Unhappy People Waiting For The Apocalypse

"25 years ago I supported my family on $425 a month which included rent, groceries and utilities, while I was in college. Anyone that says they can't make it on government handouts.....isn't trying. My belief is that excuses are like A**holes,...Everyone's got one."

Well done Dale, thats about $850 a month now which is a lot more than many families end up with in the UK these days. Over here now its typically five weeks before you recieve first benefit payments so in the meantime families are asking families for help or getting into high interest debt to feed the kids before payments kick in. Families who want to work can't find work because there are NO jobs, some that can work can't get help with child minding etc. Living in substandard housing ain't the best environment for a family either.

We used to have the working class, middle class and the upper class now we have the zero hour contract working class, well paid middle class and the money class and you can add to that a section of society that will never come to much and end up living hand to mouth exactly the same as the USA; we have a group of broken people.

06:30 this morning I was grocery shopping, spent £142.77 (no booze in that) and its likely I'll be buying some more the weekend and thats for me and my lad...lot of families of four have less than that to feed the family for a month.

I don't know what the answer is but I do know that looking down on folk ain't it.

 

That seems a good bit different than the numbers your government post,

Benefit cap amounts
The amount you get through the benefit cap depends on whether:

• you live inside or outside Greater London
• you’re single or in a couple
• your children live with you (if you’re single)

If you’re in a couple but you do not live together, you’ll get the amounts for a single person.

Use the benefit cap calculator to find out how much your benefit might be capped.

Outside Greater London
The benefit cap outside Greater London is:

• £384.62 per week (£20,000 a year) if you’re in a couple
• £384.62 per week (£20,000 a year) if you’re a single parent and your children live with you
• £257.69 per week (£13,400 a year) if you’re a single adult

Inside Greater London
The benefit cap inside Greater London is:

• £442.31 per week (£23,000 a year) if you’re in a couple
• £442.31 per week (£23,000 a year) if you’re a single parent and your children live with you
• £296.35 per week (£15,410 a year) if you’re a single adult

According to the website this cap isn't in effect if you don't receive a housing allowance. Seems like a fair amount of money to me.
Benefit cap: Benefit cap amounts - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)

Current exchange rate. 1 U.S. Dollar = 0.71 Pound Sterling

I didn't do the math but I'm pretty sure that's over $1000 US a month at the out of London rate.

I don't know about in the UK, but here in the states a person still has the ability to become whatever they want. You do have to work for it though. It doesn't come from sitting on you but with your hand out. If you choose to get a degree in English or gender studies. Don't expect a six figure income from it. If money isn't your end goal for a career that's fine, but don't complain about your income if that's the road you choose. There are consequences to the decisions we make, own them is all I'm saying.

Substandard housing??? LOL! While I was in college we lived in a terrible house that had been on fire and was missing most of a back wall, very little insulation and I had to heat with a wood stove. We still have good memories of that time and moved up from there. Choices again and consequences.

Dale

 

Just looking at my reciept, £44 of the bill was meat and £10 was fish. I could feed a family on that but they shouldn't have to live like that watching every single penny, we've gone back to the Victoran slum era...its beyond belief.

 

Why not? Seriously, why not? Were you personally given any kind of a guarantee when you were born as to how you would live. I know I wasn't. The only guarantee in life is death and it's up to the individual to forestall that as long as possible and everything in between is up to us.

Max, groceries are going up and expensive EVERYWHERE! A pound of 80% lean hamburger is over $5 a pound where I live and I live in an inexpensive state. A pound of cod is over $10 and a pound of shrimp is over $15. There is a reason I garden, hunt and fish. Thanks to Biden our price of gasoline has gone from $1.89 in November to currently $3.09. A $1.20 raise in 6 months. Liberal politics....great for someone making money.

Dale

 

Choose wisely and live with the consequences.

Dale

 

Quality of life LW, or rather a lack of it.

 

Quality of life is no doubt influenced by a number of things, social background/education/skill set et al but they don't guarantee a good life. Peer pressure and mental health can keep you deep in the rut of life. I don't care what people say, I think having some money helps, takes off a lot of the day to day pressure if you don't worry about paying the bills and or having no loans or mortgage...makes me feel happy with a hit of 'smug' thrown in. Can you imagine being stuck in cramped accommodation with young kids during lockdown?

Not just a case of having skills and positive attitude for some people.

 

Money doesn't solve all problems thats for sure. I do believe some people are born negative, its in their nature sort of thing and that sort of innate characteristic will impact their whole lives. We all have different coping mechanisms to get us through.

 

Still nice to have a lot more coming in every month than is going out, cheers me up come payday On a serious note anxiety/depression/serious mental health issues can hit anyone regardless of your financial viability, they don't look at your bank statement before taking grip of you. "There but for the grace of God" and all that.

 

Thats for others to say, you may think your fine when in fact you mentally ill and just don't realise it

Is it difficult being a 'lone wolf' when, like you, your married? I'm thinking lockdown, did you and your better half sort of grow as a team or just live separately under one roof sort of thing. Rates of domestic violence went up in lockdown as I guess being forced to live together 24/7 a lot of folk got on each others breasts. My lad was saying my ex wife and her third husband are splitting up but I doubt thats lockdown, more likely she just fancies another house and more cash (oooooh saucer of milk for max).

 

Third time lucky mate, good for you (both).

 

money helps grease the wheels, also if something goes sideways you can get yourself out easily . I am not rich but live furgualy . and have more than i need. My mother was scotish and father was an accountant . We never thro money away , like people today $100 for a cell phone per month. not me , a littl flip phone and honda civic .

 

LW I grew up the same as you, "If you want it, save for it"

I found out I was in debt when I was home on leave and a bailiff knocked at the door, my (now ex) wife had spent over £8k on credit cards. Worse part about it was it was on stuff for her and not the home, clothes, shoes and jewellery sort of thing, stuff I just never noticed. For me back then that was a fortune and I worried more about that debt than being sent to a war zone...I hated being in debt

I have credit cards and use them from time to time because of the buyer protection they offer and I clear the bill before the end of the month. Debit card I use daily its very rare I use cash. I noticed in Tesco (Walmart type store) that they won't do 'cash back' anymore and most tills are card only. I prefer cards but don't like not having a cash option. The government wanted a cashless society and C19 has been a great excuse to push it on people. Even at the start of the pandemic they knew that the chance of getting infection from handling cash was a million to one.

Off topic I had a fantastic day in the hills, and would like to thank Mr Robert Gore for his fantastic invention which proved itself today on a Welsh mountain named Tryfan. Corned beef stew tonight and a few cans of Guinness

 

Paying off the mortgage or your last big loan is a great feeling. My brother and I have had an inheritance from a relative who passed a few weeks ago which will allow my brother to pay off his mortgage and be debt free for the first time in his adult life and he's really happy with that happening (once we sell her house).

 

Very true LW but sadly its getting harder for low wage folk but that said I suppose its always been that way.

 

" everyone "has" to have a mobile phone dont they?"

Yes, they do. So much is linked to phones days from online banking which is now pretty much the norm with so many high street branches closed, to signing on...you have to have a mobile number and be able to receive and send texts. That said a new basic phone can be had for not much more that a tenner and a five quid a month sim gives unlimited calls and texts. I'd guess you can often scrounge an old phone off a mate, I've got a draw full of the bloody things because I can afford a new phone when I feel like it but your right, folk on a tight budget don't need an expensive phone they can't afford.

 

Theoretically I'm low paid but I live frugally and grow a fair proportion of what we eat...last month we paid £30k off our mortgage and that is without any lottery wins or inherited money.
It can be done, if you learn to seize every opportunity...we don't do flash cars or foreign holidays and I guess I'm going to be carrying on working until I'm too old or sick but the payback for that is that I have a beautiful home that belongs to us and not the bank.

 

The cost of meals is more of a social thing that a real thing. I am pretty lucky. i was raised almost dirt poor and we ate a home cooked meal every night. Beans play a big part in our diet and when money is short the meat is what is in the beans. We also eat a lot of homemade soup and gumbo. If you cook and shop sales eating can be very good AND inexpensive. When money is good we eat a lot of meat but if things get tight we are just as happy eating poor.

LOL, being poor and happy is a great life advantage. It makes it easy to live with a low budget. Since we lived in an area that was oil based and heavily union you had to be prepared to weather a strike. Once you hear a bullet go WEEEEEEEE by your ear you get a little leery about crossing picket lines. As a Union official you have to cross a wildcat picket line or be held in contempt of court. Those crazy asshats averaged a wildcat strike every couple of months. I HAD to cross their line. Most of them understood the deal but it only takes one nut to take a shot at you to make it get a little nervy!!!

Onward to happier things…We cook outside a lot and because our girls live on the same piece of land as we do, we eat a lot of meals together. We all like to cook outside and in the spring, fall, and winter we eat a lot outdoors. Most of the summer it is just too hot to eat outside unless you wait until about 9:30. On the weekends that does happen pretty often.

Mealtime is and always has been family time and we ate together, and they now do the same with my Granddaughter. It takes work to turn a group of people into a family. Sadly, with both parents working nowadays most people just let that slide. Then they wonder what happened when their kids grow up and disappear out of their lives. We see our kids every day and my Granddaughter, Danni, is here every day. That didn't just happen it was the cumulative result of how we lived when we were raising our daughter. We were an active part of her life and not just roommates.

We made a lot of sacrifices for that life. I probably could have about doubled my income if I had been willing to be more of a visitor in my home than a full time everyday husband and father. I wanted my family to be in a safe place and someplace that was a lot more rural than where we left. We went from a 50 by 150 lot to acreage. I left a crime ridden city and moved to the country over a hundred miles away where I don’t even have a key to my house because the door is NEVER locked.

We went from a booming high pay oil industry place that was struggling. The Democrats were shutting us down so the important people in the Middle East could take control of our economy through control of the oil prices without us evil Texans competing with them. We now live in a place with an almost rock steady economy. We have an economy based on a big University and 10 prisons just full criminals (15,000!!! Inmates) We love our criminals!! Most of them are less irritating than the 20,000 students in the University. At least when they annoy you, you can lock them up and wait for them to get an attitude adjustment.


Prisons are mostly NOTHING like you see on TV. At least Texas prisons are all working prisons and when you look at an inmate every thing that you see him wearing was made in the prison starting with cotton seeds and cattle. They nearly all work for a living and we build almost anything that you see in a school or courthouse. They also maintain and repair the school busses from all over the state. If you want to sit on your butt that is fine. They have a place for you in solitary, a 8 X8 hole with no window and no cooling and not much heating. You have a small bunk and a toilet with a sink on top of it to keep you company. If you act right and are willing to work, you probably live and eat better than a great majority of free people in the world.