Money seems to be the hot topic of conversation these days. Those who have it talk about their latest property acquisition, their latest car, trip abroad, spa treatments or whatever. Those who don’t (who before felt they had!) moan about the lack of it and with good reason. Somehow most of us can cope with feeling broke, but when your standard of living starts dropping, or is perceived to do so, it hurts.
Having said all that, we must not become hilariously self-pitying. One contributor to The Times, Lorna Vassallo, who writes in l-orrizont as well, decided to be semi humorous (at least I hope she was) for a change. She wrote an article about how life is hard for thirty-something girls, as guys don’t pay for drinks or whatever when she goes out, and all this due to her perception that we are in an economic recession. You have to be politically blind to see this as the Nationalist government’s fault, as she evidently does. Basically, today the younger guys tend to have the same earning power as the girls and don’t always feel they should pay for the girls’ entertainment. It was the same when I was in London, but here we somehow associate how much a guy loves or cares for us by how much he pays for us.
Some guys see it differently and will tell you how a meal out can easily get you sex with all the trimmings, as young women increasingly (and not just the Russians we love to hate!) prostitute themselves for whatever they can get. In other words guys do pay when they know they’ll get something in return, which is a pretty worrying trend for all us mums of young girls, who we hope will always have the sense and the financial independence to ever need this kind of male. Back to Lorna.
It got funnier still. She bemoaned the fact that today we have to think before going out, whereas before thirty-somethings like her could just go out as and when the fancy took them!
Well it really looks like it’s welcome Malta to the real world. The fact is that we have an amazing quality of life here, although there are of course pockets of poverty too. But most people live in large and well-equipped homes; most people have a social life that would be the envy of many of their European neighbours (and this applies both if you’re a tombla and coffee morning person, or the Marsa tennis or Hilton gym sort).
So many of us now have lifestyles, and expectations of a lifestyle, that really are beyond our means in the long term. This is a very bitter pill to swallow, and hardly what people were voting for to become part of the European dream. Many people think nothing of eating out, which I always remember as a rare treat when I lived in London. Yet here, every Friday night and every Sunday lunchtime, those restaurants that give good value and good food are full. Did you try booking a table for Mothers Day just two days before? It was staggering how even this has become as much an accepted part of our culture as prezzies for children on Christmas day.
The trouble is that expectations are high but so are expenses and our wages can’t cope. Now you don’t have to budget ahead only for Christmas spending. Birthdays mean parties. Communion means expensive dress and party. Being 40 or 50 merits a big party. If your children go to extra curricular activities there are always shows and expenses to cope with besides the fees.
The bottom line is that in Malta today, to cope with what we could call middle class expectations of a good lifestyle, you practically can’t do it on a salary. And that’s not only because the salaries are low. Even high salaries leave you with little to play with after all taxes are paid. To cope you have to be one of those middle class people who don’t declare all their earnings. For them life is still rosy although obviously in the end we will all be affected if the standard of living goes down for some, as everyone starts spending less, which will influence the cash flow all around.
Having money, whether you have it to spend or not, today does not depend on your income, your brains or your status. It’s largely about whether you are one of those who can get away with avoiding paying all your taxes, or whether you can’t. Those who can’t are the increasingly disgruntled Nationalists whose only cause is now to have more money in their pockets.
In the 1980s their cause was a free way of life, in the 1990s and up to 2002 it was EU membership. Now their cause is money. They need more disposable income to cope with today’s realistic and sometimes unrealistic expectations. Will political parties have the honesty to address this problem of money for the men and middle class women of working Malta?