To wonder how other families get to the end of the month?

[gundigirl]

DH and I are both middle earners, with a combined income of around £90k. We have one DD in state school – no fees, but she does a few clubs and after-school activities, which add up.
With the rising cost of living, I’ve had to take on a side hustle. I actually enjoy it, but still – without that extra income, I wouldn't have been able to cover recent repair bills, for example.
I honestly don’t understand how other families (especially those with two or more DC, or just one working parent) make it to the end of the month. I’ve never felt more financially squeezed.
I’m not exactly a super-saver – I like the odd hair appointment – but I do try to save or invest a bit each month when I can.
What am I missing?

That's the thing, isn't it. The business I worked for very nearly folded in the 2008 crash, and actually did fold the day before lockdown in March 2020, because the women who could afford the items we sold immediately stopped buying. If everyone stops going for their one holiday a year, going to the cinema/theatre, shopping, sending their child to swimming lessons and going to soft play we'll have a much narrower range of industries with jobs and nothing going into the pipeline of secondhand clothing.

People count coffee as "luxury" nowadays (PP on this thread), it sounds bizarre to me but it seems that's how bad the economy is now.

Babe,

I think that you and I live on different planets! I can't be in the same room as UHT, let alone drink it! As for tea - well I just posted about my tea snobbery.

Yes, music and art clubs are folding because middle classes have less disposable income now. Stagecoach will either go out of business or increase their fees and become the realm of upper-middle class (I doubt the latter as upper middle DC usually go to boarding schools or do drama in top private day schools anyway). Stagecoach is usually for middle- to lower MC whose children go to comps.

@Ubertomusic I think people expect better quality now too - when I was a kid people used instant coffee - or a cafetiere for posh - now a huge majority of people have coffee machines, pod all the way to whole bean depending on how much you are into your coffee.

A 200g jar of instant coffee makes approximately 100 servings of coffee for as little as £2 for the whole jar - my cheapest coffee pods are the Aldi dupes, and are £1.85 - for 16 coffees (if I am buying the branded ones it can be £4+ for a pack.) If I buy a pack of pods a week that's around £100 - where as previously I might have bout 2-3 jars a year for around £10.

So a jar of instant coffee not a luxury, coffee pods however could be argued are a luxury.

It's so sneery as well. Yes, of course you can make an instant at home and cart it about with you or get a McDonalds coffee for about £1.30, but a coffee out is no different to lunch or a pint in a pub. You are paying for somewhere to sit, the staff, light/heat/rent, and some tax.

I buy a couple of takeaway coffees a week because I can only take one flask and my office doesn't have a fridge. I am aware I'm paying for the convenience and for someone else to have the beans delivered, buy and store the milk and make the damn thing for me.

@SoMuchBadAdvice I guarantee you have had UHT in your life and drank it happily without knowing, I think if you want to save money you need to wind in your snobbery.

I agree with you on complexity, and I'm not qualified to have a view on Social Statistics anyway. Still, it seems to me that the statistic doesn't indicate that Reform's support is restricted to certain Social Grades.

FWIW I think this was where I got the population data from, but I should have included the decimal in my arithmetic and said 47%

Yes, you’re right - but OP isn’t exactly at a point where she has to live off beans on toast and worry about how she’s going to pay the electric bill.

She could cut one of her child’s activities and re-assess her food shop and she could easily be £250 a month better off.

There seems to be a real theme on MN whereby relatively high earners have no concept of budgeting or monitoring their daily spending, then act surprised when people tell them they need to cut back on X if they want to be able to pay for Y.

I was just reminded of how in Victorian era coffee was a working class drink - no pods or instant then. It looks like we're going backwards straight to the 18th century when pretty much everything was a luxury... I'm not sure if I find it funny or sad.

Yes I have had UHT, that's how I know that I hate the taste.

@SoMuchBadAdvice BABE - no I 10000% bet you have had it - and not known it was UHT - and liked what ever you consumed it in, never even questioning if it was UHT or not.

I bet my life on it.

Unless every single time you consume milk you check and watch that it is "fresh" milk being used - and if you do then I fear you have bigger issues.

It's not sneery though, I think people who work hard and earn above average should be able to afford plenty of "luxuries". If MC stop heating their homes and use services, this means something is really really wrong with the economy. I view it just as a symptom, nor more nor less.

I am a squeezed middle myself like OP and many other PP. We just get told to shut up and be ashamed of ourselves of course 😁

Don’t diss the Stagecoach. Pretty sure both Emma Watson and the new Hermione Granger started there.

I have a guilty coffee pleasure. However, I have solar panels and my own barista machine as well as the monthly massive coffee beans that arrive from Grind (yes I am sucker for the MC shite). Not sure I would survive working from home without it! I also purchase some of my fine wines directly in France (all within legal limits, of course). And my most guilty pleasure has been gambling successfully on US tech stocks via my ISA (probably not recommended though)

Also, my grandmother was pretty posh and she darned her stockings and never put the heating on and poked the fire, so we are just rediscovering it in our latent post war DNA. Together with others we know.

Kids activities? So millennial parenting, you know. It is back to sticks and muck and boots, even in the local park. So they can still be done, just make a reasonable choice on a couple and do those focussed and well. I am pretty sure as a kid of the 90s we did not do a gazillion clubs either.

I think people really need to let go of the idea that just because they earn X, they should be able to afford to buy Y without having to budget, or without thinking about the impact it will have on other areas of their spending.

I think you're missing the point. Of course we can budget more and save more money and thankfully middle -high earners have capacity to do that but the point is WHY is this happening and what will happen if we all suddenly stop going out for meals, cut kids activities etc. the wider impact is huge and it's a sign the economy is in trouble. It's not about the individuals budgeting skills but what this change means for society. Cost of living rises are bad for all.

Well I used to buy a costa for myself quite regular. Now I don't but I bought myself a milk frother from JLewis and make my own at home. Expensive instant coffee plus my frother and it pretty much tastes the same.

I also bought some fancy large latte mugs which also help with the experience.

Small things I know but much cheaper overall.

Are we in the post war era though? That's the main point for me.

Absolutely. Whining doesn’t help anyone. If you want something, work or save for it. Or learn to budget.

Cost of living crises have always impacted society - twas ever thus. People can’t expect things to stay the same forever 🤷‍♀️

This idea that because you earn X, you should be able you buy Y because that’s what Auntie Nora could do 50 years ago is just daft.

I “think you're missing the point. Of course we can budget more and save more money and thankfully middle -high earners have capacity to do that but the point is WHY is this happening and what will happen if we all suddenly stop going out for meals, cut kids activities etc. the wider impact is huge and it's a sign the economy is in trouble. It's not about the individuals budgeting skills but what this change means for society. Cost of living rises are bad for all.”

The flip side is that we were all brain washed into overconsumption at the cost of community, being green etc and reusing stuff. Something the war and post war generation did successfully.

So I really am on the fence about this. Older generations would never have upgraded their phones/cars every few years and used cheap labour to bike their takeaways through town. Rather than have a home cooked meal that is shared with friends etc. Same with home improvements, get one really solid kitchen for life and repaint it and value it. No need for throw away stuff.

Exactly, I find the entitlement absolutely mind-boggling.

There’s also an option not to be offended at a question asked genuinely. Just because she may more than some others doesnt mean she isn’t struggling- no one knows her circumstances- she could have bills that are zapping her funds. Massive mortgage, debt etc. she doesn’t deserve to be castigated because she asked a question !

Ha! But everything has been deliberately made not to last. I bought school socks in September - all have holes already, I'd be mending stuff constantly 😁 I used to buy Melton and they literally last forever but - Brexit! - and they're not available anymore.
Just one example of sooooo many.