to hate the phrase 'ive worked for every single penny'

[pinksaltlamp]

Usually said buy someone well off to justify having such wealth. I've worked in jobs where I take home 800 a month and 6k a month. The lowest paid one (pot washer) was by far the hardest and the most well paid job was much easier in comparison (although had plenty of testing times!).

That's a very generous and honest post, witsender.

Great post Mrs d. I totally agree, "working hard" sounds like some kind dof religion the amount its spat out. I used to reply I work smark when I was cattier and working in fs in the city where most people wasted most of their time and would work late ijn the office just to get promoted, despite being very counter productive.

You hear it spouted all the time whether it's Britney going "you want a Maserati, you've got to work bitch" or tom cruise saying anyone can make it in Hollywood if they are prepared to work hard enough. No lots of it is about luck, Hollywood is full of down and out people with additions that never made it.

I dislike it too...it's a bit like 'I pay my own way...' when actually, who doesn't? I mean - I know there are a lucky few who don't - but most of us work hard. It's often used to excuse being a bit mean, and I think its a defensive thing.

YANBU
and it's often not true either. i know plenty of baby boomers in modestly-paying employment who say stuff like this, ignoring the fact that the main source of their wealth has been house price appreciation. PIL's house for example has increased in value to over 10x what they paid for it, without them doing anything to add value.

I feel the same wit, I'm relatively well off. But I know lots of it wasnt particularly hard work, more working smart, I know lots of people who have worked far far harder than me and have less to show for it.

baby boomers in modestly-paying employment who say stuff like this, ignoring the fact that the main source of their wealth has been house price appreciation

Yes that is annoying, the effectively won the housing lottery. They weren't canny investors or anything.

Bialystockandbloom - read any thread about people trying to buy a first house/house prices and you'll find tale after tale of people getting hand outs to the tune of tens of thousands from parents, inheritances from grandparents etc. Converse to this thread, there does seem to be a general view on MN that those who are wealthy / have a good lifestyle and a big house haven't earned every penny, it's presented as the norm that in order to own over a certain sized property, you can expect that person to have had help, being 'rich' is down to inherited wealth or unfair help.

I don't know how much that is true, if getting large scale financial help from parents/grandparents really is the norm, but it does feed the feeling amongst those who haven't that they are unusual in never getting any help towards the wealthy position they are in.

YABVVU.

In the past (I'm currently too ill to work) I have had jibes arising from a combo of nature of then job (telly presenter), big house, 'posh' sounding name, and a lifestyle that others could reasonably deduce meant there was significant cash involved.

It used to piss me off no end and I HAVE had to actually use that phrase; ironically including to my then ILs at a point when I was taking them and entire extended family on now ExH's side to villa in Cannes for ExFIL's 70th birthday (IE when my income was directly to their benefit).

In some bizarre parrall universe, they thought the fact I could afford it somehow devalued it as it was 'easy' for me

It got to a point where I had to spell out in no uncertain terms the council 'b&b' terrifying hovel full of predators I'd spent a large part of my childhood in; the fact I was removed from formal education at just 14; the fact that I had worked my fucking backside off to get BACK into education and that the very holiday they were on (which cost me c.£20k for all of them) was solely as a direct result of my working my arse off initially in my chosen career, and then by building a telly/media career on back of my expertise in said area (it was the PR gigs based on the telly profile where I earned seriously high cash; unless you're a Holly or a Davina the actual day rate for filming per se is much lower than folks imagine it to be IME).

[BTW, the stealth boast vis £6k pm was unnecessary and makes your OP even more U so here you go - my day rate at point I had to stop working was £5k per day; how d'you like THEM snapples OP ]

Don't know if it the fact I'm macro ill or micro due on but your OP, and the memories it brings back of other's twattish beahviour, has seriously riled me

(i would say it, mainly because I haven't worked particularly hard in my life and am now a SAHM so am not spending money I've earned, and I claim child benefit, so it's not even like DH could say he's earned every penny we have coming in..)

I take it no one on here watched Location ladt night?

On it were a couple, apparently not from flash backgrounds, who had a £1.5 million budget due to City jobs and buying in the London market at the right.

Every single time, Phil's voice over said they'd "Worked hard", "their hard work" and so on. As if it's some kind of novelty to have to work to afford a deposit and a mortgage, rather than the reality for most people.

Crumbs, the typos in my post.

I married for every penny I have now. But that was after working hard and paying my own way.

YANBU. It's a phrase that gets trotted out when people want to justify why they should get Nan's house instead of it paying for a decent care home, or why they shouldn't have to pay tax, or why other people are wrong to envy them.

Most of the time, the truth is more along the lines of 'I worked hard for every penny. Except for the interest on my savings, the two hundred thou rise in house value, the inheritance from my parents and Auntie Ann and the money from the investments I was fortunate enough to be able to make when I was younger... but otherwise, yup, earned every penny!'

dinosaur yes that is absolutely true. Tbh I don't disagree that many people haven't actually worked really hard.

It's more that I just don't think I'd get on very well with people who would actually use those words in conversation.

I suppose i'm saying that for me, how hard someone works at whatever job they do, isn't a factor in why I might or might not like them. But this isn't about me or who I like or don't like of course - was just posting "lightheartedly"

*Today 17:37 Babyroobs

I can see how pot washing might be physically hard but certainly not stressful or mentally taxing*

Really? Have you ever done it, do you think you just stand there washing them at your own pace and when you're done you're done?

My in laws do this a lot. They often mean someone is badly paid. "They haven't got much but by god he works hard". He is a barista. It can be physical, busy and tiring. But it's not hard.

I worked as hard as a till girl at tesco as I do now in my profession. My professional job is so much harder- nothing is simple- politics of the corporate, getting staff to perform, pushing new ideas through- the mental strain is HUge. And the work itself is hard

That said, my in law barista couldn't do my job. He doesn't have the brains and hasn't had the opportunities. I wasn't handed much but I had brains and massive determination. And an easy family- his home life was hard. Different people, both work for our money.

How is washing a pan mentally stressful?

Babyroobs You've clearly never worked in a kitchen have you?

I have (when I was studying for the career that eventually led to me having to use the bloody phrase up) and I can tell you it's MIGHTLY bloody stressful and the pressure is beyond intense.

Sidebar note - why do people make comments like Babyroobs here on things they clearly know NADA about?

*ABOVE, not 'up'

Usually said buy someone well off

I see what you did there!

I think it depends on the context. I don't think I've said that but I have said I work damned hard when people:

• Assume we got an inheritance or trust fund (wrong)
• Make sneery comments about my job not being hard work, essentially because it is reasonably well paid and I work in FS
• Or the one that really gets my goat - assume DP funds our lifestyle

Having said that, if it's 'I worked for my money' (through decades of prosperity, buying my house for buttons and watching my assets grow), then yes, I can see that is twattish.

More seriously, it's encouraging to see that even investment isn't a totally passive game:

www.moneytalksnews.com/why-youre-probably-better-investing-than-donald-trump/

It's one of those phrases that only really offends people if they aren't happy and confident with the way they get their own income.

Not in my case. Both DH & I work and always have done (since 15 for me & 18 for DH) and when anybody says this to me I always think "well, haven't we all?" IME, the people who say it tend to be quite self-important types who somehow think they are better than others and clearly think they work harder than anyone has ever worked before.

I wouldn't really say the phrase offends me as such. I just think it makes the person saying it sound like a twat.

YANBU. It's the kind of thing that's said on threads about paying 1k for a handbag. So what if you've earned the money? It doesn't mean it makes sense to spend what is another person's monthly wage on a bag.