To think that you can be content working in a poorly paid job

[GandolfBold]

Because BIL thinks you cant, and that I am kidding myself (work as a support worker on just above NMW which I love) if I think I am content.

He said that people may think they are happy, but they would be happier if they earned more money.

As a bit of a back story, all my family work minimum wage-ish jobs, and BIL is quite snobby about it.

I cant be the only one, can I?

Makes me think of American Beauty where, after Lester is made redundant, he applies for a burger-flipping job and says when he did it age 17 it's always been the best job he ever had.

It depends on your lifestyle, good friends of ours live very frugally in a bell tent in rural Spain. They only work in the summer months, as waiting staff, and earn enough to mean they don't need to work the other times in the year. They are happy however their only real expenditures are food and fuel. It wouldn't be for me, i'm too materialistic and, as a result, need the wage i'm on and then some

Before I became a sahm I was a chef and earning a pittance. I was pretty skint but I bloody loved it. I have a real passion for cooking and I miss it quite a bit but plan to go back once ds is in school full time.

So yes, you can definitely be happy in a low paying job.

I don't really have fallback as such. I don't take money off my kids - they grew up with me as a single parent and we didn't have enough money; it's driven them to be successful and in mostly high-earning jobs. They deserve it.

I work in a supermarket, on NMW but have another self employed job which earns me a variable income. Some years it's very very little (like last year's 9k) sometimes I earn up to 12k. The supermarket job allows me time to do my (creative) self employed job which I love. I have a low rent, keep my other bills low (hence no heating), eat orange stickered food I buy from the supermarket at the end of my shift and live very rurally, so I have a beautiful environment. I have a friend who works at an auction house, so I can get a very cheap replacement fridge or washing machine if I need one. Only thing I sweat about is my car, if that breaks down I am having to use my credit card to sort it!

Bluntness

We have never received that amount of money/ equivalent, even when we had 3 dependant dc.
Maybe that included other benefits?
The only time tc equated to a wage for us was when I worked 8 hours for dh as his book keeper, before this it was a small amount which meant that with our low outgoings we could afford a sahp.
That's different than assuming tc will pay a wage for a parent to sah.

I am on NMW but as a single parent do get tax credits.

I have always worked in NMW jobs even before I had DS. My favourite job by far was working as a bartender and I would do it again if the hours weren't so family unfriendly.

Obviously the only worry is having enough money for a pension, but I will inherit money and property by that time. I won't have enough for a lavish lifestyle when I'm older but I'll survive.

gilly: blueshoes why? I don't understand why a lot of money is important. If you can meet your basic living costs how does this impact on ability to raise children? I'm not saying you are wrong btw, it's each to their own.

Money makes a massive difference to the ability to raise children by giving options: Private education, universities (graduating without debt), sports, holidays, hobbies, private medical care, deposits for first home, wedding.

The bank of mum and dad features more and more in the quality of their dcs lives, including allowing them to downsize to nmw jobs, if they wanted.

Money makes it possible for dcs to move in one direction (i.e. down). Moving up is increasingly not so easy without parental financial support.

By choosing nmw jobs, the dcs' options are more limited. Of course, a bright hardworking child has the potential do well anywhere. But the reality is the disparity in incomes makes that harder and harder and social mobility is suffering as a result. It is an incredibly unbalanced situation - this is a concern for me. The jobs situation in the face of technological advance and automation is creating polarisation towards the opposite sides of the spectrum. I fear that those in the lower end of the spectrum (trump supporters?) might find themselves increasingly trapped.

Anyway, I digress.

Well, all these tax credits won't just materialise by themselves, so off to work now.
Will return later tonight, very interesting thread.

Depends if you are on the breadline or not. If you have family money that allowed you to get in the property market, got a property in a low cost area, a low number of kids, a husband that earns a good wage, a nice inheritance to prop you up in retirement etc etc then a low paying job probably isn’t a big deal.

It is definitely possible to have job satisfaction and enjoyment from a low paid job

Personally I wouldn't have but then I'm materialistic

Both dh and I work nmw jobs. Dd is 10. I work 6am to 2pm, dh 2pm to 10pm. Never needed or paid for childcare. Not entitled to tax credits.

I clock on, work, clock off. Don't work weekends.

Not always happy in my work (is anyone?) But guess content would cover it.

It is definitely possible to have job satisfaction and enjoyment from a low paid job

I agree. The point is when you remove all safety nets and subsidies, then there a very few people like zaphod in existence. Because the fact your basic needs aren't being met causes resentment, you're working but can't afford to heat your home or are hungry for example.

For most, it's easier to enjoy it and get satisfaction if you are also getting financial support from elsewhere.

DH and I both do low paid jobs but don't claim any tax credits only child benefits. Neither of us like our jobs we just go in every day do what we need to then come home and forget about it. We are content though, as long as we can pay the bills, have a few treats and a liitle holiday once a year we are happily tootling along.

Work out pt nmw job and add on tc and cb it nowhere near equates to that sort of salary, it's a small top up not another wage.
This is where people go wrong, they believe that a low wage with a top up equates to a much higher wage and it doesn't, nor should it.

Well no, actually sometimes it does. If you have enough kids, 3 or more. I've done loads of legal aid assessments so I see what people have coming in. It's certainly possible to receive only a sliver of tax credits. It's also possible to receive nearly as much as your wages, or more.

Maximum child element is £2780 p/a per child (more if your child is disabled but let's leave that out of it for now). If you have 3 children, that's £695 per month and if you have 4 it's £926. For now anyway. 24 hours a week on NMW is £780. You'd also get working tax credits at this level of income and hours.

This includes families with a SAHP, though it's true that sometimes two earner families get much bigger awards because of childcare costs. If you earn 20k with a SAHP and no childcare costs, you'll get less than a couple earning 2 x 10k with some childcare costs. I don't know why your household got more when you put down that you were working gilly but iirc your circumstances are atypical anyway: weren't there things like dividends and pension payments involved?

But anyway, the salient point is that if a poster came on saying she and her partner and 3 kids felt content with one of them doing 24 hours a week at NMW, I'd believe her, but a large part of the reason for that is that their earnings would be a minority of the household income and thus they wouldn't be having to live on them. This isn't bashing either- the people responsible for this situation are not NMW earners.

Or if you want a non-benefits example (except we do get CB) I don't earn much more than someone who works FT NMW. I'm financially comfortable too. Because I'm in a two income household and I do less than half the hours of the FT NMW person. If I were to post saying how easy I find my life earning 16k and then subsequently revealed my hours and second earner status, I'd rightly be told that my situation isn't remotely comparable.

Blueshoes

I suppose if that's what you choose to do for your dc then you will need a lot of money.
Mine were basically on their own when they left school, they had to stand on their own two feet.
Fees were only a third of what they are now though when ds1 went to uni.

beetle
We could take a dividend out of the business if we wanted to, but it wouldn't do the business too well as the surplus is needed for business purposes. so not really an option to date, but maybe in the future.

We have a property, but it doesn't provide any income it's there for our pension as we don't have one being self employed/ business owner.

Well, enjoyed my time at work today, it goes pretty quickly, my colleagues are a good laugh, and it's not hard work in my case.
Any problems you pass to somebody else and have no responsibility at all. This works well for me.

Gilly I think you've sort of proved the point I was trying to make. When you said 'we raised a family on one minimum wage' what you actually meant was 'one minimum wage...plus tax credits....plus we owned our home....plus another home for retirement. ....plus a business we could draw from if push came to shove'. Obviously Zaphod has disproved my point! I still think most people wouldn't be content on nmw without some other/previous source of income though.

I do live in a very beautiful rural place though, so can enjoy my time walking outside or looking at the view - plus there's not much to do unless you drive 35 miles to nearest city. Perhaps it's harder in the city to live on very very little?

Plus my self-employed creative job is very satisfying (and quite high profile amid my peers), so I get a lot of enjoyment from that. Don't use me as a benchmark for 'being happy on NMW', my circumstances are quite unusual and I spent a long time bringing up my children on next to nothing and being very unhappy!

Zaphod you are an example though. And pretty much the only one on here who is currently doing it alone with no support and being happy.

I think thr ops brother has a point, but he's not made it well.

People can be content in low paid jobs, but they are few and far between if no one else is helping pay for their living costs.

The reality is people are more likely to be happy in low paid jobs when they have someone or something else paying their bills, be it the state, a partner or a parent.

I'd have to assume that very, very few people are content in low paid jobs when they have absolutely no other means of financial support and have to live entirely off their wages.

So yes, the brother in law has a point. Albeit one not expressed well.

I don't enjoy my low paid job as I work harder than colleagues who earn much more than me. I'm on my own at the bottom of the pile which I suppose colours my view. I never intended to stay in it forever though and will be retraining soon.

Studies have shown that people in low paid jobs can end up more stressed than people in higher paid jobs as they have less control over their work day. I imagine these would be zero hours employees, call centre workers or factory workers who cannot dictate their hours or work conditions. They may have less responsibility but also less control.

Not all low paid nmw jobs are cushy numbers in friendly work environments, particularly to Bluntness' point if there are bills that depend on that job to be paid. And as Jennifer observes, these people don't necessarily work less hard than higher paid workers.

I’m also slightly resent the implication that lower paid = less stress, you don’t take your work home with you, and you get to lead a blissfully simple modest life free from the stresses of a high pressure job.

I earn just over £20k a year in London and my job is far from stress free. I am contactable by email pretty much 24/7, I think about work a hefty amount of the time when I’m not at work, and I have to do some incredibly high-pressure stuff a lot of the time too.

My job is definitely a ‘vocational’ one where people always say they’d do it even if they didn’t get paid, and I love it, but that doesn’t mean it isn’t bloody hard work.

blueshoes

I have found the people I work with are usually there as a stop gap/ students, or parents working at opposite to each other, so no childcare, or older and just wanting pt work before they retire.
The lack of responsibility is a big draw, the conditions are quite good and they are quite flexible in many ways.
You can't choose your hours though.
There's never any problem with taking holidays, you can ask the night before if you want.
There's no restrictions or first in with summer holidays, you can take them when you want.
There's quite a big shutdown for Christmas too.
There's a high turnover of staff though as the hours don't suit people long term.
I know that's just one example though.

In dubious.

Not exactly, as you can imagine lots of things change in 30 years, they were examples of various situations over the years, but I see your point.

When our last dependant leaves home, we will still be living the same, there will be no surge for me to become a full time worker, I'm hoping to work pt for my favourite charity when the time comes.
It will certainly be low wage though as wouldn't want any responsibility.

So long as you are not worried about money / can cover costs . .. then yes absolutely .
I have left a very stressful
Professional job for a minimum wage job and can honestly say it's changed my life .
I just had to adapt to other people's perception of me as I was used to being treated with a certain status and now am not and some people make assumptions - but that's not an issue now at all to me as I just love the job .

I cant be the only one, can I?

No. I'm also a support worker and don't earn very much but I would never want to do anything else. It's not just a case of enjoying my job, I feel it is the place I belong and a huge part of who I am. I am quite lucky though (extraordinarily so in the current climate) to have an ancient excellent contract and good managers (for the most part) so my working conditions and my work life balance are exactly as I like them.

I've been pushed towards promotion on more than one occasion and have the qualifications and skills to earn more in this or other fields, but that would mean not doing my job, and I just cannot bring myself to do that.

Thankfully I'm a bit of a "The Good Life" type and enjoy the simple things in life. I don't believe I'd have any sort of lasting happiness from earning and spending more money. For the most part it really only brings fleeting gratification. In my life I've had lots more and lots less and by and large my happiness was not correlated to how much money I had.

If you're paid enough to live (food/housing/heating) then I think that's the threshold.

There's no need to earn more than you need.