Media Cost OF Living Crisis

There is a general global cost of living crisis aka poverty pandemic, and it is getting worse

Just because you have your own anecdotal evidence that people are not struggling, doesn't mean that people are not struggling.

It's also a very subjective and personal experience. Example would be I have an elderly friend who only yesterday told me she now limits her food spend to 30 euro a week and tries to stay in bed more often to avoid putting the heating on. Is that struggling? To some it would be, to others, not.

The charity Bernardo's (so not a media outlet) produced a report last year that showed this (in Ireland during 2023):

37% of parents have had to go without or cut down on use of their heating systems

20% of parents had to cut down or go without food in order to feed their children

23% said they had to cut back on using their electric due to not being able to afford it

28% said they had to cut back or go without medical care or medicines.

A different research taken place by a dedicated research company showed very similar to the above along with seven in ten (70%) parents said they sometimes or always worried about not being able to provide their children with daily essentials such as food, heat or electricity. Only one in ten (11%) said they never worry. 

So are people struggling, some would say yes they are, they perceive that they are and perception is reality.

You perceive people are not so you believe that to be true.

Some people are struggling to eat all the food they buy.

(2021) Current household food waste is estimated to be 255,000 tonnes per annum. The average Irish household throws out 150 kg of food waste each year; at a cost of approximately 700 euro.

It's inconvenient for the squeezed middle, but they're not the ones I worry about. It's the people who were just about managing before inflation, that I worry about.

There's loads of evidence of people skipping meals and not being able to heat their houses due to the increased costs. These people aren't aliens. They're Parents who don't eat so they can feed the children and they're old people like your grandparents, sitting shivering in the cold.

How on earth you think think the people who feel the pain are the squeezed middle, is beyond me. I'm in the middle and I responded by not being able to go on holiday and not going for pints anymore. We'll boo-fcukin-hoo. I still have a roof over my head and food on the table.

The middle are definitely feeling the effects but ones suffering are not the middle.

Everyone drives a Tesla?

It’s disgracefully hard for a couple these days even a decent bit above average wage to buy a house and have a small family.

Child care is going to be costing me 1700 from next month.

The weekly shop has gotten insane as well. And fuel etc.

While we’re far from living in Tenements, we live from payslip to payslip with little opportunity to save a cent and fingers crossed for no emergencies etc

People in this country moan about the strangest things- bank fees of 25 quid per quarter, Ticketmaster adding a fiver in service charges to a 90 euro ticket, 12 quid a month for a tv licence when they spent 30 on multiple streaming platforms that produce the most low grade rubbish ever known since TV and film were invented.

I've never understood it.

The media loves bad news and Ireland is full of beal bochters, cute hoors, vested interests and the financially illiterate. Various groups will feed sob stories to the media who will lap it up.

No doubt some people are struggling. Groceries have increased a lot and some people's mortgages have also gone up a lot in a short space of time. We know about cost of renting but that has been an issue well before the current cost of living crisis.

If someone tells me that they can't afford this and that because of the cost of living, I'd be sceptical enough without more details. Have come across many examples of people making bullsh*t claims and also people whose struggles are self inflicted and/or easily fixed. Someone claims they can't put food on the table but then shortly afterwards asks did you see x, y and z on TV last night. Turns out they don't have a "dodgy box" but a full sky sports/movies multiroom package plus other entertainment subscraptions too.

Also I had someone who is on a household income of nearly 200k (two public servants) living in a cheap area with no mortgage with cheap childcare who claimed to be dipping in to savings for day to day spending due to the cost of living crisis. That's was either rubbish or else there was some major financial outlay that they had "forgotten" to disclose

Cost of living crisis is real,we've had near double digit inflation for nearly 3 years.

Everybody feels it but there are very few in my opinion actually not able to eat.I think that's what the thread is about.

There are lots of countries in the world where people actually can't afford to eat,Ireland is not one of them.

Irelands problem is whether you work your hole off or live off the state there's not much difference in your quality if life.

Ok, cool, well I do. See what I'm saying, perception is king. Just like I believe Audis are crap cars, but other strange souls seem to like them?