People on good wages saying they are struggling

[ChopSuey2]

Am I being unreasonable to be annoyed by people on good wages saying they are struggling?

I am not talking about people who have good wages but are paying off large debts or whose childcare leaves them broke, but people who say they can't afford to live on a certain amount but actually have a decent or even lots of money left after essentials. Equally, people whose essentials (food shopping and heating particularly) are ludicrously high (not including those with high costs related to disability).

I really feel like people need to read the room. People are genuinely struggling and saying you can't afford to live on a good wage is insensitive.

I'm not sure if it's relevant but I would consider myself to be on a good wage (not a higher tax payer and in London).

YABU - people can say they can't afford to live on a good wage because it's all relative
YANBU - people need to think about what being unable to afford things really means

@Thingshavegonetoshit

I'm sorry. That's hard. Have you got a mortgage broker looking out for you? You can lock into a new mortgage deal quite a while before your current one runs out & surprisingly drop it if you find a better one. Mortgage brokers (IME) are worth their fee. Plus can you extend the length of your mortgage? You can always shorten it again in the future when your term comes to an end.

basically I'd do whatever it takes to keep your house because renting is SO expensive and worse still is the uncertainty of it.

best wishes

British Gas want £1100 a month off my mate. I said why. She said apparently that's what we're using!!!

She lives in a 2 bed Terrance house..... not even 10 years old. I feel there's a huge issue but they're refusing to look into it and keep saying that's what she's using to hear her house

However they don't even earn 20k as a family. Let alone 100k

On paper, we look like we are in good wages. In reality though we are fighting to keep a riff over our heads. We get zero financial help, because on paper we look ok, and have less disposable income than many families who get some kind of help through benefits (whether or not they’re working). We live in a tiny house but we live in the south east which brings along higher costs towards a mortgage or rent and council tax. It’s not possible for us to downsize as we are already bursting at the seams. if we sold our house the rent would cripple us and we have no chance of getting put on a housing list for support. The COL crisis is hitting us hard, we have more going out than we have coming in. We just can’t sustain this…………….of course we can’t complain can we because we are on a decent wage 🙄

Blimey. You'd have a beautiful house though. Probably talking over 600k!

These pompous types are usually the first to say poor people shouldn't breed as well! Why would you have 5 kids if you can't afford them?

I think that 'struggling' means different things to different people. To some it might mean that they're living in their overdraft, not putting their heating on etc. To others it means they can't afford a foreign holiday this year, or they haven't been able to put anything in to their savings account this month.

It's about the lifestyle people are accustomed to- and I think that sometimes those who are used to a certain lifestyle will really struggle to cut back. Either simply because it's what they've got used to/ it's all they've ever known/ they don't want to have to cut back... or because they're tied in to their outgoings- high mortgage payments, car finance, commuting costs etc.

For some people, when they say ‘read the room’, what they mean is they want anyone who isn’t in the same position as them or with the same view as them gagged.

No. MN isn’t about that.

In real life and on MN people should be sensitive to others, but also people need to understand in coming onto public forums that every once can post and you have to accept that, even if you don’t like what they say. If you don’t want to read it, you shouldn’t come into the forum.

Often there are more specialised and niche threads, or other forums focused on very particular experiences which might be better suited to people who only want to discuss issues with those in an identical situation to themselves.

No gagging.

I think it falls into two camps

I think you have those (who write many threads on here) who claim to struggle despite being on good money, when in actual fact after a bit of gentle unpacking from others it becomes apparent that in actual fact they just cannot manage money - for these people it is very disingenuous to say theyre struggling I agree

Then you have those who yes may be on a wage above your wildest dreams...but these people can still be struggling. Its all relative based on your outgoings, if their mortgage suddenly becomes untenable and they have to downsize that is a struggle, lifes problems do not evaporate once you hit the 40% tax bracket unless you live wildly, wildly within your means, which few people do. In this case - yes people are sruggling despite being on a "good" wage

in summary - stop gatekeeping what it means to "struggle" - it doesnt help.

Just using this as an example of not knowing the details, as just looking at the figures, well it doesn't mean nothing, but it can hide a lot.

Our net income is about £1500 a month plus child benefit for DS. No benefits, though we should probably see if we can get anything as things aren't easy, but we've been able to have the heating on, with the thermostat set to 17 or 17.5 through the day.

But we have no childcare costs, no rent, no mortgage. I have no travel costs for work as wfh. And if and when we get DS going to school again, hopefully DH will bring in some more money - he's not quite covering his expenses (car etc.) atm, as his working hours are very limited so I didn't include any of his earnings - he's not had any for three or four months now anyway.

Totally agree with you, OP. People seem to have lost all sense of perspective and responsibility for their lifestyles.

I think YANBU but neither are your family and friends. In bust (boom and bust) times, society historically always gets more fragmented, resentful, jealous, etc. (I'm thinking of some historical examples but don't want to get controversial, though it's not really.) Money is a very divisive topic, especially when there's not enough of it to go around (outside of the fat cat sector). Even your definition of "having actually struggled in the past" and "people close to you who are really struggling now" might not be good enough for someone else.

saw a post on a thread claiming people can be “absolutely struggling” on salaries of 100k+.

IMO if you can’t stretch that amount of money to live on you need to sit down and have a good look at your budgeting and spending.

if private school fees or a huge mortgage leave you struggling I can’t see how you can claim you’re worse off than someone on 20k who doesn’t have school fees and/or has a more manageable mortgage.

I cope quite easily on my 30k salary with good budgeting and debt/savings management. Someone telling me they can’t afford to live on 100k is taking the piss.

I live in an 80k household and while there's not much left now after bills I totally appreciate that I'm lucky because I had that money in the first place. It's quite obnoxious when people bray about feeling the squeeze AFTER paying the mortgage, childcare, cars etc That said op, I think it's important that we can all talk about the way our standards of living are diving. The country is on it's arse and we need to be vocal so in that sense yab a bit u.

I know how difficult is when you are TRULY struggling. I remember working 14 hours a day and after bills and food couldn’t afford paying for the tube so cycling everywhere around London at 3.00 am after work.
Now, many years later, I see people in the news complaining, saying they are struggling, they are going to be evicted, but some are clearly eating a lot more than they should, other with fillers in her face and a dog… seriously? At the same time, someone with a generous salary may be supporting a mother with Alzheimer’s and no qualify for any help. Poor people don’t want their expenses to be scrutinised, I assume neither the wealthy ones. We should just understand that we are all learning to live with less.

It depends on the room - in real life settings, you should absolutely gauge your audience. On an open internet forum used by a wide demographic, I think people are allowed to reach out or have a moan even if their circumstances are different to mine.

It is all relative to circumstances also. When you see single mums on here say they don't know how to get by on their 60k salary people start throwing eggs. Yet a couple who both earn 27k will have a similar take home, and you wouldn't accuse them of having good salaries.

You need a 25k morgage for a 2 bedroom house round my way, even on a decent salary it's tough to save for that. Granted, this is different to someone who is trying to save to put food on the table, but it's still worthy of a moan.

And who or what do you think that is? Government? Putin? Energy companies? Brexit?

There's saying you're struggling, and there's passing comment on how much the bills have gone up. Our bills have gone up loads its ridiculous. But I'd never complain about being skint and I would certainly read the room if I made this comment, considering we live a comfortable life. But I've been there in a situation where we had absolutely nothing, we were only able to eat because my parents got us some food shopping. Coming from that has made me hyper aware of other people's struggles.

We earn good money. But in two months over December and January we spent £1400 on gas/elec and we weren’t even warm. Yes we’re struggling compared to last year, and also pretty cheesed off.

I do not believe them either.

Depends how it's framed.

Anybody else cutting down on holidays?

Vs

I'm skint, can only speed one holiday this year

The latter will piss people off because that's not skint

It's more nuanced than that though. When did someone buy their house? Has their mortgage gone up? Are they renting? What salary you earn really isn't everything.

Hands down know someone who is close to being a billionaire and she said she struggled to put fuel in the 3 private jets this year

This wasn't this year. It was the year before last.

I audibly gasped!!!!

It does annoy me when I'm told 'it's all right for you, you have solar' in relation to excessive electricity bills that we don't have ourselves. Like them, we too could have gone on various holidays abroad, and spent a fortune on eating out every week and new cars instead, but we super insulated, double glazed and paid out for solar. It's finally paid off - but we planned this for cutting bills for our retirement.

(Note: I lived through the 15%+ interest rates and only survived by doing a pub cleaning job before work 6 days a week, working 8-4 in my main job Monday to Friday, quick tea then working evenings in the pub, followed by night club late shift Friday and Saturday nights, plus carding houses for Glowworm boilers at weekends - the free meals, plus tips from the pub and nightclub/restaurant were my saviour.)

living standards are going backwards so most people are going to notice if.