There is quite a gap between London and the UK as a whole, for better and for worse.
> £55k as being equivalent to $100k in the US
Is not? I don't see any argument for that not being correct. Everything you said about costs, sounds that exact same as $100k in the US. Unless you live in North Dakota, chances are you are paying pretty close to the same percentages for rent/foot in a larger city such as San Fran or Chicago.
Not exactly sure what zone 5 is, but a rough search gave me $2500 for rent in Chicago, which is about double £1,500 (roughly), council tax probably doesn't exist, but travel in Chicago is certainly going to be WAY more than "£50 a week". And GOOD luck finding utilities for "at least £100", internet alone is probably $50 US, cell phone another $40 US, power, heat, hot water, depending on apartment is probably another $100 US. Food for "£50 a week" is also a dream I would expect food to be closer to $200 USD a week. Unless you're living on ramen.
Everything I see adds up to that being about correct.
Insurance is also less, both contents and car insurance. Utilities a lot lower (fast internet for £30 a month, sim only contract with 50GB of 5G data for £15 a month).
There is this strange idea that the UK is super expensive, and whilst not cheap, a lot of things are decidedly cheaper in the UK than they are in the US.
Also student loans - universities are capped at £9250 per year, so you've not got hundreds of thousands in student loan debt to pay off either.
Which has now collapsed so in practice you need to go private if you need any kind of decent, timely care. And it never covered dentistry from what I’ve heard.
In practice you end up paying twice - once in taxes for the dysfunctional health service you can’t actually use, and a second time in the form of either insurance or out of pocket to go private when you do need healthcare.
If you have a life-threatening issue, MI, stroke, cancer - you will be seen quickly and the standard of care is similar to the US.
If you need something treating that is non-life-threatening, yes, you may need to wait some time.
Don't get me wrong, the NHS is being handled appallingly by the current ruling party, but it is not collapsing - thanks to the doctors, nurses and support staff going above and beyond to keep it running.
Sure, but there are plenty of anecdotes about ambulances taking hours to arrive right now, as well.
"Life-threatening" is also too fuzzy of a term, here. Don't get me wrong -- I'm an immigrant to the UK from the US, and I think things are better here for most people -- but mental health issues, gender-affirming care, etc. are not treated as life-threatening even when they genuinely are, and care is nearly impossible to get in a timely manner. I'm not especially well-connected to the trans community, but I have some friends who are, and it's quite common for trans people in the UK to move to the US because they can access care much easier and much faster.
Additionally, objective measures of wait times show them increasing unsustainably right now. :(
Zone 1 is typically very expensive. Typically, with some variation, it gets less expensive as you go to outer zones. Zone 5/6 is getting to the outer reaches of the city, and historically was much more affordable at the cost of >60 minute commutes into zone 1 and higher fare costs.
You also need to keep in mind that the marginal tax rate can be very high. This is esp true for UK university graduates that typically are repaying what is technically a "student loan", but even the government's statisticians call a tax because almost nobody will pay it off in their lifetime given the repayment terms. Many graduates have marginal tax rates in excess of 50% on incomes above roughly 40k.
Literally the first search for a 1 bed property to rent in zone 5 (Croydon, specifically), showed up several around 1100/month. The furnished ones in the more expensive new-builds certainly are around the 1500/month range. Those are in band A, while my house is in band D, so even lower council tax, before taking into account the single person deduction.
E.g. a single person in a band A property in Croydon will pay around 1200/year in council tax. Varies by borough, of course.
And I don't think the adverted price are representative of how much you'd end up paying in just rent. My current place went up £200/mo from £1800/mo advertised, because the agent went back to us (and the other applicants), telling us other people's offers, and goading us into increasing our offer.
Anecdata: I share a 2 bed in Ealing, £2000/mo in just rent, council tax band D which adds about another month's rent a year. If I weren't working in finance and paying more to make up for my housemate's lower salary (my ~70k/yr to his ~£30k/yr) there's no way we'd be able to afford this place. We'd have to find somewhere in a worse location, with poorer quality, or both.
The point, though, was that lower prices are available. If you choose not to take advantage because it's not as convenient as you like, that's a valid choice (though if you opt for several hundred pounds difference a month to avoid calling a removals firm once every few years, I question that choice; been there, done that, it's not that much effort)
To be clear, housing prices in the UK are atrocious, even if it's possible to do better than the person above stated.
Personally I'd favour the government basically forcing prices down by guaranteeing to pour money into added construction until the market crashes. I'm saying that as a homeowner because for most people, me included, it'd be better if the prices come down so we can afford to trade up, and it'd be cheaper to provide for some limited bailouts for people left with mortgages under water, than to continue having this massive drag on the economy because it's now advantageous for developers to sit on land and wait for it to appreciate before building as an exit (e.g. one of the plots near my local station that is finally being built on now was standing empty for over a decade before the owner of the land started doing anything).
The 1100/month flats I saw were in calm, green, solidly middle class areas with walking distance to several large parks, shops, and great transport links.
This [1] and this [2] suggests Croydon is about halfway down the borough list per capita, with matched better what I remember from looking at Met numbers in the past. Croydon is the second most populous London borough, so in absolute number of crimes it is usually high up the list, but per capita it's for a long time been pretty much middle of the road, again pulled up by the poorer parts of the borough (particularly, as far as I remember, the Northernmost parts most urban parts, and estates like Addington and Fieldway.
[1] https://www.finder.com/uk/london-crime-statistics#london-cri...
[2] https://www.mylondon.news/news/west-london-news/most-violent...
I do have to say, though, the process of finding them was quite stressful.
I think you're missing some benefits. I don't know anything specific about this job offer and what would be on the paper offer, but UK public sector offers quite insane benefits compared to private sector, where salary might be like 50-60% of total compensation. Some I'm failiar with: free access to public nurseries (normal price was around £1200/monthy), 50% of costs for private high school, high retirement employer contributions, refunds for all public transport tickets used to get to work, access to gym, swimming pool, sauna, massage and therapies with max. 1 entry per day, free car parking during working days and weekends (otherwise £3-5 per hour), up to £100 per month for books - and this doesn't include annual training budget.
While the cash is quite low and won't get you far with luxury holidays abroad, it offers very high living standard in the UK.
I wonder why they don't advertise all the benefits more explicitly in public sector job listings.
One of my best friends is a paramedic and has decided to quit and leave the country due to the shocking pay and working conditions. He has to bail on so many social events as he constantly gets assigned to unrelenting shifts with no notice at all.
Like, I live in Zone 2 with a rent of £1600/month, including heating. My previous place (only a few months ago) was £1450, also in Zone 2. My company is revving up hiring, and we've definitely not seen salaries decrease. If anything, we're prepared to pay more to basically anyone who isn't a new grad.
Seriously questioning whether to stay in London itself, but even outside of London rents have gone up crazy amounts given the average salaries of those areas. This country is starting to become unaffordable despite the fact that I'm technically >97th income percentile.
What better options do you have realistically?
Two people from the UK joined my team in Australia who work in tech in the last two months. They both had the same complaint, life is not good in UK.
We are both working in tech so finding a job shouldn’t be an issue. She is an EU national by birth so automatically has the right to work and live there. I would need to jump through hoops as a result of the big B :/
London is very expensive, there’s no need to overstate it.
The concerning thing, in my opinion, is that the poster linked by OP seems disillusioned as to the standard of living in the UK. They specifically mention being paid £55k as being equivalent to $100k in the US. It isn’t.
£55k in London is about enough to rent a place and live ok’ish on your own, and relatively comfortably if you have a partner whom is also earning a salary in a similar bracket.
Rent on a 1 bedroom flat in zone 5 is costing £1,500 as a minimum. You then have council tax which is about £200 a month (soon to be increased). If you travel to the city to go to the office that is gonna cost you at least £50 a week, more if you need to go everyday. Your utilities will cost you at least £100 a month and food, without takeaways is also going to cost you about £50 a week.
All the costs above are lowballing intentionally and do not factor in things like the inevitable lunch coffee and after work drinks, albeit non alcoholic. The reality is that the UK is becoming a much less livable place and that the cost of living/energy/whatever comes next is always passed down to the average person.
I will not be surprised to see an exodus of skilled workers over the next decade. I personally have set a 5 year target for leaving the country personally, which is sad. My partner has noticed the change herself and is equally as sad that the reality is she will need to leave (after working to acquire citizenship) in order to have a proper chance at buying a home and living a happy life.