To , just once ,ask is anyone else fed up of being the squeezed middle?

[Wildandallthatjazz]

Thats it really. !

Yes , on mn , its seen as a privilege to have a mortgage, a job etc .

But sometimes it feels hard and you just wish that you got a break . Recognition of the hard slog maybe .

I am not begrudging those on benefits who got the extra payment support, its more about just wanting to have a treat / a bonus/ etc .. a spare bit of money.. a boost .. the heating on … or maybe recognition that the middle can struggle too ?

I totally accept that people can struggle and need help , sort of also feel the struggling middle are invisible ? ( and not seen to have the’ right ‘to have a little moan as it does you good sometimes )

I do think we are incredibly lucky to live in a county with a welfare state, nhs, free gp care I really do .
But sometimes, it just would be nice not to feel you are paying taxes , working as much as possible, and to be able not to feel squeezed all the time and the need to just have a grump about it .

sometimes it is good to let of steam .. when you cant IRL

and then you move on in a more positive fashion .

I struggle to believe that more than one poster has said why dont uou go part time and get top up benefits then ?
how can that be the answer?!
who would pay for it iif we all did that ?!
personally i do not expect others to fund my oart time lifestyle .
we all should pay into the system to help each other not say oh well go on benefits on the back of others as an answer. What attitude.. owed a lifestyle ?!
( this , of course excludes anyone who

HAS to work pt )

@Ijustreallyoveogs I said anyone with kids, they already have a full time job, paid work of whatever hours is on top

The costs of lockdown seriously boil my piss

At the time if you dared to say that we are going to trash the economy you were accused of being a killer. Literally. And literally that there should be no cost put on saving a life.

Yet here we are with a trashed economy, inflation through the roof because we had to print money, and absolutely no evidence at all that the lockdown measures made any difference at all.

Justthisnonce12 many many women have kids and work full time . Their partners share the job of childcare and the house with them , the latter are not just women’s responsibility .

You were one of the most vociferous supporters of lockdown. Hindsight is a wonderful thing.

I’m a bit baffled by this idea everyone is bandying around that you can just go part time and get loads of benefits. I am part time in a not enormously high paying job (chronic health condition- too unwell to work full time but not ill enough for PIP) and my husband earns minimum wage and we don’t get anything other than child benefit. When we had really high childcare costs we got about £200 towards that but it in no way matched what I would earn if I was working full time.

@Ijustreallyoveogs back on planet earth I think we all know that that’s not true for 99% of women and I’m sure you’re going to give me oh poor you how terrible you’ve married a dick head well yes but theres so many of them around its hard to dodge them. So the reality these days is that men can’t afford to support their families or won’t for one reason or another and therefore women have two jobs. Somebody needs to support them in that.
Or we decrease our productivity we stop making it necessary for there to be two incomes in order for people to survive which may mean a backward step initially but would it be better for the greater good, certainly the mental health crisis that I believe is a reflection of people trying to do too much.

I probably haven’t constructed this argument particularly well I’m getting ready at the same time but I think the jest of it is that we’ve shot ourselves massively in the foot the day became necessary for two incomes to survive.

OP most people on benefits are working, and working bloody hard, and keeping the heating off, and most are probably paying more in rent than you pay for mortgage in rent to live in a shitty private rental with bad paintwork and horrible carpets. And we don't get to own our property at the end of it. So please remember this.

Track and trace is what the Post Office does for your parcels.

For some reason many people trying to pretend that the costs didn’t cover the hundreds of millions of tests carried out do what you did there, and change the name to track and trace instead of test and trace.

It’s deliberate.

@Justthisonce12 back on planet earth I think we all know that that’s not true for 99% of women and I’m sure you’re going to give me oh poor you how terrible you’ve married a dick head well yes but theres so many of them around its hard to dodge them. So the reality these days is that men can’t afford to support their families or won’t for one reason or another and therefore women have two jobs.

Oh come on, 99% of women have husbands who don’t support them or play an active and equal role in raising their shared children? Bullshit. Some people try to make themselves feel better by claiming all women have to do it, but they don’t.

Yeh I know, any suggestion of the financial hit was met with abuse.

Justthisonce12

Not my experience at all . Nor anyone I know . See above post.

@luxxlisbon A very predictable response and even those that think their husbands are doing more than the average in reality if you actually break it down they do very little. I have actually carried this exercise out with several friends who think they have marvellous husbands it transpires they don’t.

but let’s pretend they do, even with a 50-50 split that still two people doing one and a half rolls and depending on the suitability of those people to perform one and a half rolls depends on the impact on their mental physical and overall well-being not to mention that of the children involved. So many variables.
But when you have young children those are the happiest years of your life I remember somebody telling me this and I didn’t believe it at the time because I was in the thick of the Mele but looking back it is absolutely true and if we can’t support people then when can we support them ?

Up and down the country thousands and thousands of pounds are found every week to pay for people to have their arse wiped and gunk force-fed into their mouth‘s. And yet there’s no money tree available to support working parents in the squeezed middle, it’s amazing isn’t it it’s almost as if it’s a policy/ philosophy and a choice.

@Blossomtoes

Are you serious? I have never for one moment supported the lockdown measures but to be fair you might not know that because many of my posts were deleted because I was a literal murderer conspiracy theorist

But collective responsibility only works if most people participate.

A lot of my circle who are now in their fifty's have had enough of paying at every budget and are now as the government say " economically inactive ". They have earned enough and have now retired.

I think we will see more of this happening and I would suggest is why the government is turning a blind eye to what's going on in the channel, we will need the workers so some of our own can work 16 hour weeks.

Not just yours. Some MNtters were bonkers! Easy to say "extend lockdown" when your hubby WFH bringing decent wage, so you can look after kids while they were doing remote learning. Now we're paying for people's paranoia.

Just seen today's headlines and am feeling a little numb.
Higher energy costs from April, an above inflation rise in council tax and public sector pay rises capped at 2%.

This week keeps getting better and better. Roll on Thursday.

I am not sure if the news is reporting another round of COL payments or if they are talking about the payments that have already been made but it will only go to those claiming certain benefits missing those that will be on a low income. Although if they are on NMW they will get a higher hourly rate., which is a plus.

Not read the full thread, but the OP is resonating with me this morning, feeling rather fed up and need a bit of a self pitying moan.

Single income household, lone parent to 2 young DC, earn okay I suppose - I'm not a higher rate tax payer however. Professionally qualified, working in the sector for over 20 years. Zero assistance from employer, not even an miserly platitude that 'we understand things are tough' despite very good Q3 profits and unlikely to get much above 2% pay rise next year - where are these mythical private sector pay rises of over 5% average they reported on the news this morning?!

Not eligible for any financial assistance, mortgage increasing each month now, cost of everything going up, we've made many cutbacks but are now drifting in to overdraft each month.

I should probably move jobs, but there is risk involved in doing that, so feel a bit trapped.

Whinge over and best wishes to all.

Speaking as someone who works part time doesn't get top up benefits and doesn't need the extra money, I think any criticism of people who could work more hours, choose not to and aren't reliant on income from the government to support themselves is a hiding to nothing. I do have an ND child who needs some extra care, so I probably pass the respectability threshold here as I couldn't actually be full time anyway. But even if I didn't, the notion that I should be pitching in to work more when I vehemently opposed Brexit and Truss, was agnostic on restrictions and saw all this coming?! That'll be a no. And there will be many like me.

I'm not a homeowner and certainly not wealthy, but I dont claim UC or anything due to working FT. It all feels like it is for nothing. Lots of stagnation, UK going backwards. I'm very angry at the state of things. I just can't be bothered with life anymore. Feels like a psychological as well as a financial assault.

We just let very wealthy people get away with taking the piss. I think the pitch forks will be coming out next year though when the housing and jobs market dives and homelessness and poverty increases. Apparently 5 million households are already behind with bills. Might be sooner if Tories continue to protect the rich which taking from working households in the budget this week.

Agree with this. In the first wave I was terrified, but soon realised what was going on. Major banks were rumoured to be failing early 2020, so pumping money into the system was needed and I think COVID conveniently enabled that.

When businesses were getting money thrown at them without any checks and business owners soon upgraded their cars or paying off theif mortgages, I realised this would end badly. In my town I was expecting to see lots of businesses shut down, but the opposite happened - more opened up and had renovations done. Now it is going back the other way!

COVID was a genuine threat, but it was also used as a gravy train and to prop up and kick into the long grass what is coming now for a bit longer. Possibly so certain people could position themselves more favourably.

COVID was a genuine threat, but it was also used as a gravy train and to prop up and kick into the long grass what is coming now for a bit longer

This is certainly true

I agree 100%. But you can’t complain because someone on £25000 would love to earn what you do.
Pisses me off that people think anything above £40k is mega bucks. I’m a higher rate tax payer and due to the governments decision to freeze the tax thresholds instead of raising them with inflation mean I will be paying a good chunk more than I should.

I really think the government are taking the absolute piss if they put up taxes for the 'middle' up on Thursday. Given how they piss them up the wall, particularly over the past 2.5 years, I don't see how they have any right to ask for even more from people.

I am unusually cross about it the more I think about it

agree but we’re not allowed to complain about it because we should all be grateful for the crumbs of what is left for us! Or we get told there is someone worse off which is true but that’s always been the case with everything, doesn’t mean People’s feelings aren’t valid whatever their earning bracket is.

that’s like saying we can’t complain about our kids pissing us off because there is someone who can’t have kids, its just so condescending.

Me complaining that we’re the middle squeezed and we’re really suffering atm doesn’t take away from someone less than us but we are still bloody struggling.