Job conditions and salaries are worse, homes are even less affordable, zero-hours and part-time contracts are more common, personal debt is colossal, there are even longer waits for medical treatment, and the interest rate for student loans has increased.
When I look back on my younger days, it's hard to believe I had it so good. Salaries were generous, homes were relatively cheap, most jobs were permanent (and often included annual bonuses), I was never in debt (except later on with a mortgage), and medical treatment was prompt.
My year as an undergraduate now seems extraordinary. I got free tuition, a maintenance grant and a travel grant. If I did a degree now, I'd be up to my eyeballs in debt, and paying it off for years to come.
Some youngsters blame us oldies for this deterioration, which is nonsense because we oldies have always wanted people's lives to get better, not worse. It's the politicians who've presided over a flagging economy and crumbling public services. It was Prime Minister Tony Blair who ended free university tuition in 1998. It's successive governments that have allowed the growth in precarious job contracts. And it's the present government that has allowed the NHS to fall apart.
It must be very upsetting for parents that their children will be so much worse off. They must have wondered whether to have children at all, given the bleak future they'll be up against.
I actually thought the 1980’s/1990’s (when we were starting out) were terrible as far as financial situations. Jobs were very hard to get, salaries and benefits sucked, and even though housing was more affordable, interest rates were sky high.
ReplyDeleteI think every generation sees its share of struggles.
Bijoux: I don't know about other people, but the 1980s and 1990s were okay for me and Jenny. We bought our first flat in 1983 and moved into a bigger flat in 1993. And we both had permanent jobs with reasonable salaries.
DeleteGrowing up in the fifties and sixties there was the feeling that government was there to try to improve lives....there was a way forward if you wanted to take it. The process of government first under Thatcher, and, much worse, Blair has wrecked that. We are now just fodder for exploiters, in work, in housing, in education.
ReplyDeleteFly: Couldn't agree more. Mrs Thatcher started the rot by selling off council flats and houses and not replacing them with new homes. She also let manufacturing industry wither.
DeleteThe same is true in the US. Most things are far more expensive than forty years ago, while wages have grown much less -- productivity has gone up a lot, but most of the extra value is being skimmed off by the richest one percent or so, who have acquired obscene wealth while most of society struggles. The educated enter working life with crushing student-loan debt due to the cost of college study. Home ownership is moving out of reach for most. The norm of fifty or sixty years ago, when it was possible to own a home and raise three or four children at a middle-class standard of living on just one parent's income, seems like a distant fantasy now. The pandemic didn't help, but all this deterioration of the conditions of life had been under way for decades before it arrived.
ReplyDeleteIt's a dangerous situation when so many young people realize they've been cheated and have no hope of living as well as previous generations. Birth rates are dropping as raising children becomes excessively expensive and their future looks dubious (US population growth is now mostly sustained by immigration). Many men, and not only younger ones, are reducing their participation in work and the economy to the barest minimum needed to survive. Similar "dropping out" is happening in many countries, even China.
It's been observed that revolutions are not caused by poverty (for almost all of history almost everybody was much poorer than the poorest people today); revolutions happen when rising expectations are disappointed. I'm not expecting violent revolution in places like the UK and US, but we could well see a turn toward radical populist movements that promise extreme redistribution of wealth and draconian laws to rein in employers' power to exploit workers. And if those movements are suppressed, well, as president Kennedy said, those who make peaceful revolution impossible make violent revolution inevitable. The wealthy parasite class should not feel assured that the tumbrels and guillotines can never return.
Infidel: Indeed, it's a volatile situation in both countries, and I'm rather surprised there hasn't already been some dramatic uprising by those at the bottom of the heap. We also have "dropping out", known here as quiet quitting. As you say, one parent's income could once sustain an entire family, but now the whole family might be working just to stay afloat.
DeleteI agree with Bijoux - very difficult when I left school in the 80's. Although there were no university fees the maintenance grant was means tested - and it was mean, and got meaner as the years went by!
ReplyDeleteHouses weren't affordable then, and my wages were less than half than they were for a man doing the exact same job.
Boom and bust. Right now - bust.
Sx
Ms Scarlet: I was an undergraduate in 1971, when things were a lot better. But yes, we could only afford to buy a flat on two incomes. Not sure how our salaries compared in male/female terms, but there was presumably a disparity, which is why several Equal Pay Acts have been passed (with minimal effect).
DeleteYour writing this day is 100% correct!!
ReplyDeletePeace Thyme: Well, thank you. That's the way I see it anyway.
DeleteIt makes me glad to not have grandchildren.
ReplyDeleteLinda
Linda: Me too. Jenny and I don't have any children or grandchildren, just one niece.
DeleteI'm sorry Nick but the people get the politicians they vote for. I'm not saying you voted for this stuff but when there is a majority who vote selfishly, this is the result.
ReplyDelete3/4 of my kids either don't want children or are seriously considering not having children and it makes me sad that they (necessarily) have such a deficit of hope
Kylie: I totally agree about politicians. People in the UK keep voting for governments that have let them down for years. Unfortunately the rest of us have to put up with the consequences. There must be lots of people thinking the same as your kids, is it sensible to bring children into this dysfunctional world?
DeleteIt will be an interesting world for the grandchildren.
ReplyDeleteJoanne: Interesting and alarming.
DeleteNick, I actually feel fortunate to have completed my education and working years going on nearly 20 years ago. Of course, being retired means getting older every day, but now I can enjoy myself. By comparison if I had to be going to school and then trying to find a job and place to live, things would be much harder now. So in many ways I am thankful to be at this point in my life and making the most of it too.
ReplyDeleteBeatrice: Like you, I'm thankful that my life has been so easy compared with what today's young people have to contend with.
DeleteThings in the states are perhaps a bit different. University has never been free here, and everytime someone tries to say it would be a good idea the folks on the right go bonkers. Things are certainly more expensive than before; but from what I see the younger generation are buying bigger houses than their parents had, buying multiple new cars on a regular basis (where in my growing up years, hardly no one had more than 1 car in a family). Kids have destination weddings causing friends and family to spend a lot of $$$ to attend their wedding. I think the things that are more difficult for kids today is the bullying, the violence, and the drugs being so prevalent.
ReplyDeleteSandy: That sounds a lot better than the situation in the UK. There are many youngsters here who can't even afford a car, can't afford a house (or even a rental) and have enormous tuition debts. I agree that bullying, violence and drugs are a big problem. So is sexual harassment of girls and women.
DeletePrices are out of control. Rent prices for a 1bdrm apartment where I live are anywhere from $1000 to $1500 a month. Who the heck can afford that let alone food, utilities, car ect if you live alone.
ReplyDeleteMary: Rental prices are just as bad in the UK. The average rental price nationwide is £1175 ($1400) a month. Also food and fuel prices are rocketing. Food price inflation in January was 13.3 per cent.
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