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In the UK around 3,000 people die per year because they can't afford fuel costs. https://www.independent.co.uk/news/business/news/cold-weather-uk-winter-deaths

• valuearb 7y ago
  How? The cost to heat a home is a tiny fraction of the cost of owning a home.
  • mirimir 7y ago
    A couple decades ago, we owned an 18th century house in the northeastern US, with some 19th century additions. The mortgage and taxes totaled ~$2.5K per month, and oil heating cost peaked at $500 per month in the winter. It had an historic designation, and insulating it properly would have been impossibly expensive.
  • phaemon 7y ago
    Because percentages don't matter when you're poor. And, of course, a poor person will probably be renting, not owning, a home. If you've only got $30 left to cover food and electricity (and your heating is all electric), you basically choose between food or heating. Google seems determined to give me UK stats, instead of US ones. Perhaps in the US you become homeless before you have to make that choice?
    • valuearb 7y ago
      How did you pay your mortgage or rent if you only have $30 left for heat?
      • ThePowerOfFuet 7y ago
        Because you're living on little income which leaves little after the rent is paid.
      • phaemon 7y ago
        Imagine you get paid 250 a week. Your rent is 200 a week. You have 20 you need to pay for travel. That leaves you 30. If you don't pay rent you become homeless and then you will lose your job. Do you understand?
        • valuearb 7y ago
          So you are saying you only have to increase your income about 5% to have enough money for heat?