New figures show we're worse off than ever
Filed under: Economiser, Financial Crisis
What's for dinner tonight? Beans on toast, jacket potato with beans, or just beans? Living on a budget is fine for a while. We can all take those lean periods. But after more than a year of financial misery, there's only so many beans a person can eat.Unfortunately, there's going to be no let up in the bean-only diet, because just when you thought it wasn't possible for your budget to get any more miserable, new figures from YouGov have revealed that household finances have become worse yet again this month.
That marks 13 months of things going from bad to worse, and there's more bad news... they're going to go from worse, to really blooming awful.
Things are already bad enough.
And they are still getting worse, in fact March has seen the fastest deterioration in our household finances for three months. A big part of the problem is that income is falling, and has done for the past 5 months, as we have taken poorer-paying jobs and many people have moved into part-time work.
The survey also noted that job security among public sector workers is falling, and if the state is your employer, you can expect a bad year, as whoever gets into power is going to be cutting jobs dramatically.
There's also another raft of things the survey didn't mention which are counting against us. The real biggie, as mentioned by Kenneth Clarke yesterday, is that interest rates are not going to stay this low for much longer. We can fully expect them to start rising within six months. At that point, mortgage and debt repayment costs are really going to start hurting again, and many households are going to be tipped over the edge.
There is a small nugget of good news. Debt levels are falling, and dropped for the second month in a row. But let's face it, that's a drop in the ocean. It's going to take more than two months to pay back our mountain of debt.
It's little surprise that more than a third of people expect to be worse off this time next year.
We're going to have to get exceptionally creative with those beans...
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)
3-19-2010 @ 8:14AM
slippy said...
whats new! petrol, food. every thing is going up bar wages... think its time to give up work and live off the sate..mmmm
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3-19-2010 @ 8:42AM
ray said...
live off the state you want to try it, i get £150 a week i have 2 children aged 5 and 6 and by the way i was self employed 18 months ago, and i am a man who as been bringing 2 kids up on my own, so not your scounger or a woman having children for a council house, let me tell you £150 a week, a bloody joke most days i don't eat,have not bought any clothes for myself in a year, and trying to just feed and put clothes on my 2 children is near impossible, you want to stop reading the bull-shit in the papers, because they are people in real poverty in this country real poverty, i dont smoke dont drink and can not survive, my grandma gets more, for herself, and she even helps out, she asks many times why do mps get 70 grand a year, when get get a pay rise of 2% they get £200 a week rise, when we get 2% we get 70pence a week rise and everything is going up by 20-30% a year,?
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3-31-2010 @ 10:05AM
Econogeek said...
Ray, I share your frustration. It isn't just about struggling to cope financially and emotionally...it is the terrible sadness when the media (i.e. the rich and powerful) portray anybody unable to work as a layabout. I was a so called 'high flyer'. I loved working, because I was lucky enough to have a great career with all the trimmings. I then got sick, and lost my balance. The being sick is the bigger problem than the being disabled, because it leaves me pretty much house - and most days bed - bound. Coping with this is hard enough, without the feeling that society views me a scrounging layabout. I was a persn who contributed to society, and never wanted to be in the unfortunate position of recipient. Now I feel I am a nobody.
4-05-2010 @ 5:18AM
Robbo said...
Ray, perhaps you should take a leaf out of Anjem Choudary's book. You may get more money if you are an extremist.
January 6th, 2010
The British Tax Payer Pays a Mad Mullah More Than Our Frontline Soldiers.
Taxpayers are forced to give to Anjem Choudary – the extremist cleric who wanted to lead a protest march through Wootton Bassett, £25,740 in benefits to subsidise his hate preaching. The question is how he can be seeking work when he spends all his time rabble rousing in broadcast studios and on demonstrations.
In contrast a frontline soldier, fighting Choudary’s taliban allies in Afghanistan , takes home £17,004 for risking his life.
If that private is killed in combat, his widow and children would have to live on a pension less than Choudary gets.
Why are British taxpayers paying their enemies more than their soldiers? Is Choudary really actively seeking work?
The evidence suggests he has other priorities – so stop his benefits
So Gordon Brown, please can we have your comments on the above? ( in Plain English please )
Perhaps more people should be made aware of this?
If you agree please pass on to anyone else you think may care.
What a sad country we live in.
3-19-2010 @ 8:36AM
Peter said...
This is what 13 years of Labour goverment has done for this ccountry, maybe all the people that put them in to power will think again!!
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3-19-2010 @ 9:04AM
c may said...
stop bloody whinging and moaning all. be glad you live in these wonderfull islands is anyone here starving ect.im voting labour again ive always found the nhs superb none of my family have been mugged or robbed . i see plenty of 4x4s on our roads despite petrol rising . people have been living beyond there means mostly now there moaning to all moaners no one is forcing you to stay here dont think the grass is greener in other places it aint . rant over .
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3-19-2010 @ 11:08AM
Alan said...
Yes but you must be one of prats who cannot see what damage is really done to this country `Just you wait untill after the election .
3-19-2010 @ 2:40PM
Melissa said...
You are probably a dole scrounger on a minimum of 50k a year, so of course you're not whining are you!
3-19-2010 @ 9:41AM
derek said...
Really lots of people arn't doing too badly. If you are in work and paying a mortgage the payments are lower than they have ever been. Income tax at 20% is low too. Now you might say that mortgage rates will have to go up at some stage but that is in the future and just now and for the past few months it is clear that many people have been quite ok. However far be it from to stop people having a moan if that's what they need to keep them cheerful.
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3-19-2010 @ 1:29PM
mick said...
income tax started off at 10p in the pound gorden bean doubled the burden for the low paid & no one gives a shit about it
3-19-2010 @ 10:16AM
eezeetiger said...
GET LABOUR OUT :) SIMPLES
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3-19-2010 @ 11:49AM
Ah Me said...
Aaahhhh! 'The Great Clunking Fist' that Tony Liar was so proud of. The clunking fist that smashed the pensions, the economy, education standards, put our kids into horrendous debt, smashed our futures and theirs, smashed manufacturing to a pulp, claims falls in unemployment when they are hiring furiously in the public sector while the private sector, which creates wealth, loses jobs hand over fist - so much so that people are losing all hope and not even registering to try and find a job anymore.
The great clunking fist that is not pursuing a scorched earth policy before he leaves office - he is pursuing a cremated earth policy. Just try to understand that he and Bliar really have tried to destroy Britain and what it stands for with their deliberate unrestricted immigration policy. What this means is that he will be able to sit there when someone else tries to sort it out and pretend that it was nothing to do with him.
The great clunking fist that underfunds the army while sending 'gender issue' advisers to help the Iraqis with anyone who might not know what sex they are - or what sex they want.
The great clunking fist that built his entire economic philosophy on increasing debt and conning everyone else to do the same. I've seen it before. Lets pay off debt by going further into debt - called 'rolling over the debt'. It doesn't matter to him - because he doesn't have to pay for it. Like Bliar, he will be fine - living in clover. But in all my years, I have never known any other outcome than bankruptcy when someone tries to pay debt by creating more debt. 'The Great Clunking Fist' that smaahed the will out of the nation.
God - if only I could leave this country - Oh but The Clunker robbed me of that opportunity also.
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3-19-2010 @ 12:01PM
RICHIE said...
sounds like revolutionary talk to me some of this moaning and the sooner the better
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3-24-2010 @ 7:56AM
derek said...
So people like to have a moan, nothing wrong with that, but when asked what we can do about their problems bloggers tend to go swivled eyed and say wait till the Tories get in everything will be all right. Maybe because the Conservatives have promised to make it all better and swivled eyed poeple seem to trust the Tories . All the men will be rich; all the women will be healthy and good looking and all the kids will be in school and above average. Just how will this very desirable state of affairs com into being? Its not easy to see because Tories are very Conservative with their polices but mainly it has to do with completing to work of Thatcher by cutting money spent on social services and public spending generally. The figure I have seen is £20m in the first year. If you take £20k as an average pay in the public sector this means 1million jobs cut at a stroke. another 1m unemployed won't make any of us any richer.
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3-19-2010 @ 12:49PM
dave said...
my god there are ppl on here who actually think smarmy cameron can/will make things better --TOSH --- GET ONE THING STRAIT IN 2010 no party is good they are ALL the sAME NO DIFFERENCE BETWEEN THEM LOOK AT HISTORY and stop moaning look at petrol at 80p a lts all hell broke loose whats happening now huh NOTHING which party has said it will lower petrol come on im waiting where will the government get the revenue from to lower this deficit if most cant afford pertol and get rid of cars im concidering selling mine
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3-19-2010 @ 1:17PM
Jack Jackson said...
You know, you cannot blame this Labour government for ruining the economy and morally bankrupting the country. No, you have to blame the people who voted for them. Not in my name!
3-19-2010 @ 3:59PM
Andrew Holden said...
I don't know where they get these figures from.
I only have a mortgage of £40000 but my monthly payments are over £150 less than they were 18 months ago.
Someone with an 'average' mortgage of £120000 must be hugely better off.
I'm old enough to remember when interest rates were 15%, inflation averaged 8% and there were 4 million unemployed - the last time the tories were in.
Unfortunately it looks like they'll be back in again in a couple of months - then people will really have something to moan about !
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3-19-2010 @ 6:12PM
jean said...
I too remember 15% mortgage rates - just after I bought my first house as a young single person. Whenever I've moved since I have always asked the building society to tell me the repayments at the rate existing at the time and then at 15%. they look at me as though I am weird, and I tell them I know what 15% is like. Then they say that they wished more clients took the same attitude. So when people apply for a mortgage they should be given those sort of figures and asked to consider if they could keep up payments at a higher rate.. It would at least make people think and maybe not take on excessive mortgages - thus perhaps stopping the stupid housing booms, as well as making fewer people get into trouble.
3-29-2010 @ 10:19AM
David said...
People like you are too stupid to realise how stupid you are, the reason for all the financial misery people felt under the Thatcher adminisatration was due to the country having to tighten it's belt after the cockup the last labour government caused. I'll make this simple so the stupid people on this board understand. If your wife spent all your savings on rubbish, and then spend every penny you earned every month and left you with huge depts, to get out of the s**t you'd have to severely tighten belts, cut costs etc to clear off the debt. Well it was the same for her government, and it will be the same for whichever government gets in after the monkeys that have been in charge for the last 13 years, If we continue Britain will be bankrupt with the amount of money Tony and his Girlfriend Gordon have spent on bringing their immigrant frieinds to live with us!!!! Every labour government have made a complete hash of running this country, read your history books instead of going to the pub and moaning!!!!!!!!
3-19-2010 @ 2:01PM
gumpo said...
I always considered myself a Conservative in the 80s, but I was beginning to think they were getting a bit tired and arrogant, so although I didn't vota at all I was indifferent when Labour got in, thinking "they cant do worse"
Unfortunately Maggie Thatcher who I credited with being strong and "no nonsence" probably started the ball of greed going with her privatisation of public services and crushing of the Unions, and the rising of fat cats within the public sector.
Unfortunately instead of reverting a few things to Govt control the Labour party continued the "sell, sell, sell, policy with just about every asset this Country had, not the least of all the gold reserves, sold at a bargain basement price, never to be replaced.Just about all of Govt power was deferred to "local level" inn the name of "giving people choice" to do what they wanted in their neighbourhood. In actual fact they were just washing their hands of responsibility and passing the buck / blame to local Councils. In turn these Councillors have become a law unto themselves, mainly un regulated and only fined when they don't perform........and where do the fines come from..........The tax/Community charge payer, who are the very ones who are said to have been wronged in the first place. Who are the only winners ? M.p s., Councillors and private sector Companies carrying out public sector duties !!
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