To be fed up with all the threads about high earners feeling poor

[trekking1]

It's always the same condescending "I've worked so hard and only have a 3 bedroom house in a great location and an expensive car", as if 1. that's not a lot 2. people who make 5 times less do not work as hard!

And the suprised pikachu face that having a degree did not magically get them a 500k job. That is not how capitalism works folks

Never claimed a single benefit in my life and now I fuxking need it. Yes could be and have been a high earner. What of it? That's why there are criteria that are not morally predetermined. Stupid divisive post.

Proportionately they’ve already paid - 100k salary is 27k income tax and 4K ni. Think for 3 years ~ £80k is enough ubtil school steps in?

And perhaps had I asked for help sooner I wouldn't be in the mess I am now. Except for all the reasons and prejudice you posted, I didn't.

I have no real say in how my taxes are spent. I have private health insurance and educate my children privately. And we pay over £80k a year in tax. I don’t think it’s unreasonable for people to hope for some return for the taxes they pay. Especially as we need the childcare in order to be able to be able to do the jobs that enable us to pay so much tax.
It’s irrelevant anyway, as it’s not going to happen. And we’re nearly out of the childcare years. Any additional tax we pay in the future is likely to be ploughed into the gaping hole that is the NHS.

Sure, but that tax is already going on other things. To subsidise more childcare, the government would absolutely expect the public to fund it through more tax.

There approx 600k high earners ~20% aren’t Uk born if they decide to relocate plus British nationals

as a straw man of my peers it’s not a stretch. But be pedantic… that’ll change the sentiment! 🤷🏽‍♀️

@SeeYouInMyDreams

for me it's the way when people complain about it, it's as though it's a new thing. Like there hasn't been financial suffering for well forever. The cost of living crisis apparently only started when it affected the middle class.

Also the fact that when the poor complain about being poor they get told they need to work harder, get a better job. The amount of posts about lazy people on benefits. So much judgement.

So tbh I struggle to sympathise for a group who when others struggled they at best looked the other way and at worst judged and sneered.

I am also not a high earner, my husband is a slightly higher than average earner and we absolutely do not vote Tory

Also, it’s fine to express dissatisfaction at not getting something without expecting that it’s actually going to be something that changes. Am I mildly annoyed that we paid £3.5k a month childcare? Yes. Do I actually think the government are going to step in and fund any of it? No. Still a bit annoying though.

I'll believe it when I actually see it to be honest.

Totally agree

It’s already happening - multiple countries are actively recruiting nhs qualified doctors.

You also won’t see it tangibly in population -600k of taxpayers are high earners that’s ~1% of the population.

last year’s immigration was about that amount.

You’ll see it in the slow degradation of the country. Everything getting worse which is already happening

Honestly, I think you should find it promising for the future (politically). It is a fact that the squeezed middle is becoming more so. It is a fact that the tax system means that if you earn more than £100k you actually take home less money, and if you have children you need to earn over £130k to be back to even. It is a fact that nursery fees are out of control and house prices have been propped up at the expense of almost anything else.

But guess what. The more people who are absolutely fucked off with the current system, the more likely it is to change. The more middle (and higher) income earners who are feeling the CoL pinch, the more likely they are to turn their backs on over a decade of Tory voting.

And also - to be quite honest - it is OK to be struggling as a high earner right now. That doesn't mean low earners aren't struggling more. It just means the economy is fucked.

People are allowed to be stressed and worried, and they are allowed to be panicking that even an amazing salary is hard to
live on in e.g. London these days. We should ALL be worried about that because it's inflation and house prices and political fuckwittery

Give over. If they were so better off than you on UC and had more leisure time why didn't you quit and go on UC

This is it for me too.

People arguing up thread that the 'squeezed middle' or higher earners aren't allowed to complain - well for many a thread on here it was middle earners who told lower paid earners that it was their own fault and they were lazy, uninspired, feckless with money, poor choices etc etc when the lower earners complained.

Now it's got to the point that the middle is being squeezed suddenly it's not about personal choices but the system being broken and wages not keeping up and things being too expensive - unless you're a lower earner when it's still your fault, and some go as far as it's the lower earners fault the middle are so squeezed as well.

Yet the reasons just about every income are feeling the pinch are the same - wages staying lower than they should be across the board and life getting more expensive across the board. Yet if you're earning little and struggling to afford the basics it's about choices, but if you earn more and struggling to afford the lifestyle you want it's about anything but choices it's about what you deserve because of all that hard work.

I think some are starting to realise that working hard only gets you so far, and does not isolate you against hardship and that's an uncomfortable place to be when you've convinced yourself that you have achieved what you have by graft alone, and those who haven't achieved it don't work hard enough, and suddenly it's not paying off anymore - something those hard working lower earners have known for a long time.

I don't doubt some people are struggling on higher wages than mine with commitments they have made etc, and for some I do sympathise, but in general if the feeling is that if I want a wage that affords me a standard of living other than bare essential survival then I need to work harder for it and make better choices, why doesn't that also apply to someone on more money than me? The real reasons we're both struggling are essentially the same - wage stagnation and high cost of living, but so many are ready to jump on people in my position while defending their own.

You do they say, reap what you sew, because that attitude is being directed back at these people and they do not like it.

YABU, as I find having a diverse spectrum of voices on MN interesting. COL has affected everyone differently, and discussion of that is topical.

I enjoy reading about all aspects of high earners, as although I am in that group, and have friends similar, no-one really talks about this kind of stuff in real-life. I also like contributing where I can as a single parent with ND DC, and balancing that with an exec level job.

An anonymous forum is exactly the right place to be having this type of conversation.

@trekking1

Give over. If they were so better off than you on UC and had more leisure time why didn't you quit and go on UC

Because in a few years when the dc are of school age the posters will still have a career. Not everyone lives for the here and now. But that doesn't mean she can't bitch and moan whilst it's shit and hard.

No because £100k is about £55k - 60k take home. So two kids at private school leaves them with £15-20k to live on.

Lower earners don't seem to appreciate how much higher earners pay in tax!

Actually, I believe you are missing the point, the problem is that if even those earning that kind of money, with those good jobs are struggling then we're all fucked

My salary increases incrementally and with promotion (public sector) and inflation has meant I have not seen any benefit to a 10k pay rise in 5 years, that's poor.
However I thank my stars I got the pay rise so I can still keep my head above water

I also think that the more you earn the more you pay out - in general. It's all relative

I think a lot of this is driven by the fact most high earners are in the South East and money doesn't go as far:

1. The South East housing is really expensive. £500k in Wolverhampton buys an absolutely lovely house in a great road but £500k in London gets a two bed flat in the arse end of nowhere.
2. Nursery care in London is stupidly expensive. It can be £2000 a child - try doing that with no free childcare hours and pay your mortgage on a shitty overpriced 2 flat (whilst paying a fortune in tax for people who live in bigger houses to have free child care).
3. Try paying for a train season to commute to London (if you don't want to live in a tiny flat) that costs £600+ a month and then spent 2-3 hours a day commuting so you can pay more tax for people outside the South East to have free childcare and live in bigger houses than you.
4. Despite paying a fucking fortune in tax and being absolutely fucked financially by mega expensive housing, expensive childcare, expensive train season tickets everyone here seems to think we should pay even more tax and be grateful for it.
5. On top of all that, many "high earners" have moved away from family to progress their career, worked like dogs with longer hours (at least in the early part of their career if not still) in stressful jobs, had mountains of university debt, whilst often the people complaining about high earners not paying enough tax still live close to their family, get free childcare, bigger houses, benefits/tax credits, shorter working hours and less stress.

Can you see why some of us are monumentally fucked off about people telling us how lucky we are and should be grateful to pay more tax?

Because I didn’t want to throw away my career and live on uc. But I did think about it- that period of my life was insanely stressful.

I do earn less now but have much lower costs and better quality of life. Stop sneering at others- you don’t know their lives.

Summed up so well.

The problem is that you’re judging all high earners as people who sneer and judge and looked the other way when others were struggling. My partner, as a high earner, has never done any of those things and neither have I. Would you judge all people in a certain group as the same? I try to take people as individuals and can sympathise with people for lots of reasons.

To be honest there are many people on this thread who claim to be low earners that are sneering and judging. So if some high earners do that, they are clearly not alone

Someone on a gross salary of £101,000 per year will take home about £5,700 per month, or £68k per year. That's before any deductions for student loan repayments or pension contributions.

If you assume they contribute 5% to the pension and are paying a few hundred in student loan repayments, they could easily receive £5,000 per month in take home pay.

This group of taxpayers receives no child benefit, 15 hours maximum childcare and personal allowance starts tapering off once you hit £100k.

Childcare, mortgage and utilities can easily come to £4k/5k and more in loads of areas of the UK, and if you don't have two incomes, you can see why they would find it tight, despite their headline salary appearing to be large.