'squeezed middle' is that they are nowhere near as squeezed as the (working) people right at the bottom of the employee pile who have not only had their housing benefit cut by 20% but also now have to find an extra £35 a month or so towards council tax - out of where, exactly? To them, £40k would be a fucking fortune, and just by owning your own home at all you are inhabiting a lifestyle that they have no means of accessing. I agree though that DC is being very disingenuous when he tries to pretend that he thinks it's a lot of money - he probably wrote cheques for that amount to pay for one night of restaurant-trashing when he was in the Bullingdon Club. So I guess both him and the so-called 'squeezed middle' are BU.

[Freshlysqueezed]

I really really don't get why you are all seething over child benefit. We still get it as we are both working on a household income of approx £60k. But we have to pay thousands of pounds a year in nursery fees which those on one income of 60k do not have to So even though they have lost child benefit they are way way better off than us as child benefit barely makes a dent in the nursery fees. Yes I guess it is unfair that a household where both earners take home 40k each so have an income of 80k still get CB. But lets be realistic here that is such a small percentage of households that fall into that bracket it would have cost too much to administer. I just dont get why loads of stay at home Mums where the partner earns 50k plus feel so hard done by because they have lost CB. Listen you are still better off than those on the same income where both parents work but still get CB - please stop seething and find something better to do!

[MrsHowardRoark]

We don't own our own house and have no chance of doing so.
I can't afford to go back to work because of the cost of child are combined with the commute is too much for us.

We have no savings and no way of saving. But even my own family think we must be well off. We're really not.

But as I said ^ it's just distraction tactics to stop people getting pissed off at the source.

[mrsjay]

people with joint income get CB as the norm

[Wallison]

I don't think it's distraction tactics. I have actually seen little in the press bashing the squeezed middle but have heard plenty from them on here and irl bemoaning their dire fate which I think is unseemly when other people are reliant on food banks to feed their families, which is where bad feeling comes into it. I almost had a falling-out with a friend a couple of years ago after I was made redundant from my previous job. She sympathised with me and made a comparison that some people she worked with were having to scale back from two long-haul holidays a year to one. She seriously thought that that was what being 'squeezed' actually meant. There are plenty of people around like that, both on mumsnet and outside it, who just have no clue about what poverty actually means, even when they are talking to someone who is faced with the grinding, depressing reality of it.

[rosieposey78]

Yes but a family with one earning say 55k and one earning 10k could still have childcare to pay but they lose some child benefit yet 2 on 48k still keep it. Plus single parents lose out too.

[valiumredhead]

Oh I know 40 is a lot of money, but not to the very privileged such as DC and his crew.

[rosieposey78]

I know about poverty. I have a sibling on jsa. I actually sub him because it is so hard. 71 per week and out of that some council tax has to be paid.

[mrsjay]

this is what I was meaning valium they are acting like we are just like them piss off dave it is to cause a divide i think , I had to laugh when gideon geroge osbourne put a picture out of himself with a half eater burger as he was working late like a normal person

[Wallison]

He's about as normal as any other shape-shifting lizard - how dare you!

[MrsHowardRoark]

I come from an extremely poor background, so I'm under no illusions about the position we are in.

I do think the whole benefits issue is a distraction, not just the 'squeezed middle'. Almost every cut has people pointing the finger at what other take that they don't earn, deserve, need etc

[Viviennemary]

I sympathise up to a point. But a lot of people do move out of London and the surrounding areas because they simply cannot afford to live there. This has been going on for decades. So it's a lifestyle choice. IMHO.

[Redpipe]

rosie
It's highly unlikely one parent earning 10K would choose to work and pay more for child care is it?

[MinesAPintOfTea]

The thing is, if you think life in the squeezed middle is harder than out is in an income of £10k and living un a rented property, why not get a poorly paid job, still your house and get all these wonderful benefits?

Its harder than for the upper class but it was ever thus. That's why people want to be upwardly socially mobile. But dint fall for the divide and rule tricks.

[mrsjay]

minesapintoftea I am not sure what your post means but i get the girst

we have been poor and on benefits it is shite this thread isn't really about benefits well it is about the CB but I do think people do struggle

[drawsofdrawers]

What do you get if you earn £50k - £3k a month, a bit less if you pay into a pension?

Must be awful if you live in London with kids.

Rent on 2 bed flat £1250-1400
Childcare £1000 at least (could be 1400)

Doesn't leave you with much for your bills and travel and food.

[mrsjay]

50k is the top scale the cuts affect my dh doesn't get 50k