AIBU to be totally confused (cost of living crisis)

[LittleBitHeiressLittleBitIris]

AIBU to not be able to understand/ grasp the scale of impending disaster that is building over the increased cost of living?

I genuinely don't see how millions of people with outgoings that are about to be actually higher than income is going to play out.

I'm not trying to be goady and obviously realise no-one has a crystal ball but am I missing something? Has this ever happened before in other recent times/ other cultures and what was the result. I can't even imagine what could happen.

I feel really clueless! Any ideas/ opinions/ further reading much appreciated 👍

@Bringsexyback

It’s just frustrating I don’t individual level obviously I don’t care about any of you but on a collective level you actually do have the power to help those that you proclaim you are most worried about the poor and yet you’re actually choosing to do absolutely nothing about it it’s ludicrous

And like you've already been told, people have been on strike recently regarding pay, others pay isnset by government and a posters Dh is paying above minimum wage which comes out of their own pot.

You can choose to listen but you dont take anyones experiences onboard. If people are so frustrating to you, fuck off from the thread.

most landlords are doing fine. Before buy to let mortgages existed, rents were cheaper than mortgages. This idea that a rent should cover a mortgage payment did not exist. Landlords owned houses and rented them out.

I'm sorry, are you actually saying landlords shouldn't expect their costs to be met? Do you think they're running a charity?

So bizarre.

@Bringsexyback

I’m sick to death of listening to people whingeing about how they can’t change their loss in life you can’t it’s about your choices we all make them

You also said in the same thread:

We were forced to move out of a property in December because the landlord wanted it back the property is still stood empty I have spent over £3000 in removal costs and storage because we had to move, and will have to move again into a purchased property and I was advised by the council that there was actually nothing I could do about it so I might as well get on with it. Absolutely appalling advice.

Let's apply your attitude to this little story, shall we? OK, here goes:

Stop whinging. It's your own fault for not finding someone who could advise you properly. You brought it on yourself through your own bad choices. Also, why on earth were you renting? Couldn't you just have asked for a pay rise to enable you to buy? Though based on what this story says about your level of intelligence and negotiation skills, it seems you are no doubt being overpaid already.

@Bringsexyback

It’s just frustrating I don’t individual level obviously I don’t care about any of you but on a collective level you actually do have the power to help those that you proclaim you are most worried about the poor and yet you’re actually choosing to do absolutely nothing about it it’s ludicrous

What the fuck are you whittering on about? That was just one long sentence.

@alltheapples I wouldn't necessarily say it's inequality that someone has held back and continued to have low outgoings despite a very good salary. They have been clever about it so fair play I say!

@Silvershroud

We are in unprecedented times. The disaster of Brexit, then Covid, now the brink of WW3 in Ukraine. What will the next 12 months bring?

We've had war, pestilence and plague. We just need famine now to complete the set.

I have to say, I'm laughing my tits off at PPs going on about other countries and their price caps, as though they didn't notice the number of energy firms going bust in the UK before the price cap increase was announced.

Have you considered what it would be like to keep prices low and then have our entire energy infrastructure fall over? What we're facing now is fucking awful, but that would be disaster movie shit. Is a 3 day week really what you're after!? Or maybe the lights going off completely?

And other countries aren't able to keep prices lower because they have nicer more benevolent governments. They're able to do it because they e.g. invested in nuclear, built bigger strategic reserves of gas, etc etc. 71% of France's electricity is from nuclear, here it is about 16% and falling.

Meanwhile, we have fannied about over nuclear with most of our plants close to decommissioning, shut down our chance at helping with gas supply issues with a moratorium on fracking, and have only 4-5 days of our winter gas needs in storage (France has about 3 months, Germany has similar). We're living tanker to tanker with gas, while others are able to smooth out price spikes by releasing strategic reserves.

As far as I'm concerned, if you play any part of the 'green' lobby, have been anti-fracking, or a nuclear NIMBY, you can sit down now because this crisis on you along with our stupid net zero obsessed government.

I'm in my 50s, i've been through similar times before. In my childhood late 60s/early seventies, (very little benefits) food prices rose so rapidly that there would be sticker after sticker piled up on cans as the prices rose faster than the goods could sell. We went fairly hungry and cold as did our neighbours on the council estate we lived in. My parents both worked and we were mainly clothed via my mum's sewing and knitting skills. She'd trade her skills for extra materials to make stuff for us. We had a coal fire and often burned anything we could find or broke up furniture etc. Meals were simple and often not really enough. Treats were walks to the park. In the early 80's we had the largest unemployment ever and massive interest rates. My sister and I had bought a flat and went cold and hungry to keep paying the mortgage. We've had various crashes since when you went from feeling reasonably affluent to having to watch every penny and get in debt.

I consider myself lucky now that I have a buffer, my income is higher than my outgoings, i have some savings, I'm hoping that I can weather this before retirement age and still have the opportunity to get back on an even keel before that. I really feel for people stuck in the stage of life where they have higher outgoings and debts. My DC are in university now and I worry about their ability to support themselves even as "educated/privileged" people.

My parents also grew up in poverty so I guess they learned to deal with it and live without things that we now consider essential.

All i can say is take whatever help you can, take advantage of any on-line resources that help to save on food budgets etc and hopefully this will pass quickly.

@SweetPeaGirl

I have to say, I'm laughing my tits off at PPs going on about other countries and their price caps, as though they didn't notice the number of energy firms going bust in the UK before the price cap increase was announced.

Have you considered what it would be like to keep prices low and then have our entire energy infrastructure fall over? What we're facing now is fucking awful, but that would be disaster movie shit. Is a 3 day week really what you're after!? Or maybe the lights going off completely?

And other countries aren't able to keep prices lower because they have nicer more benevolent governments. They're able to do it because they e.g. invested in nuclear, built bigger strategic reserves of gas, etc etc. 71% of France's electricity is from nuclear, here it is about 16% and falling.

Meanwhile, we have fannied about over nuclear with most of our plants close to decommissioning, shut down our chance at helping with gas supply issues with a moratorium on fracking, and have only 4-5 days of our winter gas needs in storage (France has about 3 months, Germany has similar). We're living tanker to tanker with gas, while others are able to smooth out price spikes by releasing strategic reserves.

As far as I'm concerned, if you play any part of the 'green' lobby, have been anti-fracking, or a nuclear NIMBY, you can sit down now because this crisis on you along with our stupid net zero obsessed government.

It's only going to get worse. Most of the duty on gas are for green subsidies. Carrie is very into the green agenda and pro Russia. She's a founding member of Conservative Friends of Russia. Ofcourse Russia wants us to get rid of all gas and oil infrastructure so they fund the green agenda in the UK making us more dependent on them. It's not going to get better soon and they have the media to convey the thinking they want us to uphold.

valkyrievik

*most landlords are doing fine. Before buy to let mortgages existed, rents were cheaper than mortgages. This idea that a rent should cover a mortgage payment did not exist. Landlords owned houses and rented them out.

I'm sorry, are you actually saying landlords shouldn't expect their costs to be met? Do you think they're running a charity?

So bizarre.*

Historically landlords owned their properties, a mortgage wouldn’t have been a cost.

@ValkyrieVik

most landlords are doing fine. Before buy to let mortgages existed, rents were cheaper than mortgages. This idea that a rent should cover a mortgage payment did not exist. Landlords owned houses and rented them out.

I'm sorry, are you actually saying landlords shouldn't expect their costs to be met? Do you think they're running a charity?

So bizarre.

No, she's saying that mortgaged buy to let is bad for renters, because a landlord's costs includes interest on the mortgage as well as the running costs of maintaining the property. When investors are buying property with cash, or at least at a very low LTV loan, those costs don't exist, and aren't loaded on to the tenant.

@Bringsexyback

I’m sick to death of listening to people whingeing about how they can’t change their loss in life you can’t it’s about your choices we all make them

Well, you could stop logging onto MN, reading and contributing to the threads. Then you wouldn't have to 'listen to people whingeing'.

It'd be a start :)

I am curious to know what solutions there are to the problem.

‘Government help’ - meaning what? I mean, if it is borrowed, we or our Dc will have to pay it back, if not, our taxes would need to rise.

Btw, my gas & electricity bill is going up from £180pm to £380pm from April!

@SweetPeaGirl

I have to say, I'm laughing my tits off at PPs going on about other countries and their price caps, as though they didn't notice the number of energy firms going bust in the UK before the price cap increase was announced.

Have you considered what it would be like to keep prices low and then have our entire energy infrastructure fall over? What we're facing now is fucking awful, but that would be disaster movie shit. Is a 3 day week really what you're after!? Or maybe the lights going off completely?

And other countries aren't able to keep prices lower because they have nicer more benevolent governments. They're able to do it because they e.g. invested in nuclear, built bigger strategic reserves of gas, etc etc. 71% of France's electricity is from nuclear, here it is about 16% and falling.

Meanwhile, we have fannied about over nuclear with most of our plants close to decommissioning, shut down our chance at helping with gas supply issues with a moratorium on fracking, and have only 4-5 days of our winter gas needs in storage (France has about 3 months, Germany has similar). We're living tanker to tanker with gas, while others are able to smooth out price spikes by releasing strategic reserves.

As far as I'm concerned, if you play any part of the 'green' lobby, have been anti-fracking, or a nuclear NIMBY, you can sit down now because this crisis on you along with our stupid net zero obsessed government.

I have to say, I'm laughing my tits off at PPs going on about other countries and their price caps, as though they didn't notice the number of energy firms going bust in the UK before the price cap increase was announced. Good for you. Our government has created a pretend "market" - which has collapsed and suppliers have gone bust. Now we all have to pay for that experiment with vast rises in standing charges.
We have considerable renewable sources of electricity - their costs haven't increased due to the gas shortage, but because the government rigs the prices, they have been told to put their prices up too. Like much of our ills, the problem is a ridiculous pretend free market created as a Tory wet dream for their pals to profit from. Our lack of nuclear isn't due to the green lobby it's because none of the Tories could find any of their mates in the get rich quick city to make long term investments in something that takes such a long time to clean up.

@WhiteCatmas

This was not ‘always going to happen’. There are several countries in Europe who have already imposed caps on the amount of increase that energy companies can provide. The companies are fleecing us because the government is allowing it, because it’s likely the Conservative party donors are board members of the different energy companies. This government is corrupt.

Yep, you're absolutely right. Our government is corrupt and if the vast amounts of money for PPE contracts for their mates didn't tell us that much then the pissing about and delaying sanctions against Russian business interests whilst our governing elites quietly got rid of their shares without losing too much money, or Boris and co having a fucking ball at various parties whilst the rest of us weren't permitted to go to family funerals or see sick and dying loved ones in hospitals and care homes, or Tory politicians grinning like sickly-painted marionettes at the opening of food banks at the same time as they were refusing free school meals for the poorest children in the country, or Priti Patel and her imminently slappable smirking face refusing to do anything of any value to assist people fleeing wars enabled by British arms sales or any of the other hundreds and hundreds of arsehole-ish, absolutely cunty things enacted by the Tories over the past 12 years SHOULD give anyone with an ounce of humility, common sense or intelligence a clue that the Tories are ONLY here for the good of one group of people - themselves and those exactly like them.

I don't think Labour have a snowball in hell's chance of doing any better though - Starmer's woefully inadequate attempts at 'opposition' would be laughable were they not so seriously depressing.

As far as I'm concerned, if you play any part of the 'green' lobby, have been anti-fracking, or a nuclear NIMBY, you can sit down now because this crisis on you along with our stupid net zero obsessed government.

Couldn't agree more. As i said before - No joined-up thinking.

Historically landlords owned their properties, a mortgage wouldn’t have been a cost.

So what that got to do with anything that's relevant today?

The landed gentry don't exist much anymore.
As I said earlier - landlords have to cover their costs otherwise the house will be sold and taken away from the rental market.

Agree with you @Tabitha005.

In a democracy we get the governejtbwe deserve. And I didn't vote Tory.

Government*

@WhiteCatmas

Quote: “ We keep being told we deserve it because we vote for Tory governments. Isn't it worth remembering that most people don't vote Tory actually.”

They have a majority, quite a large one. If most people didn’t vote for the Tories they wouldn’t be in power.
Also, people who voted for Brexit, this is on you.

Governments can return a thumping majority even if most people across the country don't vote for them. It's called first past the post.

46Bringsexyback

alltheapples

@Bringsexyback
One of my clients actually just gave their team of 5% pay rise without even being asked which begs the question why didn’t they ask there was probably 10% on the table there that they could’ve had

Are you having a laugh? We've just been given 5%. I wouldn't want to say what my boss would have said if we'd have asked for 10%.

There’s a massive shortage of care workers. If spending on luxuries ends there will still be plenty of jobs for those people

Not everyone is cut out to be a care worker.
Its dismissing these jobs as above that makes them the realm of cheap labour.

I'm not a care worker and frankly I'd be no good at it, I dont have the patience required, so should I lose my crappy min wage job I'll just go on benefits.

Those of us who don't vote Tory failed to convince those that do to reconsider.

[quote Cocomarine]@LittleBitHeiressLittleBitIris
Has this ever happened before in other recent times/ other cultures and what was the result. I can't even imagine what could happen

Are you a big bit “heiress”.
What bubble have you been living in?!!![/quote]
I wish I was...

@ValkyrieVik

most landlords are doing fine. Before buy to let mortgages existed, rents were cheaper than mortgages. This idea that a rent should cover a mortgage payment did not exist. Landlords owned houses and rented them out.

I'm sorry, are you actually saying landlords shouldn't expect their costs to be met? Do you think they're running a charity?

So bizarre.

@ValkyrieVik I don’t your comment here. At one time, and in many cases still the rental property was not mortgaged (pre buy to let mortgages now available) so owned outright so yes costs were covered but not required to be the mortgage repayment+.

Just because you don’t understand this don’t call others’ comments ‘bizarre’!

Ofcourse Russia wants us to get rid of all gas and oil infrastructure so they fund the green agenda in the UK making us more dependent on them.

Nato has been saying for years that Russia has been funding anti-fracking groups and spreading misinformation.

We have considerable renewable sources of electricity - their costs haven't increased due to the gas shortage, but because the government rigs the prices, they have been told to put their prices up too.

Tell me you don't know how the national grid works without telling me you don't know how the national grid works...

Our lack of nuclear isn't due to the green lobby it's because none of the Tories could find any of their mates in the get rich quick city to make long term investments in something that takes such a long time to clean up.

Probably more accurate to say that until recently, gas generated electricity was significantly cheaper per KWH than nuclear, and so there was limited appetite for nuclear.

Short termism all round.