Is it rude to ask your annual income?

[dontcomeatme]

I am always gobsmacked and a little in awe whenever a thread gets onto the topic of money. Posters often stating they have an annual income of 100k+, but still struggling with finances for example. I am really interested to see if this is a demographic thing, so same job = totally different salary depending on location. Which I understand would then be reflected in the cost of living for the area.
But if any MNers feel comfortable I wanted to start a thread where everyone could state their

• individual annual income + job title
• the house as a whole annual income if different
• plus where you live.

No one is obligated so if you dont want to absolutely fine. This is more out of my own curiosity than anything!

Ours -

• OH annual salary before tax £37k, head of year in a comprehensive
• I am SAHM so just CB coming in which we put aside for 2 DC
• North East of England.

We live quite comfortably, just bought a home, save for both DC and a rainy day fund, able to do stuff with DC every weekend and holidays (in the uk) every year, no debt other than mortgage.

Google is your friend. 4% of UK taxpayers earn over 100k. Given MN distribution towards higher educated/wealthier groups of society I hardly find this to be surprising. Go to S&B board and see the level of cloths/bags/beauty items being discussed.

Mmm. And most of those are men.

Of the less than 1% of women that actually earn over £100k...yeah it seems a very decent percentage of those have found their way to mn 👀😂

Why do you think most of those are men?

Also it apparently doesn’t pick up people who earn over £100k who salary sacrifice into their pension to avoid the 60% tax rate. And probably doesn’t include contractors and self employed. So that 5% figure for last year is probably very understated.

Because most of those are men.

£30k me Social services
£30k DH NHS
4 kids and one on the way.
no financial help other than CB £230 per month, savings of £80K as inheritance on his side which will go on house deposit when we’re able to buy.
We get by but it’s tight and end of the month we usually need to use credit card for shopping etc.
£350 a month childcare for youngest

I can only guess you aren't a high earner yourself. For reasons obvious to most but not you

Did you think that was witty? Bless you.

Just take your own earlier advice - GIYF.

What makes you think that?

All full time hospital consultants, dentists and GPs will earn over £100k. Many professionals such as lawyers and accountants will too, especially in the south east.

Presumably you wouldn’t be amazed to find a female GP posting on here, so not sure why you are dubious that anyone earns a GP’s salary?

41k at 0.78 FTE plus £500 pm UC, £220 CM, £200 ish SCP and £170 CB.
Think that around 55k?

single parent so that’s whole house income . Mortgage around 60k on a 200k house in Scotland.

£60k Pa for 4 days a week. No mortgage and another £10k Pa in late husband pension. House just below 7 figs and I have another 7 figs in investments and draw down about 3% per year to cover uni expenses and holidays / house improvements. Never worry about money but I am also not particularly extravagant. Likely to inherit a further 7 figs at some point and feel incredibly fortunate that essentially as long as I don’t go crazy me and my children will be v comfortable

Well clearly you’re not one of them

I’ve just googled and less than 2% of women in the uk earn £100k or above. So I’m a bit at this not being considered a high salary by some?
Post edit: I didn’t read the full thread and realise this has already been pointed out!

For full disclosure:

I earn c£95k pre tax. Supply Chain
DH earns £180k ish. Varies according to bonus. We feel like we are propping up the whole of the uk in tax if I’m honest.

Paid off our mortgage (live in Home Counties)

1 DD at uni.

We consider ourselves well off (but not super rich)

This we are HENRYs
https://www.investopedia.com/terms/h/high-earners-not-yet-rich-henrys.asp

A snapshot from my P60 for 2024-2025. Of course the non-believers can say it's been photoshopped or that it's DH's income.

I'm a senior director in pharma and last year my pre-tax earnings were £268k. I'd say the majority of employees in a similar position in my company and with similar earnings are female.

This plus DH's £23k to £46k as a freelancer brings our total annual household income to around £300k.

One child (teenager) and the mortage on our 4-bed semi in Cambridgeshire, bought for £650k and now valued at £820k, was fully paid in 2017.

Furthermore, most GPs and dentists are women and around 40% of hospital consultants are women. So it’s not just that one wouldn’t be surprised to come across one, they’re very likely to the next time they need a doctor’s appointment or dentist appointment.

I find that there’s a sub section of MN that thinks it’s still 1970 when it comes to all things women/family related. I read on another thread something along the lines of “most doctors are married to a SAHM” which I would say is an outdated view by about 50 years, given that most doctors aren’t even men.

https://www.theguardian.com/society/2025/mar/06/female-doctors-outnumber-male-peers-in-uk-for-first-time

I am always quite bemused by the fact many posters don’t believe any woman on here who says they earn above a certain amount. Not going to screenshot any part of my tax statement but I am a high earner in law and every woman I work with above a couple of years PQE is on over £100k and that is the case whether PT or FT. This is in London. Yet every time the woman who dares to say it is called a liar and a fantasist - sometimes it’s just true and some of the smaller percentage of people who earn those amounts will indeed post on mumsnet. Shocker.

Seconding @bluevelvetdrapes

I’m a lawyer. My first year trainee salary back in 2011 (so I was 24) was £39,500.

These days (and before bonus and lockstep year on year salary increases)?

https://www.thelawyer.com/trainee-newly-qualified-salaries-uk-law-firms/

And for the haters that want to shit on it or let the green eyed monster take over…don’t worry. For that salary, your employer gets their pound of flesh and all your time and nights and weekends.

I think it's a bit more complicated than being stuck in 1970s...

If you believe that women can't be high earners, that this is a rare exception, than you don't question why you can't be the one. But when you know that this is totally achievable and many thousands of other women get there then there it's a slightly different dynamic.

Many careers, e.g. medicine, Finance, IT in particular, lead to 100k+ in the first 10-15 years. Of course this requires working both hard and smart. And the first step to get there is to believe that is completely achievable.

OP mumsnet is really weird about money. It’s all about the K’s you earn in a single year, nothing else. That has limited relationship to how well off you are.

ours jointly pre-tax is probably about 125K these days, not entirely sure as DH is self employed. So very mumsnet average for two earners and I’ve been soundly reminded of our lack of success only earning 2-figure salaries frequently. My employer has generous pension and share save though which adds a bit more.

Most importantly though we’ve both worked in real world good jobs (mumsnet average paid jobs) since our early 20s. We had the money to pay off the mortgage to our first house before we had our first child in early 30s. We paid off second house in mid 40s. We haven’t upped our expenses just because we can afford it with yet bigger houses and expensive cars so our normal spending is lower than our income. We have reasonable savings too.

I dread to think how much money we’d need to be comfortable if we’d bought our first house in London in our early 30s or if we were renting there. Particularly as when you earn more more and more get taxed.

So I would say the mumsnet obsession with salary is weird no more or less.