AIBU to feel middle-class luxuries have become increasingly out of reach?

[cocobow]

I had to go to the local shopping centre the other day to pick up a click and collect for my husband, new work shirts so nothing fancy! I thought why not make an afternoon of it as I rarely go shopping and I could maybe get a coffee and cake and even treat myself to a little something as my birthday is coming up.

I loved some of the clothes in places like monsoon and seasalt but it was all way too expensive dresses were £80 to £100 or more same with skirts which seemed to start at £65 and I know that isn't even considered expensive today but for me it is! I went for a look in the sephora as I love skincare but again it was all really expensive. The queue for the till was full of school girls buying things I wouldn't be able to buy for myself!

To be fair they were probably there spending birthday money and probably aren't spending money like that all the time. I suppose it just feels like the goal posts on these admittedly luxury items have been moved since I was in my teens and early 20's when I imagined that by my 40's I'd be able to at least buy some of these things or buy nice clothes now and then. My husband and I both degree and post graduate educated and work in professional jobs but we have to prioritise bills, the kids and food over luxuries. To be fair we have no debt at all and we will save for an buy large purchases cash mostly but I admit to feeling a bit personally deprived at times! When my mum was my age she worked in a call centre part time in the evenings and would go round the shops most weekend and buy herself a new top or other item of clothes and exclusively used clarins skincare, I use the ordinary, cerave or boots and superdrug own brand mostly and my clothes come from charity shops. My parents were working class made good but their disposable income seemed to go a lot further than mine does. We don't even have a large mortgage.

DH and I recently looked at taking a short trip to London as a joint birthday present to each other but the cost was so expensive we seem to have quietly shelved the idea.

In the end I had a look in waterstones but even that was expensive, since when are paperbacks routinely £14.99! I never even had a coffee or bit of cake as the selection of cakes looked dry and unappetizing but would still have cost £10 in total.

Am I being unreasonable to think the cost of a middle class lifestyle with a few luxuries has had the goalposts moved by quite some amount?

Again though, to get to these we have to walk through town - with kids who want £7 icecreams or £5 pastries after school, that is not an option people will want to do. Fine by yourself but who has time when you have kids?
Also libraries are fairly notorious for having weird men trying to use their computers for porn, we have a lot of youths and homeless who take over the parks, so saying kids should use these spaces isn't practical or often safe.

Clothes are relatively cheap compared to 40 years ago, I was paying £30 for dress early 90’s so £90 now is proportionate or cheaper. We didn’t habitually drink coffee out or even eat out until 90’s either. I’m sat in a sea salt dress and it was £65 3 years ago and still looks good, people have lost touch with reality due to cheap fast fashion

DH and I went out for a drink (one each) and some tapas - just three small plates between us. It cost £80 and we needed dinner when we got home. All it means is that we do it once a year not once a month.

I get my hair cut once a year now, instead of three times a year.

Um one word Brexit- Since joining the EU in 2004, Poland has benefited from frictionless trade, structural funds, and alignment with European supply chains (especially Germany's manufacturing network). Brexit has cost us a fortune in many ways.

Also people in the UK generally pay lower income taxes than people in Ireland, especially on middle-to-higher incomes, while Poland has a more mixed structure with lower entry rates but heavy social contributions.

It is expectations that are out of whack.

Technically I grew up in a middle class family. We didn’t expect to eat out regularly. A new winter coat for my mum would last until it had holes in, then it would be mended.

We might get a coffee and pastry in John Lewis once a year at Christmas, and have a meal out in our home town about twice a year but sometimes less than that. We might have a couple of big day trips a year. Some holidays were self-catered in the Uk, some overseas.

A new book was a gift at birthday and Christmas; in between we had the library.

We had more choice buying food, clothes and material - a local market helped there. We ate a lot of seasonal food and very little “fancy” ingredients.

A lot of my clothes came from the school jumble sale or my neighbour who had two older girls.

We have had excessively “good times” in my adult life, and I feel we are being put
back to something more like normal.

Ordinary people can’t expect luxuries and treats just as and when. We’ve lost touch with common sense.

I don’t disagree with you. But would caveat that a lot of people in coffee shops have “downgraded” from lunch out. A cheaper luxury than they would have enjoyed a few years ago. And people in proper restaurants are apparently ordering fewer courses and drinking tap water. And many people with brand new cars are on no deposit lease deals, renting cars on the never never. So it’s not that straightforward - a lot of presenting a veneer to the world (and the socials) is happening.

@bababamama i agree. And the world is burning down round us while we consume more and more and more.

I don’t think humans are fit for purpose any more.

Also I don’t think £14.99 is expensive for a book it probably took someone a year or more to write. That’s slightly over an hour’s minimum wage.

You are absolutely right, and a lot of it is down to how much the tax take is. You should be able to keep enough cash to have a cake. If the tax free amount had moved with inflation we'd all be over 3K better off! That's a lot of cake. Vote for a fairer system when you get the chance.

So you’re not capable of saying no to your kids!Thats a you problem. My kids had sweets on a Friday and that was it. They rarely nagged for anything.

Also don’t be utterly ridiculous re libraries . We use 3 and have never , ever come across that. I read a lot-60 books a year. I worked out the library saved me over £500 on books for me alone last year . I order brand new books and haven’t felt the need to buy any for quite some time. My kids loved going when they were little.

Our parks are not taken over by youths either.

Yes, I agree that nicer things in a lower income didn't pinch so much but that didn't make any of us middle class.

Things that are 'nice' to us, as you've said, aren't nice to the middle class.

Being top 10% earner in a poor country still makes us poor when compared to the top 10% earners in other countries.

We shouldn't have to work as hard as we do for the crumbs of bread we get in the end but that is Britain.

Everyone has a degree now (many from poor unis in weak courses) and everyone considers themself a "professional".

Your early forties are typically when your earnings peak, id expect two graduates with professional jobs to be earning at least 100k between them (fte) by then, and more in london.

Exactly this which is why the planet is burning.

In my 20s I could afford to go to the pub and stay there all night several times a week, plus going out and all the associated costs to at least two or three parties/clubs/gigs a weekend.
Also I could buy lunch and coffee from a cafe regularly. Eat fast food whenever I felt like it, go travelling/backpacking for months on end.

Now I can't afford anything!

Do you mean middle income or middle class? I don't see clothes or make up shopping as middle class pastimes.

I wouldn't call this a middle-class lifestyle at all.

Exactly. I wear Seasalt all the time but I can't remember the last time I paid full price.

We are hugely better off than the majority of the rest of the world which is why so many people want to be here.

I make all my blouses, dresses, husbands shirts, clothes for the grandchildren, summer trousers, nightwear and I knit all the jumpers. Granted, I love doing it and the savings mean I can change my wardrobe frequently because I'd really have to think hard about a blouse at £30 and a dress at £80 from the shop.

They aren't, but it's a Mumsnet thing to try and make EVERYTHING a class issue.

While I completely get what you’re saying OP, I agree with the above. My DM never went for coffee with friends, clothes were actually much more expensive, and high-end skincare and cosmetics weren’t really aimed at ‘ordinary’ people in the way they are now. We had meals out or fish and chips once in a blue moon. Dsis and I wore a lot of ‘pass on’ clothes (all nice but we didn’t always get massive choice of what we wore).

We weren’t poor and we didn’t feel poor. But I would say middle class luxuries were things like affording a bedroom each for children in a big enough house, music lessons, going on a non-package holiday (to France, not anywhere wild), Clarks shoes. Later on Dsis and I went to a fee paying school but we still had second hand blazers etc. This was the norm among friends, some had hols to the US or a fancier car, or maybe fruit corner yogurts every day!

Obviously things have changed - and I myself am addicted to buying coffees - but it’s easy to compare oneself to a standard of spending that’s only really existed for a short time for a few people. Also, before Amazon, EBay and Vinted it was actually much harder to get second hand clothes, books etc. so some
‘lifestyle’ things are cheaper and with way more choice.

You need to get yourself on Vinted plenty of 'MC' labels on there bought by us WC plebs.

Yanbu.
DH and I are in responsible, complex professional jobs with decent salaries but we barely ever spend on anything remotely frivolous or luxurious these days.
Our lifestyle felt better 15 years ago and at that stage we were more junior in our careers and had eye watering nursery fees to pay

Years of below inflation pay rises (public sector but senior) are grinding us down

yes and it’s only going to get worse. This is not a blip but a symptom of a slowly collapsing system. The best (but hard! We are all products of our environment) option is to try and turn your back on capitalism/consumerism as much as possible. It is serving fewer and fewer people - but there are ways to live that don’t centre “stuff”. Try and adapt now while it still feels like a choice.

You are being unreasonable as you are focussed on the prices of the wrong things - stuff like clothes is cheaper than decades ago

and if all your money wasn’t going to the bank or landlord you would afford those things easily ( well not in your 40s - that’s the worst decade )

house prices have way outstripped inflation and that’s why your feel poor