{"id":1809,"date":"2014-10-13T08:00:55","date_gmt":"2014-10-13T07:00:55","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/unitelive.org\/?p=1809"},"modified":"2014-10-10T17:25:49","modified_gmt":"2014-10-10T16:25:49","slug":"food-bill-doubled","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/?p=1809","title":{"rendered":"\u00e2\u20ac\u015bMy food bill doubled\u00e2\u20ac\u0165"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Stella Ridgway works in finance \u00e2\u20ac\u201c an industry where the gap between the average earner and the highest paid top boss is mammoth, often accounting for a disparity that\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s hundreds of times wide. In fact, the Economic Policy Institute argues that it is skyrocketing executive pay in the financial sector that\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s driving income inequality in this country.<\/p>\n

 
\nSo what\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s it like to work in the trenches of a sector where pay at the bottom is so low?<\/p>\n

 
\n\u00e2\u20ac\u015bI make only \u00c2\u014117,500 per year in admin,\u00e2\u20ac\u0165 Ridgway explains. \u00e2\u20ac\u015bI\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve noticed a huge increase in the cost of living in the past few years, and my wages just haven\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t been able to keep up. The bank I work for only gives pay rises based on \u00e2\u20ac\u0098performance.\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 There was one year I didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t get a pay rise and I haven\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t recovered since.\u00e2\u20ac\u0165<\/p>\n

 
\nRidgway lives on a narrow boat with her husband, whose benefits were stopped two years ago. He had initially been on incapacity benefit, but under benefit reforms, he was moved to ESA and found \u00e2\u20ac\u015bfit to work\u00e2\u20ac\u0165. Now both she and her husband, who is not able to work, must make do with the meagre pay Ridgway earns.<\/p>\n

 
\n\u00e2\u20ac\u015bI actually earn just \u00c2\u0141500 too much for us to claim working tax credits or any other benefits. It\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s really hard without the additional support.\u00e2\u20ac\u0165<\/p>\n

 
\nWhile bank bosses may only sense the cost of living rise incidentally, as an afterthought, Ridgway and her husband have felt it palpably, in the year on year that food becomes ever more unaffordable.<\/p>\n

 
\n\u00e2\u20ac\u015bMy food bill has doubled in the past five years,\u00e2\u20ac\u0165 says Ridgway. \u00e2\u20ac\u015bSomething I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve noticed is that you get a lot less now for the same price. For example, a few years ago, you\u00e2\u20ac\u2122d get six apples for 50p, and now you only get four.\u00e2\u20ac\u0165<\/p>\n

 
\nNoticing the tiniest rises in food prices is testament to how careful Ridgway must be with the little she makes. But what most people don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t understand about living on low pay, says Ridgway, is that it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s not the actual living budget they can\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t manage; it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s the extra expenses life throws at you.<\/p>\n

 
\n\u00e2\u20ac\u015bWhen you earn so little, you budget like crazy,\u00e2\u20ac\u0165 she explains. \u00e2\u20ac\u015bFor example, my husband and I don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t eat meat; we keep track of every single expenditure we make. But then the other day, our dog decided to have a wander and he ended up at the pound.\u00e2\u20ac\u0165<\/p>\n

 
\nTo get their dog out, the pound charged a \u00c2\u014190 fee.<\/p>\n

 
\n\u00e2\u20ac\u015bThat was more than our entire budget for the week, gone, just like that.\u00e2\u20ac\u0165<\/p>\n

 
\nCommenting on the outrageous pay that top execs gain at the expense of their workers, Ridgway has no inherent animosity towards high-earners.<\/p>\n

 
\n\u00e2\u20ac\u015bIt\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s really not a problem for me if some people earn more than others,\u00e2\u20ac\u0165 she says, \u00e2\u20ac\u015bbut only if they\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re worth it.\u00e2\u20ac\u0165<\/p>\n

 
\n\u00e2\u20ac\u015bJust the other day, our bank was fined billions for a mistake those at the top made. Now, they\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re cutting everyone\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s bonuses. Even if the bosses have some of their bonus taken away, it doesn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t make a difference to them. For me, if my bonus is cut because of someone else\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s fault, that\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s my heating bill for the entire year.\u00e2\u20ac\u0165<\/p>\n

 
\nUltimately, Ridgway believes workers deserve a pay rise because they often work just as hard as those who earn hundreds of times more.<\/p>\n

 
\n\u00e2\u20ac\u015bThey just don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t have a clue what it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s like to do what we do,\u00e2\u20ac\u0165 she said. \u00e2\u20ac\u015bFor them, we\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re just a number.\u00e2\u20ac\u0165<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Stella Ridgway works in finance \u00e2\u20ac\u201c an industry where the gap between the average earner and the highest paid top boss is mammoth, often accounting for a disparity that\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s hundreds of times wide. In fact, the Economic Policy Institute argues that it is skyrocketing executive pay in the financial sector that\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s driving income inequality in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1810,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[17],"tags":[76,129,65],"wps_subtitle":"This week, UNITElive will be running a series of stories on why workers across the nation and in various sectors of the economy, who face stagnating wages and soaring living costs, deserve a pay rise. ","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1809"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1809"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1809\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1811,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1809\/revisions\/1811"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/1810"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1809"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1809"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1809"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}