Could you live on £53 a week

[tommy.irene]

£53 a week? I can survive on ONE POUND A DAY says cash-strapped teacherKath Kelly ate at free buffets and picked fruit from bushes 
Teacher started challenge as she bet her friends she could live on small sumIain Duncan Smith was challenged to live on £53-a-week on Radio 4

A teacher who survived for a year on just £1 a day has backed Iain Duncan Smith and said 'anybody' can live on a daily budget of £7.

Frugal Kath Kelly, 51, ate at free buffets, shopped at church jumble sales and scrounged leftovers from grocery stores and restaurants.

She picked fruit from bushes and trees and collected a staggering £117 in loose change dropped in the street - a third of her annual budget.

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2304042/Iain-Duncan-Smith-right-You-CAN-live-just-53-week-sa...

[upthecreekyetagain]

I vaguely remember the case you are talking about Spawn - all this talk about £53 a week is simply a diversion - quite frankly if it's not possible to live on £53 a week then £3 either way is not going to make it possible.

[salfordmarinade]

Well it certainly fooled you:^O

Lets make this crystal clear for the hard of understanding....there is no 'scale' as you put it
There are numerical values which you appear to have quickly summed to greater than 100, and erroneously and lazily concluded it is all a distortion, when in fact that is just those who said they thought they could live on such an amount, broken down by household income and as such do not constitute the whole of the population sample in question,.

As for the Stilton example, its drivel.

[spawnjohnuk]

Glad you see it ,It boggles my head (you may have noticed) why we don't take a leaf from our foreign counterparts and stick together ,I do not know,,no-one I have spoke to think IDS is anything but a creep..he may or may not be but he should no longer be allowed in the governing process

.I liked your vote candidates without party agendas  ,that would bring things back to a fairness and I would add reviews every year..non of this 4 yrs stuck with it nonsense .

[spawnjohnuk]

ps 62 was to creeky 60 

[upthecreekyetagain]

Well it certainly fooled you:^O

Lets make this crystal clear for the hard of understanding....there is no 'scale' as you put it
There are numerical values which you appear to have quickly summed to greater than 100, and erroneously and lazily concluded it is all a distortion, when in fact that is just those who said they thought they could live on such an amount, broken down by household income and as such do not constitute the whole of the population sample in question,.

As for the Stilton example, its drivel.

As I said - numerately challenged.

Look at the title of the graph

Add up the unweighted numbers in the table - these are the people who answered two questions.

Suggesting that looking at the raw data, as you did, would tell you how many are in each income bracket just further demonstrates your lack of understanding.  566 people out of a sample of 1,994 didn't answer the question as to what income bracket they were in.

[salfordmarinade]

The only thing challenged is down Surrey way

You fail to understand the nature of statistical sampling and the numerical values associated with that and cling on to anything to try to save face, and usually fail
You appear to believe that very little effort and application leads to a better understanding than those who conduct, compile and compute the data in question, who likely have far more experience as well as qualifications than a few old men who prattle on, and hope a bit of smoke and a few mirrors will see them through

[upthecreekyetagain]

The only thing challenged is down Surrey way

You fail to understand the nature of statistical sampling and the numerical values associated with that and cling on to anything to try to save face, and usually fail
You appear to believe that very little effort and application leads to a better understanding than those who conduct, compile and compute the data in question, who likely have far more experience as well as qualifications than a few old men who prattle on, and hope a bit of smoke and a few mirrors will see them through

You are kidding yourself :^O

What have I got to save face over?

Of course if you wanted to be divisive from the other direction then instead of the headline - "70% of the country says they could not live on £53 a week - but rich people are more likely than poor people to think they could"

You could use the headline, "70% of the country says they could not live on £53 a week - but four times as many poor people than rich people think you could"

Both statements are equally meaningless.

You are confusing poll results, which are FACTUAL and "Headline" claims that are interpretations.

[salfordmarinade]

No, I leave that entirely up to you :^O

What havent you got to save  over?...last I saw you were trying to massage figures by saying a council would move in someone not on HB just to make certain figures appear on the surface at least to have at least some small meaning. beyond mere waffle .I wasn't aware that was a criteria for the waiting list point system, just an act of desperation to try to appear other than nonsense

You fail to understand numerical analysis and sampling. When wrongly blundering about over 'scales'  you wish to divert attention away to the underlying data.....some of which is given in the tables provided, if you care to look at the data given in the pdf document.

But then it's like all those comparable surveys you claim exist, but cant  show them or otherwise support that,claim, or the numerous misquotes....

No i'm not confusing anything of the sort i am correcting your errors....I said nothing specifically about interpretation, merely commented on incorrect facts and analysis oh and meaningless drivel 😉

[bookhunter2007]

creeky under 25 yr olds as you say live with parents and have little understanding of real costs of living like bills.

To which I agree.  And I think that this can also be applied to wealthier people in that they will tend to have less understanding of basic living costs than the not-so-wealthy.

[upthecreekyetagain]

No, I leave that entirely up to you :^O

What havent you got to save  over?...last I saw you were trying to massage figures by saying a council would move in someone not on HB just to make certain figures appear on the surface at least to have at least some small meaning. beyond mere waffle .I wasn't aware that was a criteria for the waiting list point system, just an act of desperation to try to appear other than nonsense

You fail to understand numerical analysis and sampling. When wrongly blundering about over 'scales'  you wish to divert attention away to the underlying data.....some of which is given in the tables provided, if you care to look at the data given in the pdf document.

But then it's like all those comparable surveys you claim exist, but cant  show them or otherwise support that,claim, or the numerous misquotes....

No i'm not confusing anything of the sort i am correcting your errors....I said nothing specifically about interpretation, merely commented on incorrect facts and analysis oh and meaningless drivel 😉

The only errors I have seen have been yours - "You would need to see the raw data old bean, nothing clever about that" #57

"Nothing to do with 'scale' either.....that is simply incorrect" also #57.

The graph is titled "Percentage of adults who think they could survive on £53 a week after rent, by income bracket"

Now if you don't know that the accepted way of scaling a bar chart of percentages is to use a scale of zero to one hundred then you are not in a position to claim that others do not understand numerical analysis and sampling 😉

[spawnjohnuk]

agree books at 68 yes the wealthy seem to concentrate on what they have rather than what they spend as bankers and accountants manage their outgoing affairs and that's a big difference.

Also when you've bought your first million quids worth of goodies you lose the buzz of spending like that comic strip the bumpkin billionaires that couldn't spend it all no matter how hard they tried.

If you asked a millionaire 'do you think someone living on 53 a week permanent can live on 53' they may well say 'I doubt it or I couldn't live on that forever'

If they say ,easy peasy then put everything you own in the pot and do it as you don't need money 😉

[upthecreekyetagain]

If I had lived on £53 a week for the last 20 years then I'd be rich 😮

[bookhunter2007]

If they say ,easy peasy then put everything you own in the pot and do it as you don't need money 😉

I think that's what the Mail - owned by a non-dom billionaire and edited by a sociopath millionaire - are trying to suggest with the article in the OP.

In fact, the article is a recycled one from a few years ago:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1052710/How-cash-strapped-teacher-beat-credit-crunch-living-1-day-YEAR-drunken-bet.html

...No doubt 'Kath Kelly revisited' was timed to coincide with Osborne's latest round of cuts to "soften up" us plebs.

[spawnjohnuk]

Im afraid I have become as bad and biased against them as they are  books,I hate their guts and reading about missy kelly makes me feel sick n hate them all more.

Waiting in anticipation for the big sit in the road and dont move day :).

[bankhaunter]

If I had lived on £53 a week for the last 20 years then I'd be rich 😮

When I worked for a firm of wine merchants in the 60s, one thing I learned about rich people was that they weren't noted for spending much money.

[salfordmarinade]

I really have no idea on what points you are failing to make with your first two quotes, but  data if you care to look, is given in the pdf document, and no there is no scale given on the bar chart, but if you see one, feel free to say what it is



It says percentages because it's from the source data tables, but no % signs are used on the bar chart for what should be obvious reasons .



Now if you don't know that the accepted way of scaling a bar chart of percentages is to use a scale of zero to one hundred then you are not in a position to claim that others do not understand numerical analysis and sampling

Firstly It's  merely basic  statistics you are muttering incorrectly about
Secondly there are no mythical scales old chap that I can see on the chart presented, merely figures on each bar and a link to the more detailed  statistics
As I pointed out earlier, and will repeat again for the severely limited, you are not dealing with a the whole population sample, just those who said they thought they could if needed to, survive on that amount
As you can see from the numbers on the bar headings, they do not sum to a 100 which percentages from a whole population sample by definition should, rounding errors aside...take your time now, im sure it will come eventually, which ever year that may be
There should be percentage integrity for any catergory analysed down the three different response, but there is no reason why there should be, going accross each catergory. Therein lies your original error.

As for scales and bar charts sorry to disappoint again, but it simply is not true, they should be appropriate for the data under consideration to give a fair and meaningful visual representation of the underlying numbers, in this example as pointed out they do not sum to your mythical 100, that was just an error to try to be diverted  away from.
Mind you im sure down the local Redbill chamber of comics, anything will do

[upthecreekyetagain]

I really have no idea on what points you are failing to make with your first two quotes, but  data if you care to look, is given in the pdf document, and no there is no scale given on the bar chart, but if you see one, feel free to say what it is

Never mind - let me explain 🙂

You stated, "You would need to see the raw data old bean, nothing clever about that" - referring to my question about how many interviewees were in the upper income bracket.

You couldn't possibly get that information from the raw data.  Unless of course you think the pollsters have massaged the figures 😉

[salfordmarinade]

That like most of your previous posts makes little sense and shows a total misunderstanding

There are numbers both weighted and unweighted given in the pdf document

LMS again;-)

[kiss*my*pixel]

Presumably that is £53 for one person. Does that take into account rent/mortgage, rates, clothing, cleaning products, fuel and other utilities? What about buying your necessary white goods - cooker, w/machine, etc. If not, then it is most likely not possible for one person to live for that amount of money for one week. I couldn't do it. Let IDS try - it really would be an interesting experiment.

Ms Kelly mentioned above as an example is just a scrounger - she is not living on a £1 a day, she is merely relying on others to support her.

[bidder.17]

Always a bit of a shock to see how little is known about some of the basics.

As for events, and freebies, that would imply there were some transport costs in getting there

Living on fruit from hedgerows is just comic book stuff, but unfortunately not really funny.

It would be interesting to see IDS try, but I doubt that will happen.

Divided Britain really.