Where does all the money go?
Discussion
I've been thinking the same recently, life is very expensive/not cheap depending on circumstances.
My parents had a simple life and we weren't well off financially but..also had civil service pensions which helped keep life manageable in retirement.
I will need to slog away for a fair bit longer to build up my DC pot even to reach a 'reasonable' level, am fed up with the corporate world but will keep plodding along..not many other options for now. So just have to manage costs/outgoings, save/invest where possible and hope it all works out!
My parents had a simple life and we weren't well off financially but..also had civil service pensions which helped keep life manageable in retirement.
I will need to slog away for a fair bit longer to build up my DC pot even to reach a 'reasonable' level, am fed up with the corporate world but will keep plodding along..not many other options for now. So just have to manage costs/outgoings, save/invest where possible and hope it all works out!
wormus said:
Mr Whippy said:
wormus said:
OP: I was earning mid 50k in my early 30s, and that was 20 years ago. Struggled then (wife was on about 40k too), so the only answer was work harder and earn more, not save/spend less. If you feel poor now, it’ll only get worse as wages fail to keep up with inflation. Earn a lot of money, you’ll feel better and be able to afford the things you want. You have between now and about age 45 to maximise what you can earn by climbing the greasy pole, if that’s what you want.
I love these solutions.Edited by wormus on Friday 1st March 18:19
Just work harder
tted myself into the next, more senior role on a higher salary. Senior exec by mid 40s working in IT/Digital. Now mid 50s, thinking about retirement. Probably jack it all in by 60 if I live that long. Once you have “enough” you stop worrying about money. My cars are old and I don’t spend much n shiny stuff, but I don’t envy anybody else either. Edited by wormus on Friday 1st March 18:49
Everyone can’t work harder if ‘society generally’ wants a better standard of living.
Sebastian Tombs said:
In a few years you will inherit from your families and suddenly you will feel loaded.
Is this just a PH thing? I plan to leave my kids very little, I’ll live off the capital and enjoy retirement or it’ll go towards my care when I can no longer feed myself. I find the idea that you can loll around half of your adult life to live off your parents repugnant. wormus said:
Sebastian Tombs said:
In a few years you will inherit from your families and suddenly you will feel loaded.
Is this just a PH thing? I plan to leave my kids very little, I’ll live off the capital and enjoy retirement or it’ll go towards my care when I can no longer feed myself. I find the idea that you can loll around half of your adult life to live off your parents repugnant. Going into the bleakest looking economic future in two lifetimes, you’ll be ok kids.
wormus said:
Sebastian Tombs said:
In a few years you will inherit from your families and suddenly you will feel loaded.
Is this just a PH thing? I plan to leave my kids very little, I’ll live off the capital and enjoy retirement or it’ll go towards my care when I can no longer feed myself. I find the idea that you can loll around half of your adult life to live off your parents repugnant. supersport said:
Hair cuts, mine is £30 every few weeks 
Worth it, when a lovely looking female does it. 
Haven’t been to barbers since Covid, as Her Indoors does mine (nothing fancy - a quick trim).
Unlimited data and a fancy new iPhone can cost a small fortune too. But that’s just some indulgence.
wormus said:
Is this just a PH thing? I plan to leave my kids very little, I’ll live off the capital and enjoy retirement or it’ll go towards my care when I can no longer feed myself. I find the idea that you can loll around half of your adult life to live off your parents repugnant.
If I had kids and had the capacity to erase the crushing worry that housing is these days, I wouldn't think twice. Giving them a full time salary is a different matter, but they might use that time to refine cold fusion rather than squandering it composing gender policies in a cubicle for an air freshener company.
Mr Whippy said:
Your kids are so lucky with a parent like you
Going into the bleakest looking economic future in two lifetimes, you’ll be ok kids.
Or teach them to make their own luck and give them just enough help to do it. Few threads on here where youngsters are moaning about parents being lucky and life being harder now, when the truth is, they cannot be arsed to get out of bed before midday. Going into the bleakest looking economic future in two lifetimes, you’ll be ok kids.
wormus said:
Is this just a PH thing? I plan to leave my kids very little, I’ll live off the capital and enjoy retirement or it’ll go towards my care when I can no longer feed myself. I find the idea that you can loll around half of your adult life to live off your parents repugnant.
Swings and roundabouts to some extent. My mother is not well off and did one of those "sell us your home for an annuity" things years ago so will never leave me anything. My father lives in Oz with his new family and I doubt there will be any money from him. I have never, as a result, expected to inherit anything, was very self-sufficient and instead worked my arse off to become better than anyone I know at what I did.
My wife's family on the other hand had a flat in Eastbourne which paid off our mortgage in London, and a house in SW France which we have yet to sell but will add a nice bonus to our retirement money.
My wife and I have no children so we will spend every penny enjoying life.
I expect most couples have at least one parent with a house between them, which will hopefully be worth something. Once your mortgage is paid off it is a game-changer. Your outgoings drop massively.
Mr Whippy said:
Your kids are so lucky with a parent like you
Going into the bleakest looking economic future in two lifetimes, you’ll be ok kids.
How is it the bleakest looking economic future in two lifetimes? That is a fairly ridiculous statement, a working class lifestyle two lifetimes ago was a fair bit bleaker than today…Going into the bleakest looking economic future in two lifetimes, you’ll be ok kids.
bloomen said:
If I had kids and had the capacity to erase the crushing worry that housing is these days, I wouldn't think twice.
Giving them a full time salary is a different matter, but they might use that time to refine cold fusion rather than squandering it composing gender policies in a cubicle for an air freshener company.
It’s more likely they’ll take your money and spend it down the pub. Kids like to have a good time! Giving them a full time salary is a different matter, but they might use that time to refine cold fusion rather than squandering it composing gender policies in a cubicle for an air freshener company.
wormus said:
It’s more likely they’ll take your money and spend it down the pub. Kids like to have a good time!
And they may turn it into a meaningful career as a pub singer serenading people sat behind trestle tables in Clacton. With the financial cushion provided there would be no need for recording contracts or world tours, or success. They could concentrate on fully exploring their niche.
Mr Whippy said:
The point is, if everyone does this it doesn’t work.
Everyone can’t work harder if ‘society generally’ wants a better standard of living.
I'm not sure about this. We're told part of the UK's problem is GDP growth/capita is poor because productivity isn't improving. Isn't working harder potentially another way of describing increasing productivity?Everyone can’t work harder if ‘society generally’ wants a better standard of living.
I get similar feelings and have to realign my thoughts as we are very lucky to be in the position to earn what we do.
We live on outskirts of London and when kids came along chose to have a smaller house than maxing out borrowing and have stuck at cars that are owned outright.
Otherwise similar outgoings to OP.
It’s easy to get distracted by those who seemingly have it all but I think posts like these just go to show that earning more doesn’t actually bring more happiness / less worry.
Part of it is lifestyle creep - really we need to pick what’s most important and focus on that.
For us it’s travel and experiences and we holiday a lot with and without the kids.
I still wish I’d started investing earlier when I hear friends talk about theirs. And sometimes I wish to have a bigger house, but then you hear the same friends worrying about mortgages being too much.
We live on outskirts of London and when kids came along chose to have a smaller house than maxing out borrowing and have stuck at cars that are owned outright.
Otherwise similar outgoings to OP.
It’s easy to get distracted by those who seemingly have it all but I think posts like these just go to show that earning more doesn’t actually bring more happiness / less worry.
Part of it is lifestyle creep - really we need to pick what’s most important and focus on that.
For us it’s travel and experiences and we holiday a lot with and without the kids.
I still wish I’d started investing earlier when I hear friends talk about theirs. And sometimes I wish to have a bigger house, but then you hear the same friends worrying about mortgages being too much.
xeny said:
Mr Whippy said:
The point is, if everyone does this it doesn’t work.
Everyone can’t work harder if ‘society generally’ wants a better standard of living.
I'm not sure about this. We're told part of the UK's problem is GDP growth/capita is poor because productivity isn't improving. Isn't working harder potentially another way of describing increasing productivity?Everyone can’t work harder if ‘society generally’ wants a better standard of living.
I’m only reading between the lines but Mr Whippy is coming across a little off the mark in this particular thread…
fat80b said:
It's inflation and tax (and the associated fiscal drag) that are the comparison killer to the past here.
If you work out what your salary would have been 20 years ago and also work out the tax level then and now, as well as the cost of things, you will discover that there was a lot more headroom (disposable income as a percentage) than there is now, and that it also went much further then.
i.e. a pair of 40K earners in 2000 were way better off than a pair of 65K earners today when measured in how many pints they could buy each week.
Especially when you consider that back then, your middle earner didn't pay the higher rate tax but now they do - This means that stuff costs you way more as a percentage of your gross than it used to.
If you think about it, it is the disposable income piece that really is taxed at your marginal tax rate and it's the marginal tax rate that makes you feel poor.
Is it not housing? The average monthly rent and mortgage as a percentage of the average income is the highest its ever been i was hearing on LBC a while back.If you work out what your salary would have been 20 years ago and also work out the tax level then and now, as well as the cost of things, you will discover that there was a lot more headroom (disposable income as a percentage) than there is now, and that it also went much further then.
i.e. a pair of 40K earners in 2000 were way better off than a pair of 65K earners today when measured in how many pints they could buy each week.
Especially when you consider that back then, your middle earner didn't pay the higher rate tax but now they do - This means that stuff costs you way more as a percentage of your gross than it used to.
If you think about it, it is the disposable income piece that really is taxed at your marginal tax rate and it's the marginal tax rate that makes you feel poor.
OP, you're gonna be in for a shock when you have kids. My nursery fee's are 300 a week!
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