What cost of living crisis?

[pagopago]

Beauty salons mega busy and some with waiting lists of a month or two.

People piling trollies high in supermarkets, carrying bags of shopping in shopping centres

Airports and flights busier than ever.

Tradesmen e.g. plumbers, painters/decorators, carpet fitters booked well into next year.

Is this people burying their heads in the sand? Or making the most of things while they can still afford to?

Right now it doesn't really feel like there is a shitstorm approaching.

I had a colleague like that. Cheapish sharedhouse so she could buy jeans for 150 and fly for holidays often. I moved to cheap postcode so I could afford holidays.

Re expensive clothes and shoes. You should zee the Asda at my estate.... I look like a poor relations😂

We’re having some essential building work done at the moment. Tbh, we can scarcely afford it but once it’s done it’s done and I’ll deal with the debt. Scaffolder putting his prices up in September so we’ve just squeeked in a discount. I’m watching them charging their batteries for the drills and thinking thank fuck it’s now and not October…

There’s only so long you can put some stuff off, and for other things like children’s activities that are discretionary we’ll economise elsewhere if we can because the kids will never get this time or opportunity back- it’s fleeting. We’re lucky I know, we’re not choosing heating or eating. But we’ll have to cut back elsewhere instead. I won’t judge people who spend on nails or coffee out - maybe that’s their choice of luxury and they’ll save somewhere else.

So you say, but it's not like you'd had sight of everyone's bank accounts, unless we're about to get a drip feed. And even if you had, that still leaves the question of why you assime this would be reliably applicable in completely different situations.

The fact is, based on a small snapshot of behaviour in a supermarket all you can do is make unverified assumptions.

You can’t tell much by appearances.

Is the entire crisis going to be people bitching about other people having more money?

I have a well paid job. Yes, energy bills will suck, but they won't bankrupt me so I'm going on holiday and getting a haircut. Sorry if that makes others bitter. Maybe direct your rage at the people who are actually responsible for your poverty?

Honestly, I'd actively prefer you to have the haircut. The further away your stylist is from the dole queue the better.

i dont think OP was bitching about people having money but more that people are still spending, which is still unreasonable to bitch about. On a side note @NovaDeltas you sound like a twat “sorry I’m well paid and you’re not, stop bitching about it” 😂

@PerfectlyPreservedQuagaarWarrior I have never seen anyone I know has money wear all cheap clothes and shoes and a cheap or home-done haircut. I am not saying it has never happened, but it is very unusual.
I have seen people I know have money wear scruffy clothes, but you can still tell they are good quality.

But that's because you know them and know they have money. I know which of my friends have money and which don't. And overall yes the ones that do have money tend to have nice cut clothes and better hair etc.

But You don't know me and everyone else in the supermarket. Sometimes I wear my sweaty Betty power leggings and Mint Velvet trainers to the shops. Sometimes I wear my Primark (slightly fuzzy) leggings and sainsburys pumps to do a weekly shop.

For work I dress head to toe in very smart gear, matching shoes, accessories & handbags. I look 'put together'.

When I'm not at the office I can look... well let's just say you have me labelled as poor. I'm not.

Has Pretty Woman taught you nothing?

BIG mistake. Huge!

It’s not everyone’s reality though is it. Because you’ve asked the question…for me the cost of living crisis probably amounts to one or two fewer dinners out a month at best.

Which is like having an EV and thinking you’re immune to petrol and diesel costs going up.

The cost of living crisis is unravelling the economy. You should be lucky if it’s not going to dinner out at a restaurant as many times. It will very quickly be never going out to that restaurant because it shutdown due to sheer costs to run it if things keep up.

People are still.buying expensive Harry Styles concert tickets and making him even richer.

Bet he's not worried about their bills

We have a tiny mortgage/mortgage payment compared with our income, even with overpaying monthly. We don’t have any other debt other debt and live a relatively simple life without many extravagances compared to many eg regular nails done (just not my thing).

I’m not happy that my energy bills will soon be more than my mortgage payment but I can afford it. I think it’s naive to assume that most can’t.

I realise that not everyone has masses left over after bills but surely not everyone is living in such a way that they can’t spare an extra few hundred a month? To stress - I do know that many do live that way but I wouldn’t have said that was the minority rather than the majority.

The point is neither are they if they’ve got 300 quid spare to buy tickets to go and see him which was actually the starting price some of them went up to 800

Agreed the price of a lot of tickets is shocking. But please don't slag people off for spending money on non-essentials! You don't know all the circumstances and also are you saying it's only the poor who don't deserve any pleasure?

While being of necessity a very frugal person, I did get a ticket for my daughter. It was £57 (the cheapest) and her Christmas present. £300 were the front standing tickets (it gets even worse when the ticket companies buy them up and sell on at even more extortionate prices.)

The bleak winter people (on here and what the fast tabloids say) is going to be felt by people on low incomes more than those elsewhere.

That’s why a lot of places are still busy, I don’t envisage it being as bad as people make out in the economy.

Retail Shops. Property Market, Vehicle Sales and home furnishings are all being reported as strong sales growth - if people were as worried as the rubbish media makes out, none of this would be happening.

How do you know who needs it more than you? I wear cheap and casual clothes and I don't wear makeup. Maybe I look "obviously poor" and people will get out of my way so I can get to the reductions at Asda.

Depressing article in the Times this morning:

Police fear hard winter of surging crime and civil unrest

www.thetimes.co.uk/article/07b8a936-2bb9-11ed-b39f-ae396665d39a?shareToken=52af078187bd482e5841cb831598d29d

Hysteria?

It is reality. Cold homes and struggling for food is the future for many.

To highlight this is not Hysteria.

Some of us are using it before we lose it. 🤷🏻
Small business are now asked for thousand and thousands in deposit to get energy fix (which is 5x more than last year anyway)...
This is 2008 on steroids

I know people are are TA reservists. They’ve been running more riot control training in the last couple of years. If the police have become overstretched, the army will have to stand in for them.

And that for me just sums up for the mentality of the types who join the police force and the army that they would actually push back their fellow man in a situation of desperation.

That's unfair. You can also look at it as preventing more damage and losses to fellow men.
I was in city centre of a large city during riots working for small business with many friends in similar situation. I wish army was deployed in early

So you’d be all for protecting property at the expense of hurting people with you ???
because that’s what happened in the poll tax riots and that’s what happened in the minor strikes men were physically beaten with buttons to allow other men to go and dig up coal to produce profits for the corporation’s.

all it would’ve taken would be the police to stand back and say do you know what no I am not going to physically beat a man for striking and the negotiations would have taken a different turn.

considering this country is policed by consent as I say it says a lot about the types that join the police force and the army that they take that consent and interpreted it as the public would like us to protect profits and profits and property over human life.

If someone is setting shops on fire again, yes, I would very much be on the side of the police of course. I was actually very much for bringing in the watercanoons and was surprised they didn't when the looting was happening.
That's riots causing damage to innocent people and that's not ok.

That isn’t typically have the British riot we’re not very good at it.

however when the police start dragging women around on the floor that’s when it kicks off.

we’ve seen how these pigs behave and I’m afraid I’m very much on the side of the rioters when it comes.

there will be looting shoplifting is already through the roof and frankly the police need to pick their side very carefully.