To be absolutely sick of hearing about the cost of living crisis

[Katypp]

I surely can't be the only person sick to death of hearing about the cost of living crisis?
I am tired of reporters interviewing middle-class (usually) mothers inside paid activities such as soft play and hearing them moan about how they are struggling to make ends meet.
Have we completely lost the ability to cut our cloth according to our means or does 'struggling' now mean carrying on spending as usual then complaining when there's no money left?
There have never been as many massive new cars on the road, towns are full of hairdressers, nail bars, brow bars, tanning salons, soft play, play cafes, coffee shops, ice cream parlours, dog groomers, most of which didn't exist 25 years ago and are probably the recipients of the money of the families who say they can't keep up with spiralling costs.
Yes, some families will have been hard up before prices started to go up and will have nothing else to cut back on. They have my sympathy.
But i am utterly fed up of hearing how hard households ars being hit by the cost of living crisis when all that's needed is a few minor cutbacks which they don't want to make.

There is another thread on AIBU where someone is questioning the morality of billionaires and whether globally we need a different view of wealth and wealth distribution and it is chock full of posters falling over themselves to defend the ultra rich.

This is a refreshing alternative read.

I take it you would be writing this exact thread if it were not a Labour government stifling growth. A tone deaf thread full of one's own self importance. I'm alright Jack, well not everyone is and cutting one's cloth is all very well when you're not a middle income earner being squeezed for everything you've got. YABU.

This thread reminds me of the one where apparently our economy is now booming. The author of that thread is now buying a second home, or is she?

So the constant noise about the disappearing middle class has started to bore you? Not concerned, not outraged that people can no longer afford to have children in Britain - never mind take them to soft play, but bored.

But most of the people on massive salaries (and 100k is massive in spite of what Mumsnet seems to think) are paying the house prices/rent and nursery fees or childminder/wraparound to match. I think a lot of people hear a big number and benchmark it against their own costs.

We can live comfortably on £75k household income in the SW because our mortgage is 17% of our take home pay and I can afford to be part time so nursery was never that expensive, but decent salaries are hard to find down here.

Exactly. Let them eat cake eh?

Norhing to do with Labour and i have said upthread, our household income is less than £60k.
But go ahead with your assumptions.

Very true. All salaries are relative, both to the level of skill of the job and the expenditure attached to that salary. Basic economics seem to pass many people by. It certainly passed this government by when it knee jerked with the junior doctor pay increase with no provisos on future strikes.

I strayed onto a thread about Eton. Mindblowing really what people have at their disposal.

You're making a lot of assumptions about everyone who sickens you with their moaning. You don't know what else those people have got going on. You're doing a good job of taking the heat off those who need it firmly kept on them.

Your post just reminds me I hate vox pops, which are useless, a lazy, cheap way to fill 24hr news that adds nothing. As somebody else has said, they just ask the people who are out and about. Those really struggling will not be out and about cos they can't afford it. Lots of people are genuinely struggling, although I do agree, there are lots of things now that people consider essential, which are actually not essential at all. But that's the world we live in. If some people consider their nails more important than eating, that's their business I suppose.

Ah, the old 'you don't know what else they've got going on' is such a convenient retort, isn't it?
Are you saying i should say there, there, it's the COL crisis not you' to a pp claiming she had no spare cash on a £10 pcm (gross) income? Come on!

Yes it is. But it does not get my sympathy and is not a 'crisis'

I'd not be that surprised if her gross monthly income is a tenner TBF.

I don't think empathy is your friend. You sound very hard and not in a good way.

I think some people don’t know how to cut their cloth and it isn’t their fault. We’ve all been pushed to buy things we ‘need’, go on trips we ‘need’, mums rushing around with £12 worth of blueberries (organic of course) in their handbag (me included), new cars, holidays…..spend spend spend (on card, not cash) and we work longer hours, don’t cook from scratch as we are time poor, and still are wanting to keep up with the Jones’. People don’t know how to stretch a whole chicken across several days, nor do they want to. We’ve been dangled a carrot of a better life with luxuries only for circumstances out of our control to change so we’re all feeling the pinch now. Yes some people have always been poor and some will always be mega rich but the ones in the middle have been sold a story. Now we can’t mend clothes, we want the latest XY and Z and a Caribbean holiday too. It’s hard to cut your cloth. We are want better for our families and we want to buy our children a magazine (£8!!) People are entitled to moan. It’s all bloody expensive.

Having no money left at the end of the month, with no savings to fall back on or family who could help you out is scary, whatever your salary.

Living like that on a low income with the constànt awareness of prices rising and cutting back and back, but still only just surviving from one pay day to another, grinds you down. Feeling anxious because you can see your children outgrowing their shoes is miserable.

It's very nice if it doesn't affect you (and I am no longer in that position and am grateful every day), but that doesn't mean that those affected shouldn't be able to talk about it.

Ok.

I will no longer donate to food banks now that all the food donated by supermarkets is sold off cheap to middle class people via "community pantries". The people that are snaffling all the donated food can sort out the food bank.

Nothing to do with Labour? How do you work that one out?

Our community pantry is anything but middle class. It works on the same principle as a food bank.

What they call austerity isn't anything like the austerity Brits went through in the post war era when there was food rationing.

The fact this post was made is not related to which party is currently in power. That's what that comment means.

As much as I disagree with the post, if you read the reply trail it's easy to see what was meant here.

I read the reply trail thanks, how are people arriving at the conclusion that a government that imposed the highest peace time tax burden ever on the population has nothing to do with the population struggling with the cost of living? Interested to see the workings out on that one.

I think there’s a large amount of that and it’s not just middle classes- I see plenty of working class girls spending a ton of money on hair, nails, clothes , bags, bottomless brunches with mates , home interiors, multiple holidays - we are all encouraged to constantly spend to a large extent, and hence general expectations have gone up a lot - I honestly have old friends from up north on my Facebook feed who clearly think 3 or 4 7 day plus overseas holidays a year is the norm these days and obviously have the cash or credit to do it whereas none of my friends here do as all paying whopping rent or huge mortgages-