to think some people have no idea of how some people live?

[ihatevirginmobile]

Being vague cos I like the person and I don't want to out myself or them but it did make me think they have no idea...
We were talking about paying for an activity for children - a charity run by volunteers and the 'fees' are deliberately kept as low as possible to be inclusive. Can be paid monthly (so small amounts) or four times a year - which works out at max £25 - but actual amounts vary for various reasons. Payment can be made by internet banking, cash or cheq.
Person I was talking to was complaining about having to make the payments (by bank transfer -takes a few minutes) - it would be better just to make it quarterly payments of the same amount so they could set up a standing order. And to make it more rather than less so the charity didn't miss out - they would happily pay £10-15 more a year for the convenience....their time was worth more than that...
They are employed in a public service role that is relatively well paid and we do live in a relatively affluent area - I would agree that most people would be fine with it - could easily afford it...(I could but have struggled in the past)
But I also know from something else that we do have the odd person who is less comfortable and struggling - and £10-15 a year for some people is a lot...it is a couple of hours work at NMW.
So AIBU to feel a bit cross ... and .. I don't know - sad? despairing? ... that people can exist in a bubble and have no idea how difficult things can be for some people...or maybe I'm wrong and isn't really a lot of money so maybe they have a point...

I understand grew up in quite our family which really pushed me to take my studies seriously and make a career for myself
Now thankfully earning a very good wage but at least I have some understanding of how some unfortunate people have to live

My mum, her sisters and brother grew up under very poor circumstances in the 1920's and 30's.

Work was very hard to find and my grandfather was a skilled man. When her grandmother asked what she would like for Xmas, she asked for a pair of Wellies. That is what she got. Her grandmother and aunts were quite well off, so Christmas was quite a good affair as one aunt was a teacher, another a seamstress and an uncle an officer on a ship and they were the only children in the family. So, there was plenty of food on that day. My grandfather seemed to have drawn the short straw in the family as regards professions as they were a very clever family.

Thankfully all four children did well. Mum being the youngest went to grammar school. Everyone kept a well stocked pantry. They were amazing hosts. Good savers. Each owned their own house and so on....but when mum told me stories of her childhood I just wanted to cry.

Houseonthelane - Someone needs shoes for their child....they only have a tenner....so it's cheap shoes all the way....the shoes last a term, and another pair is needed. So that person ends up paying out way more than the person who'se got 45 pounds to spend on a good pair. It's like a tax for being poor!

You are referring to the Samuel Vimes 'Boots' theory of socioeconomic unfairness there link

I agree, it's not right.

I always say, when I grew up there was no sense of lack in our house and neither was there in my cousins either.

When I see and hear what is going on today it's just unbelievable. This is still a very rich country and people having to choose between food and heating....disgusting.

Don't get me started on food banks and soup kitchens. How those in charge of this country can sleep at night I don't know. Yet suddenly we can find money for bombs....

My mum grew up very poor, her mother was v ill and at one point my mum & her younger brother (children 3 & 4 out of 4) were shipped off to an orphanage for 6 months when their mother was in hospital.

Unfortunately my grandmother died when my mum was 10 and they had just moved from Wales to the SE. My Grandad had a 'nervous breakdown' (aka started having epilepsy) and lost his job. There was no food or money for food so they went scrumping or stole slag from the vicarage next door's coal shed just to have something to heat their house with.

Funnily enough my mum hoards food (as well as anything else that comes her way ) and so do I. I have children with allergies and I hoard things like their special pasta and other store cupboard things as I dread being without and not being able to have something suitable to feed them.

I can't imagine what it would be like if we weren't as well off as we are (& I didn't shop as carefully as I do - no new clothes apart from school shoes & polo shirts really). If we were on the breadline I'd not be able to afford to feed myself as soya yogurts are horrifically expensive and don't even get me started on paying £3 for a tiny loaf of wheat free bread that's mainly holes.

We are very lucky though that my DH earns a reasonable wage but as we live in the SE it doesn't go that far.

Sorry only just got back to the thread. I meant purely that people have experience of their own lives. These threads are always about how people who are well off don't understand the lives of those who have less than them. I've never read one in the reverse. People don't always understand my life, getting up at 5.30 for a long commute for example. Few people have lives that are easy across the board.

But people live in a bubble and often hear an echo chamber of their own beliefs and expereinces if they mix with the same people. They forget that what is normal to them is very different to other people

this^^ but it works both ways. I'm not pretending that my life is harder than if I couldn't afford food. But people who aren't so well off on mn are at the salaries that some earn, they just can't imagine it and they don't know anyone in that situation.

I don't agree Tobysmum - we are well off - I am a SAHM, dh works bloody hard but life is so much easier with money worries - we have choices, loads of choices. People on very low incomes don't understand my life? - I can't even begin to get why that's an issue?

Precious bane, snap!

Mini boxes of cereal give me an absurd amount of pleasure. I do ration them to when we have sleepovers!

Tobysmum - I am assuming you are relatively well paid...but eg office cleaners leave home at a similar time and earn crap money and may well go on to another job or two - work 12 hr days just so they can make ends meet....
One of the reasons 'my time is worth more that that' argument annoyed me -someone working long hours at NMW will have just as little spare time but don't have the choice to buy their way out/outsource chores...
I do need to clarify that the person was suggesting it for everyone - not just themselves - they actually brought up the less admin for the organisers argument too and next time I see them I will suggest they suggest to the charity that you can opt in to the more expensive but convenient way of paying...
Someone said I was feeling superior -I'm really not - having been someone who has been seriously skint -watching the meter spin and not having another 50p is something you can't easily forget. And I understand if you have never struggled or even known anyone who is - you really can't understand - how could you?
I said for the thing I do we have a hardship fund -there are no real set criteria, procedure. It is on a case by case basis - occasionally we will be approached by an outside agency but if someone appears to be struggling or are withdrawing their DC and we suspect it is purely for financial reasons we approach them and explain we are a charity, we want to be inclusive and we can help them. The biggest problem we find is pride, not wanting to accept the help. I guess in theory it could be open to abuse, accusations of favouritism etc but ime so far it hasn't been. And it hasn't been widely used either.
However I once sat in a room surrounded by relatively affluent people discussing the fund and how it should be made more official and the person 'applying' should have written confirmation of their circumstances provided by two officials eg a teacher or a hv or a gp...I nearly wept with frustration. I did get quite vocal. Thankfully the 'criteria' weren't introduced.

Everyone always needs to keep reminding themselves of how little many people have on this planet. I try and make it one of my priorities and to pass it on to the children. If they can learn how to survive on very little indeed that is a huge benefit for the children as whatever happens to them in life they will cope. I even make sure they know what food from the wild you can pick, survival skills and all that stuff.

I understand toby's points too though. Plenty of women who don't work or work part time would not be prepared to commute to leave a baby at 2 weeks, to work full time express milk at work, and 100% of your salary goes on child care (or 50% of mine and 50% their father's 30 yeras ago). That is not easy either but at least there you know you are building up to 30 years on having no mortgage but it certainly wasn't dead easy. Is it easier than the life of a cleaner? Depends on the cleaner. If she works 6am to 9am and then evenings then yes her life is probably easier. If she cleans before going to a 9 - 5 job and then cleans in the evening then yes her life is harder and those of us who are mothers or fathers whether we work full time, full time with a second job or whatever also have all the out of work stuff even I do night and day - clothes washing etc.

My sons ordered a takeaway last night (ncie if you can afford it - I stuck with my tin of sardines) and I made my usual comment about being able to feed yourselves for a week on that cost.

Higge its an issue because of aspiration and lack of understanding of opportunity. Britain has one of the worst records for social mobility in the western world. There are often people on mn who are by how much some people earn. (Although I'm not in that bracket lol)

My cleaner's life isn't appreciably harder than mine I don't think. Her dh has a good job, she works around school hours. Not all cleaners are poor. Of course some are and I think the hardship of not being able to afford the basics is a very serious thing.

YABU actually, as I don't see your friend suggesting everyone pays by DD. My kids do numerous afterschool clubs and I always forget to pay the subs for somthing. Thats becuase I work 14 hour days, and there is always so much happening. Direct Debits or standing orders mean I don't have to worry about that. It should be a choice, yes, but for some people it is much easier, and saves the club time chasing. I think its a perfectly reasonable thing to suggest.
Also on the subject of the cleaner v tobysmum. You get paid in accordance to the responsibilities of the job you do and the skills you have. Being a cleaner is not a responsibility neither are cleaners in short supply as pretty much everyone can clean. Therefore I am sure that Tobysmum not only has trained in someway to earn the money she does, but also has a level of responsibility that means whilst the cleaner switches off after her shift, Tobysmum does not. It really irritates me when people (who obviously don't understand what a highly paid job entails) suggest it is no more stressful than mopping the floor.

No, I don't think you do get paid according to the responsibilities of a job or the skills you have. If you were, a carer would be paid more than a cleaner. Nurses and teachers would be paid more too. I get paid one amount by the local authority and three times that amount by private individuals for doing the same job.

But carer's don't need exams or training why would they get paid more than cleaners?. I know lots of people who are carers and they are not qualified in anyway, There are lots of people that can be a carer, but not as many who are qualified to be a lawyer. Same with nursing tbh - I admire nurses and what they do, and I couldn't do it, but - you don't have to go to Uni for 4 years like a doctor, you don't have the same responsibliity as a doctor. I don't think teachers get paid particularly poorly, and as they move up the ladder they get a pretty good wage. Head's earn 6 figure salaries, so I think.

In terms of contribution to the community of course a carer and nurse contribute more, but they don't have to be more skilled to get the job

Nurses do need a university degree now.

Specialist nurses like endoscopists need additional specialist training (and do a better job than a lot of doctors).

Hmmm. Maybe you need to look at the facts about training first. So for you the pay people receive is correlated exactly to their training and responsibilities?

None of this is rocket science. If you can get good enough exam results you can become a doctor o lawyer - most people can't, ditto playing football like Beckham inr elation to that skill . Where more people can do the job such as nursing which is not as hard to get into as medicine the pay reflects that.

There is always the interesting moral issue as to whether we should pay more for people with rarer skills of course. China tried paying doctors less than street sweepers. It didn't work very well. Internationally some highly trained professionals qualified abroad have to come to the UK to drive taxis as even that pay is higher than the home state.

As we are saying above you cannot easily generalise. You will get some people as lazy as sin in all jobs (or nicely subscribing to the relaxed idler philosophy if you look at it from that point of view) and others who have had to work very hard indeed to get where they have.

Of course not exactly Geranium, but as I said its supply and demand. Plus if you have A Levels and the choice to do a degree you then make your choices related to what you can/want to do and the pay involved. You can find out what a nurse gets paid, and if you don't feel that is enough financial reward you can do something else. If you are not qualified you have less options to improve your finances and more competition for the jobs. Not everyone wants a high salary and the stress that comes with it, some people would rather have less money and more time to enjoy their family and life (like me!!)

I certainly agree with that. It does none of our teenagers any harm to get good qualifications and a degree (even if like my graduate son they choose to become a postman). It just gives you a bit more choice.

I have qualifications.
Hasn't helped. I'm still skint. Education is important but please don't behave as if you just need to go to school and do well then you can waltz into a job. Life doesn't work like that.

Black eyed Susan...try being gluten and lacto free...that really bumps up the grocery costs :(
We could spend less I suppose but tbh with my health issues I often go for what is easiest and that - inevitably - costs more.

I think the OP's friend has a point. Setting up a standing order for a monthly or quarterly fixed amount does make a lot of sense for the vast majority of people rather than having to remember to pay each month. It is particularly helpful when on a tight budget to know the amounts that will be going out each month, IMO.
I also don't think that £10 or £15 difference over the course of a year is enough to make a difference of affordability for most families - what are you talking, around 40p a week? Plus of course, it would be good if the charity / activity weren't struggling in quite such a hand to mouth way, as they would then have wriggle room to make exceptional cases for those who genuinely couldn't afford it.

The irony

First - I will reiterate they said it should be for everyone to simplify things - we had a conversation about less admin for the charity etc.
As to intelligence and qualifications and earning potential ...
I have a scientific doctorate - got as a mature student - it takes a minimum of 7 years to get qualified (3yr undergraduate, 4yr post graduate degrees).
As a PG student/post doc researcher I worked long hours -as did everyone else -people ate lunch and dinner there, taking in ready meals to microwave. (I also did a few overnighters (36-48hr experiments with 2hr sample collections). People were often around until after midnight and even on eg Christmas day.

It is very competitive and pressured - you will take reading/writing home because it is incredibly difficult to be successful, few succeed - the successful ones are often divorced/never see their DCs, have a SAHP... The majority have a max 9yr career (3 lots of 3yr contracts) earning around £30k for the whole time.

A lot go on to retrain - a lot actually as teachers - ironically when I did my undergraduate someone was gutted they only got a 2.2 and couldn't do a postgrad - they went straight into teacher training...they are probably doing much better than most who did do a Phd.
I had a DC and gave up as I decided I couldn't compete -and actually not sure I wanted to...and it isn't an aid to employment - quite the opposite (if I was applying for most jobs I would not put my Phd on the application). I said I am ok for money -through a small business that has nothing to do with my scientific training...

It's a very interesting discussion, especially the idea that we should all think about how much money our neighbours and acquaintances might or might not have.

I don't think I live in a bubble; I was brought up in a third world country and most people I know used to walk to a stand pipe as few homes had running water.

This thread seems to be about comparative living. I'm imagining the comparison between those who couldn't afford a dishwasher thinking the remark about getting a bigger house was any worse, comparatively, than assuming everyone has a kitchen or indeed can afford washing up liquid.

I thought commenting on others' financial situations was vulgar?