To think £100k pa is NOT 'the squeezed middle'?

[ArsenicFaceCream]

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The article is very confidently attributing the definition to Danny Dorling, but did he really name this figure?!

These women are fools.

the local nail bar tbh. They provided a rubbish service, they dont speak enough English to know what is being asked for and they take cash only.

@ the sheer brass neck of them

Arsenic - my point is that it is not accurate to see 100K and '4 times' a 25K salary. Even on headline figures it is only triple - and if you include benefits and swindles it very quickly approaches 'double'. I'm not saying this as a complaint - it is the point of progressive taxation - to even out differences between different incomes & help people over bumps (without edam's guillotines).

happybubblebrain You'll be the only one left if that was the case, with you being the only one to fund "the poor".

We do have a progressive tax system, but a family on 30 k doesn't get benefits generally. They may get tax credits but it's dependent on circumstances. The reality is the genuinely average is using ALL their money and then some to pay for absolute essentials. So even though someone on 100k pays considerably more tax. They may have 1000x as much to spend in luxuries (or more). Obviously that is the reason to have a progressive tax system. I am really against envy politics. I don't want the rich to be squeezed into poverty. My point is that if you are earning 100k, whatever anxieties, sacrifices etc you may make, you still aren't the squeezed middle.

On the issue of cash in hand money. It does happen and it shouldn't. It is absolutely not a justification for the well off to claim that no one is really struggling financially (they cheat) and if they are it's because they are work shy etc. have you met any real people on PAYE earning 20k there are thousands of them!!!

Posters are mis-interpreting the term 'squeezed middle'.

You're in the middle in the sense of not being poor (benefits/evictions/electricity meters) nor rich (staff, shares, property portfolio). The people below can't be taxed more because they are too needy - and the people at the top can't be taxed more since they are too wily with their financial planning. So when there is a shortfall in public finances - this is the zone out of which the exchequer tries to squeeze more out of. Which is fine - but it is unfair to dress it up with a spiteful edge of 'you'll have to cut down on 10K holidays' - which does not show understanding to the sacrifices and valid difficulties that can be faced even by families with high headline salaries

AS for the op - of course 100kpa is NOT the squeezed middle. Google fu suggests Ed Milliband came up with a wishywashy definition that was those "not relying on benefits" or earning "6figure salaries".... which would in fact be 88% of the population.

From a guardian article -
"In fact, the term refers to households with an income below the median but above the poorest 10% and with less than a fifth of their income derived from means-tested benefits (excluding tax credits). The definition comes from the Resolution Foundation, a thinktank devoted to improving the lives of low-to-middle-income households ("the squeezed middle"), which estimates that they make up a third of the working-age population. Because the definition takes household size into account, the incomes that qualify for inclusion have an enormous range: from £12,000 to £30,000 a year for a couple with no children to £19,200 to £48,500 for a couple with three."

& primaryteach - my point wasn't to minimise struggling families. My point is to do with whether the headline figures for a median London income give a reasonable guide to what income you need to have a reasonable London life. I think it is not - because the figures are skewed by: tax credits, fiddles, people who don't actually need to work (eg dependent spouses), people who have external support (eg own home) and people who are only temporarily in London.

What no one seems to be bring up though is this:

Over the last few decades, disruptive technology has replaced a lot of jobs that was once done through manual labour. This naturally means that a lot of people do not want to pay a human for doing a job that a machine could possibly do better. There was never a 'replacement' for these types of jobs. The only way to deal with this was train people - make them go into jobs that may require 'softer' skills (service, more intellectual tasks). The few remaining 'manual' jobs are often left for 'transient' people to do (Eastern European builders/cleaners who will go back to their home country one day, students who need extra income, etc.). The more this happens, the less people feel the need to pay a salary that can actually sustain an entire family's life in the long-term here in the UK.

And to those saying that it is 'unfair' that some families have a household income of 100k... it's sad that there are people at the bottom. But that has always been the case - whether now or 100/200/300/400 years ago. That's never going to change. I feel that some people are falling into an idealistic trap here. Our parents' generation was the one generation that probably never had it better, and believe (as previous generations believed) that it can only get better. But what if that generation was really just a 'blip' and not the norm? What if we're merely reversing back to how it used to be 200 years ago, with a few wealthy people and masses of poorer ones? In the grand scheme of history... some households having £100k while others don't is really just the norm.

Sovery your description pretty much describes my DH's 140k banking job. He is a global IT head and there is a lot of time difference involved. He often gets woken at night by his Blackberry, works for a couple of hours and then leaves for work at 6 a.m and gets home 15 hours later. There is quite a lot of travel involved. Sometimes 2 different Asian countries in a week and straight into the office after a night flight. It sounds glam but the reality is mega jet lagged, back to back meetings and insomnia. We are also out of pocket because the expense limit is never enough especially in expensive places such as Tokyo and there is an expectation that as the 'boss' my DH takes his team out for for drinks which cost a few hundred pounds in each country.
I love having the high salary and have said a few times up thread that I am totally not squeezed but I do get a bit cross with the anti banker comments. We get a lot of these from DH's family. His siblings have had the same upbringing and education as him but earn around 15 to 30k and do like to drop the banker bonuses comments into conversation especially as we use a lot of the money to go on holidays. My DH's siblings have stayed living locally to where they grew up and have a wide circle of friends and a good work/life balance and seem to work from home play golf a lot on Fridays.
I do admire my DH for pushing himself and moving to London leaving behind families and friends.

The real intentions of the Resolution Foundation

"The Commission on Living Standards, whose members include Win Bischoff, chairman of Lloyds Bank, and Paul Johnson, director of the Institute for Fiscal Studies, has concluded that, in an era of austerity, transfers from the state, particularly in the form of tax credits, will no longer be valuable enough to counter these trends, even if “benign economic conditions” return.
But, says the commission, the bleak outlook could be averted through measures that it says it has “carefully costed and fully funded” through a mixture of spending reductions and targeted levies."

copied from the FT. www.ft.com/cms/s/0/66571f78-ae8a-11e3-8e41-00144feab7de.html#axzz3FSnCdYQX

They want to ensure government picks up the bill for poverty to ensure that business can keep on shafting the workers. They are trying to limit changes to the minimum wage so that it suits the business sector better. Any spending from the poor is to be earned not by taxing business, but by means testing pensioners and some investments.

They really must think we were born yesterday to believe that they really care about the poor.

My dad was in a career paying silly money (200k plus) for a time. He worked extremely hard. I don't think many people here are arguing rich people don't deserve to earn their money or that those people don't encounter challenges financially or personally. What I am saying, is that it is right those people pay more tax than those at the bottom of the wage scale and that those people earning decent salaries (no doubt through hard work but also family support, education etc) should acknowledge they aren't 'the middle'.

I should add that the Commission on Living Standards is an offshoot of the Resolution Foundation, which was founded by people in the Insurance sector.

zillionare - dh's job sounds utterly horrendous. I do hope he enjoys it. And what do you do?

I am a care worker in a residential home for adults with physical disabilities.

'Doing what you enjoy' is one of the reasons UK has employment problems - including employers struggling to fill roles, a lot of companies moving overseas (manufacturing & others) and a precarious service based economy.

You do what you need to do to support your family. And preferably adopt that attitude young and get a solid vocational qualification behind you ('vocational' including engineering and law as well as electrician and doctor - but excluding things done for pure enjoyment of the subject).

Sovery your description pretty much describes my DH's 140k banking job. He is a global IT head and there is a lot of time difference involved........... It sounds glam but the reality is mega jet lagged, back to back meetings and insomnia. We are also out of pocket because the expense limit is never enough especially in expensive places such as Tokyo and there is an expectation that as the 'boss' my DH takes his team out for for drinks which cost a few hundred pounds in each country.
I love having the high salary and have said a few times up thread that I am totally not squeezed but I do get a bit cross with the anti banker comments.

That sounds very difficult. But presumably you are able to cope?

My DHs plan A was to be an academic, wear tweed and make exciting scientific discoveries. But he looked at teeny weeny DD, looked at his recently widowed mum, looked at the 1 year 18K p.a. contract that was on the table at the time, remembered how hard it was to grow up in a household where money was always tight - and thought again.

That was quite a while ago. He is good at what he does - although it would be hard to 'enjoy' anything for those kind of hours. He followed the money out of a sense of needing to support his family.

Partymatron
I do what I enjoy. It just happens to support my family rather well.
In a few weeks time I will have zero debt. I spent this morning at the gym and shall go shopping soon.
DH also does what he enjoys. He spent this morning cycling and is currently working on his website.

Those of you in salary land seem not to realise that there are very comfortable ways to live that do not involve paying for bosses to take a cut.

Our household income is a lot less than £100k a far as HMRC are concerned, but our disposable income is plenty for our needs.

That sounds very comfortable I'm afraid we are firmly wage-slaves.