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Comment by 3princip | Hacker News Reader

That's what I suspect, but it's crazy. The average salary in London is £27k, a senior dev will earn 3x that (I'm guessing). And that's still barely enough to live comfortably.

I guess that's the point of the campaign in the linked article, but I can't see how that will change, unless the financial bubble bursts.

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And finance will pay you more than double that, and give you a 100% bonus on top of that again.

http://oxfordknight.co.uk/jobs/all-jobs/core-risk-and-pricin...

Oxford Knight looks like some sort of recruitment agency. Any link to the actual institution offering that?

No, and to be fair it is the top salary I could find publicly. But I have a couple of friends who are compensated not far off that. Another twist - they're both humanities students, that HN loves to claim will never get a job with their classics and literature.

What do they do?

and that's still barely enough to live comfortably.

Many people live comfortably in London for far less than 90k gbp, it all depends on your expectations and requirements.

Even with rent prices? If I was single it wouldn't matter, I could live in a shoe-box, but a family needs a little extra room. And we're a very frugal family.

It's interesting that growing up in London my single-parent mother on an income between 40-50k managed to buy a house and raise two kids. We lived comfortably.

That house is now worth 6x more than the price she payed. Her salary today (she's retired) would be almost the same. That's why I can't imagine doing the same thing she did, even on a 2x salary.

I'm not complaining, just thinking out loud.

Given wage inflation over 40 years her salary would not be the same. Given asset inflation I'd expect the house to go up say 4x. Prices in London have been frothy recently, but as someone in a similar situation it is possible to buy in a nice area if you compromise on some things first time - either garden house/flat, or area. If you are in the top 10-20% (as many posting here are) there are lots of options in London for a good quality of life. Personally I would rent right now, save and await a correction.

I think £27k is the UK average or the southeast average? I thought the london average was closer to £60k? I can't find a source for that though.

My mistake, I just looked at wikipedia

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Income_in_the_United_Kingdom#In...

It's 2007 and income distribution is probably per capita rather than average salary. In that case it's not as extreme as I've implied.

EDIT: A newspaper article from last year claims the UK average is 26k, so London is probably significantly higher. http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/uk-average-salary-26500...

Is that the mean or the median average? From what I know, there are a large number of people earning more than £250K, but a massive group that earns around £20-25K - supermarket workers, nurses, primary school teachers, etc. It's that latter group that simply can't afford to live in London in safe, comfortable environment.

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