To think you're not poor...

[RunningjustasfastasIcan99]

AIBU to think you're not poor if you can afford SKY TV? Felt a bit irritated that on "rich house poor house" this week the "poor" family had massive Tv's in the kids bedrooms and sky tv. I know they didn't have a ton of money and were in the bottom 10 %. But really?

ohreally reread what you've quoted...

I have a 50in tv that is 6 yr old I just bought it for £ 50 from a neighbour and I have a sky package as we are a low income family. What we don't do is smoke, drink, and go out to restaurants. We cook everything from scratch at home, and I have 100's of story books for the kids. No other luxuries only essential things the kids need. If they want things they save for it out of their chore money.

@Gilead if they were poor then they'd have freeview and the cheapest broadband package they could find. I'm not saying poor people can't have entertainment but what I am saying is Sky is certainly not the cheapest available and therefore if people can afford that monthly expense, they're obviously not poor. Maybe not very well off, but certainly not poor because poor people cannot afford unnecessary expenses like Sky if they can't afford other basic necessities

I was raised by my low income grandparents (council house, combination of 'minimum wage' employment & benefits). Like many Irish people of their generation they paid a bit extra to have a wider choice of channels, because TV was literally their only entertainment. They never went out in the evening, never ate out, never went on holiday, did not own a car, nothing.

Ha! slutty took me ages to see that....yeah, got it now!

They should be budgeting for essentials only if they consider themselves poor

Have you seen the threads on MN where people consider themselves poor?
They are usually titled things like 'AIBU to think its wrong that we are struggling on £150k?'
They get lots of support.

But woe betide anyone who is surviving on benefits if they have a grumble.

Then its all 'how entitled!' and 'you should take in ironing' and 'meal plan and bake your own bread''

Fact is, well off people are allowed to moan that they don't have enough but people who don't have enough should STFU.

We pay about £60 for Sky, the price soon ramps up once you add cinema, sport, multiroom etc and that’s without the broadband which we get from BT

I'm £128 a month. Would definately change to now TV or something if I was low income.

We use our old Sky box for free view channels. It costs zero a month. I know plenty of poor people that do the same.

@TheFirstMrsDV Poor to me is people living on food from food-banks and people who can't afford to pay their water and electric bills and are struggling to keep a roof over their heads. If you can afford the monthly luxury expense of Sky then you obviously can afford food and clothes and bills...if not then you would just be bad at budgeting...hence in my eyes, those people aren't poor

I don't understand why anyone would pay for Sky now Freeview and Netflix exist

How are you all paying so much for sky? Honestly haggle with them and threaten to leave.

A lot of people have both

I work day in, day out with people in debt and it isn't Sky that breaks my heart, it's seeing people borrow more than they can afford to buy things they don't need on tick. Places like brighthouse are vultures. They suck you in and bleed you dry.

When I lived in Malaysia every tiny shack had a sky equivalent disk on it. Doesn’t mean they weren’t poor. Many people wasn’t £50 per month.

Earnt

Budget loans. That’s how. That’s how I afford nice things, we take out a budget loan and then pay it off and keep to what we need. I just got laminate done thanks to a budget loan, now my house will be cleaner for our disabled younger child who crawls and vomits.

Just because people have Sky TV it doesnt make them less poor
Sky are very difficult to get out of a contract,
My own son is having a struggle to pay for Sky since he was medically djscharged from work, but its his only entertainment as he cant go out
I hate this attitude, that the poor should be on starvation street before they are classed as being poor
Snobby attitude at its worst

@Alevel so basically they were poor but they had their priorities wrong

Why should we decode what their priorities should be. They were dressed well, clean, well fed due to the plentiful land and had scooters for transport.

That doesn't sound very poor to me then especially for a country like that

Poor to me is people living on food from food banks

Well that's a massive misconception. Most food banks require a referral note from a gp, social worker or charity and that is only granted if eligibility criteria are met. There's a very limited number of times a family can visit a food bank. It's regarded as an one off emergency stop gap for people in dire straits.

You can't just do your weekly shop there

That doesn't sound very poor to me then especially for a country like that

You have no clue. No clue at all.

Ok then. They were rolling in money on £50 a month obviously

How are they poor if they can feed themselves, pay their bills, clothe themselves, pay for Sky etc? They're just not well off- it doesn't make them poor