(Thread IKs:
OwlFancier, crispix)
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Yep it's a death spiral Evergreen page snipe
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# ? Mar 5, 2024 13:59 |
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# ? May 27, 2024 03:12 |
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Hard to summon sympathy though, where I hang out I get exposed to a lot of the swedish suburban middle class person and I deeply loathe them and their well off (and wasteful) lives.
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# ? Mar 5, 2024 14:12 |
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It might be nice for the press to talk to the staff at the pubs and restaurants and cafes who are complaining that they just had their worst winter season on record and aren't getting any bonuses rather than the temporarily embarrassed discretionary spend people.
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# ? Mar 5, 2024 14:21 |
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MeinPanzer posted:It's time for this thread's favourite kind of journalism: the "help, we make £80k a year but we're poor" article: https://www.theguardian.com/business/2024/mar/04/middle-class-workers-mortgages-bills-tax. With a student loan type 2 his take home would be £4000. But he also mentions having a pension so would be less than that again. MeinPanzer posted:The kicker? They bought a £400k house, an electric SUV that must be £40k, regularly take expensive vacations--and do that all with a huge dose of financial help from their parents. Meanwhile my wife and I are doing just fine living in a house that costs less than half that amount, driving a used car that cost £4k, and taking modest vacations. Cool where do you live? Cos £200k would net me a shed where I live. My mortgage DOUBLED this year, and even in the midlands where prices are lower I do feel for people being caught off guard after a decade of low interest. As for the leased car, yeah I wouldn't get one but it's a dumb decision they are now locked into and a LOT of the pre-owned car market is fueled by those lease cars, so if those chumps didn't exist the 2nd hand market would get substantially pricier.
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# ? Mar 5, 2024 14:22 |
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I guess the thing that surprises me is that on those salaries I'd expect them to be doing better. I'm on less and not having similar issues, but then I've foregone the idea of home ownership or kids in the near term (if at all), so I guess it's more that the aspiration of a house and kids is unaffordable now, and yeah pretty much. The Tories got what they wanted, the youth impoverished and in despair, and then they bitch about us not having kids.
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# ? Mar 5, 2024 14:24 |
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His Divine Shadow posted:Hard to summon sympathy though, where I hang out I get exposed to a lot of the swedish suburban middle class person and I deeply loathe them and their well off (and wasteful) lives. Yeah, the economic point is a valid one and not everyone in the article is necessarily an arsehole, but it's hard to be sympathetic towards people who share no sympathy themselves. Lowering taxes to rectify a cost of living crisis is straight up FYGM - yeah it helps if you're working in private sector, don't rely on public services and currently pay a lot of tax. But it leaves teachers and nurses on pay freezes while their cost of living continues to spike. Then there's the guy at the end - claims to be fine with paying his share of taxes as someone in the top 2%, but is annoyed by the state of public services - again the solution there is quite obviously to spend money on public services instead of enriching Tory donors. But he gives himself away in the end when he says he's jealous of other people who go on holidays as he can't afford to. As though all these holidaymakers he's jealous of aren't making their own sacrifices to afford them?
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# ? Mar 5, 2024 14:26 |
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Pretty hosed up that home ownership, children and the occasional meal out are now viewed as luxuries Great country, A++ would recommend
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# ? Mar 5, 2024 14:28 |
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Tesseraction posted:The Tories got what they wanted, the youth impoverished and in despair, and then they bitch about us not having kids. But we can always rely on immigrat.........
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# ? Mar 5, 2024 14:28 |
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From what I gather (ok from watching too much Blaze channel), the Knights Templar had a complicated and not altogether adversarial relationship with the Muslamics. Eg quote:Robert of St. Albans (died 1187)[1] was an English templar knight who converted to Islam from Christianity.[2] In 1187, he led an army for Saladin[3] against the Crusaders during the Battle of Hattin as well as the reconquest of Jerusalem,[4] which was at the time under the control of the Franks.[5] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_of_St._Albans
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# ? Mar 5, 2024 14:28 |
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Scikar posted:Yeah, the economic point is a valid one and not everyone in the article is necessarily an arsehole, but it's hard to be sympathetic towards people who share no sympathy themselves. Lowering taxes to rectify a cost of living crisis is straight up FYGM Jaeluni Asjil posted:From what I gather (ok from watching too much Blaze channel), the Knights Templar had a complicated and not altogether adversarial relationship with the Muslamics.
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# ? Mar 5, 2024 14:37 |
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His Divine Shadow posted:If I focus on a single example, take modern led lamps, studies show they cost on average around 1500€ to replace and last on average 15 years, that is 150€ per year if it lasts that long. MeinPanzer posted:Right, so that's about £2,300 of his £4,400 take home accounted for, leaving £2k for everything else. Computer, zoom in again. The thing that immediately stood out to me here is that the guy is paying bare minimum into a pension and wants to pay less. The first advice people with this level of income get is to increase pension contributions where possible, as it's <=50p per £1 in your pocket now versus >= 80p towards retirement. With large enough contributions he could even be claiming child benefit for those two kids to offset the lower take-home figure, while paying substantially less of his gross income to tax. However spunking between £1k and £2k on a car lease is obviously more important.
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# ? Mar 5, 2024 14:37 |
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Outside of what you think about this particular guy, it has to be acknowledged that if someone on a 90th percentile salary can't live comfortably there must be something deeply wrong with this country.
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# ? Mar 5, 2024 14:43 |
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Tesseraction posted:The Tories got what they wanted, the youth impoverished and in despair, and then they bitch about us not having kids. I wouldn't say that they wanted that. They wanted to have all the money. An impoverished despairing youth is just a by-product of that, one that Tories don't care about because they are not young. Everything else is the standard boomerism of "I did it with all the advantages I had, so why can't you do it now we've taken them away?"
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# ? Mar 5, 2024 14:44 |
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Guavanaut posted:I forget who, but one of England's fash heroes got kicked out of Hungary for being associated with them, as a group too racist even for Hungarian politics. So whatever they were in the past, their current namesake is this bullshit: quote:Dowson relocated to Budapest, Hungary, and has been observed in several eastern European countries with his latest venture, Knights Templar International (KTI), along with the former BNP leader Nick Griffin and a Hungarian anti-abortion campaigner Imre Teglasy. Dowson's last sighting, according to the Daily Mirror, was on the Turkey–Bulgaria border with the KTI supplying equipment to a vigilante paramilitary group, the Shipka Bulgarian National Movement, to hunt down asylum seekers. Dowson was subsequently reported as having developed close links with the Russian extremist Aleksandr Dugin, with Dugin aiding Dowson in the establishment of a Belgrade office for his internet activity in support of the "alt-right".
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# ? Mar 5, 2024 14:45 |
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xtothez posted:The first advice people with this level of income get is to increase pension contributions where possible When do they get this advice, and from whom? There's a lot of animosity being wasted on higher paid people when it could be directed towards the tories who got us into this mess. That said, high paid folks quoted should just shut up moaning, it's not a good look.
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# ? Mar 5, 2024 14:47 |
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xtothez posted:"Vimes' LED headlights" doesn't have quite the same ring to it, sadly And then either the private pension provider will collapse or the terms of the public one will be crushed and he will end up with gently caress all. gently caress that. Live for today and enjoy a nice motor
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# ? Mar 5, 2024 14:48 |
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Bozza posted:this is extremely dumb and short-sighted This is a great post.
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# ? Mar 5, 2024 14:49 |
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Sir Sidney Poitier posted:When do they get this advice, and from whom? Again this isn't necessarily everyone quoted in the article, but I'm just as capable of holding animosity towards the Tories as I am towards the people who vote for them and only start complaining when they are personally affected by the results.
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# ? Mar 5, 2024 14:52 |
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Also a really good way of increasing discretionary spend in the local economy would be to make sure that everyone can afford the basics, because then any wages on top of that tend to go to discretionary spend in the local economy. Media outlets only interviewing people who complain about taxes and rates deserves mockery.
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# ? Mar 5, 2024 14:55 |
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Guavanaut posted:Those are sweater puppies, I've never heard it the other way around. Although in the theme of the above, it's possible that we're both some kind of deviated prevert
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# ? Mar 5, 2024 14:57 |
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xtothez posted:"Vimes' LED headlights" doesn't have quite the same ring to it, sadly Also, I meant 100€ not 150€, but still a new H4 halogen is 3 euros.
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# ? Mar 5, 2024 15:02 |
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Bozza posted:Stuff I missed this originally but it's a good take.
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# ? Mar 5, 2024 15:10 |
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as someone on less than 30k i would love 75k that's my opinion
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# ? Mar 5, 2024 15:11 |
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Bozza posted:this is extremely dumb and short-sighted Returning superstar with an extremely good post. Scikar posted:Yeah, the economic point is a valid one and not everyone in the article is necessarily an arsehole, but it's hard to be sympathetic towards people who share no sympathy themselves. I think that's a big assumption. These people tend to be well educated and politically aware, particularly when it comes to local issues. For example you will never find a bigger supporter of teachers at a local primary school than middle class parents. They pretty much consider teachers superhuman and in the most part will back pay rises to the hilt. Post office closing? They can rally an army. Local foodbank needs this or that, who do you think buys it? However they also have nothing to get excited about at a national level and are extremely time poor, making anything nuanced and complex, like the internal politics of the Labour party, a massive turn off. Far easier to be jealous of your neighbour's holiday and moan about the state of the roads. These things used to just work. There will always be twats and people who are never going to get it because of upbringing or whatever, but although some might have a slightly better boat it's the same storm we're in. We need to stick together. Tesseraction posted:I guess the thing that surprises me is that on those salaries I'd expect them to be doing better. I'm on less and not having similar issues, but then I've foregone the idea of home ownership or kids in the near term (if at all), so I guess it's more that the aspiration of a house and kids is unaffordable now, and yeah pretty much. Kids are very expensive. Particularly in the two years before free hours of childcare kicks in. You can easily spend over a £1000 per month, per kid. I remember one thread regular with what a lot of people here would consider a very good salary mentioning that they have two under two and struggling at the moment. In another somewhat bleak post I remember them saying they basically don't go out, which doesn't surprise me either. Owning a house is bizarrely often not as expensive as renting provided you can afford the deposit in an area you would like to have a house. I have a dream that if I ever win the lottery I am just going to provide houses outright then rent them cheaply, give one away to the renters as soon as I have the money to buy another saved up and so on Zalakwe fucked around with this message at 15:23 on Mar 5, 2024 |
# ? Mar 5, 2024 15:15 |
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Yeah I would say if you don't think you can live comfortably on £70k then the issue isn't the economy it's that you have an utterly warped notion of "comfortable". If I was on 70k I would be putting half of it in the bank and quitting my job as soon as I had enough to run me the rest of my life, and still have every material possession I could want.
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# ? Mar 5, 2024 15:16 |
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Zalakwe posted:Owning a house is bizarrely often not as expensive as renting provided you can afford the deposit in an area you would like to have a house. I have a dream that if I ever win the lottery I am just going to provide houses outright then rent them cheaply, give one away to the renters as soon as I have the money to buy another saved up and so on
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# ? Mar 5, 2024 15:27 |
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I think the posts of "if I was on £70k" are forgetting he's the soul breadwinner of a family of 4. That families have the choice of both parents working but child care costing THOUSANDS of £ a month or one partner just not working at all, is an issue facing people all different classes and incomes (well except the super rich).
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# ? Mar 5, 2024 15:31 |
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Guavanaut posted:It might be nice for the press to talk to the staff at the pubs and restaurants and cafes who are complaining that they just had their worst winter season on record and aren't getting any bonuses rather than the temporarily embarrassed discretionary spend people. Yes. But the Guardian knows where it's bread is buttered, and it's not at those places.
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# ? Mar 5, 2024 15:40 |
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The solution is not to gripe and complain about who makes £20k or £30k or £70k a year. The solution is solidarity and the willingness to strangle the landlords, aristocrats, and CEOs.
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# ? Mar 5, 2024 15:40 |
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The goal of a decent society is for everyone to be able to afford nice things, not for us all to be sitting in the mud. These people didn't cause the economy to be poo poo, they merely have higher wellies.
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# ? Mar 5, 2024 15:42 |
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Wellies I'd like, mind you.
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# ? Mar 5, 2024 15:43 |
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domhal posted:Yes. But the Guardian knows where it's bread is buttered, and it's not at those places.
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# ? Mar 5, 2024 15:50 |
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His Divine Shadow posted:Hard to summon sympathy though, where I hang out I get exposed to a lot of the swedish suburban middle class person and I deeply loathe them and their well off (and wasteful) lives. Are you sure it isn't the Swedish you hate & not the middle class? Sir Sidney Poitier posted:When do they get this advice, and from whom? I assure you I have enough animosity to go around. Bozza posted:this is extremely dumb and short-sighted I don't know about extremely dumb. It's entirely relatable. Like yeah, it's entirely true that this country is loving ruined & has been completely ransacked over the last 17/18 years in particular (though honestly the rot started in '79 & more people need to be willing to say that) to the point where the connection between the health of "the economy"™ & 99.5% of people's actual lives has been completely severed. But there's people who do get by on under £20k a year, with families. Doing 35 hours a week on national minimum wage gets you about £19k a year. So if you're earning that, while raising a kid & your partner works part-time while school is on because you can't afford childcare, so 6 hours a day or at weekends? I think you can see why someone wouldn't exactly waste a tear on someone earning 3 times that. Meanwhile an adult living alone without kids on the dole is expected to get by on £9,119.76 a year. People, barely, manage this. Not really sure how, but they do, they have to. And then Scott from Leicestershire is in the top 10% of earners & is claiming he pays too much tax. Cry me a loving river. Lillian from County Durham acknowledges we need public spending but oh, it can't come from those earning £70k a year! Fucksake man, (it's annoyingly hard to find historical income tax bands) in 1973 the highest band was 75% of earnings over £20k, with the basic rate being 30% on earnings below £5k. Which according to the BoE's inflation calculator works out at £50k & £200k respectively. By comparison the top rate for now is 45% on earnings over £125k. People earning £50k+ to £124,999 are paying 45% on those earnings over £50k. And yet aside from a few rock bands pissing off to tax havens in the Harold Wilson years, people survived these outrageous tax rates! Yes, broadly speaking the problem is that the concentration of wealth in the UK is growing greater & greater, leaving the rest of us behind. The Marxian analysis of their only really being 2 classes when it comes to economics is truer than ever, the people who make poo poo & the exploiters, or the proletariat & bourgeoisie if you prefer 19th century terminology. But the thing is, these people earning £50k & up a year need to realise that they have more in common with the guy behind the till in Tesco than they with the CEO running their company too. The only one in that Guardian article who gives even a hint that he realises how hosed it must be for everyone else if he's struggling is Lee from Surrey. Because an awful lot of what we'll call culturally middle class have no loving interest in class solidarity, are the types of people who are fully signed up to not rocking the boat, of addressing the systemic rot in the system. That spent the 4 years from 2015 to 2019 fully believing that Jeremy Corbyn wanted to murder all the Jews & use their blood to fertilise his allotment or something equally deranged. That looked at a chance for doing something about the rampant inequality in our system (not even much, ultimately Corbyn was still willing to play within the confines of capitalism) & shrugged & decided they'd rather vote for Boris Johnson & chums. I can realise that laughing in their faces at their misfortune is counterproductive, but you can't stop me being angry at them. Like I'm a dumb loving minimum wage worker & I managed to work it out, how can't our university attending betters? Poor people these days don't have much. Let us have this. I promise I won't be like that to their faces, honey attracts more flies than vinegar etc, but I've only so many of the world's smallest violins to play at once.
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# ? Mar 5, 2024 15:52 |
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forkboy84 posted:Are you sure it isn't the Swedish you hate & not the middle class? Yeah I'm pretty sure, I also hate the finnish middle class, basically anyone more well off than me.
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# ? Mar 5, 2024 15:56 |
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Sorry, the more I looked at that Graun article the more angry I got. So I just started ranting.
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# ? Mar 5, 2024 16:01 |
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everyone has made really good points but i would still really like 70k
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# ? Mar 5, 2024 16:05 |
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His Divine Shadow posted:If I focus on a single example, take modern led lamps, studies show they cost on average around 1500€ to replace and last on average 15 years, that is 150€ per year if it lasts that long. I pointed this out and someone countered with that most people would be new owners so it doesn't matter (yeah gently caress 2nd or 3rd hand owners) and if it broke they would have insurance replace it so increased costs on lamp replacement doesn't really matter. But you think the insurance companies will just take that lying down? They will get that money back by increasing rates. Which affects even you with a very old car using halogen bulbs you can replace at home for a few euros / pounds. Well, good news and bad news! Good news: your insurance won't put the rates up to pay for the cost of replacing a lamp that breaks due to reaching the end of its lifecycle. Bad news: that's because car insurance doesn't cover mechanical failures and natural wear and tear. I dreaded conversations about this when I worked in car claims. Car insurance is one of the few areas of insurance where we cover you 99% of the time (not out of the goodness of our employers hearts but because of very solid laws and regulations), but that doesn't count people who'd phone up to ask us to pay for their breakdown and I had to explain that no, insurance just flat out doesn't cover that sort of thing. It's for accidents fires and thefts. Even breakdown cover, a service most car insurers provide, is about providing you transport to a garage or back home, not actually paying for replacement parts. Bonus good news: While mechanical wear and tear isn't covered, it's usually not covered so hard that you get a knockback before you can even make a claim, so you don't have to report that you tried to claim in future! Bonus bad news: The increasing price of parts does still increase the cost of replacing a lamp damaged in an accident, which causes more write offs and more expensive claims, so the costs still affect everyone's premiums like you said.
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# ? Mar 5, 2024 16:05 |
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There is something incredibly perverse about paying through the nose to have led headlamps for the sole purpose of making everyone else on the road worse off. The most Tory invention.
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# ? Mar 5, 2024 16:10 |
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Imo people in this thread are allowed to not sympathise at a ratio of their income to the person they're disdaining. Unless you're disdaining me. I am smol bean and you're a jerk if you do
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# ? Mar 5, 2024 16:11 |
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# ? May 27, 2024 03:12 |
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£70k a year is not enough to live on as I get ready to go out for my 4th dinner this week at Haute cusine £150 per head.
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# ? Mar 5, 2024 16:11 |