In our How I Manage My Money series, we aim to find out how people are spending, saving and investing money to meet their costs and achieve their goals. This week, in our celebrity version, we speak to comedian, author and broadcaster Mark Steel, who talks about living in a squat before comedy took off, buying a flat in Crystal Palace, London, for £59,000 and why he has never paid into a pension.
What was money like growing up for you?
My dad had a working-class job. He was the insurance man for the area, going round knocking on doors, collecting insurance money. My mum mostly stayed at home, though she had odd jobs here and there as a dinner lady or receptionist. We didn’t have much money and we never went on foreign holidays or anything like that, but I don’t remember there being huge crises either. We had a two-bedroom bungalow with a garden on one wage, which now just seems impossible.
Before comedy took off, what were some of the strangest jobs you did?
The longest proper job I had was working for London Transport in an office. A depot would send us a form asking for things like washing supplies for the canteen, and my entire job was copying the details from one form onto another form. I never once found out why. That was the whole job. I got a free travelcard, though, which felt quite exciting at the time.
