How much keep to ask for? 20 September 2022 at 11:13PM in Marriage, relationships & families 55 replies 5.7K views

tooldle

My folks mentioned it but they are older than you. Mum particularly was persistently encouraged (pestered) to take a higher paying retail job with no prospects, over her job with the admiralty, which although lower pay did have prospects. Parent was after a bigger slice of the pie. The same parent chucked a fit when mum married and told him, she was no longer able to pay for her brother’s school uniforms and school expenses, as she was saving for a house and family of her own. 

Thankfully times have changed and we are no longer seen as possessions, including our pay packets. That’s not too say there isn’t work still to be done. 

maman

Pollycat said:

getmore4less said:

All I can think about now is Monty Python...

Care to share...?

We had it tough...... 🤣

Coffeekup

When I got a job many moons ago my dad made me 25% of my income. At the time I thought I was so hard done by, a few years later I remember saying to friends etc I'd gladly go back to paying that.

As someone else said things are tougher these days so, I'd expect more from them 35% maybe. If you don't need the money you could put it to one side and help them use it for a house deposit at a later date.

RobM99

Back on topic.

I live alone, food about £40 a week. To rent a room round here £600 a month. One bed flat, no bills, £1,000 a month.

Pollycat

maman said:

Pollycat said:

getmore4less said:

All I can think about now is Monty Python...

Care to share...?

We had it tough...... 🤣

I'm not talking about having it tough.
I'm talking about being very unfairly treated compared to my friends and compared to my siblings at the same stage in their lives. 

Spendless

tooldle said:

Spendless said:

tooldle said:

There are plenty of reasons why a family may ask for 'keep' and that is why I say it is not always about the absolute cost of feeding and housing (keeping) a young adult. It is possible to have a household income above the threshold for tax credits and to struggle for a variety of reasons. Equally it may not be about struggle and more about paying for a costly error, or paying for a costly extra where the family provided support in the form of a loan, or contributing to additional cost over and above the norm. 

It wasn't. I knew the lad well and  I used to give him a lift home each night as no buses ran that way home. Parents would have been entitled to exactly the same child related benefits as they had the year before when he was taking GCSEs. The tax credit system was more generous then and child benefit paid to everyone. They asked for a contribution because 'he was working'. I still find it wrong since he was also a f-time student

I’m not suggesting these were the reasons for the lad you speak of. Simply making the point of living expense not necessarily being the driver. For some it may just be a principle. I can think of a few families who have not a penny left at the end of the month and some families who spend more than is earned. Now I think on it, I can think of a few with really hefty debt circa 50K on credit cards. If the teenagers are earning, is it really so bad to ask for a small contribution? After all, being a full time student leaves an awful lot of hours available for earning, socialising and doing other stuff. I know as I myself worked 20 hrs a week whilst studying my A’Levels. I still found time to go out etc and managed to take a holiday overseas, something my parents had never done or afforded. 

There was an incident near us a few years back, significant flooding. Quite a few families were caught out as they had no insurance. Some had not long bought their properties and had spent all their available cash on deposit, furniture etc. A very difficult situation to be in. 
Some cases are poor planning but for others not so much. None of us know what goes on behind closed doors.

Not always. I've known  A level students in schools be required to be in 5 days a week. Same is true of some Performing Arts sixth form classes. My daughter did 3 full days but also had a 3.5 her round trip commute to get to her college, leaving the house at 7.30am and not arriving back until 6.30pm. 

She couldn't get a p-time job till she turned 18 partly due to lockdowns and partly due to the expectations where we live. She lost her first p-time job in a cafe within 3 weeks because she couldn't commit to fully flexible working. It was the end of May, her college course didn't end until the beginning of July..

No I don't think post 16 students should be contributing to the household bills. Paying for their own spends and preferred personal items out of any wages  certainly. That is different to 18+ when they start degrees or  when they start in f-time jobs.

Plasticman

I added up all of the household bills and divided by the number of people in the house. I don't need to make a "profit" from them but when they're out of education they need to pay their way. I also committed not to take more that 20% of their pay to allow them to save. 

tooldle

Same for me Spendless. Train commute and 25 hrs of classes minimum each week. On working days I arrived home around 9-10pm, having left at around 7.20am. Would have been ‘nicer’ to have more frequent trains but that was the way of things. Luckily I lived right next to a railway station, my college was a 20 min walk from its nearest station and my work a 10min walk from a different station. No cars in my family hence we all got on with things as best we could, and sometimes that meant waiting the best part of an hour for the next train. 

Lots of posts on Twitter this weekend from teachers commenting on hungry students right across the age range, with some feeding students from their own wages. 

Spendless

tooldle said:

Same for me Spendless. Train commute and 25 hrs of classes minimum each week. On working days I arrived home around 9-10pm, having left at around 7.20am. Would have been ‘nicer’ to have more frequent trains but that was the way of things. Luckily I lived right next to a railway station, my college was a 20 min walk from its nearest station and my work a 10min walk from a different station. No cars in my family hence we all got on with things as best we could, and sometimes that meant waiting the best part of an hour for the next train. 

Lots of posts on Twitter this weekend from teachers commenting on hungry students right across the age range, with some feeding students from their own wages. 

Which days did you fit your 20 hours working in as I'm guessing it couldn't have been the days you were out of the house between 7.20-9/10?

DD had to do 3 modes of transport to her college. Car/bus train from our village. Train from main station to her college's city station and then a bus from the city to her college.

Here the 'Saturday job' that I had as a teen no longer exists. You're fortunate if you can find something before aged 18 due to places preferring that age due to any restricted sales and frequently want full flexibility (as in available all days/any times). my friend put up a post on SM this summer did anyone know of any p-time jobs for her son as he was struggling to find anything and had been turned down for several. I messaged her saying how difficult it would be until he turned 18 (which he did last week) combined with continuing it once he returned to sixth form. 

  DD only got another job after the cafe one ended after her course ended so could then do any hours. 

Camster

Plasticman said:

I added up all of the household bills and divided by the number of people in the house. I don't need to make a "profit" from them but when they're out of education they need to pay their way. I also committed not to take more that 20% of their pay to allow them to save. 

That's just the conversation I've had with my son. It worked out at around £250 a month, so we agreed on this without any problems or complaints from him, because I think he saw it as being a fair arrangement for everyone. It comes to around 15% of his take home pay, so is also affordable for him.