Tax in UK

aspiring said:
A lot of people look up to "6 figures" and have discussed the almost sense of pride to reach such a figure.

100k is not easy to get and the reason for that is because it is so high
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if you asked me 10 years ago would 100k be a very good wage, id say yes. today I would say just a good wage.

Because it says 100k, we have been condition to think it is a high wage, however with fiscal drag, higher rates for everything these days it becomes less of a wow and more of a ok wage.
 
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bigmike20vt said:
of course it does!.
relative to the average working person in the uk £100k is an incredibly high wage and even compared to the average working person in london its still a damn good chunk of change. Sure if you want to benchmark against Elon musk its a pittance but if that is how you benchmark your salary i would say that is rishi sunak levels of not understanding the life of the average working person in the uk.

There are loads of properties in the commuter belt of london as well, so its not like you have to buy a house in Nottinghill (Royston has a line to london and prices there are more more sensible - tho not cheap, more than enough for a 100k salary to get you on the ladder even as a singleton (and as a working couple with say 1 on 100k and lets say 1 on 40k............................. you are looking at a 4bed+ no problem)

having a high wage does not mean being utterly loaded. simply being able to cover your bills and not worrying about "sensible" spending as well as putting a little aside for a rainy day puts you in a better position than most in the uk... (and we are still just about considered a fairly affluent country)

BTW i live just outside of cambridge and my salary is less than half of that, and i still consider myself fortunate and am able to afford a nice car, and have luxury items like solar and battery etc..... I have to save for them for sure........ but i dont think not having everything available to me without having to think about it is a good yard stick for am i in a fortunate financial position or not.

(my wife works as well........ but we have a child and he does not go without anything he needs - and tbh gets more of what he wants than he probably should (way WAY more than i ever got) . Personally i do not believe a single persons salary should necersarily be expected to be good enough to cover yourself and your child AND you partner in luxury....... imo the days of a worker and a housewife are generally long gone. we all need to work and equally all need to pull our weight around the home and with child care.
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Good points theres no need to live in middle of London. Sure there is plenty of affordable accomodation outside of London.
 
Mrwong said:
if you asked me 10 years ago would 100k be a very good wage, id say yes. today I would say just a good wage.

Because it says 100k, we have been condition to think it is a high wage, however with fiscal drag, higher rates for everything these days it becomes less of a wow and more of a ok wage.
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It might be less of a good wage than it was 10 years ago, but it's still a wage in the top 3% now.

Even a £50k wage is in the top 12%, shows how fast it drops away.

I take your points on London, and ideally it would be good to see a regional split of the data I think.

But even if it is not a wage that affords high living standards in London, it is still a high wage compared to most other wages.

What do you suggest we all do about this, to pop out and get £100k a year jobs?
 
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aspiring said:
Most people would drool for a 100k wage during the current cost of living crisis
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If my wife earned more I'd happily drop to 50% of my salary, on the proviso that I didn't have to do the silly hours a week I do now (I'm still at work) maybe even a 4 day week, more holiday, healthcare, and other benefits. It's taken me nearly 25years to get to where I am but only by chance and because I dared ask pushed myself out of my comfort zone, and became a bit of an expert in my field.

It's tiring and a higher wage isn't always commensurate with the lifestyle and expectations.
 
Freefaller said:
If my wife earned more I'd happily drop to 50% of my salary, on the proviso that I didn't have to do the silly hours a week I do now (I'm still at work) maybe even a 4 day week, more holiday, healthcare, and other benefits. It's taken me nearly 25years to get to where I am but only by chance and because I dared ask pushed myself out of my comfort zone, and became a bit of an expert in my field.

It's tiring and a higher wage isn't always commensurate with the lifestyle and expectations.
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Often the case, most people only see the surface. It's often the iceberg analogy and the illusion of success.

- Long hours. Not uncommon for this bracket to work 60-70 hr week.
- Constantly learning to stay relevant
- Usally a niche role and required sacrifice
- Requires years of experience and mostly luck (being at the right place at the right time).
 
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kai said:
Often the case, most people only see the surface. It's often the iceberg analogy and the illusion of success.

- Long hours. Not uncommon for this bracket to work 60-70 hr week.
- Constantly learning to stay relevant
- Usally a niche role and required sacrifice
- Requires years of experience and mostly luck (being at the right place at the right time).
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Good post and agree entirely.

I'm not asking for sympathy but there's a lot more to earning a large salary that just turning up to work and replying to some emails. A lot of extra out of office hours work goes on as well.

Whilst there is an element of luck I will challenge that a little and say that you can make your own luck by going out there, putting yourself out of your comfort zone, become an expert, learn, network, and make yourself a credible person.

It requires a lot of tenacity and it's exhausting. Hence my comment on being happy to have a paycut with less responsibility and better conditions of employment if my wife earned a bit more to be able to do that.
 
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aspiring said:
Would rail drivers strike if they got 100k?
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Probably. They'd find a reason to strike, like working hours or conditions or something.

That's less to do with pay and more to do with union interference.

Train drivers are well paid, it's mainly the ground staff that aren't, and arguably have an equally tricky job as they have to deal with customers daily and help maintain the railway, deal with timetables, etc....
 
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Freefaller said:
Good post and agree entirely.

I'm not asking for sympathy but there's a lot more to earning a large salary that just turning up to work and replying to some emails. A lot of extra out of office hours work goes on as well.

Whilst there is an element of luck I will challenge that a little and say that you can make your own luck by going out there, putting yourself out of your comfort zone, become an expert, learn, network, and make yourself a credible person.

It requires a lot of tenacity and it's exhausting. Hence my comment on being happy to have a paycut with less responsibility and better conditions of employment if my wife earned a bit more to be able to do that.
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This 100%.

100K ia not some magic figure that requires luck. If you managed to get a basic degree, have worked for 10 years and are currently earning say 50K, there is zero luck involved in earning 100k.

But you might have to have been selective in your career path (some fields simply don't pay), and as you say FreeFaller, it comes from a constant battle to push yourself .

And once yiu are earning 100k it is not given to you. It is a big sacrifice. Stress, responsibility, regular travel, long hours, and you never really stop working.


I have regular meetings at 6am and 10pm to cover different time zones. Core working hours are 8am to 8pm. although I will take breaks. Then weekend work is pretty regular. And when i am not working i am usually thinking of work.
 
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If I'm doing some difficult coding I'll quite often wake up at 2am panicking about some mistake I might have made or something I overlooked.

Have to start early to get on top of things before the daily stand-up. Otherwise I'd be in that meeting at 9am basically saying "yeah I need an hour to figure stuff out before I talk to any of you".

I tend not to work evenings. I'm good at stopping when the work day ends. Need that time for the brain to wind down before it's time to sleep, otherwise sleep won't happen at all.
 
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Freefaller said:
Probably. They'd find a reason to strike, like working hours or conditions or something.

That's less to do with pay and more to do with union interference.

Train drivers are well paid, it's mainly the ground staff that aren't, and arguably have an equally tricky job as they have to deal with customers daily and help maintain the railway, deal with timetables, etc....
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Your saying train drivers drivers are paid well and most get 60k.

However your saying 100k is not a good salary?
 
EvilRob said:
I often dream about big work problems too. It's annoying as hell. I actually wonder if that's normal in a high pressure job or whether I should be on some meds.
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It's normal.

If you care about your job and doing your best then you stress about work problems. This naturally puts you on a path to earning 100k a year .

We have a prod issue at the moment, and although i do more product management im stuck into debugging the internals of our spark pipeline at 9pm. But even if i tried, I doubt i could relax if i tried to ignore this issue
 
aspiring said:
Your saying train drivers drivers are paid well and most get 60k.

However your saying 100k is not a good salary?
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The thing with train drivers they could largely be automated. The metro system here is entirely autonomous. That puts a pretty hard upper limit on what kind of salary you can expect
 
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