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.

My daughter is at a private school and we have both a bursary and a scholarship she won. We're not very well off but certainly couldn't ever afford full fees, which are probably easily £30k a year.

Bursaries do exist, but are absolutely means tested and reviewed annually.

We have had foodbanks since the early 2010s so I don't think they can afford the essentials either. The essentials have soared in price. Housing in particular.

It’s not that difficult to see that in many parts of the country housing costs are the big issue butcrekk li ated to earnings. In 2000 we bought a small house but in a good home counties area for £118,000 , that house is on the market for £425,000 and not much changed - I earned 33,000 at the time , today in same job would probably earn around £48k . Not difficult to see why some basics are far less affordable .

It really annoys me when oldies whinge about youngsters buying coffees and having a netflix subscription and making out that's why they can't buy a flat/house!

Back in the 80s and 90s, the youngsters on pretty low/average wages could relatively easily save to buy a flat/house. We weren't living in poverty to save. We were out spending money, just differently. Me and DH would have "dates" to the pubs 2 or 3 nights per week, the equivalent cost would be far more than the odd Costa Coffee today. Likewise we went to the cinema nearly every week, the relative cost being more than a netflix subscription today. We also rented videos on the weeks we didn't go to the cinema. We both went out with our respective friends for pub nights/meals. We'd pick up takeaways on our way home.

We didn't have smart phones or xboxes, but we both had other gadgets, i.e. we had CB radios, I had a Sinclair spectrum computer, he had a Commodore 64, we had hand-held nintendo computer games, walkmans then portable cd players.

Things were generally a lot cheaper back then in proportion to wages. Not just housing costs, but food, meals out, entertainment, etc.

I can guarantee that all those youngsters who did save to buy their own flats/houses back in the 80s and 90s weren't living austere lives and saving every penny they earned towards the deposit, yet that is what the oldies are suggesting when they whinge about today's youngsters actually wanting a life!

Nobody is denying there has been a recent increase in the cost of living. The OP asked if people were fed up hearing others moan about it.

You are choosing to spend your income on things that meet your families needs - that is absolutely your choice. The fact you would prefer to spend £2400 plus on Christmas rather than a holiday, is your choice entirely. Whilst some people will budget more, many people budget less and perhaps go on holiday. Also, many more don’t have either.

It seems you are probably spending well over £1500 per month on council tax (200?), WiFi, (50) gym membership for 2 (150) phones (100), Christmas (200) and dog insurance (100). Around £800 - is this correct? Surely there is a little bit more than £1000 left over, since your net should be over £2500 per month? Maybe you are making large pension contributions/private health care etc? Even student loan repayments would only be an additional £120 ish

You earn slightly over the national average wage (which I think is around 39k?) You are not on rockstar wages! Why should you be able to buy everything that you want? No matter how hard you work, you don’t earn enough for that. You earn enough to have a slightly better than average standard of living. You both earn a decent salary which is enough to pay your bills and have a considerable amount of ‘extras.’ You just feel that you are not getting enough, which is a shame.

You must have been on benefit/part time work some time ago, before you completed 6 years study and were funding your adult children? Young children can be relatively inexpensive. Once they start wanting gym membership or expensive hobbies, uni accommodation fees and mobile phones, they become pretty expensive. It won’t be forever though and it is a privilege to be able to support them, as many can’t afford to do this.

Holidays are overrated - you (and your children) are doing just fine and are benefiting well from you and your partners hard work.

Of course there is a COL crisis and it's obvious the gap between the 'haves' and 'have nots' is widening. I'm in a part of London where it's the 'haves' for sure - LD constituency - but you don't have to go far to see the opposite. And so many places outside London are like another country! It's why Brexit happened - people feel totally hopeless. It's why Reform are still able to galvanise votes because when people are suffering and dissatisfied with their lot, they instinctively need someone to blame. In 2016, it was the EU, unfortunately, but could have been anything. Now it's 'immigrants.' Story as old as time and scary stuff.

• surely you can’t believe this?

There’s a difference between a 90s blue collar wage and a low wage. Not necessarily the same thing.

You did very well if you were able to do this and support your partner and children too, including taking them on lots of holidays, theatre trips and meals out etc, whilst earning under that national average wage - hats off to you!

Today’s equivalent would be around 32k. It would be difficult to buy a property and support a family with this low income alone now, given that in most areas a 2 bed terrace will cost you at least 180k.

I think it’s ok to moan when you work hard. I haven’t listed everything I need to pay and the fact that me and my partner have chronic illnesses that make working feel much harder. It’s all relative. I work with many people on full benifits and they are left with more disposable income than myself which isn’t right. Most people I know that earn what I do have felt the impact. I would not moan to someone less fortunate than myself but I have a right to express my opinion. I moan as I would love to be able to help my children more the way my parents helped me even though they earned less at that time, I worry about how my children will afford to get on the property ladder. I could say it’s that persons choice to earn less or not have competed higher education so why should they moan. People paying taxes should be allowed to express what they feel when the roads and nhs are terrible. You’ve said that I don’t earn much which I agree with but the other poster was implying I should be minted which I was simply saying I was not

A combined household income of 90k is good. I don’t recall saying you don’t earn much (maybe I did?) just that you don’t earn enough to have everything you want. You earn slightly above average. This is good.

You seem very hung up on the fact that you have studied and you work hard. Care workers work hard. Your studying is compensated by being paid nearly twice as much as a care worker. Lots of people are university educated now.

I understand there are lots of things you pay for that you haven’t disclosed. I would suggest that these things are not ‘essential’ expenses, but for the type of things we pay for to support our standard of living. If they were essential, you surely would have mentioned them ahead of luxury expenditure you listed.

I would challenge you to think really hard about what your disposable income actually is, particularly if you genuinely believe those on benefits/lower wages have much more than you. Aside from your council tax, internet and dog insurance (permitted because you’ve already committed to your dog… and I love dogs 😄) and £50 for two phones what else is actually an essential expenditure? You’ve mentioned you spend 1k on food and petrol. This leaves you with well over 1k disposable income a month from just your wages. Presumably your partner has a similar excess? .

I suppose what I’m saying is I’m happy for you. Please be happy for you too. There are so many worse off - which you gratuitously acknowledge. Families can operate on half the income you have and still take a holiday. This is perhaps why the other poster suggested you were minted, because by comparison to half the working population (who also work equally hard) you are!

This doesn’t mean we can’t worry about how the cost of living impacts others less fortunate and be disappointed we can’t have all the luxuries we used to have. It’s human nature to feel a bit miffed, but to moan and describe it as ‘struggling’ or complaining we can’t afford luxury X, because we’ve spent our money on luxury Y and Z is a bit crass. You are entitled to this opinion, but I disagree with you.

I think we all worry about our children, but yours will have had better support than many. My son earns a modest salary and is saving slowly. Like his peers, he focuses on the lifestyle, experiences and travel that I could not have dreamed of when I was in my 20s. I am really happy for him. He hopes to get on the ladder eventually and if I had a household income of 90k I’d be looking at my outgoings to see what savings I could make to help him in the future, like you. My household income is less than half yours and we have been saving to help our son onto the ladder. Maybe the difference is he’s always paid for his phone/gym and accommodation etc from part time earnings, even when at uni.

Which Benefits would you cut and how much would it raise?

Decent growth.... How exactly? it is something that has escaped Govt's for many years...

Remember what the Bond markets did to Liz Truss when she tried tax cuts to boost growth..

Welfare cuts come with a price, more poverty, more homelessness, longer waiting lists, less SENDs provision. less free childcare, more pensioner poverty.

Also we had many years of public sector and benefit cuts and they achieved precisely no savings.

Can I ask, out of curiosity, why do you assume that welfare cuts come with a price of extra poverty, more homelessness etc?

That only happens if the cuts don’t drive additional economic activity and productivity. Why are you assuming they wouldn’t?

Plus, there comes a time when everyone, countries included, must cut their cloth. It’s not pleasant but unfortunately we live in the real world not a utopia where we can spend on everything that matches our ideological wants and needs: sometimes it’s just not possible and I think at some point, the country needs to realise that. There’s no bottomless bit of cash.

I pay back student loan and pension. I am not hung up on going to uni and I know how hard carers work as I was one for years but if I thought I wouldn’t have a significantly better income I wouldn’t have studied for 6 years as it was extremely hard. I am comparing it to the lifestyle I had before earning and what my parents afforded. People on ful benefits are on up to £1500 a month with no rent or council tax to pay. A young woman I know with a baby living with her mum is getting nearly £2400 in benefits so yes she does have more disposable income than me. Again I am not pleading poverty but £40000 five years ago got you much more for working the same, that’s all my point is.

A whole lot of them that's for sure.

Lizzy didn't cut spending. She should have.

I have more right to my money than anyone else.

"Lizzy" 🤣🤣

A single parent with one child and no housing costs can receive an estimated £728.84 per month (£424.90 standard allowance + £303.94 child element) in Universal Credit, plus £117.21 per month (£27.05 a week) in Child Benefit, totaling £846.05 per month. Not sure how the young lady you refer to has £2,400 per month purely from benefits? Maybe she works and has her benefits topped up? It doesn’t seem right, does it?

Some household receive considerably more than £1,500 in benefits per month, depending on their disabilities and/or needs etc. I truly hope you are blessed to manage your own chronic illnesses and have good enough health to continue working for as long as you wish. If you are too ill to work, you may need to apply for benefits yourself.

I have two Degrees and a post graduate qualification. I have worked full time and paid national insurance for 39years. I am currently too poorly to work and receive the highest rate of benefit due to my illness, because my NI contributions were sufficient. I am not able to claim universal credit as I have some savings.

I receive £640 per month.

My husband is also graduate and has a Masters Degree. He earns less than the national average wage as he supports young people. Between us we earn much less than half your household income. We still pay a mortgage and council tax (along with all the other utilities) just like you. You say that you wouldn’t claim to be struggling in front of less fortunate people (can’t remember your exact turn of phrase) but you have done that exactly that, so it’s obviously hit a nerve as here I am, not letting it lie, at gone midnight! 😂

You are certainly not the only person questioning whether the uni and student loan route was the right choice in hindsight. University education no longer guarantees a higher income - I’m not sure when that changed?

But I agree with you that 40k 5 years ago had more purchasing power than it does today, due to the cost of living rise. It’s not in dispute. Maybe we could publicly moan on behalf of those who are disadvantaged and privately grumble to ourselves that we are not getting quite as much as we used to. You have confirmed you are not pleading poverty, so I guess I’ll just have to settle for that. 😃

She gets full ADP too and a payment as she is excluded from working for a couple of years. I know she definitely gets this as it’s part of my job to look into it. She gets takeaways every night and taxis everywhere. Her daughter has the best of everything and has a holiday to Spain booked. Benifits are needed but I don’t think you should be better off not working than a nurse for example who is a single parent.

I’m sorry you are not feeling well, I’m probably triggered too as working is doing me in and I will probably not be able to do it until my 60s because of my health too, I just wanted to be a bit more comfortable for once in my life but studying and this job has taken it out of me. Hope things get better for you

ahhh… so that’s similar to PIP for a disability then? That would explain it.

I agree that benefits shouldn’t give people more income than those with the same family circumstances /disabilities etc but working full time. But that’s probably an entirely different thread!

i read that some European counties calculate welfare benefits based upon previous earnings (and therefore tax contributions) If you earned a decent salary, your benefits are more generous than if you are lowly paid. Should we be adopting this sort of approach? I will have a look now.

Which, while true, is irrelevant to now. Should everyone just shut up about economic struggles because people used to have plague and don’t now? I don’t think so.

OP, perhaps if other people’s financial struggles irk you so much, you should spend some of your apparently abundant free time curating your news feeds and social media to include only items that are more palatable to you. What a sparkly, oblivious life you must lead. Far be it from anyone else to take the shine off.

And? People had scurvy and pellagra and plague and polio and other ills. And they smoked and drank themselves to death. So fucking what? What does that have to do with the cost of living now? Exactly NOTHING.

Seeing as it’s relative, a matter of perspective and context, you must be well aware that not everyone or their parents have had the experience you describe. Not denying that trauma, but you shouldn’t deny or dismiss the challenges facing some people today. What if people had said to your parents, “Mealy worms in your bread? At least you have bread. Stop complaining.” Would you be okay with that? A little grace wouldn’t kill you.

I know you are joking. But comparing having to eat wormy bread to not being able to buy a £5 coffee every day kind of illustates my point!