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One million cancel broadband as living costs rise

bbc.com

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Re: One million cancel broadband as living costs rise

#331

Post by pcurve »

EddieEngineers wrote: post #190
jameshush wrote: post #153

Visiting family in the UK for the first time in about five years. Costs here are _way_ higher than I remember. I bought three hamburgers, three drinks, and two large pops at a burger shop here, the total was 48 GBP (about $60 USD). This was at Five Guys. I couldn't believe it. I visited my co-worker in the UK, and over some beers, he mentioned he's getting taxed at 48-50% on top of this. Also 20% VAT on regular shopp…

Five Guys has always been that price, but I agree with your point. As a Brit, the US is pretty crazy too though. I just saw a single broccoli for $7 at a grocery store in Palo Alto. On my $172k salary I pay $59k in taxes which is roughly $1k more than I'd pay in the UK but in the UK that includes national insurance while in the US I pay health insurance on top. So while taxes sound crazy in the UK it's not actually d…

agreed. US price is bat shit crazy. 'some' things are reasonably affordable in the U.S., like processed food in bulk, grains, dairy, etc. But eating out, rent, service labor, healthcare, are insane.

Re: One million cancel broadband as living costs rise

#333

Post by larksimian »

ianlevesque wrote: post #273
omginternets wrote: post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Worked pretty good for what it is, Sure. The "for what it is" is doing a lot of heavy lifting, though. See also: it's rather expensive for what it is.

What? I feel like people coast on experiences from 5-10 years ago. This isn't a 3G hotspot. Ping time right now is 53ms and I'm getting 200/20 for $50, all included, no additional fees. This is outside their actual ideal service area too. I'd love symmetric fiber for $50, but 'for what it is' isn't doing much lifting at all.

Eh, it's relative. You can get that for like 10 euros a month in Romania and they throw in a mobile phone and some cable channels to boot I think.

Re: One million cancel broadband as living costs rise

#334

Post by dukeyukey »

KaiserPro wrote: post #59
monk_e_boy wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Other than london and a couple of other cities, most of the country was already ranked as most deprived in Europe. Throw in Brexit, cost of living and most normal people are fucked. I'm a lecturer (5 yrs) and I'm struggling to pay my bills. We've been out on strike and nothing happened. NHS is struggling. Pay rises are around 0% for most people I know. Food inflation is around 16%. Foodbanks are struggling to feed fa…

I'm not sure why this pose was downvoted, apart from mentioning brexit. I used to live in the countryside, the 90s had a background of rapid improvements in schools and hospitals. 2000s full of out of town megashops killing the high street. 2010s public service cuts. 2020 stuff just not working. The scale of the housing price problem is difficult to behold. https://www.plumplot.co.uk/Norfolk-house-prices.html has the…

> if you live up in the northern part, the average house price is 100x times wage

I really, really, _really_ doubt that's the case. That'd need salaries to be £1 million.

Re: One million cancel broadband as living costs rise

#335

Post by noneeeed »

jameshush wrote: post #153

Visiting family in the UK for the first time in about five years. Costs here are _way_ higher than I remember. I bought three hamburgers, three drinks, and two large pops at a burger shop here, the total was 48 GBP (about $60 USD). This was at Five Guys. I couldn't believe it. I visited my co-worker in the UK, and over some beers, he mentioned he's getting taxed at 48-50% on top of this. Also 20% VAT on regular shopp…

Is your brother in Scotland? If not he should get his tax code checked.

Combining income tax and national insurance contributions, the highest marginal tax rate on your salary is 47%, and that is only on everything over £125k (about $150k).

The vast majority of people are in the standard rate band where you pay 20% IT and 12% NI contributions, a total of 32% on what you earn over the tax free allowance £12,500 and under the £50k higher rate threshold, at which point it switches to 40% IT and just 2% NI.

If you earn £50k you will pay 23% total tax on your salary.

If you earn £125k you pay about 38% total tax on your salary.

The very highest marginal rate he should pay is 47%, if he is paying more then someone screwed up.

In Scotland they have slightly higher rates.

Re: One million cancel broadband as living costs rise

#336

Post by dragonwriter »

dukeyukey wrote: post #309
dragonwriter wrote: post #230

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> In the US, someone earning $155,000 USD (Equivalent to 125 GBP) will also be paying 6.2% in social security taxes, 1.45% in medicare taxes, and then another 6.2% in social security taxes (employer’s portion), and 1.45% in medicare taxes (employer’s portion). In the UK, there is also National Insurance tax on top of income tax, which works similarly (but is a bit more complicated.) The employer share is 13.8%, which…

> And there is also a 20% VAT impacting the cost of pretty much anything you might use your after-tax income to Except stuff like food, rent, utilities, small stuff like that. I'll give you the rest though. The UK is a low-tax country by European standards, and even by developed-world standards, but is above the US quite significantly.

> The UK is a low-tax country by European standards, and even by developed-world standards,

The UK is a bit above average tax burden as share of GDP for the OECD. It is not particularly “low tax by developed world standards”.

Re: One million cancel broadband as living costs rise

#337

Post by omginternets »

ihattendorf wrote: post #194
rcme wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

ADSL is too slow for most modern internet usage.

If you're referring specifically to ADSL then yes, however VDSL is passable, typically 100 down/10 up. Fiber would be ideal, but not worth 4-5x the price IMO (currently paying $33/month).

Ah yeah, I think I had VDSL in mind! Thanks!

Re: One million cancel broadband as living costs rise

#338

Post by rojeee »

ilikerashers wrote: post #275
Shaanie wrote: post #222

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Top marginal rate in Sweden, 50%~ starts at $59k and our VAT is 25%. So eh, UK doesn't seem so bad.

Can we have your childcare, your healthcare and your housing market please in exchange? Childcare alone in Zone 4 London is £2000 per month.

Yup, it's mad! I pay £2,500 a month for nursery for my son in zone 2. So... to send your kid to nursery you need £40k of spare gross income before paying the mortgage, and everything else.

I'm fed up and moving up north!

Re: One million cancel broadband as living costs rise

#339

Post by omginternets »

abawany wrote: post #238
omginternets wrote: post #117

Just yesterday I was trying to sign up with Verizon for my new address. Fiber is not available in my building, so they offer "5G Home Internet" for $60-$80/mo, which is crazy expensive for what it is. I asked whether there were ADSL lines available, since these were recently available for as cheap as $15/mo. It seems this is no longer the case. Maybe there's a market here? EDIT: I am in the US, and I've just realized…

Verizon 5G Home Internet is also typically $50/mo - were you ordering through the building, which might be taking a cut?

Nope! This is straight through Verizon's main website.

Re: One million cancel broadband as living costs rise

#340

Post by no_wizard »

mdasen wrote: post #170
syntaxing wrote: post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Over 100ms most of the time, it worked fine for WFH when I had meetings. Terrible if you want to game.

That's rare. T-Mobile averages 53ms latency according to Ookla/Speedtest.net for multi-server latency. For wired connections, Xfinity averages 24ms, Cox 25ms, and Spectrum 31ms. So wireless does add an additional ~25ms of latency compared to wired, but 100ms is out of the ordinary.

Try the fast.com or speed.cloudflare.com instead. Ookla is pretty easy to game by the ISPs
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