To think people on middle incomes are forgotten about?

[Squeezedout]

I am so upset tonight and just need to vent. I have always worked, as has my partner. We have 2 children who we could provide for until my industry pretty much collapsed and I had to find a less well paid job.

The cost of childcare and rent (south east) is absolutely crazy and I can’t keep up. I put in an application for universal credit that said we’d be entitled to a few hundred a month so have jumped through every single hoop, taken unpaid days off work to attend a job centre (the irony!)

Only to find out now (6 weeks after the initial claim) that we are entitled to roughly £4.50 a month.

On paper maybe we have decent salaries, combined with the rent and childcare we can’t even break even each month. I know we are not alone.

It seems in this country that if you are the poorest of society, you are helped (in terms of council properties with decent rent, council tax help, 2 year funding and everyday benefits as well as lots of media attention to the problem) to ensure you have enough to live on. If you’re the richest in society, you obviously don’t need help but the squeezed middle are just completely forgotten about.

I am NOT benefit bashing at all but It really doesn’t pay to work sometimes. I’ve calculated how much better off I’d be as a single mum not working in a council house and tbh I cannot keep taking out loans and am starting to think this is the only option to keep my kids fed.

AIBU to think the ‘squeezed middle’ are completely forgotten about in this country? And that it is fucked up that I can’t feed my kids on an average wage?

@Kazzyhoward a perfect example, I myself work in a Chartered accountancy practice in the North East. We are a small local firm Yes, my point being that granted these jobs are lower paid here than they would be elsewhere - but every employee/partner has a house with garden, work within a 20 minute commute, our standard hours are 9-5 and even partners hardly work outside of those hours, it is not a crazy pressurised environment which I imagine those you describe are. Yes I could earn 3-4 times as much in London, but the work life balance for me means so much more than money in the bank.

I really only asked as i see so many threads on MN which discuss the jobs which are only London based - and have always wondered what jobs those are.

We live in Yorkshire. DH and I both earn around the 30k mark. We have a mortgage on a detached 3 bed house that we bought for 220k not too long ago. We pay childcare and we still get to go on 2 holidays a year. The problem isn't middle incomes, it's where you chose to live

I'm not saying "just up and move", it's not as simple as that. But it seems most of your problems come from the added inflation from living in the SE. I've seen a previous post from someone who lives NE who can afford the same as my family with less income.

SIL lives in Manchester with her family. A lot of big businesses are moving to Manchester to save money. However, the problem is now the city is in its own little bubble too. SIL paid £280k for a terraced 2 up 2 down, and her cost of living is higher than ours too. She earns more money but her standard of living isn't higher and she has around the same disposable income as us, despite her and her DH earning a considerable amount more money.

I think it more a location issue and the ridiculous cost of living in certain areas of the country, with nothing being done about it, rather than a generalised middle income issue

Forgot to add, MIL is a partner at a solicitors firm in the NE. She was thinking about relocating to London for double the money. She chose not to. Instead she bought a 5 bed detached house surrounded by fields, takes 3 holidays a year and regularly goes on trips to the Lake District. She also has enough money left over to entirely renovate her house, buy 2 brand new cars and still be able to eat out/go for drinks/shopping as she pleases. Never in a billion years could she have done all this if she lived in London.

Her house is beautiful too. 500k in the NE, millions in London/SE

Two teachers crying poverty? Christ I’ve head it all now.

Everything in life is a choice.

Where you work, where you live, when you have kids, if you have kids.

None of these decisions should be determined by whether you will get a handout.

State help is there for people who really need it for me and there are plenty of those.

It’s just been abused over the years and we are we are where we are.

Kit Kat- I totally get your point about how hard it is when you’re in a two working parent family and you realise you’re no better off than if you weren’t working and claiming benefits. But you need to remember that once the kids grow up, there’s very little in the way of benefits and you won’t have an occupational pension either if you haven’t worked much. So in the grand scheme of things it’s far better to be taking the early ‘hit’ for the sake of the longer term

I do know how you feel though.... we have 3 kids and lived through the era of astronomical mortgage interest rates, 3 x childcare (this was before the free hours too) and there was many a month when we lived in fear of repossession. Then it gets easier when the kids start school and childcare costs decrease (again, the advantage of staying in work is that you feel the benefit, whereas if you don’t go back to work until the kids are in school then even wraparound care comes as a shock.)
I won’t lie.... the years when the kids are in uni get tough again, specially with more than one there. If I was divorced and not earning, or just working part time, my kids would have got full maintenance loans. As it was they didn’t get enough to even cover their rent. Very unfair system
BUT the big advantage is that once they get through this you are SO much better off and you really get the benefit of having remained in work, gone up the pay scales and accrued a good pension pot (and of course kids like ours don’t have such a huge student loan to repay because they never got as much in the first place!)

I think one of the big scandals about the benefit trap is that a lot of people have no idea how vulnerable they’re going to be later on when their kids grow up

The other thing I did was move away from the South east early on. A lot of my family still live in the London area but I knew I’d never be able to afford to live comfortably there so never returned there after university. Change is always possible (and I agree with pp that too many people are afraid of it, and insist on remaining in their area of birth even if they can’t afford it) but it does get harder to move the older your children get. I guess that if you don’t move before you have kids, and maybe even start relying on family for childcare, then the kids start school.... it just becomes harder to make that change.

maybe its time you looked at your outgoings , especially if you are taking out loans to 'survive'
I think the problem is peoples expectations are too high ,its all very well saying there should be more financial help , but where do you think this will come from ? Taxes would have to be raised and we will all be back in the same boat
We struggled when our children were young , our mortgage at one time was at 16% ( admittedly houses were cheaper )
My parents couldnt afford to buy a house or run a car , the only holidays we had were visiting our grandparents and we only did that a couple of times . My mum only had 2 dresses , 1 to wear 1 to wash

There are people who are genuinely poor , but how many of you have sky , have mobile phones , run 2 cars a wardrobe full of clothes and spend too much on food

OP you need to get over to money saving expert

@BigVern1

I'm a teacher and I must admit I was surprised at those posts too. Whilst I think we are underpaid for what we do, we earn a decent amount with a pay rise most years. The pension is cushy too. I think I get around 9% pension currently.

I used to work in an office on the same salary for 5 years with not a single pay rise and a 3% pension scheme. I'm definitely better off. Plus no childcare payments during the holidays which saves a huge amount of money

Dh and I moved from the SE to Yorkshire (many years ago now) leaving family and friends behind so we could buy a house/start a family. 20 years later and our families have relocated here too. I know lots of people who made that choice

The benefits system can't be a universal panacea for most of society or be used to prop up the I sanity of London's housing market.

insanity

YANBU OP. I'm not struggling, but I don't have children, and I but I made a choice to leave my salaried because job and set up my own business because I felt the rewards weren't there. Its a decision that has proved correct. DH has a salaried job and his salary has gone up a total of 8k in the past 11 years, despite him working in a supposedly skills shortage area of engineering.

We moved to cheaper area to get more house for our money, but he has a dreadful 1 hour 20 minutes commute each day. His employer is located in the middle of a big city but the transport links are awful so it would take him 3 hours plus by public transport. His employer does provide workplace parking free of charge, but the Scottish Government has just announced it is going to tax that soon.

None of his expenses are tax deductible, unlike mine, because I have a ltd company. It costs him a fortune for the privilege of going to work.

David Blanchflower, former economist at the Bank of England has written what looks to be an interesting book, 'Not Working. Where Have All the Good Jobs Gone? Just out.

Excert from the summary - 'Blanchflower shows how many workers are under-employed or have simply given up trying to find a well-paying job, how wage growth has not returned to pre-recession levels despite rosy employment indicators, and how general prosperity has not returned since the crash of 2008. Standard economic measures are often blind to these forgotten workers.'

Its true though. You used to be able, if you were reasonably bright and motivated, to go to university and qualify in a professional field and then look forward to a very good standard of living and reasonable job security. Now, people are faced with massive fees and not greatly enhanced jobs at the end of it. Another of my bugbears is lack of respect in the UK for professional qualifications - there are too many jobs requiring none or almost none which are ridiculously well paid in comparison to their professional counterparts. Even in my field [law], outwith London, its often considered a detriment to have a Masters degree, which is just crazy.

I'm going to disagree slightly with the OP. There are a lot of people on middle incomes who are doing fine. It seems to be mostly those on middle incomes with young children who live in the SE for whom life is difficult. I think that's an important distinction.

For years my DH & I lived on 2 PhD stipends (13k each) and were doing fine. My parents do fine on one middle income. PiLs are doing fine on two middle incomes, but that's because all our housing costs are manageable and none of us (currently) have kids that need child care. I don't think a general tax cut is the answer as there'd be too many people -like myself- who'd benefit without really needing it. Instead, we need targeted action to address the cost of housing & childcare.

Optimisticpayrise - I’m a teacher too, and although the pay isn’t stellar, if you work your way up to management positions then it’s not bad. And the pension is very good though boy do we pay shed loads into it! I’m intrigued by your assertion that you get pay rises every year though! Did the pay freeze completely pass you by?

So why arnt you all complaining about shitty wages instead of benefits for those who really need it?

Its like you're working yourselves into a mindet which means you will support those who cause these problems.

With the best will in the world Alaimo it's never going to be affordable or desirable for half the country's population to live in one small corner of it.

In fact when you look at the public sector pay freeze, followed by pay caps, while inversely payments into the pension scheme have rocketed, it’s absolute bollocks to claim that teachers’ pay has gone up... in real terms it’s gone down considerably over the last decade, in terms of what’s actually in your pocket in the context of the cost of living

I still wouldn’t complain though, because lots of people are worse off. And I’m a ‘long game’ player so feel far more comfortable taking the hits early in the knowledge I’ve got security later on

I think the worst thing must be to be getting older, more tired, possibly not great health and to suddenly realise the benefits are falling away, you maybe haven’t even paid full contributions for the (shitty) state pension and knowing you won’t qualify for it til almost 70 anyway.

I only read to page 2 but the comments of how lucky you are to have a regular wage even if 2 days after you're paid you're skint 🤨

That is no way to live FFS.

Dh and I are in a very fortunate position. Mortgage free and I contract when needed. My dsis has a 180 existence to me and it breaks my heart.

Why are people having to be thankful for just scrapping by?!

I don't know what the answer is, but surely being thankful for only being poor and not dirt poor is pretty fucked up.

As is those that recommend moving somewhere cheaper. Dh and I live somewhere cheap now after 10 years in London, because my family is here. Dh commutes a fair way into the city.

But no chance would i now move away from my support. I've done 10 years on my own and I'd never recommend it.

@shemakesmewaitonabedofnails disagree with this as a big four CA too.

Although, working in the big 4 means you're underpaid for your work and most likely undervalued too until you make partner. Only perk is I work from home a lot.

As a few others have said, I would not be struggling to live by staying in the South East. I appreciate this isn't an easy decision, but I wouldn't want to struggle long term and not feel like I was having a decent enough quality of life.

Having worked in Manchester for 15+ years, there are certainly a few cities in the UK that are much more affordable and offer a variety of professional roles. It sounds like your DH earns more money, could he research where good opportunties are in the UK.Depending on industry, I'd be looking at Manchester, Leeds, Birmingham, even Edinburgh where there are loads of head offices.

Depends on what your previous experience is, but I have personally found my commute is much shorter living up North too. This has allowed both my husband and I to drive to/from work in less than 30 mins. No family support, but seem to manage with a mix of after school club and flexing our working hours, working 4 days each.

As others have said, life feels very expensive before children start school, but then things do get easier after this point.

Why are people having to be grateful about just scraping by

Define "just scraping by"

A roof over your head, food on the table, clothes on your back, access to healthcare and education and some time off each week/ year sounds like success to me. What do you think the basics should be?

@BarbariansMum some of us work and struggle to put food on the table AND pay for our electric. It's often a choice between the 2. The kids get fed. But I often have ceral for dinner or just skip it.

Does that sound great to you?

And forget buy decent work clothes. Replacing uniform etc.

Its bloody impossible, to be able to provide everything the kids need.

Put it this way

This week is a good week. Because I have some petrol in the car, and £12 to last until Friday. Ds is staying with his dad until saturday. That's a good week for me. Fridge is almost empty. But only me to worry about. So, £12 is actually quite good.

Some are worse off than me.

Agreed it can be really hard. Can you cover short term until childcare costs reduce by working weekends or evenings on top. When we’ve had cash flow issues my partner took a weekend job doing viewings for an estate agent for example.

I agree.

I don’t think you’re saying that being on a middle income is the same as being poor but just that it’s assumed everything isn’t as difficult as it is.

I was talking about this with a friend as she is against FOM as she says it brings wages down. It might do in some areas but it goes both ways, I used FOM to move abroad, get a job and a flat as it was too expensive to stay where I was (south east).