How would you feel if the standard household was single income again?

[Omydearehert]

Not necessarily the man working. How would you feel if a single income was enough to live off of and became the standard again?

Great - we would both work part-time like a shot.

Id quite like a 3 day week as standard for everyone.

@MadeOfStarStuff

I would be fucking delighted as a single adult household

Never going to happen though

Yep. Same!

I would be happy to be in a relationship where we earned an equal amount to be honest. I have always been the breadwinner and it would be nice to share the responsibility more equally.

It would be absolutely brilliant in terms of choice, family life, everything really. Except i can't see it happening with the extortionately high cost of living in the UK ( which I see only becoming worse with Brexit) . Only hope would be the universal income idea which is talked about by the powers that be occasionally. I think it works in maybe Denmark (or somewhere Scandinavian, maybe Finland). It would just be so freeing to have the choice of whether or not to work at certain times in your life, maybe have the opportunity to spend time studying or even take a year out to try a new business idea or something creative. Sorry, I'm waffling now.

When a single income was truly enough (and actually was it) then the domestic and child rearing work really was a full time job!!!

Laundry took days, very few if any nurseries or pre-schools. Trips to the butchers, bakers, greengrocers most days. No freezer no microwave!!

My parents generation were the economic blip where life really improved but they always were going to be a blip. Working class traditionally worked until death and didn't own their own home...

I'm a stay at home mum, have been for 10 years, I earned better than my partner when we met but decided after we had our second child to be a Sahm. Never regetted one moment as someone else would have predominantly been bringing up my children and that's not what I had them for, I wanted to see them grow and be there for them. For us it wasn't about the money but bringing them up in the best environment and having me at home enabled that. It has been hard at times but I would not take anything back

People are making massive assumptions here that a family has two parents and (usually) the woman will be happy to stay at home and the man go to work. But life is less and less like that. Couples split up, some parents are not together from the start, some are gay, Britain has changed!

As I said before, as a now lone parent who can support a household on my own, I’m very glad nobody is instructing me to get back in the kitchen!

Mum worked and so did both grans, working class always do, it’s a myth that there was a time when most stayed at home, also most people claiming social care dont own a property or have savings, again a myth that has been created that most have a house that’s gone up massively, just look at the stats.

It also like the so called gold plated pensions we hear about, again most people even pensioners now do not have a company pension plus the ones that do paid in most of their life yet the average pension is £4000 in the uk, no news outlet ever tells this story

I think it will never happen, but I also think it would be lovely if BOTH members of a couple had a choice on which one would work, and who would stay home, or if BOTH would work and afford a greatly enhanced lifestyle.

I was bored at home looking after a baby .Why spend years training as a Midwife never to use it I worked nights .I hate the word pin money it’s what my father in law said to me and I turned round and said I earnt more than his son it’s so insulting

@suzieCath what do you mean "someone else would have been predominantly bringing up my children"? What utter nonsense.

I work round school hours for instance. My children see as much of me as they would if I was a sahm. I know a lot of other parents who do the same. And even those who use after school clubs are still the centre of their children's worlds.

Never regetted one moment as someone else would have predominantly been bringing up my children and that's not what I had them for, I wanted to see them grow and be there for them.

Oh, what a strange and unusual attitude. I had my children largely as a job-creation scheme for nursery nurses, like most working parents.

I wouldn't want to bring up a family either relying solely on someone else's income, or being responsible for bringing in all the income myself. DH and I both work four days a week now and that is a really good balance for us.

I guess if the cost of living was somehow magically lower so that we could be comfortable with each of us working two days a week, that would be nice in theory, but I don't know of that many jobs that can be done well two days a week. Maybe job sharing would help.

I think I can see what you’re getting at OP. It would be great if minimum wage, or even average wage, could support housing, utilities, food, clothing and other modern- day essentials (broadband, mobile phones, home entertainment Etc.)
However, while utility, mobile phone/broadband and home entertainment companies are allowed to continuously charge obscene amounts more than it costs to maintain the networks and supply, I don’t think this is likely to happen.
If we go back to the early 1980’s, a normal quarterly phone bill would cost maximum £5.00 - fast-forward to today, and in a household with 4 mobile phone users, we are looking at a cost of £100.00 per month!
Add that to the trend of buying stuff for home use, then having to subscribe to use it (Peloton, I’m looking at you!) I can’t but feel that other manufacturers are going to jump onto this bandwagon soon, and you’ll either no longer be able to buy your appliances, or you’ll have to subscribe to the manufacturers to keep them working.
This is the new model - do you think a single average income could sustain that against such temptation for manufacturers to make so much more regular income?

A single income could be acheived by both parents working part time (in a 2 parent household). A far, far, far better idea is a Universal Basic Income that would take the pressure off working stupid amounts of hours just to live.

For news on how money is wasted by government on useless contracts that often cost us on top of what is thrown at them, see Private Eye.
There is and has always been enough money to go around. Poverty is a political choice.

@chaosmaker
“A far, far, far better idea is a Universal Basic Income that would take the pressure off working stupid amounts of hours just to live.“
My cynical mind thinks that if a UBI was put in place, this would be greedily targeted by the utility companies and would very quickly become the new £0.00

[quote Notjustanymum]@chaosmaker
“A far, far, far better idea is a Universal Basic Income that would take the pressure off working stupid amounts of hours just to live.“
My cynical mind thinks that if a UBI was put in place, this would be greedily targeted by the utility companies and would very quickly become the new £0.00[/quote]
I don't understand what you mean. How could utility companies target payments directly to every person (including children)? Are you saying they'd increase bills or something 'cos energy has already gone up by 25% across the board. Oh and my energy company, people's energy has just gone bust along with many others.
If we had a thinking government they'd be investing in things like the green hydrogen (not blue hydrogen which is extracted from natural gas and therefore pointless in terms of getting away from fossil fuels).

I have always been a single income household. I can’t imagine it any other way. I’m engaged to be married but it wont change anything. We don’t live in the same country and don’t plan to in the near future so our finances will remain separate. I’m not sure how comfortable I would be if our incomes were combined.

@Notjustanymum

I think I can see what you’re getting at OP. It would be great if minimum wage, or even average wage, could support housing, utilities, food, clothing and other modern- day essentials (broadband, mobile phones, home entertainment Etc.) However, while utility, mobile phone/broadband and home entertainment companies are allowed to continuously charge obscene amounts more than it costs to maintain the networks and supply, I don’t think this is likely to happen. If we go back to the early 1980’s, a normal quarterly phone bill would cost maximum £5.00 - fast-forward to today, and in a household with 4 mobile phone users, we are looking at a cost of £100.00 per month! Add that to the trend of buying stuff for home use, then having to subscribe to use it (Peloton, I’m looking at you!) I can’t but feel that other manufacturers are going to jump onto this bandwagon soon, and you’ll either no longer be able to buy your appliances, or you’ll have to subscribe to the manufacturers to keep them working. This is the new model - do you think a single average income could sustain that against such temptation for manufacturers to make so much more regular income?

I laugh at your idea of 'modern-day' essentials. With the exception of broadband they are really NOT. No-one has to subscribe to anything that feeds into a company's profits. Just live simply If minimum wage was raised - inflation would be let loose. There would be cries for more benefits and if people took years out to 'find themselves' and were still paid by the government (aka the taxpayer) - where would the money come from? I am a single person household on circa £13k p a (NOT one of the 'rich pensioners' ) and I have to find council tax, utilities, broadband and phone, PAYG phone (quite sufficient), insurance, keeping the car on the road (18 years old now) and saving a bit to replace broken goods. I get most of my furnishings second-hand, ditto my clothes. Forgot the cost of the dog to keep me sane. I appreciate that many of you see getting generous maternity pay, working part time for full-time wages as very desireable for yourselves but it all has to be paid for.