Does earning more than £60k a year make you rich especially in London?

[Payinglotsoftax]

Labour has said that as part of their manifesto they will target earners over £60k for higher taxes. My personal view is that Jeremy Corbyn targeting those earning more than £60k a year will target some families without a high standard of living particularly in London and the south east. AIBU?

This thread is reading like an argument for taxing households rather than individuals... (Which is what happens in Germany, where I pay 45% tax on some of my earnings despite earning less than 18000€ atm)

Or a regional taxation system.

But really it's never going to be fair for everyone - I know several people both in the UK and here living a fairly "rich" lifestyle on a very low income due to having been handed a lot of things without having to work for them, and other people on higher incomes who live more frugally because nobody gave them free housing and childcare etc etc.

Earnings from employment are only a tiny part of the equation if what you're trying to work out is who is "rich".

£70K puts you in the top 10% in London and the top 5% in the country. It's rich.

Perhaps you can't afford private school fees or a second foreign holiday each year but it's still wealthy.

Have a think about being poor, especially in London where it's particularly hard due to housing costs.

It's not rich but it's above average. The median household income in London is about £39k (from the most recent figures I can find which was 2013). Remember there are a lot of households on minimum wage, zero hours contracts, on benefits etc. DH and I are on minimum wage doing 40hrs pw and our joint income is £31k. I'd certainly feel rich if our income doubled! Our rent is council which is about £135pw for a 3 bed flat on a grotty estate - not everyone is able to even consider the cost of a mortgage so it's not relevant for all households. We get child benefit and tax credits at £115 a week for three children. Our council tax and bills are much lower than the estimates above but that's partly because it's a flat not a big house and council tax is cheap because these flats have always been the cheapest (and less desirable) in the area. So those bills mentioned might not be relevant for all households.

I can't believe this is even being questioned. It just goes to show how unaware the wealthy are about how hard the rest of us have it.

70k was the number I heard, not 60k. Either way, that is much, much more than most of us will ever earn, even in London.

So, if you are on that kind of money you are in fact rich. No question.

I'm not rich Helga. I earn £75k

£4200 take home
£300 pension
£15 health insurance
£1000 mortgage (London- we're not all paying £3k rent )
£1200 household bills and food
£1100 nursery fees
£400 loan

It's gone! What's rich about that?

It doesn't help that this is one of the only developed countries where there is no standard allowance in the tax system for dependents.

You have a mortgage, pension, health insurance. I have none of these things.

To me, you are rich.

Having a mortgage pension and insurance doesn't make someone rich. Not even close! Secure, maybe. But it's the minimum we should hope for anyone surely?

To you rich isn't an actual definition of rich is it? Not sure why you're so convinced you're right

Helga- I have none of these things. I live in London and am barely above minimum wage. I don't think £70k is rich.

Yes, having money would mean security. That's what it would mean for me and many others. Most of us don't have that.

I'm not being quarrelsome, this is just my point of view.

Unless the statistics I have seen are wrong, then 70k is about twice what the average Londoner earns. If that is accurate how can that not be rich?
Maybe we just all have a different definition of what "rich" is.

It's not rich though is it? What is it about what I've just described makes me rich? I have no savings, little spare cash for non essentials.

I think what a lot of people forget in this LONDON LONDON LONDON bubble (esp on MN) is that a lot of people in London are very poor- it has some of the poorest parts of the country. And in comparison with the rest of the country it has huge amounts of social/ council housing which is commonly lived in by low earners.

Because housing can take up such an enormous amount of people's income, maybe it's also partly dependent on when someone got on the housing ladder. If you bought your house 20 years ago, a salary of £70k may make you rich, even in London. However, if you bought 1 year ago, you'll have very limited spare cash.

We are in London, our household income is around £40,000 and we actually live quite well.
Granted we have a council flat and not a mortgage. We don't have a car but don't need one due to excellent transport links.
We have 2 young DDs in part time child are. We cut our cloth accordingly and manage a holiday each year and shows/days out with the DDs.
Neither of us smoke and we stick to a meal plan but that's more for convenience than anything else

The word rich is too subjective.

Unless a person is genuinely able to buy whatever they want without a thought (whether it's chucking anything they fancy into a trolley at Waitrose instead of totting it up as they go round Aldi, or buying designer clothes on a whim or even multiple homes) they probably won't see themselves as "rich".

Almost everyone except the fantastically wealthy defines rich as "a lot richer than me".

The word should be kept out of political discussion, it just derails as people start pulling up the drawbridge and screaming that the rich (who should pay more taxes) are another group - those richer than me!

No bigger will admit that they themselves should pay another penny on the pound to fund public services. Somebody should. Someone else though...

It depends.

All we have is what we earn. No inheritances and no money made through property here.

The only way we can get ahead is by working really, really hard. How is it 'fair' that we get the biggest hit for that?

I agree, I think it's fairly rare for someone who works for their money to be rich. It happens of course- you can't claim someone earning £400k with a £2m house isn't rich- but often coming from money is what helped get them there anyway

(Also agree everyone thinks rich is more than them)

It demonstrates labours real lack of imagination on raising finance.

For w/c people like my family, working like a pig is the only way we can ever hope to do as well as our mc friends - and yet labour seeks to penalise us- once again they say nothing about inherited wealth, money made from property or self-employed tax avoiders.

Meh. They won't get my vote.

To me this just seems a lazy policy. Pick a figure, we will tax those who earn it = all problems solved. As PP have said they are not talking about those who have inherited wealth or property at all. So someone who earns £50k with inherited houses and who comes from money will pay less tax than someone who earns £70k but has had to earn it all themselves and may be paying off student loans etc as well. There is no fairness here and also no real plans as to tackle the problems of those below the poverty line and the astronomical cost of housing. Its a statement with no thought behind it.

London is a totally different situation altogether so I won't comment on that, I've never lived there and don't get why anyone would unless they had to as it's just ridiculously expensive.

Anywhere else in the country however, 75k a year is rich! You're taking home nearly a thousand pounds a week! Plenty of people survive on taking just over that a month.

I lived very comfortably in Plymouth on 27k a year (cheap rent) and have moved more South East on 40k and would say I'm well off (and grateful about it).

Also I would add that if you have a pension fund and a mortgage on a house then you do have 'savings' - plus you should be able to put away 1-5% of your monthly earnings on top of that - there's £50-100 a month in an ISA or whatever right there

Its really subjective though isnt it. 70k after tax and ni is 48k according to google, you would prob spend at least half that on rent/mortgage and essential bills.

Outwith london it would be a good salary i guess. We earn 22k in scotland, we live within our means but means im better off being a sahm the now

My mc labour friends on fb will all be posting how happy they would be to pay more income tax.

I'd be happy too if I already had a lovely house in a good catchment and money for the kids. Are wc people not allowed to aspire to those things? How else are we to have them except through work?

Labour really need to get out of this mind-set that workers are an easy tax target. Workers won't like them for it.

histinyhands I would hazard a guess that you are from a working class background but not working class yourself if you earn over £70k ...

It's very much dependent on housing. I earn £70k; here's how it breaks down:

£4,000 - monthly income after tax
£2,300 - mortgage (3-bed house in zone 6 bought last year)
£400 - council tax and utility bills
£300 - food / supermarket stuff
£100 - car running costs
(DP works part-time but all that money is spent on nursery fees.)

This leaves us with £900 a month for everything else. That might sound like plenty, but unexpected bills keep popping up - car needed £500 of repairs at the last service, boiler broke down twice last winter, £85 parking fine once, £60 flat tyre, etc. On average I manage to put £300 into savings each month. I admit we could probably scrimp a bit more though.

Because I earn over £60k, we don't get child benefit or tax credits.

Compared to @hiddenwhale above who earns £31k but pays just £135pw in rent and receives £115pw in child benefit & tax credit, we actually have a lot less disposable income. Obviously that will change once the mortgage is paid off, but with 24 years left it seems a long way away.