Discontent #6 food, energy, transport, cost of living, society etc

[Folkevermore]

Those who are in receipt of Furlough state benefits may not have cared. I remember saying to someone at the time that the smug furlough lot who were annoying her and showing off to her - would not be laughing in the long term and those who showed off to those who got none or a week like her husband who worked throughout would have to deal with resentment (because propaganda) when the consequences and bill needed paying. I said to my family recently that those requesting a pointless wage spiral will receive the same attitude.

As someone who is a public sector worker and worked throughout the pandemic it pisses me off when people who happily took furlough say we’re greedy for wanting a payrise because it’s costs taxpayer money.
they had no concerns about taxpayer money while they chilled at home getting 80% pay for nothing and I put myself at risk every day to keep the country moving

 

[Yel]

So sir Keir has woken up and now demands that ofgem doesn't raise the price cap. Well it sounds good at first glance, but wouldn't that lead to more energy companies going bust and then the tax payer having to take on their debt as happened before? Doesn't sound like a real sustainable solution to help people.

 

[WhiteFlorals]

As someone who is a public sector worker and worked throughout the pandemic it pisses me off when people who happily took furlough say we’re greedy for wanting a payrise because it’s costs taxpayer money.
they had no concerns about taxpayer money while they chilled at home getting 80% pay for nothing and I put myself at risk every day to keep the country moving

The pay rise will cause a pointless wage spiral - it's just drama lama anxiety inducing, sharp elbowed people (not necessarily workers) causing bad feelings - on top of an already terrible situation, you simply can't keep up with and chase inflation in this situation.

 

[Caffeine Fiend]

The pay rise will cause a pointless wage spiral - it's just drama lama anxiety inducing, sharp elbowed people causing bad feelings - on top of an already terrible situation, you simply can't keep up with and chase inflation in this situation.

What do people do if theyre on a tit wage and can barely pay their bills? Some public sector wages have been stagnant for years and years. Im talking 10 years of 1% pay rises. People are finding their wage the same give or take and bills say 1/3 more.

Okay they leave and get a better paid job, who then does the tit paying jobs?

I work in the public sector and some of the job roles are like a revolving door. The expectation and responsibility for a crap wage is a joke. The only people who then suffer are the public as staff arent experienced, dont know what theyre doing, understaffed as they take so long to actually recruit people they tell 60 people theyve got the job, fast forward 12 weeks and only 15 appear because its taken so long to even get them into a seat.

My partner is on a decent wage in the NHS (in the 8 bandings) they have been offered 5% pay rise across the board. 5% for them is a great amount. 5% for the lowest paid is pitiful and its for them my partner has voted for strike action. Theyre preparing the ballots now. My partner would rather get a smaller percentage and they taper it down.

I dont know what the answer is but people are fighting against the tide here and they are drowning

 

[WhiteFlorals]

What do people do if theyre on a tit wage and can barely pay their bills? Some public sector wages have been stagnant for years and years. Im talking 10 years of 1% pay rises. People are finding their wage the same give or take and bills say 1/3 more.

Okay they leave and get a better paid job, who then does the tit paying jobs?

I work in the public sector and some of the job roles are like a revolving door. The expectation and responsibility for a crap wage is a joke. The only people who then suffer are the public as staff arent experienced, dont know what theyre doing, understaffed as they take so long to actually recruit people they tell 60 people theyve got the job, fast forward 12 weeks and only 15 appear because its taken so long to even get them into a seat.

My partner is on a decent wage in the NHS (in the 8 bandings) they have been offered 5% pay rise across the board. 5% for them is a great amount. 5% for the lowest paid is pitiful and its for them my partner has voted for strike action. Theyre preparing the ballots now. My partner would rather get a smaller percentage and they taper it down.

I dont know what the answer is but people are fighting against the tide here and they are drowning

I am not at fault, shooting the messenger will not deal with your understandable grie f process. It is a combination of issues. I can't change economic truth, it is just the way things are. You will just keep chasing the impossible wasting hope on something that can not be and will drag out harm, you can't beat this type of inflation in this type of situation, you have to somehow accept this and adapt.

I read people are giving up beloved pets, it's horrible for many people.

 

[Folkevermore]

The pay rise will cause a pointless wage spiral - it's just drama lama anxiety inducing, sharp elbowed people (not necessarily workers) causing bad feelings - on top of an already terrible situation, you simply can't keep up with and chase inflation in this situation.

Being able to pay my electricity bill isn’t going to cause a pointless wage spiral.
I haven’t had a payrise in over three years. Inflation (in the current scenario) isn’t caused by excess payrises.
I’m not asking for an inflation matching payrise, I just want something.
Instead of telling people to “adapt” (not sure how you adapt when you can’t afford food or to heat your house), maybe we should accept that inflation isn’t caused by payrises, but corporate greed. And then general public should not be used as punching bags

I am not at fault, shooting the messenger will not deal with your understandable grie f process. It is a combination of issues. I can't change economic truth, it is just the way things are. You will just keep chasing the impossible wasting hope on something that can not be and will drag out harm, you can't beat this type of inflation in this type of situation, you have to somehow accept this and adapt.

I read people are giving up beloved pets, it's horrible for many people.

It’s not an “economic truth”, it’s actually a much more nuanced topic, With many different view points

 

[Caffeine Fiend]

I am not at fault, shooting the messenger will not deal with your understandable grie f process. It is a combination of issues. I can't change economic truth, it is just the way things are. You will just keep chasing the impossible wasting hope on something that can not be and will drag out harm, you can't beat this type of inflation in this type of situation, you have to somehow accept this and adapt.

I read people are giving up beloved pets, it's horrible for many people.

Im not shooting the messenger and thankfully we will survive without a wage increase.

I am thinking of those less fortunate and asking what they can do. I genuinely dont know how people can adapt to things like energy bills doubling or tripling.

 

[Folkevermore]

Im not shooting the messenger and thankfully we will survive without a wage increase.

I am thinking of those less fortunate and asking what they can do. I genuinely dont know how people can adapt to things like energy bills doubling or tripling.

Saying we can’t give payrises to stop inflation is all well and good when people are overspending on non-essential items.
the same can’t be said when people need to get payrises to afford gas and electric.
The idea that the general public should have to accept suffering because of corporate greed is a ridiculous notion.
Weirdly the government didn’t have the same view when it came to their own payrises.
The public sector pay increase is well below private sector, yet people call public sector workers greedy for wanting payrises and threatening strikes.
Haven’t seen any private sector people rejecting payrises

 

[WhiteFlorals]

Being able to pay my electricity bill isn’t going to cause a pointless wage spiral.
I haven’t had a payrise in over three years. Inflation (in the current scenario) isn’t caused by excess payrises.
I’m not asking for an inflation matching payrise, I just want something.

I am not the person who decided on your salary, maybe send them an email?

I understand that occupational therapy has support for public servants, maybe they can offer help?

You just need to look at why we have the public services in the first place and what they have done with the money and trust they were given, we have more cancer and mental health issues than ever. The NHS for example was to improve the health of the nation after two world wars so people could fight, farm and manufacture. It's a different world now. As once coal was needed you need look to the miners and disappearing cashiers at the supermarket to view the future. Mechanisation and AI can do a lot, you just need a body of specialist Drs to oversee the robot surgery, medicine, the care plans to be carried out by care assistants with hoists and skills like phlebotomy eventually. Jobs disappeared in the industrial revolution too.

Im not shooting the messenger and thankfully we will survive without a wage increase.

I am thinking of those less fortunate and asking what they can do. I genuinely dont know how people can adapt to things like energy bills doubling or tripling.

They will struggle more especially in the gig economy if state workers earn more, the state workers will make the already poor even worse off so that state workers can be more wealthy. Can't you see that?

 

[Folkevermore]

I am not the person who decided on your salary, maybe send them an email?

I understand that occupational therapy has support for public servants, maybe they can offer help?

You just need to look at why we have the public services in the first place and what they have done with the money and trust they were given, we have more cancer and mental health issues than ever. The NHS for example was to improve the health of the nation after two world wars so people could fight, farm and manufacture. It's a different world now. As once coal was needed you need look to the miners and disappearing cashiers at the supermarket to view the future. Mechanisation and AI can do a lot, you just need a body of specialist Drs to oversee the robot surgery, medicine, the care plans to be carried out by care assistants with hoists and skills like phlebotomy eventually. Jobs disappeared in the industrial revolution too.

my point is just that your idea that public sector workers should just accept no payrises to stop an inflation spiral is ridiculous.
Private sector pay grew a fair bit this year, this just increases the gap between private and public, and public sector workers will see the increased inflation because of private sector payrises and get pushed even further behind.
They already have a huge shortage of NHS staff, I doubt NHS workers will be losing their jobs to automation anytime soon.
Also no amount of occupational therapy is going to pay peoples gas bills is it

 

[WhiteFlorals]

Saying we can’t give payrises to stop inflation is all well and good when people are overspending on non-essential items.
the same can’t be said when people need to get payrises to afford gas and electric.
The idea that the general public should have to accept suffering because of corporate greed is a ridiculous notion.
Weirdly the government didn’t have the same view when it came to their own payrises.
The public sector pay increase is well below private sector, yet people call public sector workers greedy for wanting payrises and threatening strikes.
Haven’t seen any private sector people rejecting payrises

It is a combination of issues outside our control. You can stand in the rain with your umbrella shouting at others telling them random people are getting wet, people will still get wet whilst you you stay dry and tell everyone else off.

my point is just that your idea that public sector workers should just accept no payrises to stop an inflation spiral is ridiculous.
Private sector pay grew a fair bit this year, this just increases the gap between private and public, and public sector workers will see the increased inflation because of private sector payrises and get pushed even further behind.
They already have a huge shortage of NHS staff, I doubt NHS workers will be losing their jobs to automation anytime soon.
Also no amount of occupational therapy is going to pay peoples gas bills is it

Strawman. Have a nice evening.

 

[Folkevermore]

It is a combination of issues outside our control. You can stand in the rain with your umbrella shouting at others telling them random people are getting wet, people will still get wet whilst you you stay dry and tell everyone else off.

Your rain analogy has nothing to do with the fact that public sector workers should have payrises in line with the average private sector pay increase this year

 

[Burrito88]

Your rain analogy has nothing to do with the fact that public sector workers should have payrises in line with the average private sector pay increase this year

It’s actually outrageous that MPs are claiming a payrise, ridiculous second home expenses and have spent billions on dodgy Covid contracts when civil servants are using food banks to survive.

 

[Yel]

Even before covid living standards were just about peaking in the west. Pay has been lagging behind for a long time. It's such a complicated picture with ever more people in the world competing for resources while a new wave of algorithms threatens white collar jobs.

People after the boomers aren't going to enjoy anywhere near as good of a lifestyle. There's this expectation that things will always get better for future generations, but sadly that isn't the case. Several decades in retirement won't be the norm for future generations.

For many decades people have been spending less and less of a percentage of their income on food. That seems over now. Maybe it was a short term abnormality from globalisation, and now the middle classes across the world are rapidly reaching western standards and it's returning to the norm.

The basics need to be affordable to all; food, shelter and heating. While food prices fell this extra money was eaten up by rising housing costs and now means people have precious little to afford food prices or energy prices rising. Lots of problems would be fixed if housing was fixed.

This is all very grim but I'm not sure what the answer is to such complicated structural problems. The only thing I'm sure of is there is no simple solution.

 

[Codiaeum]

Friday was my last day at work before I start my new job in September, leaving me with a bit of free time. I've been very lackluster about cooking the past month, with no ideas at all about what to make, so I always shopped for very basic items and made rather basic meals. I think the looming backdrop of high energy prices, and always higher grocery prices are also affecting me in that regard.
I'm gonna use my free time to come up with some more dishes that use inexpensive ingredients and that fit well into our regular dishes, as I don't like buying specialty stuff that I only use in one or two dishes. I don't meal-plan per se, but I do like to make sure that I can cook multiple things with what I got.

 

[Eeyore147]

Friday was my last day at work before I start my new job in September, leaving me with a bit of free time. I've been very lackluster about cooking the past month, with no ideas at all about what to make, so I always shopped for very basic items and made rather basic meals. I think the looming backdrop of high energy prices, and always higher grocery prices are also affecting me in that regard.
I'm gonna use my free time to come up with some more dishes that use inexpensive ingredients and that fit well into our regular dishes, as I don't like buying specialty stuff that I only use in one or two dishes. I don't meal-plan per se, but I do like to make sure that I can cook multiple things with what I got.

Have a look at The Batch lady. She does some great meals. No complicated ingredients. Great for energy consumption as some of hers are 10 meals in an hour.

 

[Codiaeum]

Thanks, I hadn't heard of her yet! I always liked BudgetBytes, while many things aren't quite available here, the general style of cooking and reusing ingredients fits well with how I cook.
I'm not a batch-cooker, even though it would be much better for energy usage, I don't exactly mind eating the same thing twice in a row, but I'm not seeing myself (and much less my boyfriend for that matter) eating the same thing several days in a row. But I do like prepping some stuff for quick usage the next day, even if it's something as simple as washing and cutting the whole head of lettuce and not only half (one usually lasts us two meals).

 

[Eeyore147]

Thanks, I hadn't heard of her yet! I always liked BudgetBytes, while many things aren't quite available here, the general style of cooking and reusing ingredients fits well with how I cook.
I'm not a batch-cooker, even though it would be much better for energy usage, I don't exactly mind eating the same thing twice in a row, but I'm not seeing myself (and much less my boyfriend for that matter) eating the same thing several days in a row. But I do like prepping some stuff for quick usage the next day, even if it's something as simple as washing and cutting the whole head of lettuce and not only half (one usually lasts us two meals).

The batch lady designs it all for the freezer rather than eating all that week. We do it then it’s easy to grab out on a busy day and simply re-heat. I like ‘dump bags’ for winter, grab from the freezer, defrost overnight and into the slow cooker. Nice and easy .

 

[WhiteFlorals]

Has anyone found someone who has expertise in using low fuel during cooking?

 

[PumpkinKing]

Sainsburys nectar double up event before Christmas used to be a great help to me, can’t believe they’ve scrapped it got £30 in points and was hoping to get some Christmas presents with it doubled, will just have to save it for when I’m desperate now.

Is anyone else seeing a lack of cheap noodles? Every supermarket I go in. My youngest isn’t a happy bunny!