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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

This may be unpopular - but what about the squeezed middle?

590 replies

AndroidUsername · 24/10/2022 07:43

They are talking about raising taxes on the average person now. Which will really effect lower middle class families who are already feeling the pinch due to increases in cost of food, gas and electic, increasing childcare costs and rent or morgage increases. They are going to increase pensions and benefits with inflation but lots of middle class earners are not having their wages increased with inflation but will now have their taxes increased. What about help for the middle class, especially lower middle class and working class who earn slightly to much to qualify for any help but will now stuggle with all these increases.

OP posts:
bercan · 24/10/2022 12:33

I worked throughout the pandemic but don't resent those who didn't

GoGoose · 24/10/2022 12:33

Total government debt at March 2022

Total debt £2,365,000,000,000
Interest bill - by 2023 expected to be £100,000,000,000 +/-

UK annual tax revenue - £800,000,000,000 +/-
UK spending - £800,000,000,000 +/-
Net repayment - Negative

Households in UK - 28,000,000
Average debt per household - £84,465
Average annual interest bill per household - £3,571

Question: What is the medium (15-25 years) outlook for the UK?

  1. Positive
  2. Negative
  3. Other

Answers please.

kittensinthekitchen · 24/10/2022 12:34

Worriedddd · 24/10/2022 12:29

This is what pissed me off as well. I worked throughout the pandemic people just kept asking for more handouts. There's no magic money tree the money was printed and now we are facing massive inflation. They already used QE to have very low rates from the last crash. What did people expect to happen? You can't close an economy for 2 years and expect everything to be fine. It would need to be paid back and it's going to be painful.

The furlough scheme was massively abused.
I recall even MN - a business that is run predominantly digitally, and I would have thought a great example in how to work from home - claimed to have furloughed around 90% of their staff (maybe be misremembering the figure, but it was high).

Worriedddd · 24/10/2022 12:36

bercan · 24/10/2022 12:32

@Worriedddd who was asking for handouts? of course people who were told not to go to work needed paying

Free COVID mass tests , , eat out to help out, stamp duty holiday, COVID pay up to 2k a month. People now asking for energy bailouts and mortgage bailouts. It was all going to be needed to be paid back now people are moaning the bill has arrived. The government can't fix this it's a global crisis and it's going to be a very shit few years.

Worriedddd · 24/10/2022 12:37

Bounce back loans I forgot about those which were abused 🤣

Fromthedarkside · 24/10/2022 12:37

I thought this thread was going to be about toothpaste.

Now I know it's not I'm not interested.
😡
Flounces off.

bercan · 24/10/2022 12:39

Free COVID mass tests

how else would you have mass testing?

eat out to help out, stamp duty holiday,

well SD was shit but the Tories will always try to prop up the housing market, many like that.

COVID pay up to 2k a month.

based on earnings so some lost out. Please explain why people who cannot go to work shouldn't get paid?

blackpearwhitelilies · 24/10/2022 12:40

Absolutely disagree with means testing the state pension. It's not a benefit. It's a pension scheme into which we've been paying for decades in some cases.

Doubledenimrocks · 24/10/2022 12:40

RedToothBrush · 24/10/2022 12:05

This is the bottom line. Plus we have everything from covid to pay for now. All those 'free tests' that people wanted to continue indefinitely. All the 'eat out to help out' costs. All the furlough costs. All the costs of vaccinating everyone quickly. And then all the additional costs for the extra border controls for Brexit.

Its a perfect storm.

What frustrates me, is how people don't understand how nothing is for free and how certain policies cost money.

However, when people see that money can be found for things like dodgy contracts for PPE and festivals of Brexit, it somewhat grates to be told that we can't afford to pay people properly.

Worriedddd · 24/10/2022 12:41

bercan · 24/10/2022 12:39

Free COVID mass tests

how else would you have mass testing?

eat out to help out, stamp duty holiday,

well SD was shit but the Tories will always try to prop up the housing market, many like that.

COVID pay up to 2k a month.

based on earnings so some lost out. Please explain why people who cannot go to work shouldn't get paid?

Because you cannot print massive amounts of money and expect there to be no consequences. It's short termism thinking as usual with our government. The government were not straight with people what this meant for the future.

bercan · 24/10/2022 12:41

of course there was abuse but the idea of furlough to protect peoples jobs so when things open up again the industry still exists makes sense in lockdown scenarios.

@Worriedddd what would you have done differently in a lockdown?

Doubledenimrocks · 24/10/2022 12:41

Worriedddd · 24/10/2022 12:36

Free COVID mass tests , , eat out to help out, stamp duty holiday, COVID pay up to 2k a month. People now asking for energy bailouts and mortgage bailouts. It was all going to be needed to be paid back now people are moaning the bill has arrived. The government can't fix this it's a global crisis and it's going to be a very shit few years.

But they can subsidise slap up meals in the House of Commons? All in it together get?

RedToothBrush · 24/10/2022 12:42

bercan · 24/10/2022 12:33

I worked throughout the pandemic but don't resent those who didn't

I think that its not as simple as that though.

I think most people will know at least person who openly took the piss out of the system and were gloating about how they were living it up at home whilst not working.

It was inevitability only ever going to be shortlived and we'd have to all work even harder to cover that drop in productivity and thus GDP.

People were also doing covid tests 2 times a day at some points, going on about just how much they were thinking of others. Except they didn't consider the cost and how that would impact on lives.

I've been trying to think of imaginative ways to help school save money / reuse things to help their budget next year. My son's year is dire and really suffered from covid. They can not afford to lose staff.

bercan · 24/10/2022 12:43

Because you cannot print massive amounts of money and expect there to be no consequences.

Which started in 08 & then we had Brexit so we were hardly in a good position for the pandemic & war.

The government were not straight with people what this meant for the future.

What do you think people would have chosen instead?

perseverence · 24/10/2022 12:44

Quveas · 24/10/2022 11:23

You seem to have a habit of criticising money being spent on those who are vulnerable or poor. Not your first even just today. You must be exceptionally comfortable (i.e. rich, healthy, in employment and heavily insured against all eventualities) to not care what happens to the more vulnerable in society. So I have an answer for you - the rich, and probably you. Tax cuts and reducing public spending do not build a strong economy. Or did you entirely miss what happened to Truss? Plans to cut taxes and reduce public spending tanked the economy. Economics is not a "one answer only" strategy. We have had over a decade of slashing public spending, cutting taxes (mainly for the rich), collaborating with tax avoidance by individuals and companies in the name of "invetstment", and severing ties with our strongest and closest markets to prove some point that escapes me... and look at where we are. Yes, things have to be paid for. But there is not a single method of generating income or a strong economy despite what Tories seem to think.

Well said.

And for those with a few brain cells - still functional - might like to revisit the 'trickle down theory of economics' - and admit that there is no part of it which works...but that evidence has been in place for a couple of decades at least...

...that fact conveniently ignored by said Tories and their supporters.

bercan · 24/10/2022 12:45

I think most people will know at least person who openly took the piss out of the system and were gloating about how they were living it up at home whilst not working.

The only person who I know who received furlough received less than their salary & later lost their job. I was grateful for the security of mine.

People were told to stay home, what difference does it make if they lived it up at home or cried in the corner?

bercan · 24/10/2022 12:46

It was inevitability only ever going to be shortlived and we'd have to all work even harder to cover that drop in productivity and thus GDP.

we had low growth & productivity pre covid?

RedToothBrush · 24/10/2022 12:46

bercan · 24/10/2022 12:45

I think most people will know at least person who openly took the piss out of the system and were gloating about how they were living it up at home whilst not working.

The only person who I know who received furlough received less than their salary & later lost their job. I was grateful for the security of mine.

People were told to stay home, what difference does it make if they lived it up at home or cried in the corner?

It matters if it was fraulent and they could have worked rather than rack up state debt.

Bacibaci · 24/10/2022 12:47

The way things are going there will be no middle class anymore, it will be the super rich, just about managing and the destitute. The 1000 richest people in U.K. increased their their wealth by £500 billion since 2009. The number of billionaires in the U.K. grew under covid. Every time there is an economic shock the bail out money ends up going largely to the richest increasing their wealth and assets. We need tax reform, land tax, wealth tax, increase in inheritance tax for the v rich. I am not against the rich, they just need to pay more than they do. A nation’s wealth concentrated amongst a few is bad for society.

bercan · 24/10/2022 12:48

I just find it bizarre how people who received furlough are the new benefit bashers.

One of the issues post covid is the "silver exodus" of workers which the gov didn't see coming. That's one reason for such a tight labour market we have now.

Worriedddd · 24/10/2022 12:49

While I don't agree with it a meal in the house of commons isn't the same as bailing out millions of people. We were already fucked from the last recession the pandemic meant we had no buffer.

I honestly think the west is in decline. They could have told people we can bail you out now but things will get worse it will need to be paid back and there will be little support when things do get worse.

ILoveAllRainbowsx · 24/10/2022 12:49

This reply has been deleted

This has been deleted by MNHQ for breaking our Talk Guidelines.

GoGoose · 24/10/2022 12:49

I will leave the important comments from the Guy Hands interview here. They really do corroborate my own experience recently. Investors need some convincing the UK is the place to invest. It is not as if there are few opportunities elsewhere - the world is highly competitive. When investment is made, it will be at a higher price for the UK as the returns on inward investment will now increase comparatively higher. I have emphasised the important parts (to me anyway).

>>

"Guy Hands, who runs private equity firm Terra Firma and has been a Brexit critic, warned the UK faces higher taxes, lower benefits and a possible International Monetary Fund bailout.

His comments come after a tumultuous period sparked by the mini-budget.
But Mr Hands suggested the problems facing the UK go back much further.

"The reality is when they did Brexit, they had a dream. And the dream was a low-tax, low-benefit economy," he told the BBC's Today programme.

Outgoing Prime Minister Liz Truss had tried to push through those policies, but it had not worked, he said.

"Once you accept that you can't actually do that, then the Brexit that was done is completely hopeless, and will only drive Britain into a disastrous economic state," Mr Hands said.

"So I think [if] the Tory party can own up to the mistake they made and how they negotiated Brexit and have somebody leading who actually has the intellectual capability and the authority to renegotiate Brexit, there is a possibility of turning around the economy, but without that the economy is frankly doomed."

He added that the Conservative Party was, in his view, not fit to run the country.
"I think it's got to move on from fighting its own internal wars and actually focus on what needs to be done in economy and admitting some of the mistakes they've made in the last six years which have frankly put this country on a path to be the sick man of Europe," he said.

**

Mr Hunt - who is backing Mr Sunak - is scheduled to set out the government's economic plan for taxes and spending on 31 October. But Mr Hands argued that much more needs to be done, in order to turn the economy around.

He said that as a businessperson, he tried to be positive about the investment landscape.

But the reality, he said, is the country faces "increasing levels of poverty, and it's poverty which is moving up the economic level", reaching middle income households who will struggle to pay their mortgages.

He painted a stark prospect for the economy, saying to expect "steadily increasing taxes, steadily reducing benefits and social services, higher interest rates, and eventually the need for a bailout from the IMF".

Mr Hands comments come after a warning at the weekend from a former governor of the Bank of England, Lord Mervyn King, who said the UK was facing a "more difficult" era of austerity than the one after the 2008 financial crisis in order to stabilise the economy.

Lord King said the average person could face "significantly higher taxes" to fund public spending."

queenofthewild · 24/10/2022 12:50

I've just had a promotion and taken on extra hours.

DH has had a decent pay rise.

Yet the rising costs of living, costs of energy, costs of weekly shopping mean we need to make cutbacks.

It's hugely frustrating. But I count myself lucky that we have had the pay rises that allow us to keep our heads above water. So many families don't have access to additional funds despite working hard. It's an awful situation.

bercan · 24/10/2022 12:51

@RedToothBrush but not everyone will have claimed fraudulently so...

The person I know is single, childless & worked in aviation for years as a higher rate tax payer. They have paid into the system far more than I have so why would I begrudge them taking furlough?