How the other half see things.........

[Deleted User 2747]

Some may find this funny or some may want to cry, it comes from the Guardian comments page (where I comment sometimes) regarding the cost of living and living standards.

1st person: The honest fact is that most people cant see any improvement in their living standards at all. They struggle to pay bills..afford decent food...pay for petrol to get to work. They go out less, if at all.

2nd person's reply: Completely untrue - most people who own a home (mortgage) and are in-work have never had it better - the mortgage rates being so low have greatly reduced their largest outgoing. 64% of houses are owner-occupied.

My reply to 2nd person: Do you assume that none of these people heat their homes, or eat food and that none of them ( the 64% home owners) have been made redundant, or fallen sick?.......Never mind to hell with the other 36% of people!!

2nd person's reply to me: Eat food - mortgage costs (or rent) are normally by far the largest single expenditure and interest is at historic lows.

All my chums seem to be picking up new Range Rovers and spending and inordinately long time on the slopes, one chap is just having a pool put in.

Of the other 36%, some will be young people who earn good money who aren't yet ready to buy, they are doing fine, we also have the social tenants who are milking other tax payers to subsidize them, then we get left with the lower orders who will always be scrabbling-around for crumbs off the table as they lead chaotic lives making bad decisions.

My reply to 2nd person: So according to your view of our country; unless people are buying a new 4x4 or having a pool added to their property; they are either young and living it up; in social housing and scrounging off everyone else; or scrabbling around for crumbs because they make bad choices?

I really don't know whether or not to laugh or cry!!

Their reply: I think that just about sums it up!

So there you go,this person is either a WUM or is just conveniently unable to acknowledge the existence of the majority of working folk! The ones who pay all of the tax!!

[Spiderman]

About two years ago there was a troll who joined one of the sites I frequented.
One thread he started was as to whether he should buy a Bentley or an Aston Martin.
Someone asked if he'd won the lottery, he stated that he owned three multi million pound businesses.
He was then asked why he was asking advice on which car to buy when he could obviously afford both.
After a bit of digging by one of the admin it turned out that he was actually a bus driver living in a council terrace in Rotherham.
The internet is not real, people don't always tell the truth & make up their own persona.

On one of the motorbike sites I visit I often give a very strong argument regardless of whether or not I believe what I am posting, just for the hell of it.

[johnh]

Sounds like a wind up to me. However, he is right in one respect. I took out my first mortgage in 1959, the interest rate was 6%. I had several mortgages over the next 40 years and that 6% was the lowest interest rate I ever had. The rate was considerably higher at various times over the years. So it is true that there is a considerable saving (for home owners) from low interest rates. The problem is that interest rates won't be low for ever. I should add that for a part of that 40 years I was able to claim mortgage interest as tax relief which doesn't apply now.

[Aces]

I think people in the main have never had it so tough. The country has just gone through the longest, deepest recession in living memory, 5 years of tightening our belts, little or no pay rises, inflation peaked at 5% gas and electric has gone up each year by 10% or more! year on year! but ...... Some people are well off, lawyers, head teachers, senior police officers, politicians, businessmen, etc, etc, the list is endless, but they are in the minority. No ..... The working class man and woman has had it tough, it irks the crap out of me, when I see all these good news story about the economy and just how great we are doing and how good it will be for everyone, well ..... I still haven't had a pay rise for 5 years and nearly everyone I know is the same and ...... There's no sign of one for years to come. There's been a set trend over the last 5 years of giving most workers a measly 1% pay rise! but then grasping it back by putting national insurance up or pension payments up. I am lucky I have a really good job and good wage and my wife is the same, but not for one minute do I think that millions of others aren't as lucky and I don't know how some poor families manage, but ...... The politicians don't care as long as the rich keep getting richer, they don't care a jot about the poor.

[johnh]

I think people in the main have never had it so tough. The country has just gone through the longest, deepest recession in living memory, 5 years of tightening our belts, little or no pay rises, inflation peaked at 5% gas and electric has gone up each year by 10% or more! year on year! but ...... Some people are well off, lawyers, head teachers, senior police officers, politicians, businessmen, etc, etc, the list is endless, but they are in the minority. No ..... The working class man and woman has had it tough, it irks the crap out of me, when I see all these good news story about the economy and just how great we are doing and how good it will be for everyone, well ..... I still haven't had a pay rise for 5 years and nearly everyone I know is the same and ...... There's no sign of one for years to come. There's been a set trend over the last 5 years of giving most workers a measly 1% pay rise! but then grasping it back by putting national insurance up or pension payments up. I am lucky I have a really good job and good wage and my wife is the same, but not for one minute do I think that millions of others aren't as lucky and I don't know how some poor families manage, but ...... The politicians don't care as long as the rich keep getting richer, they don't care a jot about the poor.

Aces, when you say that you think 'people in the main have never had it so tough' I assume that you are referring to more recent generations. There are still a lot of us who experienced the 1940's and 1950's who know what a 'tough existence' really is. (Cue violin music ) Seriously though, the 'tough times' now would seem a luxury back then, but I suppose everything is relative.

[Aces]

I know what you mean John, I was raised in the 60s and not many had anything, we couldn't even afford carpet and had linoleum. Obviously it was far tougher then and of course I'm on about more recent times, inflation doesn't stop rising, but wages have over the last 5 years, the average wage has actually gone down over that period, for the working man, not the rich toffs.

[Deleted User 2]

Aces, when you say that you think 'people in the main have never had it so tough' I assume that you are referring to more recent generations. There are still a lot of us who experienced the 1940's and 1950's who know what a 'tough existence' really is. (Cue violin music ) Seriously though, the 'tough times' now would seem a luxury back then, but I suppose everything is relative.

I was thinking that before you'd posted it, John, and I don't even think these kind of statements need to be put against the extreme backdrop of the post-war era to show how exaggerated they are. I think people have short memories sometimes, and when things go a bit (a lot) worse, they forget the times when they started going a lot better than before. There's no such thing as a perfect economic system, least of all capitalism, and a lot of the upturns and downturns are inherently cyclical.

I can only draw a parallel from abroad (though I'm pretty sure Britain has had some grim days in the not so distant past). I grew up through a time when inflation didn't drop below 150% for about 4 years straight. 20 years ago I was 9 and queuing up to buy bread and milk on a ration card. Don't think my Mum had had a raise for about 10 years when she retired. I don't mean to paint a pitiful story, but needed the example to make a point - we never went without at home, because my parents had grown up through much worse and knew you can't rely on anyone but yourself and your hard work. You don't buy things you don't need, you don't buy things you can't afford and you don't waste what you already have. Nowadays though, most of these values have gone, and not just in my (youngish) generation. I've met all sorts of people who can't prioritise their expenses regardless of the level of income, I've met people who just don't want to work, because the state looks after them well enough, and I also know people who continue to do alright for themselves because they know how to live with measure (and I don't think they would class themselves as rich toffs). I'm by no means suggesting there aren't people in some dire situations (though equally many mechanisms to look after some too). Yeah, there's a lot of problems too, and some of it can and should be addressed, but to say this is the nadir of most people's working lives? It's one hell of a solid country with outstanding foundations and even more potential, but some of the change could start with our attitude to non-stop consumerism and a belief of entitlement to non-stop progression.

[Sniffer]

[quote="Frankie"]Some may find this funny or some may want to cry, it comes from the Guardian comments page (where I comment sometimes) regarding the cost of living and living standards.

I used to get the Grauniad every day, Frankie. Then I just got the Saturday edition, and now...? It has become a horrible mixture of a politics I believe in and an acquisitive culture that makes me sick. It is clearly pandering to the guilty middle-class, people that have money but have a "social conscience". The Saturday supplements are full of holidays you or I couldn't even dream about and clothes the cost of which would give a Yorkshireman a heart seizure.

[Mellor]

I tend to follow the trends in The Guardian and Observer and then wait for the actual clothes to find their way into TK Maxx. I would be on trend if I wasn't a year out of date Fortunately I find flying the single most boring activity known to man (lufc has run it close this year) so exotic holidays hold no interest for me. A week in a cheap flat in Southwold discussing Alan Bennett with the Mrs or reading my Guardian with a pint of Adnams does me fine

I've been reading The Observer for 40 years or so, the Guardian a little less. If neither were on the mat when I get up I would melt down. I've tried other papers - pointless for me. I'm a luvvie for sure, guilty as charged darling

[Sniffer]

I tend to follow the trends in The Guardian and Observer and then wait for the actual clothes to find their way into TK Maxx. I would be on trend if I wasn't a year out of date Fortunately I find flying the single most boring activity known to man (lufc has run it close this year) so exotic holidays hold no interest for me. A week in a cheap flat in Southwold discussing Alan Bennett with the Mrs or reading my Guardian with a pint of Adnams does me fine

I've been reading The Observer for 40 years or so, the Guardian a little less. If neither were on the mat when I get up I would melt down. I've tried other papers - pointless for me. I'm a luvvie for sure, guilty as charged darling

I've been reading them both for 30+ years. I wouldn't go to any other paper but I find it undercuts any credibility it has with its adverts for Agas and £1300 per person yurts at Glastonbury. And as someone that regularly got in to Glastonbury for under a tenner many years ago I find it rather repugnant.