To be shocked that 50k in savings is seen as ‘ not much in savings’ - maybe on mumsnet - but think about how people are struggling to put food on the table.

[Ginandbitterlemons]

I posted about our savings of £50 k for a specific reason , and was asking advice .

A number of mums netters appeared to mention that that was not a great deal of money.

Now- its not a question of me being offended by such responses- but it has hugely struck home to me just how much society is divided.

There are people who consider this hardly anything - yet I am aware that so many sections of society would be glad to have this , or any, savings at all .

Am not sad for me that I have this ‘ insignificant ‘ amount of savings- but I am aghast that some people do not seem aware that its something than actually may be out of reach for many ,and how such comments may sound to those folk .

I was aware that mumsnet can be elitist- but for goodness sake- there are people really struggling out there.

I am not expressing this very well , but how do people think it sounds to others who are living day to day hand to mouth?
Its been really thought provoking- and made me both aware of what I do have , what my values are , and to up my donations to the local food bank.

Hope I don’t get slated for this - its just really made me think about the wealth divide .

It's a crazy world on here. I asked here once about how best to invest our 20k savings and was told it wasn't enough to worry about investing, it was a tiny amount. I was pretty insulted! We saved for ages to build that up. I don't know anyone with loads of money in the bank.

Very true, I know quite a few high earners, if I ever mention mums net, they always laugh at me!!

High flyers work long hours and enjoy active social lives, they are not on here!

OP your £50K is a well above average nest egg, good for you!

Im a high earner with a shit social life, due to a disabled DC. Hard enough getting child care for him in working hours, let alone for a night out 😂

There’s a lot of bullshit about money on Mumsnet.

Check the salary threads, everyone claiming to earn 100k “it’s child abuse to have children if you don’t earn 100k your family will be impoverished”.

FACT only 4% of the uk population earn over 100k.

But sure ill keep believing that 4% all choose to spend their time congregating on Mumsnet while the other 96% seemingly don’t know Mumsnet exists

Top 1% earner here, and I have plenty of time for mumsnet 😁

my social life is shit though, so maybe that’s the tradeoff

Theres a lot of wealthier people on here. Sure, there’s undoubtedly a number of liars, but I doubt that number is as great as some (would like to) believe.

As an aside, not everyone who has wealth on here will have it through a career, or through a career that requires them to work long hours.

Of course £50k is a lot of money but in the context of your thread it is not. Context is key.

FACT? You know a lot of wealthy people aren’t on PAYE? Those stats are missing great swathes of people earning a lot more money.

Yes but what does that 4% equate to in actual numbers?
For London if we assume population of 8.9million, assume 50% of working age and then take 4% of that - gives us about ~222.5k people. Being v generous about 50% being women that's still 110k women.... Is it really so hard to believe that a fraction of us are on here?

That's not considering the numbers who work in London commuting in, or the rest of the country. Plenty will have some downtime to post, esp during maternity leave....

I’m a SAHM because DH earns well, and I have plenty of time to ‘piss about’ on MN.

The PP mentioned high earners, not SAHMs 😳

So you’re not a high earner are you…..someone else earns for you….giving you lots of piss about time 🙄

There are also those of us that aren’t British, and don’t live in the UK.

How on earth do you know? I wouldn't tell my parents/sibling/best friend exactly how much I had in savings, let alone every random friend and acquaintance.

You might know multiple people with that and more, they just don't go round telling people.

Most of my friends do talk about money openly, plus quite a few are on benefits so they aren't allowed savings over a certain amount. So yes, I do know.

I am not saying nobody on mumsnet earns 100k+.

People earning 100k+ are 4% of the general population and yet when a thread about salaries comes up on here it seems like more than half of mumsnet earns more than that with the other half not being too far behind.

Wifi isn’t the expensive luxury it once was 4% of the population should be 4% of mumsnet but barely anyone on here wants to admit to earning sub 60k.

You either genuinely believe mumsnet has an exceptionally wealthy user base despite it being a free to use site or you accept that there are a significant number of bullshitters on here

I think many MNetters are tone deaf when it comes to money. They like to say things like 'Oh poor me, where does my £5000 monthly income disappear to? I can't make ends meet.' Etc etc ad nauseum.
Then there are a whole swathe of people who are really struggling. And who probably don't talk about their finances so much because it's harder to admit you're not doing so well. We'd all do well to remember these people next time we are tempted to boast about our salary or our pension or our savings.

@DingDongJingle same! high earner with 2 children, one with disabilities. i have no social life

I think though a lot more than 4% have joint salaries of 100k.

But I agree there is a weird obsession with it as a figure, for sure.

i earn less than 60k but so do 90% of women in the U.K.

there’s another explanation, which is that users gravitate to different topics and different parts of mn. Some posts will have an over representation of wealthier individuals, such as holidays or private school boards, but the opposite is also true. I have found my way to some boards where it feels like everyone is on benefits or anyone who spends more than £50 a week on groceries is profligate. No one in my life lives that way, but I don’t assume the posters are all ‘bullshitting’

The reason why I think a lot of it actually is bollocks is the obsession with pure K’s being earned in the short term. No one ever talks about quality of pension provision for example - a good pension makes a huge difference to earnings. In real life it’s one of the things that people consider really important. Some employers offer stuff like sharesave, again never mentioned.

Also everyone is totally cocksure about the amount they are earning. In reality salary is usually supplemented by bonuses in the private sector, rarely mentioned only ‘salary’.

Plenty of people have savings and many don't. Perhaps some lie about it. There are many out there delusional. Sure some are not able to save, but its not impossible to save either. We don't buy fancy cars, designer handbags/clothes or take holidays every term time, so we manage to save. Our biggest expense is for the children, but we still manage to save. I do worry still about money and wish we could save more!

I imagine like everything in life the truth is in the middle. Some are bullshitters and some aren’t.

Well yeah, but on a post like this people aren’t really going to break down precisely where all of their income comes from, are they? I could say ‘my salary is x, my bonus is y, I have x amount in my share save account, my employers pay x pension contributions, other staff benefits include x, y and z’, but generally the post isn’t calling for that granular level of information. FWIW when I refer to ‘savings’ I mean the cash readily available to me in accessible accounts.

The strange thing about savings is you can’t tell how much someone has. The person driving a 10 year old car living in a 3 bed semi may well have a lot more than the people with a brand new Range Rover and 5 bed detached. Savings are completely invisible.