What do you consider a ‘high’ earner?

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In my head, a ‘high earner’ is someone who never really has to think about money. So, perhaps £200K and up. However, I’ve recently seen threads where people on circa £50K are described as ‘high earners’. As a Londoner, that seems like madness to me, but these things are obviously very dependent on where you are.

So, I’m curious. Where do you live and what would you consider a high salary?

This thread is wild. I live in East London zone 2, own a 2 bed flat (high mortgage), early 30s. Our household income is around 110k. All my friends are designers/artists and so don't earn more than 50-60k. We all live a comfortable lifestyle, take multiple holidays a year, go out/eat out a lot. I would say that we generally feel like highish earners compared with a lot of people who live and work in London - very conscious that there are vast amounts of people who are on much less.

I only know one person who earns 250k and they work in some kind of wealth/investment role. They earn vastly more than anyone else I know (and probably will ever know) and looking at statistics must be in a tiny minority of mega-high earners in the country.

To me a high earner in London is anyone on 70k upwards. Anyone saying otherwise is living in a bubble and should check their privilege.

This. There is a difference between being a high earner and being well off.

Even in London I would say earning over £70k makes you a 'high earner'. But it doesn't necessarily make you well off if, e.g. you have a large mortgage and childcare costs on top of that.

If you're talking about being able comfortably to afford a decent sized family home, private school fees, a couple of holidays a year at least, kids' extracurriculars, multiple cars and still have some savings...I think you'd need a household income of at least £350k (probably higher) in London. Less elsewhere if housing costs are cheaper.

Aside from London and surrounding areas (which are a world unto themselves). I’d say over £50k

Pointless question

ask on here and many will claim you need £100k to live in London which is absolute nonsense

To me a high earner in London is anyone on 70k upwards. Anyone saying otherwise is living in a bubble and should check their privilege

absolutely agree amorlisboa

100k + high earner
50k mid earner
30-35k - reasonable earner
15-25k low earner

I'd probably agree with 50k upwards, but higher in London (maybe 70k).

There's a lot of people on threads like these saying that they feel hard done by on 70/80k a year. Even in London, which is ludicrously expensive in terms of housing, come on!
If you can't manage on 70k a year, you aren't poor, you're shit with money.

£250k +

I'm SE (just outside of London) and on minimum wage. Based on my own situation and those of all the people I know (which does include some very high earners) I'd say I consider 50k+ a high earner. The majority of people I know earn between 20 and 30k (full time roles).

I'd say £90k p/a and over. Or a household of around £150k between two working parents.

Southeast £100k plus is the start of a high earner bracket to me but not in the sense of ‘has no money worries’, just someone who earns more than most even in London and more than others in good professions with lots of experience (who tend to be in the £50k+ bracket).

I don't think it comes down to a figure.
I think if someone has enough to run a reasonably nice car for each adult, pay all bills plus mortgage, be able to shop for food without thinking about it, get takeaways/go out for meals if they want to, and still have some left for luxuries, THAT'S a high earner.

I’m not really sure what the point of being really wealthy would be if you weren’t enjoying said wealth i.e. living in a big house in the nice part of town, sending your kids to the best schools, etc.

Most people aren’t interested in amassing wealth to roll about in gold coin like Scrooge McDuck.

I would love to know all these jobs where people earn £60k plus especially outside of London!

I would class high earner as 40k upwards !!!
Mega high is anything after 55/60k!

Yorkshire

Whatever you earn plus 20/30%?

60k in London isn't that high tbh

I'm outside of London and earn £85k a year and merely middle management, I don't know anyone on less than 40k a year - many of which work in the civil service which are known for paying under private salary rates.

It does make a difference whether the household income is from a single salary or joint. Could both earn 70k , which would result in combined net income of 96k. If a single earner makes 140k gross, their take home is 83k. Obviously that's still loads, but a huge difference.

@GalactatingGoddess DH earns about £63k in a very specialised field (computer security architecture) that requires a PhD. He is in East Anglia.

I’m a director for an NGO and my husband works in investment banking (and earns considerably more than I do).

We live in London, though, so perhaps not the demographic you were interested in.

He must be reasonably inexperience/junior though. Senior security architects (many of whom don’t have PhDs) are on six figures even outside London.

That’s very true.

@SudocremOnEverything Yes, he is under 30, so has a lot of potential for wage increases.

@GalactatingGoddess There are lots of jobs where you can earn over £60k outside London. And not just in tech (as the stereotype goes).

Civil servants, for example, earn more than that at G6 grade. They’re experienced professionals but they can be all over the country - and in the whole range of civil service professions.

The main thing about it is that, for the most part, people on these kind of salaries have qualifications and experience. They aren’t in entry level positions. They usually have quite a lot of responsibility (not just managerial - they might have technical responsibilities without managing people).

It’s not some ridiculous, unicorn-like salary. But that doesn’t mean that everyone is going to switch into a role with a salary that stops them qualifying for child benefit.

He does indeed! 😁

@Ineedtoletgo83 that's also my experience. My mother was absolutely horrified when she realised what we earn. She scrimps and saves, I felt really bad, so I told her because I'd rather she spent it on herself or charity than on creating an inheritance we don't need.