To detest the term 'squeezed middle'

[unicormb]

And how it's being used on here to forecast that the poor high earners will be worse off than anyone else over the next few years?

It's absolutely not true, for one. The worst off will be the worst off.

I grew up in poverty. My kids are middle class. I know the gulf that exists between the two, firsthand, and secondhand from working with kids in inner London for twelve years.

The squeezed middle will be ok. So can we stop pretending that people who earn over £50k a year are on the brink of destitution? It's really demeaning to those who survive on a lot less.

But why do you need to make the comparison at all? Like it’s a competition in misery?

You are sneering. People have given you crystal clear examples. People can clear the equivalent of decent salaries on benefits yet the people next to them earning that are worse off as they don’t get all the additional stuff.

Some of the poorest families I work with are the working poor who earn just enough to not qualify for top ups but are expected to pay in full for everything. They have no slack and they are in serious danger of losing their home. No UC rent support for them.

We are a family in the top 1% of income and goady people like you give us all a bad name.

The comparison should be made @whumpthereitis and should always be made.

And yet you don’t think it right that the struggling family also be told that they have no reason to complain either until they are selling their children to buy bread?

It’s bizarre that you don’t understand your hypocrisy.

Your last line is such nonsense,I don't know many middle class people cutting back on audis or golf or horse riding. Most are cutting down on far less frivolous things than that.

Typically a middle class person will still be on a fairly strict financial package and there won't be a whole lot of scope for cutting back despite your views. Plenty who you are sneering at may well fall right into actual poverty next year if enough support isn't given.

Plus if your so concerned about the poor you should be real worried about the squeezed middle. Because once the limited leftover money is gone guess where the axe will fall. On the type of jobs people in poverty/on the edge will do.

Then you will see real problems.

And ’actual poverty’ in the UK is rich compared to ‘actual poverty’ elsewhere in the world.

I have to say, this attitude gets my goat too. It depends doesn’t it! If you are restricting the class of ‘actual poverty’ to only the refugees who are fleeing war and have nowhere to stay, or similar in Afghanistan, then yes.

If you look at the number of people who are in full time work yet own only what they stand up in, the private rental they’re forced to live in has dangerous wiring and rain seeping down the walls, and they need an occasional food bank hand out, then no. Why is the bar made so low?

Far too many, as shown in the last few pages, have a remarkable faith in law and due process. But such processes have been destroyed: most are public sector and have been required to do more with less for years. The whole sector, across social services, law, health, education, has been complaining that they can no longer do their jobs due to lack of funding for years. Meanwhile the rich landlords cut corners and get their mates to sign off on ‘legal’ electronics and gas certificates and there is nothing the tenants can do because there is no legal recourse open to them, nor alternative housing when the landlord chucks them out for complaining.

What do you think all the current trouble about the NHS means in practice too? Healthcare is failing and disparities due to wealth going through the roof.

Law, due process and health - all the markers that make us richer here - are in very limited supply now. That’s what cuts to the public sector mean, and talk of poverty in war or near-war situations is not good enough as a comparison point.

Surely it's a justified term in the context of people who earn too much to be eligible for say, free dental treatment and legal aid, but who don't earn enough to be able to afford these things in practice.

I have to scrimp and save for my dental treatment, and I do feel resentful when I'm lining up to pay while everyone else in the queue gets it free. You don't need to waste energy telling me this is perfectly reasonable - I know it is really, but I'm just defending the concept of the 'squeezed middle'. Not rich, working hard for every pound, but not poor enough to get things free.

Why? You are setting it up as a competition. You can appreciate that the squeezed middle are struggling without taking away from the struggles of those poorer.

What you’re managing to do is set each group up in opposition to one another, which is going to have the effect of making the squeezed middle display the same consideration that they themselves are being shown.

I mean, well done if that’s what you were aiming for.

This thread is bullshit. No-one would say outright poverty is better than being working poor, but ‘squeezed middle’ is still a useful term for a certain economic demographic.

I just wondered if you’d read this post about the difference in student maintenance loans for students with different family circumstances and what your thoughts were, @unicormb ?

As much as this thread is dressed up as concern for the poor, it reads more like you’ve held a long grudge against those financially better off than your family during your childhood, and you’re now taking the opportunity to stick the knife in.

This is not how to get people to care, and/or unite.

You are absolutely sneering @unicormb
Suggesting that other groups who are struggling to manage or adjust shouldn't complain just because they aren't the poorest group of all is unkind and shows a massive lack of empathy from someone who seems to think they are empathic and kind (volunteering in food banks, etc). Perhaps we should argue that the poorest in the UK shouldn't complain because refugees or people dying of cancer are having a worse time. It's a stupid argument.
Your argument is exactly what the elites want you to do, blame another group. Some people blame benefit claimants or immigrants, you are blaming the 'squeezed middle'. Whoever you blame, it's divisive and very unhelpful to society at large. The fact is that people need to work together in communities and creating division is unhelpful.
The 'squeezed middle' are often people contributing a great deal to society, not just in terms of taxes (which are not contributed by the lowest group). They often provide essential services in their jobs. Apart from that, spending by this group is vital for the economy (as is the spending of the £50,000+ earners). If the 'squeezed middle' or those just above cut back discretionary spending, what do you think will happen? Lots of businesses will start to fail leading to higher prices, less available products and then redundancies and business failures. That will mean more people on benefits. All of these things are bad for the poorest and bad for everyone else. This is all about to happen now as we are in recession and nearly everyone is being squeezed so you will get to watch this play out.

I'm not sneering. I'm saying that the people in the middle are in the middle because they're not the worst off, that's why they're in the middle. And no matter how bad it gets, they'll still be able to eat

Both of these things are wrong though. This is a mess of a thread OP, and that was evident even before we found out your household are on a hundred fucking grand.

Yes, exactly.

I'd just like to point out that all the time people on these threads mention public sector jobs been mainly affected eg teachers, nurses why do people always assume that this is the case? I don't work in public sector and I am in the same position as them (albeit without the fantastic pension...if I'm going to be goady about it)

I am absolutelty fed up of the false comparision of the poor and the middle
In that it is
NOT
ALWAYS THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN EATING AND CANCELLING PONY LESSONS.
OR SWAPPING AN ALDI FOR A FORD.
PEOPLE IN THE MIDDLE PAY MUCH MORE IN TAXES AND GET SHAFTED.

my bil has 7 kids , he claims benefits and is not one of the group that work.
He openly says he would not get out of bed for my wage
.
And loose all the passport benefits like free treatment , help with rent.
This sort of person is far and few between, but surley folk can see how annoying it is not to get recognition for tge squeezed middle who pay their taxes and both get told stuff like this and also that they are not actually struggling?
We are all human .
I think the middle and the poor shd stop this battle , its wasted energy. Its ok to admit that middle and poor are actually struggling. Its not a competition .
Why the anger at taxpayers?

Are we really all fighting on this thread about whose standard of living is going to drop the most in the coming years, rather than about the fact that it is everyone's standard of living that is going to keep going down now, apart from an increasingly small number of people whose wealth is just going up and up at all of our expense?

The system is failing increasingly more of us as time goes by and this is what I take to mean 'the squeezed middle' - that families who would have previously been middle class and reasonably comformtable are being squeezed ever downwards, towards poverty (relative or otherwise). Soon there will be no middle - just a mass at the bottom constantly struggling and an elite at the top living a life of luxury and going to ridiculous restaurants like SaltBae's London place (£4.6 million profit in the last three months)

Western civilization is heading for collapse as it's clear now that capitalism is just a giant pyramid scheme with a base of sand. The super wealthy are riding this train (and us) to the end of the line and hoping that by then they've accumulated enough to build the walled communities and the bunkers and the private security that will keep them safe when everything falls apart.

They're the ones we should be railing at rather than competing in some kind of poverty olympics.

To the barricades comrade!

Before you do though, could you explain how me having a really expensive meal or earning a lot of money supposedly makes your life harder, and why you are resentful of it?

Seems like a stupidly easy one to answer - I'm guessing your money or your job were inherited rather than earnt. As money is not an infinite resource, then one person having more of it means another has less. If one person has a lot more then lots of people have less.

@ImWell because you don't 'earn' the money. The system has been rigged by successive governments as a result of finance and Uber rich lobbying. It makes it seismically easier to generate money once you have money and leaves deep and worsening inequality.

And the latest view shows that the wealthy will suffer far less from the energy price hikes than the poor as it's a much lower proportion of their outgoings.

What a ludicrous assumption. Ludicrous, and wrong. I’m from a poor family, but am wealthy now through earnings.

And no, money is not a fixed quantity, that’s a very ignorant and wrong view. The overall wealth of the world is clearly more now than it once was, how can you not see that? People can add net value, and take a share of that increase, which makes them better- off and no-one else worse off.

Go in then, this should be good? In what way have I earned my money any less than you have?

I really hope you aren’t making this claim while I’m receipt of any money from the state. It’d make you a massive hypocrite to have received child benefit, for example, while telling someone else that they had not earned their wages.

Bollocks. We are “working class” I lived in absolute poverty and I’m now in a professional career. My husband the same and he now is in the top 1% of earners. Yeah, we have a nice life and house and stuff. Swimming in cash we are not (taxation, that great leveller sees to that). It is literally impossible to be swimming in millions because of the taxation system unless is super, inherited wealth. Totally different to those who earn their money.

Money begets money in the current system @ImWell
I'm surprised you don't seem to understand this. There are plenty of stats available.

OK, but what does that have to do with me? I’m from a poor family. No family money, no family connections, so what point do you think that you are making?