Any other poor people here?

Wow, just want to express my deep anger in what Halifax are doing here.

Hope it works out better for you :frowning:

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Absolutely not poor by any means but I am in pretty brutal amounts of debt.

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I was talking about something similar with my friend the other day, I mean my talents are not marketable or Iā€™m unable/unwilling to market them, itā€™s a big waste!

Also on the flip side of what youā€™ve said, beyond a certain point I donā€™t have much time for abstract learning just to sit in a university and continue to educate a small percentage of people who will then just repeat that cycle forever (apologies fellow philosophy students/all of DiS!). I know this is simplifying things but university is a very wasteful system, hopefully we come up with a better idea some day.

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I mean weā€™ve reached the point where people canā€™t know everything about a specific subejct anyway, maybe the whole concept of ā€œsubjectsā€ and ā€œcoursesā€ needs to change into learning specific aspects you are interested in and a flexible system and encouragement for people to continue to learn and be educated on a smaller scale throughout their whole lives. Maybe some kind of state sponsored or encouraged shceme for taking a couple of days out a year to recap on things youā€™ve learnt throughout your life and even just the idea of meditating/taking time to put your life into contextā€¦dunno what Iā€™m talking about anymore but my heart is in the right place!

ā€¦actually quite enjoyed spending a small minute thinking about a way in which part of life could be better. Will try to do this more often :slight_smile:

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Thanks.
I did speak to them about that but Iā€™m doing a two year part time degree, and they only offer an interest free overdraft for full time degrees. Maybe a different bank would allow it? Iā€™ll look into that.

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well itā€™s the whole echo chamber (hate that phrase now thanks internet) thing too I guess, I have known some people who meant well and are probably doing good and interesting things but they only exist in a tiny circle of folks etc etc I dunno, maybe I donā€™t have to come down too heavily, I mean itā€™s hard to say learning isnā€™t a good idea inherently but also part of me wants to say that all education without practical application is shameful in a sense. Still people arenā€™t productivity machines and sometimes need to do things for themselves, I donā€™t think you could stay sane thinking about the greater good all the time

I think feeling like you canā€™t achieve a purpose in life or feeling like you are doing worse than your relative peers is really one of the worst things for people whatever station in life they inhabit. Pretty psychologically damaging, sadly it seems like thereā€™s a lot of shitty blame culture around, probably the same the world over but yeah, youā€™re totally right

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Itā€™s weird, Iā€™m always reluctant to call myself or my family poor because I feel like many have it worse off than we did - weā€™ve never been homeless, for example. My parents have a caravan, although they got it at a hugely reduced price because it was so old. So Iā€™m like, well, who are we to plead poverty?

At the same time, when I really think about what theyā€™ve been through, times my mum had no money for food and her co-workers clubbed together and bought us a weekā€™s shopping, my stepdad working for almost no pay for four YEARS because ā€œat least itā€™s a jobā€ and running up debt that heā€™s still nowhere near clearing 20 years later, my mum claiming housing benefit for a few months when he finally did lose his job, only to get a bill for Ā£800 that took them two years to pay back, even with my help.

As for me, I managed to get some sort of career going and started earning decent money, and was I able to save any of it? Was I bollocks. Pretty much all of what Iā€™ve put away has gone on moving house 4 times in 4 years. When I think I could have saved some of that and helped my folks out while they had to take pay cuts and got made redundant I could kick myself. Like, I did help as much as I could, but their rent was a good 2-300 quid less than paying for one double room in London.

I donā€™t think I will go back into a job that paid like my previous ones. Fact is, I was earning good money (I joked that I had become a class traitor) but I couldnā€™t enjoy any of it because the workplaces themselves were so awful. My last job was the highest I ever got paid and I genuinely believed I was going to have a stress-induced heart attack at any point.

Iā€™ve moved back home in the hope that I can find work that pays less but is not as stressful, but also that I can use that money to help make life more comfortable for my parents. Itā€™s been a terrible couple of decades for them.

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sorry your parents have suffered so much trouble :frowning: I can relate to job stress, I felt it really bad with my old role and I was paid very close to minimum wage too which didnā€™t help. Coming home late every day and just sitting with my head on the table for an hour because I was too tired and stressed to do anything, itā€™s awful isnā€™t it? I hope you are able to find something that gives you a better balance and also pays you what you are worth too :slight_smile:

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itā€™s just the same old thing with people assuming whatā€™s worked for them will work for everyone else/is good for everyone else/possible for everyone else. Itā€™s really strange to think in a world where people are so different in so many ways that we should all be working towards the same goals. I always feel better when I think about it this way. I have skills that many people donā€™t, maaaany people have skills that I donā€™t, thatā€™s fine, thatā€™s just human isnā€™t it?

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I wouldnā€™t consider myself poor at the moment, but I remember things being really tight growing up. I remember my Dad losing his job and the effect that had on his MH. I think thatā€™s led to me constantly worrying about losing my job and not being able to find anything else.

I feel massively lucky that my kids have things better than I did growing up, but itā€™s also scary to think about how quickly the situation could change and how much worse off other people have it for no other reason than situation/luck. What a shitty system!

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:clap: :clap: :clap:

perfectly expressed. this was basically the root of my depression last year. which was rudely awakened last Wednesday when my friendā€™s drunk husband started ranting at me about ^all of the above, telling me that I should have known when I was 18 that uni was a waste of time lolllll~

(Iā€™m not poor, but working a shitty 0 hour min wage job for over a year and being unable to get a full time job -
let alone one that would actually use my skills - for, oooooh, 8 months has profoundly affected me. I have terrible daily resentment for how I was treated by the management at that place, being humiliated by my manager and patronised by customers who thought I was unable to spell simple 4-letter words, and am indescribably relieved to have escaped it. I canā€™t even begin to imagine how much those feelings of anger, resentment, misery and begrudging subservience would be amplified for someone who didnā€™t have a family supporting them, some savings and an education that might eventually bear fruit.) ((really sorry about the privilege in that ^))

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I realised last year that if I wasnā€™t basically middle class Iā€™d probably be on the streets yā€™know. Thatā€™s mainly due to a massive lack of MH capacity and social capital. Having a southern accent, getting a job working for the uni when I did my degree through sheer nepotism and (basically) getting into indie music has saved me.

Fortunately I now live in a flat and hopefully lower middle class wages are on the near horizon with an internal transfer Iā€™m going for at work.

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It annoys me that society puts so much pressure on young people to know what they want to do, and to spread their wings as soon as they can, and that itā€™s a positive thing to have debt, and that you should try to buy your own home as soon as is possible. Whenever iā€™ve been abroad, or even just spending a bit of time with mates or colleagues who might have a different background to me i often get the sense that people are less isolated, that they have better support networks, idk. Gone off on a tangent here, but i donā€™t know if people on the whole have enough people around them nowadays, thereā€™s a sort of pressure to branch out and do your own thing, and if you have little money it can be quite scary and lonely. People should stay at home if they want to, or move back home, or not be embarrassed to ask for help. It frightens me how easy it is to be a couple of bad decisions or bad bits of luck of away from being in serious financial trouble.

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wrings sock

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further to darwinbabeā€™s comment, I banked with the co-op during uni and my student account also had a no-fee overdraft of Ā£1000 built inā€”might be worth looking at changing banks if you get the opportunity but I get itā€™s not a click your fingers deal

Donā€™t feel bad, most people on here are middle class and it doesnā€™t change your struggles or situation. Hope things are heading in the right direction for you now

Hello :wave:

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