UK here. These are my current year numbers. Do note OP numbers are from 5 years ago.
Electricity: £100 or so normally, £200 during autumn/winter. I dont have gas, everything is electric and I use my PC 8/7.
Internet: £50 for basic 1GB speed nowadays. You can try playing around with new customers contracts just to go down to 30 again but it's more trouble then it's worth. Avoid Vodafone though, they cancelation process is cancer.
Mobile Bill: £10. Sounds about right. I dont do much calling around though.
Council Tax: £110. It keeps growing 3% every year for the last decade.
Car Insurance: Dunno. I cycle everywhere.
Food Bill: £300 without takeouts. With takeouts it might be 400.
TV license: You don't pay for that unless you're dumb. Everytime I recieve a letter I regret not collecting them because I'd have enough to make a wallpaper.
Fyi, you can actually declare you don't need to pay a TV license if you genuinely don't watch the crap the license people try to collect money on. They've obviously been sneakily trying to expand it but I'm one of those people who don't watch television at all and normies give me confused looks when I mention it. They absolutely would make the TV license a proper tax soon enough if they could get away with it and they might do it because more and more people are simply refusing to pay and the boomers they normally milk for money are dying off.
Getting out of paying a TV license after you've already been paying at the same address is actual aids to do.
They expect you to "prove" it with photos and shit. And because they've overstretched if you take any photos of a TV/computer or laptop they'll deny it.
Moving address is the easiest way, you just don't pay from day 1.
lol well I guess I'm lucky because that's what happened to me where I moved out and was getting that stupid letter from them. I don't know if the rules changed though, but either way even if they did try and berate me I would be able to do a rant to end all rants about how television can die and society would be better off for it and they wouldn't need convincing that I don't watch television.
Wow, and I thought I was frugal. Granted, I'm not sure what a council tax is or what the American equivalent of that would be. It sounds like a property tax, but you pay it even when you're renting? The food bill definitely seemed low to me, but not impossible I suppose.
Council tax is what goes towards local services including police and firefighting as well as bin collection and general infrastructure, at least, that's what it should go to, the local councils organise that sort of thing per constituency.
By the way I feel I should mention just for the sake of accuracy except for the TV license which is an incredible grey area even by UK politics standards local council taxes have existed for years and the British public are thoroughly cucked on the issue of paying taxes. Now where Britain has been getting really nasty and it will definitely make Americans vomit is with stuff like ULEZ cameras and green zones. As well as the idea of trying to turn little suburbs that can barely maintain the infrastructure as is into these creepy 15 minute areas.
The ULEZ stuff in particular has the working classes up in arms because van drivers especially are simply not going to be able to afford to work as this stuff spreads. To call the UK a police state at this point is something of an understatement of how bad things really are and even the normies are getting sick of it all. They'll vote Labour though and stick with the two party system, because they're utter brainlets and then Labour is probably going to collapse the government outright rather than keep things at the speed limit as the Conservatives have.
Other than the $10 mobile bill, you could do all that in a small apartment in America. Or at least you could until recently. I just say small because your electric bill on anything I think more than 1BR is going to top ~$120 . Electric bills have gone up 30% for me this year.
We don't have council taxes, though, though there are all kinds of other taxes. Typically that would be built into your rent, assuming you rent. Rent is really expensive. Car insurance is a lot more than GBP45 a month equivalent.
These days, I feel like you'd be very limited what you could eat on a $300 food budget a month. If you need 90 meals a month, that's $3.33 a meal. You can't buy a meal for that, hardly anywhere, for good reason. I'm sure you could do it and not starve, but it would be a lot of beans and rice. Yes, it is substantially cheaper to buy and cook your own food, but we're looking at the ingredients cost quickly approaching what you have to spend without, certainly, any extravagance like prepared foods.
Insurance in the USA has gone up like 30% even just recently. I think people are dying of the vaxx. They never did "figure out" what was causing so many people to die and claim life insurance, nor does it appear from rates that the torrent has abated. Insurance operators are still losing money in market conditions. That is to say: their customers will not absorb the rate increases as fast as they need to make them to try to balance their actuarial tables. People may be giving out on the road, increasing auto rates, too. The industry may not survive without government help.
LOL where the fuck are you living where you consider that cheap? Is it California? Whatever you do don't consider moving here if you're a foreign country. The gas and electric are woefully out of date and optimistic because this was before the west screwed itself with Russia. Car insurance is definitely going up as is council tax, I'm currently having to calculate whether or not potentially it's worth me getting a motorbike license for parking purposes as well as a scenario of society simply breaking down.
The calculations that I've done indicate to me that I would almost certainly make money if I simply left the UK even if it was some EU country where the taxes weren't as high and society still functions. That's another thing as well, you're not taking into account how shit things are here in general. Foreigners really are a major problem here these days and it's also worth pointing out that the cost of living calculations being done are probably in northern areas where it's poorer. They are not adapting to the society they've supposedly chosen to live in and that's why everyone here is getting pissed off with it.
If you try to live anywhere near the South you will be shocked at how much everything costs. Food is one of the big reasons why you should always learn to cook because if it's any kind of 'upper class' place they're going to be serving sub-par food at extortionate prices and then depending on what kind of place. It's potentially worse than California especially London, you will not find anywhere to live there I guarantee it, or even if you do it will be insanely priced for what is on offer.
Edit: Oh and I forgot to mention, good luck trying to socialise with anybody in earnest and make some real friends depending on where you are. Americans think they know about leftist smug but you haven't experienced real leftist middle class smug until you've been forced to sit at a dinner table with a bunch of larpers with actual TDS and it gets so much worse depending on which area you go to because some places in the UK just ooze leftist smug.
Think I'm joking? Feel free to visit Oxford sometime, you'll hate it, it's another example of an overpriced hipster shithole as well.
Oh I wasn't planning to move to the UK, I was just curious because I saw this come up while watching a video about LibreOffice Calc. But yes, I do consider those prices cheap. Electric bill - mine's in the triple digits. Food bill - I could spend $10-$20 cooking a single steak dinner for myself. I have no intention of leaving the U.S. though; seeing these numbers just raised an eyebrow.
You're in a fairly lucky position in America despite everything, I would simply seriously look at switching states because it will likely be your local area rather than the whole country necessarily. California and New York are classic examples where even the moderate people are simply fleeing due to high cost of living but of course being American you're probably well aware of that.
UK here. These are my current year numbers. Do note OP numbers are from 5 years ago.
Electricity: £100 or so normally, £200 during autumn/winter. I dont have gas, everything is electric and I use my PC 8/7.
Internet: £50 for basic 1GB speed nowadays. You can try playing around with new customers contracts just to go down to 30 again but it's more trouble then it's worth. Avoid Vodafone though, they cancelation process is cancer.
Mobile Bill: £10. Sounds about right. I dont do much calling around though.
Council Tax: £110. It keeps growing 3% every year for the last decade.
Car Insurance: Dunno. I cycle everywhere.
Food Bill: £300 without takeouts. With takeouts it might be 400.
TV license: You don't pay for that unless you're dumb. Everytime I recieve a letter I regret not collecting them because I'd have enough to make a wallpaper.
Fyi, you can actually declare you don't need to pay a TV license if you genuinely don't watch the crap the license people try to collect money on. They've obviously been sneakily trying to expand it but I'm one of those people who don't watch television at all and normies give me confused looks when I mention it. They absolutely would make the TV license a proper tax soon enough if they could get away with it and they might do it because more and more people are simply refusing to pay and the boomers they normally milk for money are dying off.
Getting out of paying a TV license after you've already been paying at the same address is actual aids to do.
They expect you to "prove" it with photos and shit. And because they've overstretched if you take any photos of a TV/computer or laptop they'll deny it.
Moving address is the easiest way, you just don't pay from day 1.
lol well I guess I'm lucky because that's what happened to me where I moved out and was getting that stupid letter from them. I don't know if the rules changed though, but either way even if they did try and berate me I would be able to do a rant to end all rants about how television can die and society would be better off for it and they wouldn't need convincing that I don't watch television.
Wow, and I thought I was frugal. Granted, I'm not sure what a council tax is or what the American equivalent of that would be. It sounds like a property tax, but you pay it even when you're renting? The food bill definitely seemed low to me, but not impossible I suppose.
Council tax is what goes towards local services including police and firefighting as well as bin collection and general infrastructure, at least, that's what it should go to, the local councils organise that sort of thing per constituency.
I knew y'all don't have formally allocated levies but that's actually worse than I thought.
By the way I feel I should mention just for the sake of accuracy except for the TV license which is an incredible grey area even by UK politics standards local council taxes have existed for years and the British public are thoroughly cucked on the issue of paying taxes. Now where Britain has been getting really nasty and it will definitely make Americans vomit is with stuff like ULEZ cameras and green zones. As well as the idea of trying to turn little suburbs that can barely maintain the infrastructure as is into these creepy 15 minute areas.
The ULEZ stuff in particular has the working classes up in arms because van drivers especially are simply not going to be able to afford to work as this stuff spreads. To call the UK a police state at this point is something of an understatement of how bad things really are and even the normies are getting sick of it all. They'll vote Labour though and stick with the two party system, because they're utter brainlets and then Labour is probably going to collapse the government outright rather than keep things at the speed limit as the Conservatives have.
Other than the $10 mobile bill, you could do all that in a small apartment in America. Or at least you could until recently. I just say small because your electric bill on anything I think more than 1BR is going to top ~$120 . Electric bills have gone up 30% for me this year.
We don't have council taxes, though, though there are all kinds of other taxes. Typically that would be built into your rent, assuming you rent. Rent is really expensive. Car insurance is a lot more than GBP45 a month equivalent.
These days, I feel like you'd be very limited what you could eat on a $300 food budget a month. If you need 90 meals a month, that's $3.33 a meal. You can't buy a meal for that, hardly anywhere, for good reason. I'm sure you could do it and not starve, but it would be a lot of beans and rice. Yes, it is substantially cheaper to buy and cook your own food, but we're looking at the ingredients cost quickly approaching what you have to spend without, certainly, any extravagance like prepared foods.
This looks like bills for a person living alone in a small flat. But it's not far off.
Car insurance/ food/ gas and electric will be much higher now.
Insurance in the USA has gone up like 30% even just recently. I think people are dying of the vaxx. They never did "figure out" what was causing so many people to die and claim life insurance, nor does it appear from rates that the torrent has abated. Insurance operators are still losing money in market conditions. That is to say: their customers will not absorb the rate increases as fast as they need to make them to try to balance their actuarial tables. People may be giving out on the road, increasing auto rates, too. The industry may not survive without government help.
This also doesn't include rent/mortgage, so they either own or don't have it listed. Which can be anywhere between 450-2500 depending on location.
Something also to take into account, the average salaries of both.
In the UK it's around £28k (last I checked) which is around 35k USD. And from a quick goog the US is over 70k
LOL where the fuck are you living where you consider that cheap? Is it California? Whatever you do don't consider moving here if you're a foreign country. The gas and electric are woefully out of date and optimistic because this was before the west screwed itself with Russia. Car insurance is definitely going up as is council tax, I'm currently having to calculate whether or not potentially it's worth me getting a motorbike license for parking purposes as well as a scenario of society simply breaking down.
The calculations that I've done indicate to me that I would almost certainly make money if I simply left the UK even if it was some EU country where the taxes weren't as high and society still functions. That's another thing as well, you're not taking into account how shit things are here in general. Foreigners really are a major problem here these days and it's also worth pointing out that the cost of living calculations being done are probably in northern areas where it's poorer. They are not adapting to the society they've supposedly chosen to live in and that's why everyone here is getting pissed off with it.
If you try to live anywhere near the South you will be shocked at how much everything costs. Food is one of the big reasons why you should always learn to cook because if it's any kind of 'upper class' place they're going to be serving sub-par food at extortionate prices and then depending on what kind of place. It's potentially worse than California especially London, you will not find anywhere to live there I guarantee it, or even if you do it will be insanely priced for what is on offer.
Edit: Oh and I forgot to mention, good luck trying to socialise with anybody in earnest and make some real friends depending on where you are. Americans think they know about leftist smug but you haven't experienced real leftist middle class smug until you've been forced to sit at a dinner table with a bunch of larpers with actual TDS and it gets so much worse depending on which area you go to because some places in the UK just ooze leftist smug.
Think I'm joking? Feel free to visit Oxford sometime, you'll hate it, it's another example of an overpriced hipster shithole as well.
TLDR: Don't come to the UK
Oh I wasn't planning to move to the UK, I was just curious because I saw this come up while watching a video about LibreOffice Calc. But yes, I do consider those prices cheap. Electric bill - mine's in the triple digits. Food bill - I could spend $10-$20 cooking a single steak dinner for myself. I have no intention of leaving the U.S. though; seeing these numbers just raised an eyebrow.
You're in a fairly lucky position in America despite everything, I would simply seriously look at switching states because it will likely be your local area rather than the whole country necessarily. California and New York are classic examples where even the moderate people are simply fleeing due to high cost of living but of course being American you're probably well aware of that.