Middle earners punished

[Eucalyptus321]

I am feeling so disheartened and frustrated by how middle earners are constantly suffering at the hands of ridiculous government priorities. My husband and I have a greater household income than other families we know but have less cash in hand due to increased taxes coupled with the fact we receive zero benefits like child benefit or tax free childcare etc. ZERO. If they want middle earners to fund the country thought tax then at least support us with childcare costs. It’s a joke that two parents earning £99k each get childcare funding but parents with one £101k salary and one £25k salary receive nothing. I just need to speak to people who understand the burden of raising a family amidst the current financial climate and then the potential of further tax rises!

Hi Ricu.

This come up all the time here. The top 1%, that people on £100k are the high earners. No they are not. They are absolutely middle earners. Have you been to London? Have you walked around the residential areas. From the City to Chiswick, down through Barnes to Richmond, miles and miles and miles of massive houses, £2mil upwards, rows and rows of house £10mil plus. Flats that cost £2mil. Theatres full every night with tickets costing £150 each. Restaurants with menus costing £200 each. The shops, the designer goods. Who do you think is buying all this. Not people on £100k. Nope.
Head/hands...
Politely the cost of accomodation and theatre tickets may be way more in London but those are costs not income.
100k income is not a middle income. It really isn't. The median income in London is £49k more than the median for the whole of the UK, but still half of what you assume a middle income is.
I think what people are actually pissed about are living standards.
Essentially... I've done the 'right thing' got a professional well paid job and unlike my parents/older cousins (insert whomever your comparison is the thief of joy target is) I can't go to the theatre/go skiing/eat out/support private education/go on holiday (insert expectations around what that professional job was supposed to give you).
I don't really have that mind set, but can see that a lot of people do.
It's been a long sorry tale of woe that has led the UK to this prolonged squeeze on living standards and I don't see any sunny uplands any time soon. But it's been a long time brewing and really isn't just about the current governments taxation rates (tempting as it might to reductively simplify it to that)

This is 100% true. People are disincentivised from being ambitious as it doesn't pay. Personally I'm thinking of cutting my hours. I paid around £40k in tax last year as a single parent who works full time (no support/CMS). I'm always exhausted. I'm waiting for the budget and the ways it'll squeeze me further but I think at think point I'm going to ask to go part time, which is good for me and bad for the fiscal hole. Can't be the only one.

@Slothisavirtue Someone I know was working 16 hours a week and getting enough in benefits to have an overall income which enabled her to send her son to a private school. He was getting bursary but she still had to pay circa £1500 per term and could afford it. No SEN/disability in the family, just regular state support.
How is that?

This in an absolute nutshell. I know of many people
who only work 2 or 3 days a week because it affects their benefits. It’s an absolute joke .

No advice really but came on here to agree with you. It seems so unfair that middle earners are paying for people who have huge families with lots of kids and yet can't even afford to pay for their own families.

I think part of this frustration is that the middle class lifestyle one might expect on X wages is out of reach due to the high cost of housing.

I think a lot of millennials (so who missed out on the housing boom) pay very large mortgages for very average properties - and keep being told they’re the rich because of their earnings…

… by those around them who bought the houses far cheaper and have more disposable income. And possibly access to benefits the millennials done eg childcare, don’t have student loans to repay.

The childcare thing is a complete pisstake on top of this too.

Did the OP not mean as a joint income?

That is fairly middle because median salary is around £37K, so two median earners = £72K.

As a teacher she is probably earning £35K or 40K and her partner on £60k-ish.

Those are not high salaries for the SE.

Many new grads start on £35K and even the starting salary for a teacher is £30K.

I think the issue is people are not comparing salaries for people who are professionals / graduates and others who are unskilled or semi skilled.

Train drivers get up to £96K inc overtime.

Sky has been doing a good chart of how much tax we paid in 2021 and how we will be paying about 64 % more by 2030 becsuee or fiscal drag

Great to say hey ! We are going to raise the minimum wage we are helping working people...

No. You are not it's business who you are grinding into the ground will have to pay !

It's going to be absolute carnage for our young people and small business ! Carnage !

I feel ya OP. My DH is higher earner, I’m on 36k ish (part time) I can’t work longer hours than part time due to health and fertility issues. We are struggling to get NHS care and may be priced out of going private if they keep taxing us to death. We get no benefits, no children. Wonder what the point of living in this country is anymore. Both university educated in professional careers.

Why anyone whose household income is above 75K thinks the tax payer should subsidise their lives is beyond me.
You ahve children you pay for them and yes child care is expensive but it is not for ever.
This ocuntry has got into a mentality that the government should pay for us to raise children, pay for people having an illness even if they can do a full time job etc just because it costs a little more than someone else.

Sorry OP you feel hard done by on ajoint household income of 125K per annum - you are out of touch with relaity. you can afford it so why should the tax payer make it easier for you.

@Eucalyptus321 If they want middle earners to fund the country thought tax then at least support us with childcare costs. It’s a joke that two parents earning £99k each get childcare funding but parents with one £101k salary and one £25k salary receive nothing.

At first, I was confused as to how you could have less cash than people earning less, but then I saw you are talking about the benefits restrictions... which apply around £100k... which is not a "middle-earner" salary.

So your thread is actually about high earners, not middle-earners.

As for not receiving benefits once you are on £101k... have you heard of salary sacrifice? Do salary sacrifice, your income drops. There, now you have benefits again.

Given the amount of nonsense I have seen over the past 2 years from whiny £100k earners complaining about how they supposedly live in poverty, I am seriously hoping that Rachel Reeves takes a sledgehammer to anyone earning those kinds of salaries. It might bring them back to reality.

I am the tax payer! My family’s taxes are paying for other parents to get government funded childcare.

You are not the only one!

Or just over half of that if you take out student loan, tax, NI and an average (5%) pension contribution. £5,200 per month is a lot. But not that much when you pay full nursery fees.

Yanbu.

@MidnightPatrol I think a lot of millennials (so who missed out on the housing boom) pay very large mortgages for very average properties - and keep being told they’re the rich because of their earnings…

No, they're being called rich by other millennials (me) because they're able to afford houses, whereas it's impossible for me to afford a house on my income.

And before a clown suggests this, no, they did not work harder.

Nursery fees are temporary though.

OP didn't say they had £125K
She gave an example of a couple where one parent earned £101K and the other parent a low salary.

Loads of people ‘earn’ less than £100k and are worth millions. The illustration of people’s earnings is a total nonsense that only people with lots of assets fully understand.

I don’t really see what the incentive is for higher earners to participate in a high tax system they then don’t benefit from… the £75k earner isn’t getting other taxpayers to fund them, they’re paying enough tax to really be funding themselves. I think anything below about £50k you take out more than you put in now.

And - as to ‘over £75k you should pay for your own childcare’ - for context, my bill for two in nursery is currently slightly more than the take home pay of £75k after tax, student loan etc. So being excluded from this benefit is very, very significant in terms of cost.

DH earns JUST over the child benefit cut off (60k) so we don't get any benefits at all (kids no longer in nursery so we don't use tax free childcare) but earn at least £40k pre tax less than your DH which is going to be a minimum of £24,000 per year. God, what I could do with that money. Wanna swap, OP?

@DeedlessIndeed Or just over half of that if you take out student loan, tax, NI and an average (5%) pension contribution.

Your pension is not money being "taken out."

That's money that's being paid to future you. That's what a pension is.

I am in sheer disbelief that there are people of working age who don't understand what a pension is or how it works...

Only 1 in 7 taxpayers earns over even 50k a year. In your example you have a household income of £125k, which is vastly above what most people dream of. You are not "middle earners".

We are all taxed equally, it's only the amount above 50k which is taxed at the higher rate. It is incorrect to say that you have less take home money than people on lower salaries.

Please go and volunteer for a soup kitchen, food bank or homestart, then perhaps you'll be able to realise how privileged you are.

I’m a single parent, in London, own a house with a big mortgage, on £90k. And though I’m fucking far from loaded it’s a joke to whinge about being penalised when you’re earning over £125k. Get a grip. You’re in the top 4% of earners in the UK.