to be fed up of hearing 'I've worked hard for my money'

[newbluesofa]

Lots of chat on MN recently about taxes on high earners. So heard lots of 'we have this money because we work bloody hard for it' and honestly I'm sick of it and think the people who say it are selfish.

Nurses work incredibly hard, long shifts, difficult job. Carers provide absolutely essential service, again shift work, difficult hours, difficult job. Teachers provide essential work, I know multiple teachers and they all devote evenings, weekends, school holidays to the detriment of their own families. All of these jobs also have huge emotional tolls. So 'I've worked hard for my money' means nothing to me, because a lot of people work a lot harder for a lot less.

Why assume the entrepreneur comes from privilege? Not all do.

Yes. As in not be totally self sufficient.

Which is apparently the issue?

I mean yeah, if you want to be absurdly literal to deliberately miss the point, then you're right.

You would have thought the pandemic would have made people stop and think before they open their mouths about it wouldn't you. 'Hard working' is usually harder for the poorest paid.

It’s weird all these people were valuable when we were banging pans for them, but now they get paid exactly what they’re owed because their work is worth less.

You don’t need to. You’ll learn the hard way, as the productive people are leaving this country in their tens of thousands.

The people banging pans were not exactly high intellect either.

To be fair, my sister was a care manager at the time and my SIL a senior nurse.

Both very clearly said not to bother as they’d have preferred PPE and fair pay.

@SleeplessInWhereverto be fair most people (retrospectively) can see what happened with allowing ‘key workers’ do their work and halting everything else, the subsequent state of the economy and who/ what funds it (eg what is really ‘key’)

There are different kinds of hard though. There's the physically and emotionally draining. Nurses, teachers etc. There's the jobs noone else would want to do, carers, bin men. There's jobs where you are responsible for hundreds of employees, looking after million pounds contracts, a different kind of stress. There's also different levels of education needed for jobs

All jobs are different.

DH is a high earner. Over the years he has worked away for weeks on end. Coming home Friday night, leaving again Sunday night. Available 24/7 when at home, at weekends. Literally taking his iPad onto the beach, and taking phone calls, whilst on holiday.... That pissed me off, I can tell you. He was paid well, but not THAT well!

Nurses, teachers and carers don't do that I would have thought.

Is that hard work? I would say yes, but in a different context. Ironically he was working on NHS contracts, who generally always expect their private contractors to do work over the holidays, and be ready for when they get back from theirs.

@Christmascarrotjumper ,

‘Why assume the entrepreneur comes from privilege? Not all do.’

The hypothetical person I described isn’t an entrepreneur. He/she is just in a well paid job, as are most of the people on this thread claiming exceptional talent is required to earn decent 6 figure salaries.

Genuine entrepreneurs are rare and of more diverse backgrounds. I suspect very few people resent people like Branson or Dyson, however rich they are.

You get people who say they have worked hard and assume others haven’t. This is wrong.
You get people who are envious of people with more money than them when the people with more money have worked harder than them. This is also wrong.
Most people work hard - some harder than others and get adequately compensated for this. Some work harder than others and are paid a pittance. It’s not anybody’s fault really.

Go on then, I have a lot of patience. Been hearing that one since the seventies and I haven’t missed anyone in particular yet. Except Noel Edmonds, to be fair to the lad, he is one of the half dozen that actually followed through with that threat.

Piers Morgan and James Corden. What a loss.

Ay yes, always the most productive ones, such a loss, you’ve got me weeping and despairing now.

I don't work nearly as hard for my money now as I did when I was on min wage. I'm paid for my experience and job knowledge rather than solid hard graft. I'm in a company where my workload is really low (v lucky) but salaried. My work is done but I have at least 50% downtime and despite not being a high earner, my hourly rate on actual work must be pretty high.

But wouldn’t it be counterproductive
a lot of billionaires run businesses that employ people and support and contribute to the economy
if they weren’t allow to keep or earn that much why would you bother
so then the treasury would lose income and we’d lose jobs

You have chosen to do that though. I mean honestly, who cares if you or others on this thread work hard? I work hard but I consider myself lucky to be able to do that. I'd feel such an idiot going around saying 'I work hard'. Who cares? I'm not saving lives, unlike a nurse or even a carer.

Working hard certainly doesn’t in itself mean you get paid well for it, but I would think most people in very good paying jobs had to work hard in the first place to get to that position (not counting any high end nepotism situations). In a lot of cases the harder you work the less you get paid (manual workers, commercial cleaners, etc).

And you can't have retail workers, food service workers and bar staff if people don't have the disposable income to shop and go out. Squeeze too hard, productivity drops and there's not enough money left to pay nurses or Costa Coffee staff.
Striking the right balance is important and ignoring high earners isn't going to help.

Is it your family or friends telling you they don’t think you work hard?

The OP any many others on this thread are saying they don’t agree with it and are annoyed by it…

Our taxes are saving lives.

Apparently Even if most billionaires lost 99% of their wealth, they’d still be billionaires so obviously still better off than most.

Do you genuinely think that the monopoly of Amazon for example is a good thing because it creates loads of menial minimum wage jobs? Having all the wealth being concentrated at the top isn’t good for any of the rest of us.