Sorry, but £80k a year in London ^really is^ a large salary

[nickymanchester]

So I was just reading the "Unpopular Opinions" threads and I noticed more than one poster saying that £80k a year really isn't a lot of money in London or the SE.

What with being locked down again and not having much to do I thought I'd have a look at the actual figures as I had no idea which side of that argument is correct.

For full time workers who work in London, the median (average) pay is £39,500 (men £42,700, women £35,800).

If a person is earning £80k a year in London then they are on the 87th percentile. Although, if you're a woman that places you in the top 95%

(87th percentile means that you earn more than 87% of all people - ie you're in the top 13%).

Of course, areas of London are very different so I split London down as shown below.

The practical upshot is that, well, if you work in the City of London then I guess you could argue that £80k isn't necessarily a large salary.

You might even be able to get away with this if you work in Tower Hamlets. But elsewhere - not really.

.............................................75th.......Gender

Area......................Median...Prcnt......Pay Gap
City of London.....57,361....89,492....27.9%
Tower Hamlets.... 49,728....72,254....20.6%
Westminster.........43,597....64,038....15.7%
Southwark............41,948....59,816....11.4%
Camden................39,837....53,950....20.9%
Hammersmith......39,676....54,132....14.9%
Islington................39,312....59,587....8.1%
Lambeth...............37,866....55,458....15.3%
Hackney................36,748....46,540....9.4%
Waltham Forest....35,651....45,552....23.5%
Hillingdon.............35,183....52,390....5.5%
Lewisham.............34,913....46,608....-2.5%
Brent.....................34,866....48,064....8.5%
Hounslow.............34,809....50,528....5.2%
Richmond.............34,726....47,070....25.4%
Kensington...........34,445....47,242....4.4%
Croydon................34,086....45,146....18.8%
Havering...............33,821....46,249....-15.0%
Greenwich............33,181....45,427....6.0%
Kingston...............33,030....49,150....18.7%
Haringey...............32,812....44,840....-11.8%
Newham...............32,292....49,618....-1.8%
Sutton...................32,167....43,898....-2.4%
Wandsworth.........31,938....45,786....7.0%
Bromley................31,777....44,824....10.7%
Ealing....................31,418....45,001....-6.0%
Merton..................30,607....48,381....-11.0%
Barking.................30,482....39,988....13.5%
Redbridge.............30,306....45,157....-5.7%
Barnet...................30,092....47,362....9.3%
Enfield...................29,895....40,586....11.8%
Bexley....................28,174....39,614....11.3%
Harrow...................26,998....43,077....17.3%

And for comparison with people outside of London:-

London.................39,556....57,975
South East............31,647...44,704
Scotland...............30,820....41,855
East.......................29,895....41,449
North West...........29,099....40,820
West Midlands.....28,730....40,186
East Midlands......28,704....40,004
South West...........28,605....39,645
Yorkshire...............28,023....38,865
Wales....................27,966....38,392
Northern Ireland...27,487....37,903
North East............27,113....37,872

All figures are ONS latest 2020 figures extracted from NOMIS. Gender pay gap is for full time employees only.

Of course it is. And Tower Hamlets includes some of the most deprived areas in London, so even those figures don't show the full story.

I think people mean that 80k a year doesn’t necessarily go very far in London once they’ve paid their mortgage, paid for the bills and possibly private schools, etc.

I live in London. That is a large salary!

YANBU. Of course it’s a good salary. I live in London and live alone on half that salary. Also, people saying ‘you can’t afford school fees’, shut up. Private school is not a necessity and has absolutely no bearing on whether something is a large salary.

@Shoxfordian

I think people mean that 80k a year doesn’t necessarily go very far in London once they’ve paid their mortgage, paid for the bills and possibly private schools, etc.

Yeah, my salary is a pittance. Once I've spent thousands on luxuries like private schools, I have nothing left

It really is, but the usual "we're only rich compared to the poor, compared to the super rich we are in dire poverty so actually we aren;t well off at all" bollocks will be spouted all over this thread

Of course it’s a good salary. But lots of people on here like to sneer at those who earn less than 6 figures.

all namechangeforfriday Do you have kids?

I don’t have any kids so I don’t pay for private schools but some people do and they’re not cheap

Good salary yes. Large salary not really.

Yes, some people choose to pay for private school and have little left afterwards. That doesn’t mean it isn’t a good salary, it means they’re choosing to spend it in that way.

YANBU.
What sort of excuse is "it's not much after school fees"? They aren't a necessity, they're a luxury you can afford BECAUSE you have a large salary.

House prices in London are, for the most part, astronomical but if people are living on £40k, £30k and £20k in London, you can probably manage on £80k.

@Shoxfordian

I think people mean that 80k a year doesn’t necessarily go very far in London once they’ve paid their mortgage, paid for the bills and possibly private schools, etc.

paying for private schools IS going "very far"

for quite a lot of people the cost of private school is their entire salary to house, feed and clothe their family!

I agree, it is a large salary.

I have lived in London all my working life, will soon retire and have never earned more than half that amount. OK, a bit more before I got made redundant in my last job - will never get that much again.

However, if you are starting out now, it really doesn't go far in terms of housing. 4x a salary of £80k will buy you a one-bed flat. If that, depending on area. And most people buying their first flat are not on anything like £80k.

The figures comparing median salaries with other areas of the country - look at house prices, too.

Even though I was lucky enough to be able to buy my first flat (salary £9k, flat £36k) and get on the housing ladder in my v late 20s, and but a 3 bed semi in my 40s, with another salaried adult, I look at the endless posts about 'I would never buy a house without a drive for all our cars' 'I would never live in a terrace or semi, has to be detached' 'we need a big garden' 'store it in your garage' insisting on a 'naice' area - which means nowhere near social housing, apparently - and I LOL.

So, while £80k is a high salary in London, it does not bring the life of luxury that it would in other areas.

It's not a great salary in terms of London wages. 40% tax rate plus expensive housing doesn't leave you with much. I would say it is comparable to earning £40k in the Midlands.

Yes, which houses if any have people bought on this salary?

@Shoxfordian

I think people mean that 80k a year doesn’t necessarily go very far in London once they’ve paid their mortgage, paid for the bills and possibly private schools, etc.

Private school isn't a necessity, its a luxury. Saying 'my pay doesn't go far/cover the bills' means after paying for bills, housing (which even in London shouldn't swallow up 4.5k a month), essentials. I also find it a bit when people say it doesn't go far in London - no wage will go far if you factor in expensive extras you want but don't explicitly need.

In the process of buying a flat in London on 45k. If I was on 80k I’d be able to afford 2/3 bedrooms in some areas.

Yes it is annoying when people lump together private schooling with mortgage, bills etc as an essential cost.

It's not a great salary in terms of London wages. Did you completely ignore the data in the OP?

It is a very good salary and certainly not to be sniffed at. I'd love to earn £80k! Bear in mind however the rough actual take home would be £55k (assuming no student loan), so it would be better to think of it as "£55k doesn't go far in London".

As I have no dependents and currently pay the cheapest rent I can by sharing a house, it would be a great salary for me. But if you're supporting a family on £80k in London, once tax, rent for a whole house / flat, and childcare costs are taken into account you might not have as much disposable income as you would think.

It would still take you a long time to save up a sufficient deposit for a place to buy in London if you were earning £80k, so you'd have to rent for quite a while. You could certainly save more if you were single and could houseshare but less if you're supporting a family.

I am on 65k and agree 80k seems huge. I am well comfortable on 65k and save 1.5k a month. I have a shared ownership apartment and will buy the rest once the cladding is sorted.

But then I don't drink, smoke, I really do not need anything excessive. I like to eat well at home, buy what I need without thinking about it and that's it. Even on 80k my spending would not increase as those things do not make me happy. Sure, I'd be able to pay off my apartment sooner, but even in London 80k jobs aren't easy to come by and it is just not worth for me to take on any extra responsibility etc. to get to that salary.

£80k is not a huge salary in London. Let's break this down
Monthly Salary after tax =£4400(approx)
Rent or mortgage= £2,000 (assuming 3 bedroom)
Kids nursery =£1,500 ( under 3)
After care wrap up = £200 (over 5) assuming the child is primary school age
Bills and food = £600 (feeding a family of 4) include electricity, council, gas, food. Council tax on its own is £200!!!

You are left with £100 at the end of the month for emergency.

Now, if you have one parent working and the other staying home then it's a good salary as you easily write off kid nursery and after care Wrap up for the 2 kids. Also you can shave off some money from the rent but I don't know many places with rent for family of three under £1,500 a month.

So it's all relative!

We don't live in London, nor earn anything approaching 80k as our combined salary (I work part time.)

A few years ago, there was a job that DH liked the look of in London.

We looked at house prices/train season tickets etc, and decided that the salary would need to be well over 80k for it to be worth our while making the move, and we'd still probably be worse off than if we stayed where we are.

I live in the South East and I'd live like a queen if I had £80k!

Its a bit like my friend growing up who complained they were always skint. Her parents put 3 DC through private secondary, they all did multiple extra curriculars, had 2-3 foreign holidays per year and all had a generous clothing allowance plus pocket money.

By comparison my siblings and I went to the local comp, had a weeks camping in Cornwall (Grandad used to drop us off as we didn't have a car), and got £5 per month pocket money if Mum could afford it. No clothing allowance, most of my clothes were hand me downs (from my Mums friend who's DDs were, IMO, unbelievably glamorous). We did do a lot of extra curriculars though, especially me.