to question if the squeeze on living standards will not be temporary?

[bindud]

"British families are facing the biggest squeeze on living standards for 30 years as surging prices and tax rises take their toll."

"The Bank of England forecast a 2pc fall in incomes after tax this year – the worst since its records began in 1990. In 2023, they’re set to fall 0.5pc."

Apparently things will get better in 2023, but will they?

We have the frozen income tax bands, ageing population, & most likely more wage stagnation after a decade of it after the 08 crash.

Is life just going to be more & more expensive going forward for the vast majority of people? or am i being too pessimistic?

France has limited Gas and electricity prices to 12% and 4% respectively.

Inflation is around 7% but thats year on year price increases, so if everything froze for 12months, inflation would be 0% but we'd still be paying far more than we are used too.

the very limited help we are getting is for one year only and most of it has to be repaid, which is fine if prices fall but thats by no means certain.

So i don't think prices will fall

@GeneLovesJezebel

Without starting a bun fight, I’d like to know what the other parties would do different. I’ve seen a lot of criticism but no alternatives. Genuinely asking the question for future voting.

@GeneLovesJezebel Labour want to impose a windfall tax, VAT cut fore 12 months and more targeted help

@helpingbereavedperson

This is your precious "democracy" in action. This is what you are so proud of.

Are you...opposed to democracy?

I expect Serendipity was referring to the many that voted Tory because they wanted Brexit so much, despite having no idea what Brexit actually meant. I've seen countless Brexit supporters going on about "taking our country back", "making our own laws", with no thought for what this actually means. Our current "democracy" is anything but fair.

I'm curious as to how the Brexit supporters are viewing the current crisis around energy, cost of living etc.

@bindud

I just read that employees shouldn't be asking for pay increases as that will make it worse! Said by man who earns 500k

He is right in the sense that a lot of business can't cope with pay rises without putting prices up. Prices going up also means demand goes down (especially if it isn't an essential product or service) and then people lose their jobs anyway. If the business survives and there are no redundancies, then the higher prices across the board cancel out any pay rise anyway.

@helpingbereavedperson

This is your precious "democracy" in action. This is what you are so proud of.

Are you...opposed to democracy?

When we have it, I will welcome it. Until then we can dream.

At best we have a sort of loose representation where the majority of voters may as well have not voted at all.

@pintopanto

I'm curious as to how the Brexit supporters are viewing the current crisis around energy, cost of living etc.

Why not ask them ? I did.

"Sovereignty"
"Taking back control"
"Blue passports"

Presumably that answers your question ?

I'll ask again tomorrow. Let you know if there's any change. We must be due one by now, since they've been singing the same fucking song for 6 fucking years. Even my neighbours toddler has gone from meaningless babble to some charming little chats in six fucking years . Yes, there are children at school now older than Brexit. Wonder what their future holds.

@nordica I understand the thinking behind it, I think some of things will happens regardless if pay stays the same though. Just thought it was a bit tone deaf.

There is no evidence that the current pressure on living standards is temporary. I wish i could hold out more hope but it looks bleak.

I know this is unpopular but as someone who rents and has savings, but never enough earnings to satisfy a bank that I could pay a mortgage even though it would be at least a third less than the rent I've been paying for the last 4 years without problem, I want and need to see proper interest rate rises.

If you don't own a home you are just watching your savings become worth less and less with nothing to offset ie. a decreasing mortgage balance and the prospect of owning property outright in the future. I'm a single Mum in my mid 40's with a nearly 15 year old, savings being eaten by inflation and pathetic interest rates, more than a decade of pay freezes or much lower than inflation rises and the prospect of income top ups and child support being gone in a few years when ds turns 19 or leaves education.

I pay all I can into pensions and savings but they're going nowhere and getting me nowhere. I don't run a car or live a decadent lifestyle and already am very careful with energy and shopping etc so there aren't really any cuts I can make. Rent and council tax is more than 3/4 of my gross income and there is zero I can do to reduce that and in all likelihood my rent will increase again this year even though my salary is again frozen.

It's difficult from outside of house ownership to see that a lot of my problems despite doing the right things of saving, has been because of tories artificially holding interest rates crazily low for over a decade.

I think we’ve lived through the best times: affordable housing, transparent government, inclusive values, well funded NHS - and sucking up fossil fuels.

We are going to go backwards now until there are alternative energy sources and a decline in population. Can’t see any other way it will play out.

@pintopanto

I'm curious as to how the Brexit supporters are viewing the current crisis around energy, cost of living etc.

I suspect we’ll be waiting a long time. They’ve gone very quiet.

Apologies - more than 2/3 of my gross income goes on rent and council tax, not 3/4 yet

@swallowedAfly I own a home too but I want to see higher interest rates too. Not 10% crazy but enough for house prices to stagnate or decrease. That way, buying a bigger flat would be cheaper. It is no point my home goes up in value but everything else goes up as well.

It's not a temporary decrease but a permanent one. The thing that is temporary is the rate of decrease in our living standards. They will continue to fall for generations to come, what's unusual is the current step change we're going through. That will flatten out and it will return to a more typical gradual decline.

Think of it in the same way as public borrowing. When politicians say that public borrowing is decreasing people misunderstand it as meaning the overall debt is going down. Debt only goes up. What they mean is they're borrowing less than before, e.g. last year they borrowed 10 trillion and this year they've borrowed 9 trillion. The debt is still rising, but at a slower rate.

Living standards for the majority will continue to decline, it's just the natural way of things. Any system of government that involves a minority humans being in charge of the majority will see that minority easing the burden on their lives at the expense of the majority. It's been like that for centuries, a medieval peasant's overall tax burden was lower than ours is today for example.

In future years people will see the 2020s as a time when prices were lower, because the prices in the future will be higher. It's the "golden age" fallacy.

@swallowedAfly I do have a home but actually I agree with you. Most of my adult life has been against the backdrop of low interest rates & wage stagnation. I've never made anything in savings & now i'm older I worry about savings & pensions.

5% would be enough to at least see some interest going onto savings and some levelling off house prices. People also forget about pensioners who are living on savings and had hoped to have some interest as at least part of their early retirement income such as my parents. The savings part of their plan is diminishing much quicker than anticipated.

@pintopanto

I'm curious as to how the Brexit supporters are viewing the current crisis around energy, cost of living etc.

If it were just a UK problem you might be able to blame Brexit, but it isn't. Prices are going up all over Europe. According to this the UK is about in the middle of European inflation rates. Energy prices have shot up all over Europe. It's very lazy, if convenient, to blame everything bad on Brexit, but it's simply not true.

& yes falling house prices can make it easier to climb the ladder

Decent rent controls would be nice too. Allowing 6% increases every year is ridiculous. I personally rent from an early retired couple who own the house they live in plus two they rent out and the mortgages are now paid off on - the last decade of those payments being at the ridiculously low interest rates stage of play yet profiting from the crazy high rents that could be charged due to housing shortages.

I'm going to be gutted and struggle not to seethe if they choose to put the rent up again this year.

@MorningStarling - where did I say I blamed everything on Brexit?

Labour would not have given Dido Harding £37 billion for track and trace, or written off 4.3 billion in fraud, or cut taxes for banks while increasing tax for the poorest in society...and that's just three things off the top of my head.
Johnson's mob of Brexit hardliners are the dregs of the Conservative party. They sneer at people like us (Grenfell victims were stupid and Stanley Johnson saying that tv viewers can't spell). They've funnelled billions to their mates while not wanting to feed school children.
Jeremy Corbyn wasa sneered at for not bowing low enough at the Cenotaph but it's ok for BJ to have piss-ups at no.10?
Oh, but he's doing his best...

Time to reevaluate everything;
Cheaper food, phone contracts, sky, Netflix, Amazon Prime etc.
Cheaper clothes, credit cards/loans.

I certainly don’t want interest rates to rise!

I am a lone parent in London and one of those people who look like they earn a decent income - but it really is not. My mortgage is not huge and much cheaper than renting but it still eats up over 40% of my salary. I really can’t afford to pay much more.

People’s mortgages are now much higher compared to when interest rates were high last time and so it’s a completely different situation. If lots of people end up losing their homes then we will end up with a situation where those homes will be snapped up by professional landlords and there will not be the glut of cheap homes that some people seem to be hoping for.

2 years of covid
I predicted that the cost of living would increase, so I am not surprised eg National Insurance going up
I would like to see an increase on interest for savings