To be surprised by the difference in take home pay between 38k and 48k?

[0rangeCrush]

Recently I have looked into reducing my work hours by 0.2 FTE. This would knock £10k off my salary, but only £400ish off my take home pay per month.
This money would be saved through childcare costs anyway so I’d be no worse off for at least 5 more years.

I had to work full-time when my eldest was younger despite not wanting to; so I’ve been there on both sides. This is purely a tax and childcare costs issue; not just because I want a day off though.

Remember you'll be putting less I to your pension pot too, though that may not be as high as childcare at your time of life

I was going to up my hours until I realised after tax and NI I'd get just £70 extra each month. Not worth it at all.

I’m a teacher and have no interest in either a pupil support teacher or a faculty head; which are really my only promotion opportunities. Plus, the relatively small increase in my wage if I was a promoted teacher would also be taxed at 42%, thus not be worth it for the extra time I would have to put into it.
I’m going to increase my pension contribution by £100/month too, as mentioned earlier.
My partner is also part time so this really isn’t a feminism issue. Even when I reduce hours I’m still the higher earner.

It’s going to be:
monday - one kid in school, other at home with dad. Me at work
tuesday - as above.
wednesday - everyone at work/childcare
thursday - as above
friday - partner at work, me at home with youngest, eldest at school.
saturday/Sunday - everyone home.

So I work Monday-Thursday, he works Wednesday to Friday, nobody works at weekends.

Not our situation, partner been p/t since eldest was born.

Yeah mine does most of the housework on his days off, providing the child isn’t a psychopath that day.

Yes, as soon as you’re over a tax band dropping that fifth day becomes a lot easier! Definitely an issue in England at £50/60/100k as well because of the child benefit/childcare drop offs.

I work part time and have also agreed with partner that extra from our combined income goes in to my pension to help address that imbalance.

My employer pays in 27% I pay in 10%.

Im increasing mine by £100/month, out of the saved costs.

I’ll go back to full time when we no longer have childcare costs. This will be no issue; even if I do the last day as a supply teacher.

I'll probably go over the tax threshold (in eng) within the next 2 years by the time I get to the top of my pay bracket (presuming it doesn't increase by then which I think the govt have currently frozen until 2028, although might change in an election year), so am planning to drop hours once I do so, probably to a 9 day fortnight.

I wonder if a lot of people will do the same. Apparently 3 million people will be brought into the higher rate if the freeze stays in place. It also has knock on effects on savings rates etc.

It’s not just the 42% tax in Scotland that kicks in at 43k, it’s such a high marginal rate as you continue to pay ni at 10% until you reach the rest of uk high threshold.

so on earning 43-50k you have 42% tax, ni 10%, student loans 9%, pension 10% for example! So could be taking home only 29% of your wage above the threshold.

I can’t remember the exact figures but when I dropped to 0.8 FTE I was only £20 a week worse off after childcare so yes does sound possible.

Really? Wow, I'm shocked so many people still bother.

If you were in any of the other UK countries, you'd be earning a lot less as a non promoted CT.

Well done you for putting your family first. The government can’t keep taking off tax payers and not expect them to sit down and work out what’s best for them financially. You’ll have years to work when your children are older. Enjoy these years.
Hell, if someone can calculate that they don’t want to work more hours because it would affect their UC then you’re just right to calculate your wage on fewer hours.

Not in Scotland but full time I’d earn 47k and working 0.8 FTE means I’m also £400 a month worse off. Well worth it imo, to have a more balanced life.

Yes but she saves on the childcare costs so it equals out

Good job I’m not then?

To be fair I’d probably take home the same anyway, so swings and roundabouts.

Yep, exactly. I’d have to be nuts to keep working full time for nothing. I hope more of my colleagues do the same.

There is good reason to assume, especially in respect of tax.

Population of Scotland - 5.5 million
Population of England and Wales - 60 million

🤷🏻‍♀️

This is the internet, not England.

As mentioned earlier; I wasn’t asking people to check my calculations (in which case this information would have been provided) - I was merely shocked at the small difference. My home country is irrelevant.

When I was on £38k, I would have assumed someone of £48k was “well off” as it sounds way more than £38k.

Hell, if someone can calculate that they don’t want to work more hours because it would affect their UC then you’re just right to calculate your wage on fewer hours

This is so true. The government really needs to get a grip on the low wage/ pay stagnation coupled with high housing and transport costs situating we have here if it wants people to work more hours. People are not incentivised to work as much as they can.

I don’t have a lot of responsibility in my work and am on about 40K. I have actively resisted promotion.

The job is flexible enough so I can also do my creative career on the side which is rewarding and brings in around 5-10K a year. I’d have to think twice if it was worth it to get a promotion earning 50K that then left me no time or energy for my creative career.

If pay hadn’t been suppressed in this country for the past 14 years I’d probably already be getting about 50K + in my current role.

YANBU to be surprised OP! You see it on MN all the time. I'm surprised this thread has remained civil so far, 3 pages in but it's Saturday night.
MN-ers yelping like rabid dogs at anybody earning over 50K, saying that 'high earners' should be 'grateful', they feed 5 kids on 19K a year so the former are probably just really bad at money management and buying too much avocado toast.

Especially when childcare and transport are so expensive.

It’s a UK website.

I made no comment about the calculations. I clearly replied to someone cross about the location assumption with an explanation.

Yeah it’s not as bad as you think when you factor in 10k less isn’t 10k take home less and when you’re paying high childcare it’s worth going part time for a few years. Yes you’ll lose out on some pension too but I don’t regret going part time for those early years. Been back full time for a while now and pensions looking fine but if I’m able I might top it up a bit before retirement (20 years to go!)