To think UK jobs are on the whole badly paid and IDK how a lot of people are managing

[AnonymousBleep]

I know there are some industries/roles where the money is good, ie tech and finance, but roles in the civil service, public sector, marketing and creative industries are absolutely woeful. I was thinking about moving (as haven't had a payrise in three years) but there are hardly any jobs in my sector worth applying for, and I can see from Linkedin that they've all had hundreds of applicants anyway. The average salary is abour £30K but that'll be bumped up by including London salaries - which actually don't go far as London is insanely expensive. £30K (roughly £2K a month after tax) doesn't go far at all either in the rest of the South East - especially as the cost of living is still continuing to soar. Everything is expensive - went into Superdrug yesterday to get some toiletries for my teens and was shocked at how expensive cleansers etc are now (just as a random example), and food seems to go up every week. How are people managing?

Am I wrong? Maybe Mumsnet has given me a weird lens on this as there seem to be a lot of very well paid people on here!

Agree. The disparity in salaries is noticeable. My current job pays above the national average at around £40k. But really with the career progression isn't going to increase by much. I could spend another 15 years in my role and might be lucky to get to around the £56k mark.

For comparison with my current experience level my starting salary in the US jobs would be around $115k (approx £92k).

I've seen people mention groceries but really from the time I've spent over there, it seems roughly comparable. Quality meat is cheaper than our basic/budget meat. But then our fruit and veg is cheaper but theirs is more.

Houses, unless im hcol areas like Cali, NY etc are pretty reasonable.
Going through the hell which is the immigration process (Sleepy Joe strikes again), but closed on a house last year for what works out at £138k. I currently live in an area in the UK below the national average for house prices.. but the same size house, level of decor/updates/modernisations, lot size would set you back around £450k.

Bills can work out comparible. Some work out cheaper, others work out slightly higher. So averages out to about the same.

Although the lack of the NHS will be a big miss, most jobs will provide health insurance that provides cover for most bits and yes the monthly fee can be a bit salty, but the lower tax kind of helps out that difference.

It never ceases to amaze me that so many Mners are happy for the children they claim to love to be cared for by someone they hold in such contempt.

Are taxes THAT much higher here though…I feel like it’s much of a muchness when you consider we don’t pay council tax or water rates.

Well you may not pay council tax or water rates, but we do. At 2024 rates, we pay £3500 in council tax and £1600 water rates. Our house is spacious and nice but there are two older people living in it, not causing the police any trouble, or educating children. And we are pensioners, who have saved from the last 38 years of self-employment, so we still pay tax on every penny we get from our pensions above £12,570 at the same rate except for NIC, which is (not) dedicated to a state pension fund. We are also paying the rent for a room in the SE while our DC gets a start in life on their desired career. Yes, we are extremely fortunate to be in this position, and not to worry about the electricity bill each month. I am not suggesting that the state should do more for us, but DH has an SME collecting VAT, paying NIC and corporation tax, auto-enrolment pensions dues, and then paying personal income taxes on anything else. There's a huge amount of admin cost to pay the accountants who work out who we pay and how much. Our tiny business supports seven families, and no one is paid less than £4 more than NMW, although we'd like to find a couple of apprentices who would probably start on less, at 17 years old.

I do think MN's view that being in business is evil quite confronting. Most people would not have a roof over their head were it not for people who understand making a profit.

To be frank, it's the effects of the financial crisis, an economy that is stuck in a low productivity loop (zero incentive to invest if you can get lots of low skilled workers) and a lot of money burned during Covid. The state was very generous to those who got furlough, gave out some very dubious grants and spent a lot of money that it really couldn't afford to place on the next generation.

It's going to be hard from here digging ourselves out of this. This is why people are already disappointed with the Labour Party and the front bench look stressed out. There is no money without growth. The idea that we can run services better and it will all be ok is not going to cut it.