To feel depressed that I’ve never and probably will never earn the National Average wage?

[Summerandgin]

As title.

I saw that the national average wage in the UK is £28,000. I have never and probably will never earn £28,000. The highest I’ve earnt is £25,000.

I can understand in London and surrounding areas for this to be an achievable wage, but it is a depressing thought that where I am in the country, I would say the average would be about 21-22k and only really professionals earn the national average +.

AIBU to be depressed about this? And to wonder what sort of job I’d have to do to earn that? I am fairly well educated with good GCSE’s , A-Levels and a Degree but my degree is worthless and I bitterly regret doing the subject I did (in fact I regret doing a degree at all) All I’ve ever ended up doing after graduating are essentially mid level admin roles.

Do YOU earn the national average? And if so, where abouts in the country are you?

I had good gcse results, all passed but no A or A* messed around during a levels and decided to go travelling, always had a part time job in catering/hospitality used that abroad, came home, moved to London and worked my way up in the restaurant industry by the time I went on maternity with bonus I was earning £55k that was 10 years ago.

Yeah, over three times, I'm 29, based in London, work in corporate comms.

But does that matter? Who cares what other people earn, really. Do you have enough for you?

I earn 9k a year and DH earns 16k
I have disabilities that effect me a lot so part time is all I can manage
DH has a degree, a masters and a PGCE and used to be a teacher on 27k.

He had a huge breakdown and was miserable, he could work for 2 years, now he has a job that he can forget when he walks out the door and I have my husband back. It's more then worth losing 11k a year for that. Yep we will never have really expensive holidays but that's all we have suffered really. DS wants for nothing and we do what we want to do and are very happy

@Cherrycokewinning

I don’t understand why you wouldn’t be able to progress within a company? What do you do?

Could be a very small company. I work for a small charity, no promotions to be had with my job, I could of course apply for other jobs of someone left but they're really not jobs that I want to do or that I think I'd be good at.

My PT salary is above the national FT average by quite a way, which means my FTE is pretty far above too.

I'm in public sector, degree educated, have a professional qualification in the field I work in. I'm considered a technical specialist.

Our T&C are so good (especially leave wise) that if I went elsewhere for the same salary it would effectively be a pay cut because I'd lose a chunk of leave. Also the pay grade above me starts at less than my FTE so I'm kind of stuck there! Good job I like it!

I know several people who have retrained or changed careers

However, they have investigated the job role and trained with 1000% committment
So if you want to succeed you have to put the effort in and then be lucky to get the job

Want more money ? I know several people who work more than one job

The other thing to consider is to work to pay your bills. But spend your free time doing something that you really enjoy
So you need to think about your work/life balance

In my experience there are two sorts of people
One that moans and does nothing about making any changes to their life
Second who makes an effort and changes their life

What sort of person are you ?

OP if you're interested in marketing then look at CIM - they do training you could definitely fit around a full time job. I did one of their courses as work paid for it. There are lots of different modules and they are a good training provider and a well recognised qualification.

I'm in the north and now earn over £30k in marketing with only a one year course in that area. My degree is fairly useless and I did crap at A Levels. I worked up to marketing from admin/customer service roles.

How old are you OP?

I don’t earn that. First baby due may and when I go back to work in August I will be part time therefore earning even less.
Frankly though, I don’t care.

I don’t understand why you wouldn’t be able to progress within a company? What do you do?
In one of the companies I work for, several of us are grossly over qualified for what we do
and thus significantly underpaid
BUT
the roles are very flexible part time and so long as we get the job done, the boss does not care when or where we work
which suits each of us fine to fit with our different family situations.

Climbing the greasy pole is not an option or choice for everybody

“In my experience there are two sorts of people
One that moans and does nothing about making any changes to their life
Second who makes an effort and changes their life

What sort of person are you ?”

I don’t know, there is a third type- a few have been posted about on here- people who do all sorts of qualification and training with no real clue how to apply it in real life.

Mirime I totally understand that but we’re talking about the OP, who does appear to want to change things

Talkinpeace- again, totally understand that. Not what OP was talking about though

I’m 23, 3 years into my career and on 34k, so well over the average. I’m on my own, and I don’t struggle, I have luxuries but I’m not ‘comfortable’. This week before payday is a tins and freezer week. I can’t save much (if at all). I live in the Home Counties and commute into outer London in a Keyworker role.
I don’t think the salary means anything when there’s such disparity in the north and south. I have friends on £25k (same job!) in Birmingham and Nottingham with mortgages, more luxuries than I and savings and I’m almost sick with envy. They’re almost certainly jealous when they hear now much I earn. Grass is always greener.

Some jobs (not all) pay more if you work shifts or unsocial hours eg rolling shift\days\nights

In my experience technical roles, pay more than admin roles

If you work for a large company there are usually ways to progress and they may pay for courses & exams.

Also, some people I know have managed to get good pay increases by changing the company that they work for every 2 or 3 years

You could start your own business too

My DD left school with no qualifications whatsoever having battled a life threatening illness throughout most of her childhood. She got admin work, took every opportunity to gain experience and moved into an HR admin role. She's now working through her CIPD qualifications in her own time whilst working as an HR officer earning around £35k. We are not in a high pay area. When she gets her next level she'll be able to start looking at more senior roles and her earning potential will increase dramatically. She's had a massive health setback this past 6 months related to her childhood illness, and she's not allowed to drive at the moment, but she's sorted out her options for getting into work, built her hours back up after being off sick and hospitalised for months, and she's refused to defer her studies. It was important to her, so she worked out what she had to do to get where she wanted to be.

There are probably a few jobs you could try with paid training. How about police training or paramedic training? I'm not sure how much they pay but must be fairly quickly up to £28,000 I would guess. Downside I guess would be shift work. Or there is teaching - think they have some work and learn type schemes

The majority of people are probably earning around your salary in actual fact so don't feel too hard done by. The average will be pulled upwards to 25000 by a minority earning massive salaries.

Someone I went to school with was clever but dropped out and didn’t do a degree. He got a clerical job with the council as a teen and is now a manager with them on £40k in his early 30s.

No kids break though.

I was on £27k before the Financial crash then retrained and did a post grad and am now on a few k above nat ave but not HRT.

There is the potential to progress to six figures eventually.

You’ll need to volunteer/intern/ retrain if you want to up gear.

Or could you start your own business?

Still more than I have! I only ever event £16k!!

Or could you start your own business

Good way to make money.

A better way to lose money. Or not earn very much money at all. Self employed income can be very low.

I'm a teacher. I earn over that but once i get to upper pay scale 3, I'll be effectively capped as I refuse to take on any leadership roles.

I think a lot of posters here are telling us about they or someone they know who started off as an office girl or as an apprentice and worked their way up to management and now earn great money....IMO those days are gone...

I curretly earn nearly three times the national average in a very swanky office job which I get to wear designer suits to and I have a really lush desk which is solid mahogany and we go for after work drinks on a Friday and me and the girls drink cocktails.

My biggest dilemma at the moment is choosing where to go on our next cruise and whether or not to bring the full-time nanny. We also have a portfolio of properties that my husband oversees which really bumps up our income.

Oh no I just woke up! I've always earned minimum wage as a waitress and I'm currently a stay at home mother who couldn't afford to go back to work because I would earn less than the cost of childcare! We have a two-bed terrace house which is just about big enough for us and the baby and probably won't go on holiday for a few years yet!

Life is different for everyone, if you can pay the bills you're in a good position! But sometimes it can be depressing to think that you earn less than the average so I feel your pain, but overall nothing to get too down about. I've got a fab family and we love our life!!

A pool would be nice though, not gonna lie

gosh hollowtree, I was really hating you for a minute there

Both myself and dp earn over the average wage. We are in Yorkshire. Neither of us have any qualifications beyond GCSE level, although dp is cemap qualified. I'm self employed, he's a mortgage adviser.