Income brackets: what is prception of low/middle high

nickmason

lostinrates wrote: »

Kind of my point, again, lack of clarity is my fault. Why not raise the tax threshold and make council tax payable over a certain income....simplification.

While we're at it, do away with National Insurance. I have yet to hear a plausible defence for it.

baileysbattlebus

mitchaa wrote: »

Different terminologies being used here then as you are relating middle income as it sounds, ie median average, i am using middle income as a point between average and high.

Middle earning singular person to me is between £32k-£75k
Average £18-£32k
Low <£18k
High £75k+

Or thereabouts give or take a little.

Think we'll just agree to disagree on this 1, anything under £26k to me is lower than the national average. (Yes i know its skewed, but so is the median where it takes into account low paid PT workers also)

Mitchaa

I posted early on in the thread that I thought anything below £25k was low and anything over £100k was high.

This is an extract from a study by AXA on middle Britain.

Middle Britain households cover around
20% of all households, typically earn gross
household incomes of between £40,000 -
£100,000 per annum, and have an average
income of around £62,000 per annum.
Middle Britain households have an average
disposable income (after tax) of around
£40,000 per annum

We would fit into that - OH earns a fair bit more than the average income stated there - I earn a good bit less, about £25k, I class myself as having a fairly low salary.

We are comfortable, I wouldn't say well off or rich by any means.

We are both 54, so OH is at the peak of his earning potential, I would imagine many of you have yet to reach that.

We have a fairly small mortgage - but at our age that would be expected. We have lived in this house for 15 years, we haven't mewed or anything. So our housing debt relative to our income is low.

It's all relative, I have a sister, she and her husband probably have about a third or less of our household income, they have no debt or mortgage. They have been much more MSE than we have. They holiday twice a year in Florida - which is their one extravagance. They live quite simply, don't have expensive hobbies etc.

On the other hand OH likes diving, one of our holidays is usually to Egypt because of this. He also builds and flies model aircraft - currently into jets - the cost of an engine alone would buy you a decent car - and you can't just have one !!!

It would be a funny old world if we were all the same.

http://www.axa.co.uk/media/pressreleases/documents/Middle%20Britain%20Report%202008.pdf

aTrumpetAndaDream

Great thread.

I'd say for an individual income

Low = <20k
Medium = 20-50k
High = 50k +

I'm 30, single, and my salary is 64k which after pension gives me a net take home of 3,400 a month.

I'd say I'm well off and there is nothing I want that I can't have. I don't want diamonds though but I never have to think about what I spend in the supermarket or the pub.

I can live very comfortably on 1500 a month including rent, bills, food, going out. probably another 500-750 a month is frittered on holidays and luxury buys. The rest is saved.

I feel really lucky... but I still have to work for the rest of my life. Even if you were earning 100k you would.

It would be nice to win the lottery and indulge a new found hobby of first class travel, exquisite hotels and fine dining.

I think once you get to the point where you earn enough then if you are on 20k or 150k you are still in the same working and getting by boat.

Similarly you can be earning 100k but if you are paying for a nanny, school fees, etc you are going to feel broke.

But, as someone as said, pretty much everyone in the UK is well off compared to the majority of humans so we should count ourselves lucky.

PasturesNew

lostinrates wrote: »

a single person on that income might be entitled to a discount on council tax.

But a couple get the equivalent of a 50% discount each because the whole is paid between two of them.

lostinrates

PasturesNew wrote: »

But a couple get the equivalent of a 50% discount each because the whole is paid between two of them.

But its not SO unusual to also half one, or one and a half wages between them too. Then you gt into th issue of house shares and how they get bigger discounts......this is th second tim that somon has surprisedtax me in seeming to suggst a poll tax would b preferable, not bcause I hold strong views either way, just I remember the furore over them.

SandC

My payments didn't alter from poll tax to council tax - for a single person the poll tax thing wasn't a big issue.

However, I was living with folks at poll tax time - so was my brother. That meant that 4 adults were paying. When I left home it was just me. Although the size of my parents house meant that the council tax bill is far higher than my bill at home.

Swings in roundabouts I guess. I like the idea of personal taxation, the council tax is simply rates by another name. Even that would end up being flawed in some way - as another tax on the higher incomes even though they wouldn't be using any more services than anyone else.

Swans1912

aTrumpetAndaDream wrote: »

But, as someone as said, pretty much everyone in the UK is well off compared to the majority of humans so we should count ourselves lucky.

This is a very important point that I fail to remember until it is pointed out to me again and again.

We are very well off, even if struggling with debt.

neverdespairgirl

skintchick wrote: »

My friend works there and says it is. I don;t really know. I'll tell her what you said though!

What did your mate have to say about Shiplake?

moneysaving_pharmacist

mitchaa wrote: »

£22k is under the national average of £26k so your GF earns an under average wage. True or false?? How can you then therefore say that your GF is a medium income earner? She isn't, as she's an under average earner

There should be 4 catagories, Low, Average, Medium and High. I would class your GF in the average category and you in the medium category

An average, be it the mean, median or mode, gives you a single figure. We are discussing income brackets so it is reasonable to classify people who earn less than the mean as medium earners. I don't understand how you could have average and medium categories.

mitchaa wrote: »

If an income of £47k is high, what is an income of £100k? Superhigh?? What about the salaries of Doctors and Consultants £150-200k...Super super high?

But these people account for a tiny proportion of the population and I'm not sure how relevant they are to the discussion. Less than 10% of the UK population earn over £45k p.a. (ONS spreadsheet on gross weekly pay, 90th percentile is £857.6 per week), so £47k is definitely high.

mitchaa wrote: »

£47k is 'only' £2800pm, not a great deal and its certainly not enough to lead the high life;) I'm not having a go, i earn similar amounts to you and it is a good wage but i dont see myself as a high earner, even at 25 and living 500miles from the very expensive Capital. A few friends of mine are coming back from offshore work with £80-100k in their hands, that i would class as perhaps high singular earnings.

It's a bit less than that once the student loan comes out, but my spending power is higher than my income would indicate due to having no rent or mortgage to pay and having no travelling costs. I'm quite happy with it really.

mitchaa

moneysaving_pharmacist wrote: »

An average, be it the mean, median or mode, gives you a single figure. We are discussing income brackets so it is reasonable to classify people who earn less than the mean as medium earners. I don't understand how you could have average and medium categories.



But these people account for a tiny proportion of the population and I'm not sure how relevant they are to the discussion. Less than 10% of the UK population earn over £45k p.a. (ONS spreadsheet on gross weekly pay, 90th percentile is £857.6 per week), so £47k is definitely high.



It's a bit less than that once the student loan comes out, but my spending power is higher than my income would indicate due to having no rent or mortgage to pay and having no travelling costs. I'm quite happy with it really.

Read post number 243 above, its not just me that thinks of medium/middle salaries.

A salary of £22k is average, slightly below, no matter what spin you try and put on it.
As to your other point, a tiny portion of the population 10% of the 30m or so in the workforce is 3million people, so its not tiny numbers we are speaking about here:rolleyes:

£47k is not a high income, its at middle income level, otherwise how do describe earnings of £100-200k?

You are using your own terminologies here to suit yourself, basically you are saying there are only 2 categories, low and high and no in between If so, where would you say low ends and high begins? Middle is certainly not £22k, that is average.

Your circumstances are your own business, i believe you said before you live in work accomodation?? Im sure at 1 point in the future you are going to need to buy a house and therefore have normal living costs