To think that people are actually getting more ridiculous in their expectations??

[Youmadorwhat]

I mean ffs, 9.99 for Netflix per month Is justified because it’s entertainment but never mind the fact that you are in deficit every month🙄

Childcare, anything medical (including hospital car parks), education, school dinners and housing should all be subsidized substantially or FREE (and 24/7) I mean should the government not just collect the babies from the maternity ward and hand them back at 18!

I even saw a thread a while back where someone stated that all extra curricular activities should be subsidized for children 🙄

I know people are struggling I get that but the government CANNOT afford to prop up everyone!! Especially when a lot of people are actually at a tax deficit anyway!! Rant over!!

I got rid of my TV license and now only watch netflix. £5.99 per month for more than I could ever hope to watch seems quite reasonable. Agree that on top of Sky (whcih seems ludicrously expensive BTW) etc it sounds like a luxury. I don't get why people pay so much for it.

@Spiceupyourlife 🙌 I’m not even answering the other posts as they are mostly the entire attitude I can’t understand “it’s only €10” etc

@TwistedBiscuit both parents worked full time in quite good, though blue collar jobs. We lived in a 2 up 2 down terrace with an outside toilet and the bathroom converted into a bedroom. Nobody we knew owned a car so bused or walked everywhere. Lived there till 1986. Had they lived in a council house they would’ve had a much better standard of living. Perhaps in more affluent areas but not in many inner cities. Besides, the percentage of people owning houses now is the same as 30 years ago.

www.theguardian.com/society/2016/aug/02/home-ownership-in-england-at-lowest-level-in-30-years-as-housing-crisis-grows

Re the NHS, in sundry European countries inc. Sweden - popularly supposed to be a socialist Utopia - where healthcare is said to be better, people are expected to pay (albeit small amounts) for GP and A&E visits, the 'board' element of hospital stays, etc.

But every time any such thing is proposed here, there are howls of outrage all round.
The fact is, although 'free at the point of use' was all very well decades ago, medicine has moved on so much in terms of treatments, not to mention so many people living that much longer, that in its current form the NHS needs a lot more funding.
Which means either higher taxes, or the contribution method used elsewhere.

I actually think Netflix is a good value way for a low income family to have a decent amount of entertainment for only £10 per month / less than £2.50 per week. There isn’t much else you can get for that these days! Many people have that instead of a TV licence anyway (and it’s much the same annual cost). Yes, you need internet for it, but that’s a necessity really now anyway. As pp’s have said, dc are expected to use it for homework, jobseekers need it for benefit claims and job applications, and most employees receive eg rotas by email.

I'm not skint but money is tight. I keep Netflix because I don't have sky, don't drink, don't go out, don't go to the cinema/pub/meals out etc etc and there is literally nothing else I can cut back. So I keep Netflix because I'm home in the evenings and on my days off and it gives me some kind of entertainment
Luckily matched betting has made it easier!

What REALLY annoys the crap out of me is ALL of the parents complaining about the price of childcare- like it was some big mystery before they had kids
EVERYBODY knows the score - it’s expensive. So IF you CHOOSE to have a child then don’t act like somebody just jumped out in a balaclava and mugged you

aren't you a joy.

I don't think most people realise the cost of a FT nursery place before they conceive tbh. I didn't. I wish I had, though it wouldn't have changed my mind.

I think a lot of people count on family helping out, work being flexible and it doesn't work out for whatever reason and they find themselves shelling out a grand a month and obviously that's a struggle for average and low earners.

Ah “the poor shouldn’t have children” eh? There’s a word for that opinion

Of course there is enough money for everybody, it's how it's managed by Politicians who couldn't really give a shit about us, lets face it The billion given to the DUP as a back hander for support could have made a difference to the NHS, be it small.

Netflix is £5.99 per month

Employers should pay decent wages before they line their own pockets, and not expect the taxpayer to fund their wages bill.
Rant over.

This with bells on!

Re the NHS, in sundry European countries inc. Sweden - popularly supposed to be a socialist Utopia - where healthcare is said to be better, people are expected to pay (albeit small amounts) for GP and A&E visits, the 'board' element of hospital stays, etc.
But every time any such thing is proposed here, there are howls of outrage all round.

That is because Sweden doesn't have the poverty levels we have here: there is no reason to believe that any parent would be unable to take their child to the doctor because of the small charge or that someone would beg not to be taken to A & E after an accident.

In a country where people are dependent on foodbanks, levels of homelessness are rising, and people in employment cannot afford to rent a room, that is a very real risk.

Don't try to compare ourselves to Sweden until we can offer similar levels of security.

If the people who ‘can’t afford’ to have children stop having children who is going to wipe our arses when we live to 120 without control over our bodily functions?

Your child? Who you scrimped and saved for and made your own adult life more miserable that it needed to be. But that meant your child could go to Uni. If everyone followed that train of thought we’d end up with a country of highly qualified people but no one to pick up rubbish or wipe bums 🤷🏼‍♀️

Personally I believe the mark of a civilised country is when services that benefit the population as a whole - are run FOR THE GOOD of that population. Not for shareholder profit. NO ONE should be making financial gain out of water !!
Along with ;

Drs
Hospitals
Dentists
Associated healthcare - physio/
chiropodist , elderly care community and residential.
Electricity
Gas
Oil (for heating)
Telecommunications -internet
Public transport
Postal service.
All education from nursery to university.

Either free at point if need in case if a service or not for profit in case if a utility.

I'm sure there are more but that'll do for now. These should be state controlled, fully financed,
We could do this ten times over if we scrapped trident !

It's a complex issue. The majority of people at all income levels strive to live the best lifestyle they can within their means. There are also piss takers at all income levels, from millionaire MP's using tax pay money to pay for their duck houses and holidays etc to pensioners calling an ambulance because they have run out of paracetamol to benefit fraud and running up huge consumer debt.
At the end of the day easily available credit combined with a lack of proper structured support in helping people gain employment and skills is to blame at the lower income end of these entitled people, whereas selfishness and weak moral is the only explanation at the top end.

I think you're seeing only a tiny part of this incredibly big picture.

Indeed.

OP you've posted this from a position of huge privilege, clearly.

Did you know the majority of baby bank users have at least one parent in full time employment? And many who use food banks?

The system is broken. Babies shouldn't be a privilege for the rich.

It depends whether you regard ‘rich’ solely in terms of money. Not everyone does.

Some people are rich in love, or family, or friends. If you equate wealth with happiness, I don’t think you will be happy because you’ll always want more. I’m not suggesting the OP is equating it by the way, before anyone says that.

I also think that being in a position where you are seriously having to consider what to prioritise for spending, does not make for happiness either.

4.1 million children in the UK live in poverty. 72% of them from working families. But that'll be because their feckless parents are spending all their excellent living wage on Netflix and Sky and the like. How dare they expect subsidized child care or after school clubs. There are plenty free sticks and rusty nails to be played with outside.
FFS!

Bravo, HerSymphony! Snuffing out your neighbour's candle doesn't make yours shine any brighter.

I agree.

I had an interesting chat with my grandparents a while back; they’re both in their nineties. They both grew up dirt poor - my grandfather ate rotten potatoes for Christmas dinner one year, nothing the next, and collected coal from the railway line because they couldn’t afford to buy it.

Apparently despite how hard things were, they weren’t unhappy- because no one had very much, even those who were better off than they were. We have so much choice nowadays and so much of everything - loads of food, loads of fashion choices, loads of furniture, loads of toys, loads of entertainment options, loads of holidays to book and cars to buy... the list is endless. So when we’re surrounded by so much stuff and so much choice, it’s very easy to feel hard done by, and envious and angry that you can’t have any of it. Our grandparents didn’t have that problem.

Perhaps nowadays we focus more on the negative and on what we don’t have, where older generations were appreciative, even if they had very little to appreciate.

We need a government that is willing to invest in essential services. Education, social care, police, mental health provisions etc. More subsidies to enable parents to return to work, more social housing needed to enable people to save for retirement and to have extra insurance etc if they wish. Look at the state we're in at the moment, it's a disgrace.

Ah “the poor shouldn’t have children” eh? There’s a word for that opinion

because it's fair on kids to bring them in a world where you can't afford to pay for their childhood and expect to relay on charity to make ends meet or worst let them go without, when other people accept that they can't afford to have the big family they'd love because they can't afford it?

I don't think the word selfish covers it.

Most of the poverty experienced by people in the UK is deliberately created by the rich. It's the people who hold down wages as much as possible for ordinary workers while paying billions to CEOs. It's the MPs voting themselves tasty pay rises while insisting that public sector pay rises no more than 2% a year. It's the years of goverment asset-stripping that has gone on - more and more basic utilities (electricity, transport, education) being transferred into the hands of private equity companies and run to profit shareholders rather than provide the service they were built to provide. It's the handing vast sums of money to incompetent organisations that happen to be run by the pals of those in power.

more social housing needed to enable people to save for retirement

or maybe make people lose that mindset that they are entitled to housing they can't afford and that someone should cover the difference between their income and what they want, as opposed to need?

It's the people who hold down wages as much as possible

That is such a naive view. If you don't pay people enough, you don't get the right staff, it's a false economy to say the least.