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.

This is one of those really lazy illinformed threads that cant seem to comprehend that there are all levels of struggling for all different reasons

If you have a mortgage and earn just over the threshold for income benefits there is zero help at all

On the other hand if you were privately renting and were a few quid lower in terms of income you would have some help to pay your rent

The outcome is that the person with the mortgage of course is paying toward an asset that they will have one day, the tenant doesnt have that luxury but thats not helpful in the here and now in terms of paying out for basics and affording food and heating.

There are some people that have their whole rent paid, dont have child care and get extra help

There are people that dont have any help with rent, do have tons of child care and dont get help

There are people who are in affordable rents, having got lucky enough to have a social housing/HA tenancy, there are others who are in private rentals where their benefits wont match the rental rate

There isnt a squeezed middle verses any other group, there is too much grey to make simplistic claims like this

In many cases, they will clear less than those on top up benefits. We call them the working poor and it’s sickening, there are real struggles. Mocking them is disgusting. In fact many of the op’s comments are disgusting.

I know people who need to divorce abusive exes but earn just over the cap for legal aid but have absolutely no money for a solicitor.

I know people who need regular medicine and have to go without because they earn too much for free prescriptions but don't have enough spare to pay for prescriptions, the same with glasses and dentist appointments as well.

I know people who can't afford to run their car, and therefore keep their job but aren't eligible for any help.

That doesn't take away the suffering from those who can't put food on the table, but it doesn't mean they aren't suffering as well. It doesn't mean those people think others shouldn't get help either. We shouldn't just be helping the destitute, we should be helping them a hell of a lot more than we are and helping others. If we just keep people hanging on the edge of poverty, our society won't thrive.

Depends what you mean by cut back. If you take a family with two working parents on average wages living in an expensive area. Their mortgage or rent will have increased, household bills and food will have increased, they might be paying for two kids in nursery full time to allow them both to work. I doubt they have too many luxuries. What do you expect them to cut back on?

@bellac11 yes you have an asset...which the government then expect you to sell to pay for your non-discounted long-term care home, whilst those with no assets don't.

Just as a point, as I NC from my usual account to make a different post but to add to my original comment. I have 2 disabled DC and we receive...

Rent £520 paid
Council tax £144.25. £110 after single occupancy discount paid
£1083 child tax credits
£302.50 carers
£200 income support
£157 CHB

Children's DLA £880 (there are 2)

Free prescriptions. Free school meals. Automatic access to HAF, HSF due to qualifying benefit. Warm home discount.

The bottom lot make a huge difference.

Taking away the children's DLA as that is explictly for their needs that's £2372 a month.

When I was with my ex we were over the cut off for help and brought in less.

There are plenty of people in the middle who don’t have mortgages and pay high rent, don’t take holidays or eat out, don’t have kids in expensive activities, don’t play golf(!), have two cars because they need to get to two jobs and drop kids off at expensive childcare. Sure their kids have duvets and Christmas presents but it doesn’t mean they won’t feel real pain and are feeling it now. And they get no government support and no subsidies or top ups.

So, the squeezed middle....as already covered are typically your teachers, tradesmen, etc etc.

What happens when they can't afford their mortgage hmm? Because interest rates are about to shoot up, and their fixed rate has come to end?

Or the industry they work in suddenly takes a massive bump and then they lose their job? Or they get less work coming in because other squeezed middle people can't afford it?

Suddenly that dual income household goes from a combined income of say 70k to 25k (because quite often in a dual household there is a large disparity between the two earners).

There is no safety net, if they had savings the cost of living has suddenly made them not very valuable.

But hey! Lets not care about those because they're living beyond their means with their Audi's and three meals a day

(Fyi, an Audi can cost less than a ford)

Fuck off.

Having grown up in abject poverty, and scrabbled and scraped and fought for a every damn thing I have and own, this IS a scary period right now. This is just as scary for me and mine as it is for anyone else.

I DO get that Im lucky that if one of us loses our job we have savings to last a few months, and I do get that I'm in a privileged position, and I pay forwards as much as I can, but don't say the squeezed middle don't get to be concerned.

Not when I'm looking at my friends who sit slap bang next to me on income, but they're going to be exceedingly lucky if they don't go bankrupt in the next 6 months. The cost of fuel has wiped out a lot of the self employed persons income because they can't pass that on to their current customers, they have 2 kids in childcare and their fixed mortgage just ended.

So it's all relative.

Seriously you think a teacher, a trained, educated individual should be grateful to earn a fraction over a bin man’s salary?! Is this where daily mail culture has got us?!

Sorry meant to link to the OPs response

If you move home then usually you sell your current home. I dont have an issue with that

But yes, I get your point about who pays for care

By the way very few people need care in the end or for very short periods anyway

Taking @QBee2022 ’s post - her income is almost exactly the same as the monthly wage of a teacher on the top of the pay scale. Who won’t qualify for free school meals, prescriptions etc, or get any of the extra help available. Now I wouldn’t swap my life for raising two disabled DC and I don’t begrudge those families the money they need but yes there will be teachers who are struggling and not because they spend money on flash cars and holidays.

Is this actually for real though? I'm not in the UK so don't know but wtf is that energy bill? Is that for a month? I'm in Ireland and we have seen enormous rises in our already high energy prices but £550 but €650 would be almost 6 months of my energy bills? @Choopi

UK energy bills are set to hit 5,000 a year by the coming Jan. So the average household will pay £400 a month over the year if they direct debit and obviously more in the winter if they pay per bill.

I understand the term squeezed to mean noticing the difference, cutting back etc.
No one is saying their kids are going without food, no one is saying those kids don't have a pen. But that they are noticing the difference. So they cut back on things. Let's say the average cleaner charges say £13 an hour and does an average house in say 2 hours. That's £26. Now let's say 4 "squeezed middle" families decide they can't afford it, that cleaner is losing over £100.
No one is saying they're destitute, they're saying they're making changes. No one is saying they're starving, they're saying they're cutting back. They may have cut their cloth according to their finances a year ago, bought a house, phone, car, whatever and now their income is the same but their outgoings are less and they're noticing the difference. Just because they're not starving doesn't mean it's OK. All it means is that people are making changes.

Many people living beyond their means because of cheap credit. How many houses do you see with 2 brand new cars on the drive mortgaged to the hilt? This will hit the country very hard.

YABVU. People are allowed to be stressed about money problems, even if they are different to other people’s money problems.

I feel constantly anxious and stressed because we are being squeezed from all sides. That’s not the same as grinding poverty but it’s not nothing either.

Precisely. I will never claim we are the hardest hit as reality is we often get more help and I've never struggled as much as I did when we were just above the help. Especially once you throw in childcare etc.

Agree. This is us.

We own two cars, both are Fords 😅 one is six years old the other 13 years old. One fiesta one focus, so not even that snazzy.

Just to highlight there, QueenB is clearing nearly the equivalent of a 40k salary in payments to her alone, before all the free additions, top ups and help. Add I. The disability payments that’s the equivalent household income of a 55k salary with no worry you’ll lose your house. She deserves every penny.

But op seriously do one with the squeezed middle hating. Some of the poorest families I work with are just over the threshold for state help.

YABU.

1. If they were high earners, as per your first sentence, they wouldn't be included in this discussion, by definition
2. No one is saying they will be worse off
3. It's not a competition
4. Level of income has nothing to do with class
5. You can't say they will be ok. You have no idea what expenditure obligations people have

I'm probably in your squeezed middle category. We forecast that the impact for us over the next year will be cutting back on heating and energy usage, eating cheaper meals, eating out less, and not being able to save as much each month. Nothing about that is 'poor me', if there is any help to be had from this shit of a government, let it all go to those whose impact will be not able to eat three meals a day, not being able to use the heating at all, with no savings to fall back on. The priority has to be very low income households and anything else is inhumane when children are going without food and heating.

if you just tip into the 40% you don't suddenly start paying a flat rate of 40% its a progressive system, you pay 0% for the first 12.5ishk then pay 20% on the value between that ar 50k do 20% on 38K and then anything over 50k you pay 40%.

Therefore (apart from Cut off of child benefit) you will always be better off

I'm the squeezed middle too. And no we don't drive Audis, two bog standard cars, 10 years old with 100,000 miles on the clock. We're lucky, we have most things fixed so should be okay through the winter...

But I do have work colleagues who are worried about meeting all their bills (increased mortgage, gas, electric, food etc) esp those with children in nursery. They're seriously worried about not being able to pay mortgage, getting utilities cut off or being repossessed. Whilst it's not total poverty, and I don't think anyone is pretending it is, it's not simply sacking the cleaner or downgrading the Audi. So on that note YABVU.

Literally no one is saying the ‘squeezed middle’ are living in absolute poverty but if your bar for complaining about the cost of living is being able to give your kids 1 meal a day that’s pretty fucking bleak.

For example since April my nursery cost has gone up £100, council tax went up about £20 earlier in the year, food has gone up around 10% on average, our mortgage is split into 2 parts and the significantly lower bit just went up by £80 at remortgage, travel card went up £25 each, and our energy bill has gone up by about £200 minimum. I dread to think how much of a knock on the energy rise will have on nursery costs.
So about £500 a month in increases to absorb. That is a lot of money and not very many petiole on £30-50k salaries can absorb that increase. But it’s probably because they are travelling to work, and feeding their kids 3 meals a day plus snacks. They need to just live within their means and drop to 1 meal 🙄

I tthink its an issue of a society level if the middle incomes are squeezed hard enough as basically you end up with more poverty.