High earners - how do you spend your salary?

[Citygirly]

DH and I earn just under £140k combined.

We do maximum pension payments (his is 9% as NHS) and we also give about 10% a month to charity.

Other than that, we plan to start overpaying the mortgage. We invest £1k a month (so £500 each) and save £1k for holidays. We of course do general/specific savings but then have a good chunk left over for disposable income.

AIBU to ask other high earning households how they tend to allocate their money? Just want to see if we could be using it better or this is about right for comparables.

Good Lord! What a pair of tricoteuses you are, @Topgub and @Nothappyatwork!

No. heeeee

Have a look at DoNotPay, calling itself the world's first robot lawyer. Yes, human lawyers will be needed for some time to come, but many of their skills will be unnecessary when AI develops further.

Err, something tells me you shouldn't have posted this trivial query..... what with the current climate 🤔

Have a look at DoNotPay, calling itself the world's first robot lawyer. Yes, human lawyers will be needed for some time to come, but many of their skills will be unnecessary when AI develops further.

Not being clever enough to be a higher earner @dillydally24, I had to Google that

I dont want higher earners to lose their heads

Just to appreciate they're not any harder working than most other people and that they only make more money because of how society priorities making money and luck.

And even maybe a modicum of underdtanding to see how unfair wealth inequality is

OP I am also a Solicitor and over the years have been earning quite a bit. BUT I'm a single parent with a daughter at private school (since reception-now in Year 7) and whose main hobby is equestrian show jumping. Between the school and the horse my money evaporates into thin air. So if you're having trouble spending your high salary, put your kids through private education and buy a horse 👍

@XelaM

What about yourself? I'm hoping your money isn't just flowing in one direction!

I earn very well. When our office cleaner comes into my office and we chat I am in no doubt that she works much harder than I do.
I get paid for my level of responsibility and unusual expertise which could have me in prison if I get things wrong.
I get paid for being available 24/7.
Would I rather earn considerably less and be a cleaner? Sometimes certainly. But it's too much like hard work!

@AnuSTart

my level of responsibility and unusual expertise which could have me in prison if I get things wrong.
I get paid for being available 24/7.

I dont get paid very well for doing those things

@topgub, how do you propose our society and economy be structured then? If we aren't to pay people in accordance with their skill, revenue-generating capability and hours worked, then how are we to compensate them?

Really? That doesn’t seem likely.

A lot certainly are. Burglaries, stabbings, fly-tipping, graffiti, vandalism, mugging, intimidation; these are the crimes that destroy lives and blight communities, and they are disproportionately carried out by low earners.

My wife never had to worry about her safety when walking home through Canary Wharf, but she would have in the council estate over the road.

It wasn’t investment bankers stealing my motorbike or putting a brick through my neighbour’s window, that’s for sure.

If you would like to earn what the OP does then why did you not do what they do?

@SlightlyGeordieJohn

Nah, its just your investment bankers robbing the country blind and causing global recession which lead to those in poverty stealing

Just your investment bankers sexually harassing and assaulting their female co workers
Just your investment bankers propping up columbias economy

Just your investment bankers kicking the shit out of their wives.

Or is thar just my prejudice?

@dillydally24

If we aren't to pay people in accordance with their skill, revenue-generating capability and hours worked

we dont pay people in accordance to skill, capability* *or hours worked. Thats the point

We pay them in revenue generated capability alone

Which they then keep even though they can't generate the revenue on their own.

They need everyone else to pay the revenue.

Id like to see linked wages. And a much higher minimum wage

@SlightlyGeordieJohn

Lots of reasons. The main one being im not motivated by money but that doesn't mean its ok for my skills and experience to be ripped off.

And if everyone chose to be a higher earner, who would do the lower paid jobs?

How would society function without nurses and carers, cashiers, refuse workers, delivery drivers?

This may sound harsh, but the reality is that some people are revenue generators (and are paid more), while others are cost centers (and are paid less). We need the cost center people for businesses to operate, but they will not make or break the success of the business like the revenue generators. Hence they are paid less. If you want to earn more, become a revenue generator. Or don't. Whatever makes you happy. Revenue generators make more money than cost centers, but they are not necessarily better people.

I do agree that the min. wage should be higher, but with what's going on with Russian and China and supply chains moving back home, I think that you'll see low wages rise at a much faster rate than they have during the prior three decades of globalization and offshoring.

@dillydally24

The revenue generators cant generate revenue without the cost centres

Simple as that.

The revenue generators could maybe justify earning a bit more. But not 1000x more

You aren’t being ripped off. Your employer offers you a wage, and you choose to do the job in exchange for it.

It’s the same with the OP’s job, and with mine, the employer pays what they have to to get someone in who’s got the qualifications and the skills to do the job.

The “but what if everyone did it” argument doesn’t work. That’s like saying there’s no point planning to do a long drive overnight when it’s quiet, as if everyone else did the same you’d not gain any advantage. You don’t base your decisions on an implausible world.

Yes, it absolutely is your prejudice. Please don’t assume we behave at home like you are used to.

@SlightlyGeordieJohn

I absolutely am being ripped off.

Its not a presumption. Your comments align exactly with my view of investment bankers

No one in my home caused a global recession or snorts cocaine while commuting sexual assaults and DV

@SlightlyGeordieJohn

You don’t base your decisions on an implausible world.

Not my fault you can only come up with implausible suggestions

Youre not worth your wage. I'm worth more than mine.

I wouldnt chose differently

@Topgub

There are numerous jobs that pay well but don't require the sorts of acts you speak of.

I don't harm people directly in any way. The environment most definitely but not individuals.

Bankers are at an extreme end of wealth. Some of us, like the OP are more modestly well off with six figure incomes.