To want to know what you consider a good salary?

[Llanali]

I'm relatively new to MN, and I keep seeing this phrase " XXX earns a good salary" so I am intrigued! What is a good salary ? £20k? 30k ? £100k?!

Is there an official guide to such definitions somewhere? I wouldn't ask my friends or family a personal question such as their salary, so the idea of what is good isn't one I have really considered.

£75,000 in the north (assuming that both in a couple earn that each) and £120,000 each in London for a GOOD salary.

Whilst far from loaded we rarely think about money. That tells me we are on good salaries

No I don't agree earning £240,000 a year is the minimum definition of a good salary, even for London! Are you saying anything less than that is poor to average?

Depends what the job is too. DH has a 'good' salary but because of the nature of the job he needs a supportive/SAHP. He works very long hours, is never expected to take any time off, cannot cover any sickness of dc, works on holidays, does no house chores etc. This means most (all the ones i know of) people who do his job have a SAHP or are single or childless.

On another thread someone said they thought anything over 75k would mean dc in private schools, expensive holidays and gifts of new cars, but we have a secondhand ford, a week at Eurocamp and a long weekend at a caravan park each year, DH has no pension, i shop in Lidl and we still go 1-2k over each month.

Im not pleading poverty. I know we are very lucky. But it doesn't afford yachts and champagne. We can't just spend willy nilly like some think.

Sorry JenniferYellowHat, it was never my intention to upset anyone. This wasn't really a what do you earn, more a what do you think?

I always thought earning your age was a good salary, so nice to hear someone else uses that marker!

Similarly thanks to the PP who linked to that £11k net thread, really interesting!

I consider my salary to be "good" for what I do, but looking at some of this I think
"Wow, I'm behind the times!"

For the record, I earn £48k plus car- new Merc, can't remember what model! It's silver lol - and pension blah blah blah,

I can do drop offs at pre school probably two times a week, the occasional pick up, if I'm working locally I'm out the house 8.30-4.30pm, if I'm away then I'm 300 odd miles
Away and obviously spend a lot of nights in hotels.

Husband works part time and brings in around £750 a month. He's on minimum wage I think. He stays at home with our 2yr old.

I'm 28. He's a little older than me.

I think the point about location was pertinent; we live rurally in east anglia. My money goes further here than it did when we lived in the Home Counties.

The difficulty is, money goes further out here but the jobs don't pay as well!

I can't really imagine earning £80k. Ever. Let alone £120k. Well done to all of you who have grafted to that.

Totally variable.

I'd say in my field £35k up is a good salary. My DH would turn up his nose at that straight out, and reckons anything below £50k is below him. My DSis starts negotiations in six figures.

We are all respectable professional types. And we all live pretty good lives - she is the sole bread winner in her household and earns about £30k pa more than our combined household income, but she lives in the south east and we live in Scotland so I'd say we probably live a slightly more comfortable life than her as our expenses are much lower.

I guess a good salary is when you have enough to cover the basics for you, have a bit of fun money and a bit for savings/security.

I don't know anyone in the North that earns or would need to earn 150k between them lala and I live in probably one of the most expensive parts of the North, all my friends are in good jobs (uni educated, professional jobs but not 6 salary bankers) and have good lifestyles, holidays, eating out, not worrying about money. I'd say most of us are on 65-110k per couple and enjoy nice lives. With 150k we'd be be spoiled for choice.

It is subjective but I agree with PP who said anyone paying higher tax is a good salary. Yes it may be simplistic but as it applies to the minority, it does make it a good salary for the vast majority of people. I accept it won't go far in London but most people out of SE would be fairly comfortable on 40 ish k I imagine unless they had ridiculous outgoings.

I think to earn 60k plus in the north you would have to work harder and commute longer. All of the northerners I know who earn 60k plus commute stupidly long distances to London & have to pay travel costs as much as their mortgages.

Depends on the industry, age and location.

For my industry (I'm freelance so have to guestimate colleague salaries) I suspect I'm probably a relatively high earner.

A "good" salary for me in terms of what I'd like, living in Central Scotland, would be over £60k pa.

But that's never gonna happen.

Are here (Home Counties) I would start saying it was 'good' at ~45k I reckon?

I think Scotland's more realistic than northern england tbh for some industries. In banking we often can't find people with the right skillset in Aberdeen for example so have to import Londoners in - that drives up salary across the board.

I think you'd be wrong in that assumption Astoria, we live in the North, DH earns six figures, pops home for lunch most days, picks DS up from school, and gets back at about 3.45 each day.

That may not be typical, but it is possible!

(And I know plenty of people in the north of England that earn 60k+).

YY Hairy. Im in Leeds and several of my colleagues earn £60-70k for what is effectively my job plus management responsiblities and they all live less than 5 miles from work, work around 40 hours a week and rarely have to go anywher near London. Most of them were born here as well, we haven't had to 'import' anybody.

BIL was doing great here in banking until they moved his job to London

The average man in England earns £32,000 so I'd say anything upwards of £35,000 is a good salary. In deprived areas, you'd probably say that anything over £25,000 was a good salary and in prosperous areas, anything over £45,000.

As others have said, Mumsnet is populated mainly by those who are more afluent and living in the South East so I'd say that anything over £50,000 would be classed as a good salary. Anything over £100,000 would be a great salary.

Of course, it then depends on whether the poster means salary alone or 'package' as quite often, package can double or trebble salary.

It really depends on lots of things like others have said

• age
• qualifications
• where you live
• family responsibilities
• outgoings

Personally I would class £40k+ as a 'good salary', £80k+ as 'very good'

Indeed Barbara, my bro is in Leeds and earns about 90k, a bit of international travel but no need to stray south of Watford.

It's grim up north though, so I would advise people to stay away.

After reading the title I decided about £15-16k was good. Means you earn too much for working tax credits, free prescriptions, 2 year old funding etc.

Although after reading other people's responses I realise I have very low expectations!

I'm in the north east and it appears generally wages are lower. People seem to think 25+ is good for the area.

My aim was always to earn over 30,000 by the time I was 30. I succeeded!

As long as my bills are paid and we are happy, healthy and enjoy our time off (nice meals/activities/holidays abroad) I'm content with our earnings.

Exactly Hairy. I'm always in two minds on these sorts of threads.

I want to challenge the blatant untruths that 'it's grim up north' no-one earns much more than NMW, there are no jobs, culture, interesting restaurants, anything worth seeing or doing, etc etc .

But if we keep saying how great it is living in northern England with access to cities for culture, coasts, countryside, that there are proper jobs with proper money that allow average working people to buy whole actual houses with, then they’ll all want to live here and it’ll become just as overcrowded and overpriced as southern England.

So on balance, I think I’m quite happy for the ‘it’s grim up north’ myth to continue .

... and then there are 'expenses' and operating allowances which can add a hefty lump to your take home pay each month as they are tax free.

I would say in the North West £35k plus would be seen as a good salary.

I've always used the earn your age marker as well.
I hit that at 30 and currently over. I'm at the top of my pay scale now though so when I'm 46 I'll be in age/salary deficit

Interestingly most retired clients i look after live very comfortably on around £10,000 pa each or £16-20k of single. Having no debt, no travel costs, no expensive lunches, free bus passes and no great desire to have flash cars and phones etc means they do very well on less than the equivalent of the minimum wage.

We are on a 'good salary'.
I am able to work part time, we have a nice house with a low mortgage in London (more to do with our position on the property ladder than salary though), we have food on the table, clothes on our backs and go on about 3 holidays abroad each year.
We are careful (Lidl for food, mindful of utilities, always get cheapest flights no matter how shit they are (Kuwait Air, I mean you!) and could definitely live more luxuriously, but we prefer to save a few hundred pounds a month.
If our salary dropped 25-30% I felt this would put us in another 'bracket'.