# Won't somebody think of "young people"? (Edit: and No, older people aren't "to blame")



## Jelly (16 Jan 2021)

*Edit:* 
_My point in making this post was mainly *to highlight the hypocrisy of many people advocating against the current lockdown* because of the "Young People"._

_As part of that, I have listed below the myriad complex reasons that for the first time in hundreds of years, people aged under 39 (which is hardly "young" by normal standards) will be significantly less well off that their parents; and pointed out that (as an overall group) older people have been net beneficiaries of many of those policies._

_Quite a few people have taken this as some kind of attack, or some kind attempt to blame older people for the current situation... *It isn't intended as one* that's just how things stand from a factual point of view_

_I can full understand it might be arresting or uncomfortable to read, and it may be outright aggravating to be generalized about if you're an older person who hasn't in fact seen any of the benefit personally whilst being impacted by some of the negatives below... But please don't have a go, accusing me of blaming you when I have not done so._​

Forked from the How would you rate the UK's handling of this pandemic? thread as I think this is worthy of a seperate discussion.

On that aforementioned thread, the same talking point keeps coming up:



> Lockdown is a cost mainly to the young, mainly to protect the elderly.



Now, speaking as a young person...

There are *lots* of things stacked in favour of the older generations and the impact of lockdown is miniscule compared to:

 The distortion of the housing market into an investment vehicle, effectively pulling up the ladder on young people's access to housing security.

 Maintaining the pension triple lock whilst systematically reducing real-terms financial support to working age people in poverty.

 Economic policy which prioritises the realisation of short term gains in the markets over the kind of long term organic growth which would support meaningful wage growth for adults of working age (and espwhich keeps pace with inflation.

 The consequent systematic restructuring the UK economy in such a way that access to well paying jobs with prospects of significant career development are increasingly out of reach for a majority of young people (at all levels of education but especially for those without a university degree).

 The impact of successive changes to the funding of higher education which have consistently reduced access and teaching quality, whilst increasing the financial stress and debt burden.

 Disproportionate infrastructure investment in the South East, where the population is disproportionately older and wealthier.

 Failure to make any meaningful attempt to address the impact of second homes on access to the housing market for young people in rural areas.

 Failure to control the impact of right to buy on social housing stocks, or prevent the transfer of social housing into the private rented sector at grossly inflated rents.

 Continued and increasingly dismissive and scornful treatment of young people who attempt to raise these issues, (or any other political issues which they feel deeply about) in the UK's (frankly abysmal) print media.

So I guess we're collectively innured to just getting screwed for the benefit of older people these days.

Which leads lots of young people to be very cynical...

Cynical enough in fact to question:

_Why is it that so many of the very same people who seem unwilling to acknowledge, let alone address any of those difficult issues which are having a massive impact, who suddenly have our back over the impact of lockdown?_​
*Answers on a postcard, please.*


----------



## billw (16 Jan 2021)

All valid points. I think many of the younger generations that I know are less cynical, and a lot more despondent and worried that the future is just going to be a massive pile of cack. Lockdown has indeed robbed them of a year of development, learning, social interaction, and work.


----------



## clogs (16 Jan 2021)

I'm 72 and do everything I can to help train the young....thats if they can get off the A*rse......
I did a 5 year apprenticeship with and extra year in Tech collage.....
the rental market has always been expensive regardless of the date/time......
I and many I know worked 2-3 jobs, went without lots of things to get where I am today.....
Fairly reg working 14-16 hours per day, 7 days per week......
mind I didn't need or want all the electronic cr*p that seems to control everybodies lives these days....
if you want to get on get a trade I was told and it's the same today.....
stop buying food out and ur Starbucks coffee.....
and mostley for the up and comming y/man stop buying make up.....hahaha....
we didn't have central heating , w/machines etc....it's not a god given right.......
My earliest memory of a bath was a galv bath hanging on a nail outside the back door....
do without and make do......it'll make a man of you
or get inlisted......
I also feel well stuffed when the suits stole my pension pot.....and I still work everyday, 7 days a week.....
To get better money I worked abroad for a long time living rough to save money.....
there will always be somebody better off than you.....it's just now the creams is taken by more at the top than ever.....
lastley there is no such thing as easy money if you have to work for it....
Cant all be bimbo's or wags......
sorry son, get a life and or a decent job.....


----------



## Rorschach (16 Jan 2021)

Do you think the elderly do "have the back" of the young regarding lockdown. Many on this forum don't and I haven't seen many out in the real world either.

EDIT: clogs above there a classic example of the kind of people I meet regularly.


----------



## Jelly (16 Jan 2021)

billw said:


> I think many of the younger generations that I know are less cynical, and a lot more despondent and worried that the future is just going to be a massive pile of cack.



I suppose there's at least two (I'd argue three) generations of young people at the moment with fairly different viewpoints... 

From the people I meet around my own age and younger I've formed the following  meaningful characterisations  _sweeping generalisations:_


 Those too young to have really grasped the impact of the 2008 crash at the time.
 Generally still optimistic about life, _ because it's not been (figuratively) beaten out of them yet_.
 Often angry and Idealistic, most likely to think the present is terrible and that if we don't do something the future will be much worse.
 Are probably right in their assesment of the situation, but don't get listened to because they're collectively young looking and a bit shouty.

 Those too young to have experienced adulthood before the 2008 crash, but old enough to grasp something big was happening.
 Most despondent group.
 Probably getting the worst deal overall, including from lockdown.
 Will probably all die of anxiety induced heart conditions before reaching retirement age.

 Those who were young adults before the 2008 crash
 Most cynical and bitter.
 It's all broken dreams and resentment of being told they could buy a house if only they would stop eating avacado toast and had had the foresight to be born into a family with significant parental wealth.


----------



## Rorschach (16 Jan 2021)

Jelly said:


> Those who were young adults before the 2008 crash
> Most cynical and bitter.
> It's all broken dreams and resentment of being told they could buy a house if only they would stop eating avacado toast and had had the foresight to be born into a family with significant parental wealth.



Hey that's me! lol
I lost my job in 2008 because of the crash, no jobs available at the time. It was rough, I had to use the savings I had to support myself and because I was still living at home (and had some savings) I wasn't entitled to any benefits or jobseekers. At the time I had never even tasted avocado so the delights of avocado toast weren't there to console me.


----------



## Jameshow (16 Jan 2021)

I would also suggest a sex divide too..... 

Women not only have the option for marriage a staying at home but also career options which are greater than for men .... Medicine 60% Nursing, midwifery primary school teaching, caring, beauty as well as any form of unisex employment which means that apart from the higher levels of professions / management and politics the table is turned upon the greater proportion of men particular white working class men. 

They call it the dumbbell phenomena where you have a large number of male noble prize winners but also a large number at the bottom of the heap evidenced by the male suicide rate 75% 

I work with many of these chaps and the opportunity for them are is low and worse still if they have any Mental health conditions. 

Just saying....

Cheers James


----------



## Jelly (16 Jan 2021)

Rorschach said:


> Do you think the elderly do "have the back" of the young regarding lockdown.


I've seen a lot of people who are anti-lockdown for purely ideological reasons (including a few Tory MP's who are getting on a bit) rather hypocritically reach for the "young people" argument when it suits their purposes.




Rorschach said:


> Many on this forum don't and I haven't seen many out in the real world either.
> 
> EDIT: clogs above there a classic example of the kind of people I meet regularly.



Whilst I can argue with you at length on othere issues, I would tend towards agreeing on this.


----------



## RobinBHM (16 Jan 2021)

Jelly said:


> Answers on a postcard, please



there is the slimmest glimmer of light...which is:

Every previous pandemic has led to social change.
The UK has both the pandemic and brexit which will massively shape the future.

All I can say is: if things get really bad in the UK, it might be a catalyst for political change

We currently have a massively broken political system and that needs to change for future generations.

My guess is this country needs to change FPTP to PR
And this country needs to stop party donations and lobbying....it results in billionaires being able to influence policy
In short we have a parliamentary system that enable the rich to influence policy to ensure the wealth stays with them.
half of English land is owned by less than 1% of the population....no wonder it expensive to buy a house



Take the housing crisis: so many people are now stuck in the vicious rent cycle, it is one of the greatest causes of in work poverty, with so many people having to pay out a substantial amount of their salary for rent, there is not enough left for food and energy.

A radical solution would be land value tax

have a look at it....its a potential solution 





Land Value Tax Campaign


About Us / Contact Content Recent Articles Introduction to the Campaign Join LVTC Donate Social Media Contact Us We are a single-issue non-party/all-party organisation based in the UK. We propose that the rental value of land should be collected and ...




www.landvaluetax.org


----------



## Jelly (16 Jan 2021)

Jameshow said:


> the table is turned upon the greater proportion of men particular white working class men.
> 
> ...
> 
> I work with many of these chaps and the opportunity for them are is low and worse still if they have any Mental health conditions.



This is a big part of the economic arguments in general.

We've re-shaped our economy in such a way that there are far fewer secure & stable non-professional careers available.

Because men in predominantly working class areas tended to occupy those jobs, they've been disproportionately hit by that particular change.

I can't count the number of skilled fitters, machinists, and multiskilled ex miners I've met who could be doing really excellent work in ver productive jobs which would justify a decent salary, reduced to general labouring for minimum wage.

I feel quite strongly that neither left not right of the UK political spectrum has made any meaningful attempt to acknowledge or address this, because it becomes much more complex and our media and political environment only really supports concepts which can be expressed in vacous soundbites.


----------



## MikeJhn (16 Jan 2021)

The problem as I see it is that we have become a NOW generation, everything must be available now, saving up for something or doing without does not come into the equation, I know of one family that are on the poverty line/hand out, but they all have mobile phones even the five year old who is one of seven children in the family.


----------



## lurker (16 Jan 2021)

Excluding the south east, the ratio of house prices to average salary are very similar now as they were when I bought my house 40 years ago.

Both my (early 30s) sons have their own home.
One has a house bigger and better than I have ever owned.
The other has already paid off 50% of his mortgage.
Both put in the effort (a levels, degree, professional qualifications, chartership) of getting into a (real) profession.
If you graft its not a lot different from my day.

Their friends all seem to be the same.
8 nephews and nieces, ditto.
2 nephews (same idle parents) whine about how unfair life is and how lucky their cousins are.


----------



## Jelly (16 Jan 2021)

RobinBHM said:


> A radical solution would be land value tax
> 
> have a look at it....its a potential solution
> 
> ...



Interesting FT article and poll on this here: Clickity Click

The thrust seems to be that FT readers seem to come out slightly in favour of wealth taxes... 

Which seems incongruous at first glance as they're likely to be disproportionately effected, but the likely explanation is that being more economically savvy they can see it's in their long term interests as it would enable the UK to break out of the trap of low productivity, meaning they'd end up earning more in the long run as a result of the economic growth created.

I would be in favour of a change in Capital Gains Tax to actively encourage long term investment which creates jobs, and a land value tax which disincentivises treating land and property as an investment vehicle.


----------



## Rorschach (16 Jan 2021)

lurker said:


> Excluding the south east, the ratio of house prices to average salary are very similar now as they were when I bought my house 40 years ago.
> 
> Both my (early 30s) sons have their own home.
> One has a house bigger and better than I have ever owned.
> ...



I don't think so, certainly not in the South West either then (and our house prices are not that high). I worked it out with my mother, when she bought her house the mortgage was about 3-4 times her yearly salary (full time clerical, so not a rock bottom wage but certainly by no means high). That same house today is 10 times the equivalent salary.


----------



## lurker (16 Jan 2021)

I bought a house for £25k
my salary was just under £3k
just sold it for £250k

And.... back then woman of child bearing age could only borrow one third of her salary. 
two and a half times mine and a third of the wife’s was the absolute maximum.


----------



## Mickjay (16 Jan 2021)

If the yardstick of the inequality is house prices against salary, should interest rates not come into the equation too, or doesn't that count? Our first house, early 80s, was bought with a mortgage rate of around 9% which was just about affordable, which subsequently increased over the years to around 15% which meant my mortgage payments were about 80% of my take home pay. Didn't leave a lot for much else, so yes my house was cheaper but it cost me more relative to my income.


----------



## lurker (16 Jan 2021)

Mickjay said:


> If the yardstick of the inequality is house prices against salary, should interest rates not come into the equation too, or doesn't that count? Our first house, early 80s, was bought with a mortgage rate of around 9% which was just about affordable, which subsequently increased over the years to around 15% which meant my mortgage payments were about 80% of my take home pay. Didn't leave a lot for much else, so yes my house was cheaper but it cost me more relative to my income.



That period coincided with our kids arriving.
No maternity payments in those days, my wife was on the dole for two years, it was worth very little as I had a salary. 
The wife, as a nurse had a job to go back to once the kids were older : weekends and nights, so I could look after them.
For most women they told the boss they were pregnant and then went to the wages office for their “cards”.


----------



## RobinBHM (16 Jan 2021)

lurker said:


> Excluding the south east


Im just in the process of selling my late fathers house, he lived in Edenbridge Kent.

average 3 bed semi...price around £400k (and it needs a lot of refurb, neighbours house is up for £495k)

£200k 1 bed flat
£250k 2 bed flat
£300k 2 bed terrace
£350k 3 bed terrace
£450k 3 bed semi
£600k 3 bed det

not exactly affordable -and not even a super expensive area


----------



## Woody2Shoes (16 Jan 2021)

RobinBHM said:


> And this country needs to stop party donations and lobbying....it results in billionaires being able to influence policy
> In short we have a parliamentary system that enable the rich to influence policy to ensure the wealth stays with them.
> half of English land is owned by less than 1% of the population....no wonder it expensive to buy a house
> 
> Take the housing crisis: so many people are now stuck in the vicious rent cycle, it is one of the greatest causes of in work poverty, with so many people having to pay out a substantial amount of their salary for rent, there is not enough left for food and energy.



I agree with the sentiments in your first point, but the reality is that whatever system/rules we have, there will always be those who are motivated to try and skew things in their favour (the extend to which they succeed and/or are seen to succeed is a measure of how much of a problem this is).

Re. your second point, I have a real problem with the emotive language "crisis..vicious..poverty" and the ideas behind it.

1) In this country we have been brainwashed into thinking that we must aspire to own property. Renters are much more "mobile" if they want to be and "secure" if they don't want to be - they can move to a new location to take up new work without the time and (large) costs associated with buying/selling/owning. Many people in many parts of the world, including the UK (and indeed several of my neighbours) live long, contented and productive lives in rented dwellings of one sort or another. A healthy rental market is almost certainly "a good thing" for a country/economy.

2) Even in this country, mass property ownership is a relatively new invention - driven by lenders being enabled (since the 1980s or so), by deregulation, to lend to those who then bid up the prices of existing houses - in certain areas, but not in others. Prior to the 1970s/80s, buying a house - or most anything else - with borrowed money was very difficult.

3) As above, an even newer invention is the expansion of "buy to let" - again driven by deregulation of lending - causing more money to be thrown at the market.

4) Regarding the proportion of houshold income, food takes up much less than in did historically, housing surprisingly similar to historical averages (barring some hotspots).

It was the illegal and cynical corruption of lending against property, mainly but not exclusively in the US, which stored up the problems which have led to negative real intererst rates post-2008 (talk about a wealth tax - it's already been happening!). The fact that a house which was worth £20K 20 years ago and is now worth £400K, or whatever, is really simply an indication of how we have debased our currency.

An excellent way to bring house prices down would be to put the brakes on all lending against property, however, spookily, there would still be those who couldn't afford to buy property (and actually, I don't see why that should be a problem).


----------



## RobinBHM (16 Jan 2021)

Jelly said:


> We've re-shaped our economy in such a way that there are far fewer secure & stable non-professional careers available.



delivery drivers on zero hour contracts working 12 hour shifts to make the rent


----------



## Droogs (16 Jan 2021)

RobinBHM said:


> half of English land is owned by less than 1% of the population....no wonder it expensive to buy a house
> 
> 
> 
> ...



You think you have it bad. 94% of Scottish land is owned by 8 English people

try putting up with that, esp when your homeless regardless of age


----------



## Jelly (16 Jan 2021)

lurker said:


> Excluding the south east, the ratio of house prices to average salary are very similar now as they were when I bought my house 40 years ago.



Whilst I'm not entirely convinced this would hold for a number of more deprived regions in the UK, even if it shows in UK aggregate figures it misses a bigger factor:

Both rents and mortgage deposit requirements have strongly outpaced salary growth (considering my parents bought with a 0% deposit mortgage, I can legitimately claim it was infinitely easier for them to buy a house); those two impacts combined have made it *much* harder for young people to get access to the housing ladder.




lurker said:


> Both put in the effort (a levels, degree, professional qualifications, chartership) of getting into a (real) profession.



That's not reflective of the experiences that everyone in their position has though, there's a definite elements of good fortune required

I'm in my mid 30's, have a Masters, hol professional registrations and Charterships in more than one field, and generally have all the "markers of esteem" that a highly successful professional is expected to have...

However due to an unlucky career choice, during one of the periodic oil industry crashes I got made redundant twice in a short amount of time, then took a huge pay cut to move to a different role and industry just to have some kind of employment still.

That then had a bunch of knock on impacts in my personal life which left me in very poor financial shape. 

After spending 6 years trying to scrimp money together towards a deposit whilst living with the stress of very tenuously finances, I recently managed to buy a house thanks to a bequest from a grandparent... 

At which point I discovered that I'm *several hundred pounds a month better off* than I was in the private rented sector (and trust me it wasn't anything fancy I was renting), and am finally able to save regularly and pay down the capital on debt which I picked up trying to keep my head above water back when I got made redundant.

I have a number of professional colleagues in their mid-late thirties who are only now looking to buy their first homes for similar reasons, and feel very privaleged that I'm in this position, knowing that as things stand some of my staff who are who are significantly less well rewarded than I am may never have that opportunity.

Be grateful your son's have had the stability to make a real go of things, because it's terrifying just how easily things can go badly wrong even when you're doing everything "right".


----------



## RobinBHM (16 Jan 2021)

Woody2Shoes said:


> Re. your second point, I have a real problem with the emotive language "crisis..vicious..poverty" and the ideas behind it



I think thats a little unfair -youve taken 3 words out of context.
In work poverty is not an emotive term, its a factual term used to describe a sector

crisis and vicious are fair words to describe the housing problem.

From my post you may have got the impression Im a a raving socialist but Im mostly centrist but cynical of both sides.


----------



## Selwyn (16 Jan 2021)

RobinBHM said:


> there is the slimmest glimmer of light...which is:
> 
> Every previous pandemic has led to social change.
> The UK has both the pandemic and brexit which will massively shape the future.
> ...



The reason it is expensive to buy a house is because of the planning laws and supply of money. Its not to do with who owns the land as much as how much land is made available to build on. Most land is agricultural usage - you cant really do a lot with it except farm it until it gets into a local plan


----------



## RobinBHM (16 Jan 2021)

Woody2Shoes said:


> A healthy rental market is almost certainly "a good thing" for a country/economy.



I dont agree on the basis that this country, housing and land is used as an investment. that means that renting freezes out people from buying a property whilst building an asset for the landlord.

I do agree with your point in countries like France where houses are often rented and housing is for living in not for making money out of.


----------



## RobinBHM (16 Jan 2021)

Selwyn said:


> The reason it is expensive to buy a house is because of the planning laws and supply of money. Its not to do with who owns the land as much as how much land is made available to build on. Most land is agricultural usage - you cant really do a lot with it except farm it until it gets into a local plan



planning is partially the problem but ultimately the major house builders land bank and carve up the market to keep prices high -most of their profits come from house price rises.

Land with planning is not a particularly limiting factor actually, there is plenty of land available 

There is a good solution to lowering house prices: good old fashioned council houses


----------



## billw (16 Jan 2021)

MikeJhn said:


> The problem as I see it is that we have become a NOW generation, everything must be available now, saving up for something or doing without does not come into the equation, I know of one family that are on the poverty line/hand out, but they all have mobile phones even the five year old who is one of seven children in the family.



Driven by the elder generations need to become richer, give the next generation stuff now and lend them the money to have it. Win win for those selling the stuff.


----------



## Jacob (16 Jan 2021)

Jelly said:


> Forked from the How would you rate the UK's handling of this pandemic? thread as I think this is worthy of a seperate discussion.
> 
> On that aforementioned thread, the same talking point keeps coming up:
> 
> ...


Agree with all that. I am old and many of us would also agree. No need to turn it into an anti-ageist thing!
There are such things as "Young Conservatives" you know. Strange creepy mutant creatures. They turned before they got old!
Re Selwyn's befuddled incomprehension of the housing market - he could do a bit of homework? Start here perhaps: Home Truths Review - by Simon Bain | The Young Money Blog

P.S. Not too late to chip in to my Shelter fund raiser - link below:


----------



## Woody2Shoes (16 Jan 2021)

RobinBHM said:


> I think thats a little unfair -youve taken 3 words out of context.
> In work poverty is not an emotive term, its a factual term used to describe a sector
> 
> crisis and vicious are fair words to describe the housing problem.
> ...


Part of the difficulty I have with these loaded words is that they are often used by those who want to build more badly designed houses in the wrong locations - which actually won't solve the (perceived or otherwise) problems with different types of housing tenure and with the poor (functional/technical/aesthetic/environmental) quality of much of our existing/new housing stock. There is adequate housing for all those of us who need it - there is no crisis - but that's not to say that improvements can't be made.


----------



## Woody2Shoes (16 Jan 2021)

RobinBHM said:


> I dont agree on the basis that this country, housing and land is used as an investment. that means that renting freezes out people from buying a property whilst building an asset for the landlord.


There's nothing intrinsically wrong with investing in property/land, or with renting it. The point I was making is that what has distorted the market over recent decades is the much increased availability of lending (and a culture shift where people perceive that "rent is wasted money", partly because of that).
PS The other point I made still stands - "a healthy rental market is a good thing" - not everybody (even those who have the finances available) wants to buy.


----------



## Selwyn (16 Jan 2021)

Jacob said:


> Agree with all that. I am old and many of us would also agree. No need to turn it into an anti-ageist thing!
> There are such things as "Young Conservatives" you know. Strange creepy mutant creatures. They turned before they got old!
> Re Selwyn's befuddled incomprehension of the housing market - he could do a bit of homework? Start here perhaps: Home Truths Review - by Simon Bain | The Young Money Blog
> 
> P.S. Not too late to chip in to my Shelter fund raiser - link below:



Not befuddled at all. I'm saying that land with planning gets a massive uplift in value. You can have two fields in a village one worth £1000000 acre and another worth £10k acre depending on planning. Even an old codger like you should be able to see that.

The other thing is of course the supply of lending has changed over the years which drives prices up.

Modern houses are cheap to build and very often they are rubbish too


----------



## Jacob (16 Jan 2021)

Selwyn said:


> Not befuddled at all. I'm saying that land with planning gets a massive uplift in value. You can have two fields in a village one worth £1000000 acre and another worth £10k acre depending on planning. Even an old codger like you should be able to see that.
> 
> The other thing is of course the supply of lending has changed over the years which drives prices up.


Read the review I linked to. You are correct, but the problem is that the increased value all goes to profit for the owner, not to the community.


----------



## Selwyn (16 Jan 2021)

Jacob said:


> Read the review I linked to. You are correct, but the problem is that the increased value all goes to profit for the owner, not to the community.



I have read that book before. I never mentioned the local community.


----------



## Jelly (16 Jan 2021)

Jacob said:


> Agree with all that. I am old and many of us would also agree. No need to turn it into an anti-ageist thing!


I wasn't aiming to be ageist so much as anti-hypocracy when I posted.

Whilst I meet a lot of people in your boat (older, but can see very clearly the issues or directly impacted by them) in my own local area...

However on the internet and especially when I travel further afield for work, I do notice a lot more people in general but particularly of the older generation have a quite jarring "I've got mine" attitude that leaves me quietly seething.



Jacob said:


> There are such things as "Young Conservatives" you know. Strange creepy mutant creatures. They turned before they got old!



I literally spat my tea out laughing!

I've met a few in my time and your description is apt.


----------



## doctor Bob (16 Jan 2021)

I know agricultural land is valued at £10k/ acre ish. However try and buy 1-5 acres on the edge of a village for that price, doesn't happen.
I have 7 acres I'm trying to get planning on, I'd happily let the community fund the £100,000 I may have to spend on a para 55 application (very high risk) and repay them double or triple if we got planning.


----------



## Mickjay (16 Jan 2021)

RobinBHM said:


> delivery drivers on zero hour contracts working 12 hour shifts to make the rent


That's a generalisation too. My next door neighbour, a white van delivery driver in his own house, took delivery of a 70 plate Audi a7 yesterday. It may be on 'tick', I neither know nor care, but he must be paying for it in some way. Very nice it looks too!

I forgot to add, he and his wife are about 30 with a young child.


----------



## Jacob (16 Jan 2021)

Selwyn said:


> I have read that book before. I never mentioned the local community.


I meant community in the widest sense; "society" etc.
The basic prob is that land and property trading is not sufficiently taxed and/or regulated and has become an investors dream. Basically a dead cert and prices rise as high as the market permits. Rents and prices are as high as they can possibly be in terms of demand. Prices were inflating before Thatcher but she gave it a boost with council house sales and no council house building. Recipe for a perfect storm - massively attractive to dodgy foreign money etc etc!


----------



## Jacob (16 Jan 2021)

doctor Bob said:


> I know agricultural land is valued at £10k/ acre ish. However try and buy 1-5 acres on the edge of a village for that price, doesn't happen.
> I have 7 acres I'm trying to get planning on, I'd happily let the community fund the £100,000 I may have to spend on a para 55 application (very high risk) and repay them double or triple if we got planning.


Not that high risk - you'll get your money back one way or another, but extremely high profit possible. As I said it's a speculators' market, unconnected/unrelated to housing needs.
PS Still fund raising for Shelter - see link below!
What about 7 acres of low cost housing to be run by a housing association for people with housing needs?
n.b. Don't have a builder doing your app - you need a smart alec town planner/architect


----------



## Jelly (16 Jan 2021)

Woody2Shoes said:


> There's nothing intrinsically wrong with investing in property/land, or with renting it. The point I was making is that what has distorted the market over recent decades is the much increased availability of lending (and a culture shift where people perceive that "rent is wasted money", partly because of that).
> 
> PS The other point I made still stands - "a healthy rental market is a good thing" - not everybody (even those who have the finances available) wants to buy.



I would agree that the rental market is not fundimentally bad, but I'm also firmly of the opinion that it is not functioning well at the moment.

A part of that can in turn be tied back to financial deregulation, both in lending markets making buy-to-let a much more widespread practice, but also in the general promotion of speculation in wider economy with the associated spread of an expectation of high returns (something which always ends badly in the end).

However the depletion of social housing stocks (especially now these stocks have begun to be fed back into the private rented sector) is also a major driver for the dysfunction of the rental sector today, which helps to distort the whole market.


----------



## Jacob (16 Jan 2021)

Droogs said:


> You think you have it bad. 94% of Scottish land is owned by 8 English people
> 
> try putting up with that, esp when your homeless regardless of age


I've never understood why the Scots didn't rise up after the clearances. I guess there weren't many left. But the same families own the land now, do the same thing (hunting, shooting, fishing, sheep) as though nothing has changed since the 19 century.


----------



## Billy_wizz (16 Jan 2021)

Personally think rent should be capt at X of market value as we've now reached the point of stupidity where renters affectively buy houses for people who can afford a deposit because rent costs more than mortgage repayments


----------



## doctor Bob (16 Jan 2021)

Jacob said:


> Not that high risk - you'll get your money back one way or another, but extremely high profit possible. As I said it's a speculators' market, unconnected/unrelated to housing needs.
> PS Still fund raising for Shelter - see link below!
> What about 7 acres of low cost housing to be run by a housing association for people with housing needs?
> n.b. Don't have a builder doing your app - you need a smart alec town planner/architect



Sorry Jacob, you don't understand para 55 if you think it's not high risk.


----------



## Jacob (16 Jan 2021)

doctor Bob said:


> Sorry Jacob, you don't understand para 55 if you think it's not high risk.


Higher than some risks, but you aren't likely to lose by it - unless you are getting bad advice. But if you don't want to speculate with an element of risk you are in the wrong game! Get a herd of sheep instead? Grow brussel sprouts? Could be good now that Brussels is closed for us.


----------



## Jacob (16 Jan 2021)

Billy_wizz said:


> Personally think rent should be capt at X of market value as we've now reached the point of stupidity where renters affectively buy houses for people who can afford a deposit because rent costs more than mortgage repayments


Or rent could be capped at a proportion of the tenant's income. Traditionally rent and housing costs have often been about a third. If you gave tenants security and also imposed better controls on landlords obligations, property prices would come zooming down.


----------



## doctor Bob (16 Jan 2021)

Jacob said:


> Higher than some risks, but you aren't likely to lose by it - unless you are getting bad advice.


Total clap trap, just talking out of your arrsee for the sake of it.


----------



## Jacob (16 Jan 2021)

doctor Bob said:


> Total clap trap, just talking out of your arrsee for the sake of it.


Let us know how you get on.


----------



## doctor Bob (16 Jan 2021)

Jacob said:


> Let us know how you get on.



I need to decide if the risk is worth it, no rush.


----------



## Billy_wizz (16 Jan 2021)

Jacob said:


> Or rent could be capped at a proportion of the tenant's income. Traditionally rent and housing costs have often been about a third. If you gave tenants security and also imposed better controls on landlords obligations, property prices would come zooming down.


Unfortunately that's not a great option as you will just end up with people on low earnings trying to rent large expensive houses that they can't afford


----------



## Spectric (16 Jan 2021)

RobinBHM said:


> delivery drivers on zero hour contracts working 12 hour shifts to make the rent


There is a local delivery company round here that the guys earn a real fortune if they put in the time, a lot work very hard for two or three years and end up with a deposit for a house. I believe they are paid per drop, and the amount depends on whether big town or more rural delivery area.


----------



## Jacob (16 Jan 2021)

Billy_wizz said:


> Unfortunately that's not a great option as you will just end up with people on low earnings trying to rent large expensive houses that they can't afford


Then the house owner has to lower the rent! Housing problems move towards being solved!


----------



## Billy_wizz (16 Jan 2021)

Jacob said:


> Then the house owner has to lower the rent! Housing problems move towards being solved!


Why should someone who has worked hard to buy an extra property as an investment be punished as well? Because some silly person likes the idea of a massive house that they can't afford?


----------



## Jelly (16 Jan 2021)

Billy_wizz said:


> Why should someone who has worked hard to buy an extra property as an investment be punished as well? Because some silly person likes the idea of a massive house that they can't afford?



Why should a public good (being safely housed) be an investment vehicle for someone to make money at low risk and low rates of taxation, whilst not contributing anything significant back into the economy?

If someone needs a large house, but can't afford it (say a blended family where grandparents have had to move in due to care needs, or a young couple who unexpectedly had triplets) why should they be expected have to make do with unsuitable accommodation in order to allow someone substantially better off than themselves to turn a profit?

*Fundimentally the question we have to answer as a society is do we value making money as being above human dignity?*


----------



## RobinBHM (16 Jan 2021)

doctor Bob said:


> I know agricultural land is valued at £10k/ acre ish. However try and buy 1-5 acres on the edge of a village for that price, doesn't happen.
> I have 7 acres I'm trying to get planning on, I'd happily let the community fund the £100,000 I may have to spend on a para 55 application (very high risk) and repay them double or triple if we got planning.


the big property developers have deep pockets to throw at planning and they have top planning consultants.

Ecological surveys can cost a fortune -I had a customer that spent £10k on a bat survey.
And even if you get planning there is the Community Infrastructure Levy.

I hate to think how much an architects fees would be to achieve 'exceptional architectural standards'

Kudos to you if you do it


----------



## doctor Bob (16 Jan 2021)

Some nice stuff there Jelly, sounds like you are going to do well in life, bit of dough and a nice house probably.
How about responding back in 40 years to see if you still have the same ideologies.
Surprising how things change in life as you mature.


----------



## Nigel Burden (16 Jan 2021)

When me and my wife bought our first house in 1978 the maximum mortgage available was 2.5 times the main salary plus one times the lesser. We had to put down a 30 percent deposit to be able to get the mortgage at IIAC 7.5 percent.
At first we struggled when the interest rates increased and were moved onto an indefinite term. Then my employment took an upturn and we were able to return to a normal term. Two years later we sold that house and bought our present house, that was 1982, and the price of the house was roughly double my annual earnings. Mortgages were still calculated on the same basis IIRC and we paid £25K for a three bedroom semi which today would sell for between £320k and £350k. 

My two children both have mortgages secured on single salaries which are around average. Both stayed at home until they were in their early thirties and saved the deposits. Five years down the line and both have paid back reasonable amounts of capital, my son about forty percent off the mortgage. This has not come without sacrifice, ie. only going out infrequently etc. The fact that interest rates are currently so low has allowed them to do this. Shortly after we bought our second house mortgage rates were in excess of fifteen percent.

De-regulation has been one of the main drivers responsible for the disproportionate difference between property/land prices and earning though.

Nigel.


----------



## RobinBHM (16 Jan 2021)

Mickjay said:


> That's a generalisation too.


Yes I know -it was tongue in cheek

but it does underline a serious point....there many people that fall into in work poverty and high cost of rent is a key reason


----------



## Billy_wizz (16 Jan 2021)

Jelly said:


> Why should a public good (being safely housed) be an investment vehicle for someone to make money at low risk and low rates of taxation, whilst not contributing anything significant back into the economy?
> 
> If someone needs a large house, but can't afford it (say a blended family where grandparents have had to move in due to care needs, or a young couple who unexpectedly had triplets) why should they be expected have to make do with unsuitable accommodation in order to allow someone substantially better off than themselves to turn a profit?
> 
> *Fundimentally the question we have to answer as a society is do we value making money as being above human dignity?*


If there is no money in renting houses then there will be no houses to rent and just because someone had triplets doesn't mean they need or should expect a big house and would have approximately 10 years to put themselves in a position to afford the house they need! Giving people a cheap house just because they have kids just leads to some people to see having kids as an opportunity for a big house at someone else's expense! Renting should be affordable and dictated by the market value but not at the extortionate percentage it currently is I don't have a problem with someone working hard to earn a 70-80% deposit for buy to rent! But would limit the number of houses anyone can own in each tax bracket to stop all the cheaper houses being vacuumed up


----------



## Jacob (16 Jan 2021)

Billy_wizz said:


> If there is no money in renting houses then there will be no houses to rent ....


The houses won't evaporate and could be available to buy instead. Or to buy for housing associations or local authorities.
Very few landlords actually build houses they are just intermediaries and serve no useful purpose beyond a low skill element of property management, which they tend to do badly.


----------



## RobinBHM (16 Jan 2021)

Jelly said:


> At which point I discovered that I'm *several hundred pounds a month better off* than I was in the private rented sector (and trust me it wasn't anything fancy I was renting),



yeah this is what it boils down to.

I cant help thinking those that say "its no worse than in my day", probably have masses of equity in their house......it makes a huge difference, if you are renting, if you become ill you are only a few pay cheques from being homeless.



Jelly said:


> I'm in my mid 30's, have a Masters


if its in virology you have struck gold!


----------



## Jacob (16 Jan 2021)

Billy_wizz said:


> Unfortunately that's not a great option as you will just end up with people on low earnings trying to rent large expensive houses that they can't afford


Or homeless people renting tiny houses which they can just afford.


----------



## Doug71 (16 Jan 2021)

I have owned a few different rentals over the years, it is not easy money as many people seem to think. I find unless you get a really good long term tenant (which are few and far between) it is hardly worth doing.


----------



## Jacob (16 Jan 2021)

Doug71 said:


> I have owned a few different rentals over the years, it is not easy money as many people seem to think. I find unless you get a really good long term tenant (which are few and far between) it is hardly worth doing.


Glad to hear it!


----------



## Droogs (16 Jan 2021)

I would make it mandatory for any business that owns land which able to be used for building housing and or business premises on and has such permisionto release it for sale, if they have not started such a project on that land within 12 months of purchase and if it has not been completed within 18 months of the original estimated time. no ands ifs or buts, That way all the land held by the builders and the supermarket chains etc would be available rather than be hoarded just to stop a rival building there. I would also make it a legal requirement for the government to allocate funds to councils to build new social housing and at a level that would eliminate homelessnes in each councils area.


----------



## Billy_wizz (16 Jan 2021)

Jacob said:


> The houses won't evaporate and could be available to buy instead. Or to buy for housing associations or local authorities.
> Very few landlords actually build houses they are just intermediaries and serve no useful purpose beyond a low skill element of property management, which they tend to do badly.


The biggest problem with housing cost is builders selling for what they can get rather than a fixed profit margin which would in tern make affordable housing actually affordable pulling a sizable chunk of people away from renting and therefore forcing rental prices down blaming people who rent out properties in isolation is short sighted and alludes to a limited grasp on the issue and don't get me started on the rediculous amount that housing associations overpay for houses from preferred builder's


----------



## Billy_wizz (16 Jan 2021)

Droogs said:


> I would make it mandatory for any business that owns land which able to be used for building housing and or business premises on and has such permisionto release it for sale, if they have not started such a project on that land within 12 months of purchase and if it has not been completed within 18 months of the original estimated time. no ands ifs or buts, That way all the land held by the builders and the supermarket chains etc would be available rather than be hoarded just to stop a rival building there. I would also make it a legal requirement for the government to allocate funds to councils to build new social housing and at a level that would eliminate homelessnes in each councils area.


That's nice but most of the homeless people I've spoken to on the street don't want a house so making houses available to these people without first dealing with the assorted issues that have lead them being there won't achieve much


----------



## Droogs (16 Jan 2021)

Homeless people are not just on the street, they are families living in a 1 room B&B. If good quality, properly insulated and adequately sized housing was built with proper amenities then most of the problems would be solved. Note I did not say all but most and at a far cheaper cost than many other alternatives once the ripple effect of jobs, wages, shopping etc is taken into account


----------



## Jelly (16 Jan 2021)

Billy_wizz said:


> That's nice but most of the homeless people I've spoken to on the street don't want a house so making houses available to these people without first dealing with the assorted issues that have lead them being there won't achieve much



The evidence suggests that homeless people don't want to deal with (and/or have previous experience of failing at dealing with) the bureaucratic hoops required to get housed.

The success of housing first strongly suggests that quite literally just giving people a place to live no strings attached, then working on dealing with any specific issued they have is quite effective, including the programme in greater Manchester.

It's notable that in the US "Housing First" has proved to be so much more effective (and thus cheaper) that it's recieved bipartisan support!


----------



## Jelly (16 Jan 2021)

RobinBHM said:


> if its in virology you have struck gold!



'Fraid not... Process Engineering with Economics.

I've done work in the Biotech/Pharma sector but it's probably not for me, I'm more of a "great big things" guy!


----------



## davedevelopment (16 Jan 2021)

Interesting thread, good reminder of the privilege I have. I'm late thirties, owned a house since just before the financial crisis. 

My parents are "well off" now, though I now it was a struggle for them when they were younger. This gives me a lot of security which I am grateful for.

I'm still good friends with a lot of the kids I went to school with, who all have different family financial backgrounds and all have varying jobs, from teachers to supermarket workers. They all own houses. I know there are people struggling in my area, but I think it's probably different up here than it is down south.


----------



## Jelly (16 Jan 2021)

Billy_wizz said:


> don't get me started on the rediculous amount that housing associations overpay for houses from preferred builder's



I deal with central government and local authority procurement on a semi-regular basis...

I'm consistently shocked by how often they're willing to buy a service with markup, which they could deliver substantially cheaper in-house if they were willing to commit, sometimes even when they already have the capability in house.

It's almost like they've been brainwashed into believing they're totally incompetent and need the private sector to deliver everything for them regardless of factors which are stacked in their favour like economies of scale or natural monopolies.


----------



## Sandyn (16 Jan 2021)

Jelly said:


> Continued and increasingly dismissive and scornful treatment of young people who attempt to raise these issues, (or any other political issues which they feel deeply about) in the UK's (frankly abysmal) print media.


If you really think it is such a widespread problem why not do something about it. Become active. develop strong arguments. Write to the abysmal print media. Write to MP's Don't just make your point here. Do something about it. Don't take no for an answer.
If what you are saying is correct, others will listen, but you will have to make a bullet proof argument. I totally disagree with you blaming the elderly and with today's political correctness. It is not a good stance to take. It seems you are blaming one part of society for all it's problems.


----------



## Jameshow (16 Jan 2021)

Jelly said:


> I deal with central government and local authority procurement on a semi-regular basis...
> 
> I'm consistently shocked by how often they're willing to buy a service with markup, which they could deliver substantially cheaper in-house if they were willing to commit, sometimes even when they already have the capability in house.
> 
> It's almost like they've been brainwashed into believing they're totally incompetent and need the private sector to deliver everything for them regardless of factors which are stacked in their favour like economies of scale or natural monopolies.


I think they probably don't have the basic skills in house!!! to do a housing development. 
Most housing social housing is subcontracted to arm's length quangos who consist of "management", housing officers and maintainance men. I generalise obviously...

Cheers James


----------



## Billy_wizz (16 Jan 2021)

Jelly said:


> I deal with central government and local authority procurement on a semi-regular basis...
> 
> I'm consistently shocked by how often they're willing to buy a service with markup, which they could deliver substantially cheaper in-house if they were willing to commit, sometimes even when they already have the capability in house.
> 
> It's almost like they've been brainwashed into believing they're totally incompetent and need the private sector to deliver everything for them regardless of factors which are stacked in their favour like economies of scale or natural monopolies.


The problem with central government and local government bodies is that historically everyone always employee's someone slightly less intelligent than themselves so as to not lose there job to them in the future the problem now is that they've got the point that most villages are now missing there idiots


----------



## Jelly (16 Jan 2021)

Sandyn said:


> Become active. develop strong arguments. Write to the abysmal print media. Write to MP's Don't just make your point here. Do something about it. Don't take no for an answer.



I'm as active in local politics as I can be without compromising my professional relationships, and I'm an active contributor to central government policy forums, both on my own account as a technical expert in a niche field, and on behalf of Industry and professional bodies.

I don't get anything for all the unpaid work I do on policy, but I genuinely believe that the UK can do so much better so I spend time making the arguments and collaborating with colleagues who also have the desire to see positive change.

I've had the odd letter published by the FT and the Gruaniad, but know better than to think I'd get typeset in the Mail or Express whilst wholly contradicting their editorial stance.



Sandyn said:


> I totally disagree with you blaming the elderly and with today's political correctness. It is not a good stance to take. It seems you are blaming one part of society for all it's problems.



I'm not blaming the elderly per se, I'm saying they're currently the net beneficiary of a particular set of circumstances, it's not their fault but its still where we find ourselves.

If I was going to assign blame, I could start with young people ourselves taking some of it, we don't vote in the same numbers as the older generation and until very recently we've been much less informed about how politics affect their own interests.

However the bulk of the blame lies with a short sighted a political class that's unwilling to address serious issues within our society (which they all claim to value so much) because it's quite complex to discuss that with the nation, compared to saying whatever will get a decent block of voters come election time (even saying inconsistent things to different voters via the magic of targeted ads on the internet), then do whatever seems expedient once in power.

Same as it ever was right? Doesn't mean it's any more right?


----------



## doctor Bob (16 Jan 2021)

Billy_wizz said:


> The problem with central government and local government bodies is that historically everyone always employee's someone slightly less intelligent than themselves so as to not lose there job to them in the future the problem now is that they've got the point that most villages are now missing there idiots



Lots of them can't even spell and get grammar correct..................


----------



## Billy_wizz (16 Jan 2021)

Jameshow said:


> I think they probably don't have the basic skills in house!!! to do a housing development.
> Most housing social housing is subcontracted to arm's length quangos who consist of "management", housing officers and maintainance men. I generalise obviously...
> 
> Cheers James


I watched a program where a developer was explaining why his development was such a good deal for the housing association at 5million for 10 houses! I only payed attention as it was the Welsh village that my father in law came from and at the time houses where selling for about 40k in the village


----------



## Billy_wizz (16 Jan 2021)

doctor Bob said:


> Lots of them can't even spell and get grammar correct..................


Is that aimed at me? I've managed to rise above dyslexia and done ok for myself Its unlikely I'll ever be rich but I'll always have enough


----------



## Billy_wizz (16 Jan 2021)

Billy_wizz said:


> Is that aimed at me? I've managed to rise above dyslexia and done ok for myself Its unlikely I'll ever be rich but I'll always have enough


ADHD doesn't help either


----------



## doctor Bob (16 Jan 2021)

Billy_wizz said:


> Is that aimed at me? I've managed to rise above dyslexia and done ok for myself Its unlikely I'll ever be rich but I'll always have enough



Yes it was as a joke. I have dyslexia as well and I've done alright. Sorry if you're touchy about it.


----------



## doctor Bob (16 Jan 2021)

-


----------



## Billy_wizz (16 Jan 2021)

doctor Bob said:


> Yes it was. I have dyslexia as well and I've done alright. Sorry if your touchy about it.


I don't care but I know people who have it and allow others to use it as a stick to beat them with as it affects there confidence in themselves so tend to push back!


----------



## doctor Bob (16 Jan 2021)

Billy_wizz said:


> I don't care but I know people who have it and allow others to use it as a stick to beat them with as it affects there confidence in themselves so tend to push back!



No make the most of it, it doesn't need to hold you back. My biggest issue is just writing, i write 6's, 9's, d's, p's and q's the wrong way round, same with s's and z's, never sure which way the loop or zigzag goes, makes physical writing slow and now I write in capitals only for ease. As I get older I get more comfortable with it. I have had an extremely professional career in the past but been woodwork for the last 20 odd, I feel comfortable in a trade than an office.


----------



## beech1948 (16 Jan 2021)

How curious. The older people have lots of experience, often just know how best to deal with a problem....the young don't. They have never seen the problem, need to talk endlessly about it and take ages to take action. Its the lack of experience.

Older people have more money or resources in general because they have been working for longer and have learnt to save a little if they can.

Zero hours workers are an anathema and should be banned.

Its not about a battle between young and old but a battle to gain experience and with it better salaries. 

I for one am sick of one of my kids telling me that because I now own my house (35yrs mortgages) and have some funds for retirement I am one of the lucky ones. Utter rubbish. I earned it. I did two jobs when young. I was made redundant 2 times. I suffered 15% mortgage rates for 9 months. I started my own company and learned to make better than £150k a year but worked probably 50 to 60 hours a week.

I have little sympathy for today's young who would complain over everything but not bite the bullet and get on with what needs doing.

Learn to survive. To cope with change. To find new ways to make a living. Get it done.


----------



## Billy_wizz (16 Jan 2021)

doctor Bob said:


> No make the most of it, it doesn't need to hold you back. My biggest issue is just writing, i write 6's, 9's, d's, p's and q's the wrong way round, same with s's and z's, never sure which way the loop or zigzag goes, makes physical writing slow and now I write in capitals only for ease. As I get older I get more comfortable with it. I have had an extremely professional career in the past but been woodwork for the last 20 odd, I feel comfortable in a trade than an office.


Oh I get the slow writing general spelling and grammar but I get by I used to get frustrated by how many opertunitys I miss out on to people who have spent there life in a classroom and have a piece of paper that says they should be able to do the job but are very poor at it! While I could do the job in my sleep but didn't have the all important bit of paper!


----------



## Jelly (16 Jan 2021)

beech1948 said:


> I for one am sick of one of my kids telling me that because I now own my house (35yrs mortgages) and have some funds for retirement I am one of the lucky ones.
> 
> ...
> 
> make better than £150k a year but worked probably 50 to 60 hours a week.



Based on that statement, you're unequivocally fortunate to have been in the position of having earned more than 5 times the median _household_ income, as an _individual_!

If you're unable to recognise that you're both unusual in your success and that it's inconceivable that everyone could replicate that level of success, then there's a good reason your kids keep trying to open your eyes.


----------



## Jameshow (16 Jan 2021)

Jelly said:


> I'm as active in local politics as I can be without compromising my professional relationships, and I'm an active contributor to central government policy forums, both on my own account as a technical expert in a niche field, and on behalf of Industry and professional bodies.
> 
> I don't get anything for all the unpaid work I do on policy, but I genuinely believe that the UK can do so much better so I spend time making the arguments and collaborating with colleagues who also have the desire to see positive change.
> 
> ...


Don't you think that a politician speaking straight to the nation addressing the big issues of society rather than either pushing a very far left / right agenda or playing for the middle ground without rocking the boat would be a big breathe if fresh air! 

Cheers James


----------



## Droogs (16 Jan 2021)

doctor Bob said:


> No make the most of it, it doesn't need to hold you back. My biggest issue is just writing, i write 6's, 9's, d's, p's and q's the wrong way round, same with s's and z's, never sure which way the loop or zigzag goes, makes physical writing slow and now I write in capitals only for ease. As I get older I get more comfortable with it. I have had an extremely professional career in the past but been woodwork for the last 20 odd, I feel comfortable in a trade than an office.


Bob weren't you an NATS washing machine watcher, how did you cope with the screens of info?


----------



## Jelly (16 Jan 2021)

Jameshow said:


> Don't you think that a politician speaking straight to the nation addressing the big issues of society rather than either pushing a very far left / right agenda or playing for the middle ground without rocking the boat would be a big breathe if fresh air!
> 
> Cheers James


Undoubtedly it would be... 

However, I've met several people in local and regional politics who do just that; and my innate cycinicism has been heightened further by watching what happens next...

Their nuanced positions don't gel with the orthodoxy of their respective political parties and/or don't make for good headlines... 

Both of which are necessary in order to get the media exposure needed to put them on a national stage, so they end up stuck, whilst loyal ideologues pass them by for opportunities to stand as MP's and the like.

*Edit:* My experiences of becoming engaged with both politics and government policy have repeatedly reminded me of the quote (inaccurately) ascribed to Otto Von Bismarck:

_Laws are like sausages, it is better not to see them being made._​


----------



## Billy_wizz (16 Jan 2021)

Jelly said:


> Based on that statement, you're unequivocally fortunate to have been in the position of having earned more than 5 times the median _household_ income, as an _individual_!
> 
> If you're unable to recognise that you're both unusual in your success and that it's inconceivable that everyone could replicate that level of success, then there's a good reason your kids keep trying to open your eyes.


Why can't everyone else replicate that success?


----------



## Billy_wizz (16 Jan 2021)

Billy_wizz said:


> Why can't everyone/anybody else replicate that success?


----------



## Terry - Somerset (16 Jan 2021)

Prices of property may be influenced more by supply and demand, rather than some interaction between rental and ownership model.

Some distortion is caused by second homes and changes in local employment. Where jobs are lost local demand falls, conversely property building tends to lag the growth of new industries.

Costs of purchase as a proportion of income have remained fairly steady - changes in interest rates seems to influence the direction of travel, not immediately impact. Regulation and policy changes also lag events - eg: increased deposits post financial crash were the result of defaults and negative equity. 

Rents will tend to reflect the alternative cost of ownership. If rents were materially below the cost of ownership, few landlords would bother to invest - the converse is also true.

As with ownership buy to let popularity may be the result of:

collapse of final salary pensions and pension fraud have driven those who can to invest in property as a way to generate income in retirement, and protect their capital
low interest rates and annuity rates have made buy to let an apparently cautious and rational option
with life expectancy increases, property inherited by beneficiaries in their 50s or 60s who do not immediately need to sell.
IMHO it probably matters little as long as people have somewhere to live. Rental market may need some regulatory changes to give tenants better long term security, and landlords similar security of rental income.

If the goal is to make a homes (rented or owned) more affordable for the young the answer is simple. Build more houses. They will need to be where jobs exist so are likely to be in an area full of affluent nimbys wishing to protect their local environment.


----------



## Jelly (16 Jan 2021)

Billy_wizz said:


> Why can't everyone else replicate that success?



If I was being snarky, I'd suggest that you go have a crack yourself and let us know how you get on...


*But in terms of a serious answer*, if according to ONS data:

 the mean (not median) household income is £35k, 
_and_
 each household has 2.1 working age adults in it,
_then_
 that means that the economy can only support an average of £16.7k per person right now...

So we would need to achieve nearly tenfold (or 1000%) productivity growth across the whole economy, to make it _even mathematically possible_ for everyone to earn £150k... 

On average the UK achieves 0.3% productivity growth, so the economy would need to become 3333 times more efficient in order to achieve that outcome; that's patently unrealistic.


----------



## doctor Bob (17 Jan 2021)

Do you want to earn more?


----------



## Bodone (17 Jan 2021)

Sheffield in the 70’s and 80’s was no fun - Every generation seems to have a pivotal struggle. Our children now are more open, enabled and told they can do anything. Reality is a kicker.

And go watch when the wind blows, classroom lessons on hiding under the desk to avoid nuclear annihilation has probably shortened my life, not to mention the pollution and what was in the food, oh and the IRA antics.

My kids 26 and 21, they’re on a journey, they’re optimistic, realistic and work for things. They have so much more confidence than I ever had at their age.

It‘s difficult times, I get that, but do you believe this is the only generation to face hard times?


----------



## Billy_wizz (17 Jan 2021)

Jelly said:


> If I was being snarky, I'd suggest that you go have a crack yourself and let us know how you get on...
> 
> 
> *But in terms of a serious answer*, if according to ONS data:
> ...


So your either deliberately or accidentally missing my point what's stopping anybody from upping there earning potential from 35k to 150k? And the reason I don't do it is because I've done 80 hour weeks and all nighters before and have settled for the remuneration/effort comprise that I'm happy with


----------



## billw (17 Jan 2021)

Billy_wizz said:


> So your either deliberately or accidentally missing my point what's stopping anybody from upping there earning potential from 35k to 150k?



Erm......are you REALLY asking that question? What's stopping people? How many jobs paying £150k a year do you think there are in the UK?


----------



## planesleuth (17 Jan 2021)

My granddad, shot to pieces at Ypres, sang "We're Here Because We're Here" in the trenches and sang it again when he was teaching me how to make Windsor chairs. So just stop moaning and discussing pointless aspects of life that, in the fullness of time, mean nothing. Accept you're ere cos you're ere and ........go and do something useful !!


----------



## Rorschach (17 Jan 2021)

beech1948 said:


> How curious. The older people have lots of experience, often just know how best to deal with a problem....the young don't. They have never seen the problem, need to talk endlessly about it and take ages to take action. Its the lack of experience.
> 
> Older people have more money or resources in general because they have been working for longer and have learnt to save a little if they can.
> 
> ...



I have a lot of time for what you write in other threads beech, but here you just show your absolutely ignorance of the real world despite your children's best attempts. You are one of those "stop buying fancy coffees with your avocado toast and you will be a millionaire within 10 years" people.


----------



## Rorschach (17 Jan 2021)

Billy_wizz said:


> Why can't everyone else replicate that success?



Please tell us how you earned your 150k a year.


----------



## Jelly (17 Jan 2021)

Terry - Somerset said:


> As with ownership buy to let popularity may be the result of:
> 
> collapse of final salary pensions and pension fraud have driven those who can to invest in property as a way to generate income in retirement, and protect their capital
> low interest rates and annuity rates have made buy to let an apparently cautious and rational option
> ...


This is in fact a big point, the failure of pension schemes and the closure of final salary schemes to new entrants at a point where an older person changing job might not be feasibly 
able to put away enough money in a defined contribution scheme, was instrumental in creating the a demand for low risk, high return investments which kick started by to let.

That should never have been allowed to happen on such a large scale in the first place.




doctor Bob said:


> Do you want to earn more?


I wouldn't object to it, and a little extra would certainly make things much more comfortable.

However what would really have been desirable was not being screwed for very low pay (relative to qualification and responsibilities) when I was a younger man... Whilst at the same time facing higher outgoings than I do now.

So what I really want is to be able to look my junior colleagues and staff in the eye when a discussion about money comes up, and know that they're being fairly remunerated and aren't paying over the odds for their living costs. 

Because "I've got mine" isn't a sentiment I can get behind, when I can see others in the same (or worse) situation I've been in historically



Bodone said:


> It‘s difficult times, I get that, but do you believe this is the only generation to face hard times?



No.

However, there's a good range of statistical information to show that on average a person under the age of 39, will be poorer in real term than their parents across most of their adult lives... (OECD Report)

There's also a bunch of statistics to show that the cost of living is rising faster than wages for the 25-34 age group in particular (FT Article ), which has some really negative impacts on people's behaviour and risk perception.




Billy_wizz said:


> So your either deliberately or accidentally missing my point



I answered the question which you asked, no more no less.



Billy_wizz said:


> what's stopping anybody from upping there earning potential from 35k to 150k? And the reason I don't do it is because I've done 80 hour weeks and all nighters before and have settled for the remuneration/effort comprise that I'm happy with



You know full well that it's entirely unrealistic that just anybody picked at random could make that kind of money... 

However I'll humour you:

 Starting with employment:
 Not all people have now, or will ever have the skills or abilities to command a salary of £150k from their employer.
 There are laughably few posts which pay that kind of money compared to the number adults of working age in the UK, and of those that do pay that well, almost none which aren't as executive directors or working in the financial sector.
 Even amongst those who have the skills to do so, there's extreme competition for the small number of posts at that level, so some of it will come down to pure dumb luck as to why one equally well qualified candidate gets chosen over another.

 If we come to the idea of starting a business:
 Again not everyone has the skills and abilities needed to grow a business to the size where it will support a £150k director's salary,
 Even if they do, finding the start up capital is a major shortcoming for someone who isn't making a great deal of money to begin with
 If you're forced to go all in to your business just to have a shot and have no significant personal reserves of cash in case it doesn't work out, then the psychological stress is likely to make you perform less well and make less effective business decisions.
 Around 60% of small businesses fail with 3 years, which is a pretty terrifying level of risk to take on if you have family comittments... Not everyone is willing or even able to take those kinds of risks.


----------



## Jacob (17 Jan 2021)

Billy_wizz said:


> Why can't everyone else replicate that success?


It's a mathematical conundrum!
Crudely; if some people earn 5 x the average, then some other people earn one fifth of the average.
But therein lies the answer to society's biggest problem! If high earnings were lowered and low earnings raised, then those earning least, could be better off! 
So simple!


----------



## doctor Bob (17 Jan 2021)

Jelly said:


> If we come to the idea of starting a business:
> Again not everyone has the skills and abilities needed to grow a business to the size where it will support a £150k director's salary,
> Even if they do, finding the start up capital is a major shortcoming for someone who isn't making a great deal of money to begin with
> If you're forced to go all in to your business just to have a shot and have no significant personal reserves of cash in case it doesn't work out, then the psychological stress is likely to make you perform less well and make less effective business decisions.
> Around 60% of small businesses fail with 3 years, which is a pretty terrifying level of risk to take on if you have family comittments... Not everyone is willing or even able to take those kinds of risks.



Hi, trust me, never start a business. 
Everyone I know with a business started it thinking "I could do alright here", not having a pre determined list of why it will fail.


----------



## RobinBHM (17 Jan 2021)

Jelly said:


> I'm consistently shocked by how often they're willing to buy a service with markup, which they could deliver substantially cheaper in-house if they were willing to commit, sometimes even when they already have the capability in house



The private sector seem to spend their money on branding.....lovely sign written vans god awful service.

Private sector has shareholder profits not the customer as their priority.

Privatisation is driven partly by ideology and partly by vested self interest. 

Covid emergency legislation is a rather good example....it enabled tendering processes to be thrown out, scrutiny to be avoided allowing noses in the trough the order of the day. 

Privatisation of NHS services is a cash cow for current politicians, loads of them have interest in the private healthcare sector


----------



## rafezetter (17 Jan 2021)

Woody2Shoes said:


> I agree with the sentiments in your first point, but the reality is that whatever system/rules we have, there will always be those who are motivated to try and skew things in their favour (the extend to which they succeed and/or are seen to succeed is a measure of how much of a problem this is).
> 
> Re. your second point, I have a real problem with the emotive language "crisis..vicious..poverty" and the ideas behind it.
> 
> ...




This pretty much.

As a person whom has lived in privately rented accomodation all my adult life (51 now) since the age of 17, I can say I've also seen the flip side of the housing situation up close with family members and friends. My (older) cousin bought a house in Bradley Stoke in the late 80's, then spent the next roughly ten years being unable to sell it due to negative equity when it turned out half the houses built on those estates were garbage - he couldn't even get buildings insurance.

My father bought a £325,000 house in an affulent area just by the Epsom racecourse only to learn, that the "comprehensive" survey was anything but and the exterior walls were bowing out because when the pevious owners did the loft converstion they just CUT OUT all the crossbeam supports and didn't replace them. 4 years and almost £90,000 in legal fees the surveying company was forced to pay for the remedial work, which was significant and expensive.

A member here and his wife, now in thier 60's, bought a house in the 80's in an affluent area in Bristol only to find about 10 years ago that the house was slowly sinking on one side, subsidence, which was DENIED in the survey report he had done, but afaik cracks in the walls dont appear on thier own - he has no idea if he's going to even be able to sell, the only hope he has right now is that he's got an official survey (paid for by the house insurers) stating no subsidence; if another survey says there is - he's boned.

A friend in Wales bought a property in Brecon, only to find out after the sale had been signed that there was a boundary dispute with the neighbour, which led to him having to give HALF his driveway on the side of the building to next door, because at some point in the past a previous owner had effectively stolen that land from the then neighbour. It's my personal beleif many solicitors and those who do surveys etc cannot even remotely be trusted to do thier jobs properly, and for a high value house it might be worth getting TWO independenet ones done.

When owning a house - work on that house is ALWAYS ongoing, and I don't mean redecorating, I mean actual work and remedial work - the young who seem to think getting a house is all roses and caviar are fools, it'll cost you thousands a year ON TOP of the mortagage payments and you'll spend more time than you realise staring at various types of "U bend" or fixing some other issue because you can't afford a plumber at £50 an hour plus callout.

Renters get to pass all that along to the landlord - true story - our cooker (a range hob) broke on XMAS DAY (for the second time). Now because it's a HMO with 6 bedrooms, no cooker is a big deal, and because it's a 6 bed, a basic standard 4 ring hob just doesn't cut it. I contact the landlord whom assigned the job of sorting the replacement to me (I've been managing this place for 15 years) £1700 later (inc installation fees etc) and we have a new cooker.

Not so many households can suddenly find £1700 overnight for a new range hob (and yes £1700 as it'll take a lot of use so needed to be good quality).

Owning property can become a noose to buyers, and that's even before you bring the issues of failed relationships into the equation.

While the current laws do not give renters the safety of not being evicted without cause, there have been steps taken to reduce it, and people whom are good tenants are seen as assets to a rental property, not a liability, I should know, I've lived here 15 years and the house has been sold TWICE during my tenancy. From family home > landlord 2 years after I moved (2006) in then again in 2013 when the landlord had to liqiudate her assets to emigrate to New Zealand, she vouched for me as a good tenant who looks after the property, and here I still am.

Renting is not quite the minefield many people (usually the young) lead others to beleive, you just have to be savvy about where, and from whom to rent, and treat the property as if it was your own, which from what I gather seems to be rare, many renters ESPECIALLY THE YOUNG have a reputation for leaving properties in a terrible state, costing the landlords far more than the value of the deposit to put right.

Landlords cannot truly be blamed for the amount of property they own - with the state of the economy etc etc, it's historically become one of the few ways to increase your personal wealth without significant risk - apart from the caveats above and the 2008 crash - My fathers cash and stocks asset value has been diminishing in real terms, year on year since BEFORE the 2008 crash and it's a seven figure sum, under previous economies a liquid asset value larger than £1,000,000 would see excellent returns, not only has it seen no good returns, it's essentially been stagnant for TWELVE YEARS, Twelve years without growth.

Now the picture of why so many people, with assets buy property looks a little different, doesn't it. (my father hasn't BTW - because he also knows the perils of property becoming essentially another mouth to feed and tying up currenty liquid assets)

You cannot also blame landlords for cashing in on a depressed market after 2008 - that's just human nature and I defy almost anyone under 60 to state were they in the same position with some spare cash, they would not have done the same. It also ALWAYS been this way - my great greandmother owned an entire street in Wales many years past, and from all accounts was a very good landlord, fairminded and honest.

Jelly, you talk about pensions etc yet seem to be unaware that in recent years the pension ages were increased significantly? from 60>65 for women (soon to be 66 and will be 68 by 2028) and for men it's 70 I think.

Because of this 5 year increase, many people die before they can even claim their pension benefits that they have paid into all thier lives, and many more, soon after. Also, as mentioned, there's all those pensions pots that got raided by various unsavory types such that an entire lifes worth of scrimping and "going without the latest iPhone" and "no holiday this year" has come to nought.

As droogs said - while seemingly harsh, some of the assessment of the younger generation is fair and pretty accurate - you can't have everything you want AND all of lifes luxuries like netflix, starbucks, new phones every 2 years, beats headphones AND holidays in exotic places. You have to CHOOSE, just like your parents did. The young also forget that many of them have the luxury of still living at home on thier parent's dime, paying little to no rent, but still living what many others would consider a very comfortable lifestyle with wall to wall heating, and broadband on tap - all paid for by SOMEONE ELSE.

I agree things are stacked against the younger generations, and I agree it can paint a bleak outlook, but I also agree it's up to them to do something about it, and one of the first steps is to STOP blaming the older generations - do you honestly think we CHOSE for 2008 to happen with millions losing thier jobs and homes in many cases, AND pensions pots and savings evaporating?

The absolute truth is that for the majority of us, this caka happened to US as well as you, and only a few out of every thousand managed to cash in on it - the rest of us got boned just like you did.

Try to remember that in future, please, before your next indignant /rant at how rubbish it is for you and it's "our" fault.

and remember one more thing you have, that we do not.

Time.

You've got time to remedy your situations, for many / most of the people who lost a lifetimes worth of hard work, this is the new - poorer - reality and no time to "fix" it.

I'm pretty sure that is the viewpoint that droogs and others are coming from, best remember that too.

Edit: here's a thing, why don't you have this same conversation of "you old people ruined it for us" with your parents and parents of your peers - that'll be an interesting one for you.


----------



## Jacob (17 Jan 2021)

Jelly said:


> ...I'm consistently shocked by how often they're willing to buy a service with markup, which they could deliver substantially cheaper in-house if they were willing to commit, sometimes even when they already have the capability in house.
> ........


It's been the simple minded driving ideology of the last 50 years and been made obligatory in many areas with PFI etc.


----------



## Jacob (17 Jan 2021)

rafezetter said:


> .........Owning property can become a noose to buyers, and that's even before you bring the issues of failed relationships into the equation..........


True. 
But in fact almost everybody who has scrambled on to the housing ladder in the last 50 years or more, will be better off in terms of assets, than those who did not.
The divergence is still growing at a pace. 
A whole generation has found that they get richer (on paper) by owning property than they could possibly do by working. Even the burst bubble of 2008 (sudden negative equity for a lot of people) has been absorbed and safely passed by.


----------



## billw (17 Jan 2021)

I saw the other day that the value of the U.K. housing stock is around £9tn, but really what does that even matter? Everyone needs somewhere to live and house prices are all relative anyway.

Housing value does virtually nothing for the economy, apart from estate agents fees and mortgage interest. Even council tax has a ludicrously low upper limit.


----------



## Jester129 (17 Jan 2021)

Jacob said:


> True.
> But in fact almost everybody who has scrambled on to the housing ladder in the last 50 years or more, will be better off in terms of assets, than those who did not.
> The divergence is still growing at a pace.
> A whole generation has found that they get richer (on paper) by owning property than they could possibly do by working. Even the burst bubble of 2008 (sudden negative equity for a lot of people) has been absorbed and safely passed by.


In a previous post you moaned about Thatcher. Now it's my turn - who robbed us of our pension pots and put the nail in the coffin lid for final salary pensions? I believe it was a certain Gordon Brown.
As ever in life, things swing both ways/two sides to a coin etc.
The older generation have fought and worked hard to own one asset - their home, sometimes at 15% interest. If you had saved hard for the last 10 years, you would *have the money for a deposit on a house at practically 0% interest, something we NEVER had*. Tell me, did you? Don't bleat about the older generation, we had it hard, I can assure you! Rant over.


----------



## Billy_wizz (17 Jan 2021)

billw said:


> Erm......are you REALLY asking that question? What's stopping people? How many jobs paying £150k a year do you think there are in the UK?


Stop letting other people set the limit for your earning potential and start your own business! Or go back to university and get a degree that leads to a job paying 150k a year! There are generally 2 reasons why some get more than others and it comes down to hard work and talent hard work being the most important


----------



## Jelly (17 Jan 2021)

rafezetter said:


> I agree things are stacked against the younger generations, and I agree it can paint a bleak outlook, but I also agree it's up to them to do something about it, and one of the first steps is to STOP blaming the older generation.
> 
> ...
> 
> Edit: here's a thing, why don't you have this same conversation of "you old people ruined it for us" with your parents and parents of your peers - that'll be an interesting one for you.



*At no point have I actually blamed the older generation.*

I have pointed out that older people happen to have become the net beneficiaries of certain policies which disproportionately hurt younger people.

I suspect it still feels very uncomfortable to be identified as being part of that group, and that it might be especially galling when you're not one of the individuals who has actually seen any of the benefit...

But this isn't about you, or any other individual, it's about the aggregate impact of a range of government policies between the mid 1980's and the present day, on different age groups.

And I would be shocked if anyone historically went out on polling day thinking:
_"I really want to vote for people who will ultimately do a bunch of things which make my kids worse off than me,"._​Yet here we are.



rafezetter said:


> - do you think we CHOSE for 2008 to happen with millions losing thier jobs and homes in many cases, AND pensions pots and savings evaporating.



No-one in their right mind would have voted directly for that to happen....

But as a nation we did historically vote for Thatcher and Major who set in motion the wheels that would eventually cause those impacts, then Tony Blair who would do nothing to undo the risks the preceding government's decisions on deregulation had created in this area.

Again it wasn't intentional, but a choice was made and this is where we've landed as a nation.



rafezetter said:


> The absolute truth is that for the majority of us, this caka happened to US as well as you, and only a few out of every thousand managed to cash in on it - the rest of us got boned just like you did.


I get that, and if you look at the substance of the issues in my first post it's obvious that I'm not claiming it's a straight case of all young people being worse off than all old people.

Many of the things that are hurting young people, also have significant negative impacts on all working age adults, and that's especially true for people in the North and Midlands who took vocational career paths.

But it still stands that all the data clearly shows the under 39's are disproportionately impacted and will end up worse off compared to their parents...


----------



## Jacob (17 Jan 2021)

Jester129 said:


> In a previous post you moaned about Thatcher. Now it's my turn - who robbed us of our pension pots and put the nail in the coffin lid for final salary pensions? I believe it was a certain Gordon Brown.
> As ever in life, things swing both ways/two sides to a coin etc.
> The older generation have fought and worked hard to own one asset - their home, sometimes at 15% interest. If you had saved hard for the last 10 years, you would *have the money for a deposit on a house at practically 0% interest, something we NEVER had*. Tell me, did you? Don't bleat about the older generation, we had it hard, I can assure you! Rant over.


What's Brown got to do with it? Pensions are not something I know about, having failed ever to earn enough to put aside for one! (always been self employed).
Low interest rates are cancelled by matching price rises. In real terms housing is much more expensive nowadays and homelessness more common, than either were at any time post war.
We own our house (my 6th!) and have spent on improvements on all of them, but can't say I've earned the grossly inflated prices they each attracted. Can't benefit from it either unless I sell up and take to a caravan. Perhaps a good idea, might do that.


----------



## Jameshow (17 Jan 2021)

I think the underlying issue is our change from a manufacturing based economy to a finance - services - retail - tourism economy. 

When mrs T brought about this revolution she made it possible for the rich to get rich without hard work and the poor to get poorer despite hard work or without hard work. 

But like a house of cards it came tumbling down in 2008 and 2020. In the finance sector and retail / hospitality sectors respectively. 

We don't make enough ppe / ventilators / vaccine and hence we have supply issues in the NHS. 

Just my uneducated thoughts!

Cheers James


----------



## Rorschach (17 Jan 2021)

Jester129 said:


> If you had saved hard for the last 10 years, you would *have the money for a deposit on a house at practically 0% interest, something we NEVER had*. Tell me, did you? Don't bleat about the older generation, we had it hard, I can assure you! Rant over.



Another one totally ignorant to the realities of life for many. I can tell you from experience it is very hard to save for a deposit when house prices increase faster than you can save the equivalent money, which of course in a savings account also earns 0%


----------



## doctor Bob (17 Jan 2021)

My sons 20, he is a scaffolder.
He has a lot of friends, a pretty girlfriend, he's handsome, 6ft 4", fit as a fiddle, a decent car and oozes happiness.
I'd have taken all that at 20.
Hopefully he has the attitude to be happy in his life, that's all I want for him.

I've had both sides of the coin, not a penny in my pocket, to financially doing very well. The level of financial security had no influence on my happiness. That comes all from within, topped up by friends and family and dogs and inner ok-ness.

I genuinely believe optimism is a great tonic, happy people attact happy people and therefore spirits are lifted by each other. Negative people attract negative people etc. Sometimes you have to fake it, but it's a habit which can end up being natural.

Also, ditch social media if you feel lifes unfair, it's a terrible depressant if you believe it all.


----------



## Billy_wizz (17 Jan 2021)

Rorschach said:


> Another one totally ignorant to the realities of life for many. I can tell you from experience it is very hard to save for a deposit when house prices increase faster than you can save the equivalent money, which of course in a savings account also earns 0%


My parents both took on an evening bar job on top of there normal job with all proceeds going into a savings account specifically for there deposit it was common amongst there friends and I suspect probably common in general! I wonder how many who say they can't save for a deposit are currently working 2 jobs?


----------



## Terry - Somerset (17 Jan 2021)

The economy is a zero sum game. Policies may impact growth by more or less than expected, but tensions over how the cake is shared remain.

If you earn £100k pa you are comfortably within the top 2% of income earners. Normality for 98% is that income is limited, choices need to be made, and not all aspirations can be fulfilled.

Some (the lucky few?) may be an exception, accepting that which they have and seeking to fulfill other life goals - contentment, free time, social interaction, quality of life. 

Giving more to the young - income or assets will deny the older. Most older folk accumulate throughout 30-40 years of effort and feel justified in their final decades enjoying the fruits of their labours. This is not a defence of the status quo - simply an observation.

Where change is required is in inheritance laws. The effect of reducing the costs of the wealthy elderly (TV licences, care costs etc) is to increase the inheritance ultimately enjoyed by the children (normally). 

This may the biggest driver of inequality - those who benefit from bank of mum and dad, have a good education, and at some point benefit from a legacy of £100k ++. Those not so blessed will struggle.

On this forum I suspect there may be a some resistance to these views!


----------



## deema (17 Jan 2021)

Never has there been such an opportunity to make money so quickly. The youth enjoy the advantage that no other generation has ever enjoyed, a truly global market that can be accessed from a bedroom. The richest people in the world, made their money in their own lifetimes, something that that could only be dreamed about. There are more millionaries created each day than there were at any other time in history. The overarching reason is that markets are so accessible. You can start a company tomorrow and in less than 10 years become a billionaire. It’s never happened before.
Now, the issue is that not everyone is entrepreneuria, wants to take the risk, or has the ability or talent to achieve. Global markets have allowed people to make money at levels never before achievable, hence the extreme discrepancies between the super wealthy and the lowest economic level in society. When compays were either locally based, or at best country based and in extremely cases Muticountry it limited the ability to accumulate wealth. 
Manual labour, low level jobs are disappearing faster than at any time in history, mechanisation, computing, and a change in what people value has led to a situation that those without the necessary abilities will be left further and further behind. There will not be a factory a walk away that will take care of you for your life any more, so there is no point is wishing for it. Equally to suggest limiting people’s earning ability and capping salaries is simply to not understand or appreciate what is causing the wealth generation. If you can’t, or arnt allowed to make money in one country, you simply move to another where you can. Paying tax is a choice when you have sufficient money. You can choose to live or base your businesses in tax efficient places......a lot of which are far nicer than the UK both in climate and attitudes towards wealth . E.g. Monaco. So a strategy to limit wealth is a strategy to reduce the number of people in the top 1% who pay the majority of the taxes that support everyone else. Tax too much and again they move. The funny side is that reducing the taxes on the top earners actually increases revenues. More wealthy people choose to base their business and tax residency in that country. However, as most people don’t understand this relationship politically it’s very difficult. When taxes were increased to 90p in the pound in the ‘good old days of the UK’ the exit of the wealthy was massive.

The question I believe should really be what are we going to do with the increasing number of people who do not have, and will never have the skills or ability that are required by society. Through no fault of their own, they simply will never have the ability to amass wealth, or make a contribution to society that is valued. This is going to affect all ages in society, not just the young.


----------



## Spectric (17 Jan 2021)

Buying your own house is I believe an English thing, you know the saying an Englishmens home is his castle. Many europeans rent rather than buy but they have a more controlled rental system as far as I am aware. In hindsight how many home buyers out there would have rented rather than purchase if starting out again? 
It used to be that people in council property probably had a lot more security than people buying, no risk of repro and all repairs done. I can still remember the rentman knocking on the door to collect something like £6.00 for the weeks rent and signing our rent book. Up until 1980 councils were not allowed to make any profit from rentals, but then came that dreaded tory government led by Thatcher, she realised one way to beat the trade unions was to allow people to buy their council houses and unfortunately many fell for her plot. Now with a mortgage they had to work or lose their home. But the sting in the tail was when inflation rocketed and people could no longer afford to keep their houses with many just handing the keys back, but if you had kids the council rehoused you anyway.


----------



## Spectric (17 Jan 2021)

deema said:


> Never has there been such an opportunity to make money so quickly. The youth enjoy the advantage that no other generation has ever enjoyed, a truly global market that can be accessed from a bedroom. The richest people in the world, made their money in their own lifetimes, something that that could only be dreamed about. There are more millionaries created each day than there were at any other time in history. The overarching reason is that markets are so accessible.


But there is more to life than just wealth, the one thing money cannot buy is happyness or time.


----------



## Billy_wizz (17 Jan 2021)

Terry - Somerset said:


> The economy is a zero sum game. Policies may impact growth by more or less than expected, but tensions over how the cake is shared remain.
> 
> If you earn £100k pa you are comfortably within the top 2% of income earners. Normality for 98% is that income is limited, choices need to be made, and not all aspirations can be fulfilled.
> 
> ...


That view is quite frankly laughable people who are set to inherit generally do so because of the hard work and self sacrifice of there parents if you remove the rewards of hard work and self sacrifice then there becomes no reason for it so most if not all small businesses will get rid of all but essential staff because there will no longer be a reason for generating surplus and therefore will be no reason for putting up with award and difficult staff!


----------



## Billy_wizz (17 Jan 2021)

Spectric said:


> Buying your own house is I believe an English thing, you know the saying an Englishmens home is his castle. Many europeans rent rather than buy but they have a more controlled rental system as far as I am aware. In hindsight how many home buyers out there would have rented rather than purchase if starting out again?
> It used to be that people in council property probably had a lot more security than people buying, no risk of repro and all repairs done. I can still remember the rentman knocking on the door to collect something like £6.00 for the weeks rent and signing our rent book. Up until 1980 councils were not allowed to make any profit from rentals, but then came that dreaded tory government led by Thatcher, she realised one way to beat the trade unions was to allow people to buy their council houses and unfortunately many fell for her plot. Now with a mortgage they had to work or lose their home. But the sting in the tail was when inflation rocketed and people could no longer afford to keep their houses with many just handing the keys back, but if you had kids the council rehoused you anyway.


As labour had bankrupted the country who was going to keep footing the bill?


----------



## Spectric (17 Jan 2021)

But at least we had the industries that could have helped, Steel, Mining and ship building. I lived through the Thatcher years and for us baby boomers it was like our version of the blitz. She finished the days when you left a job Friday to start a new one Monday, so many companies fell and dole ques grew with estate agents doors being blocked by the numbers of keys returned.


----------



## Billy_wizz (17 Jan 2021)

Spectric said:


> But at least we had the industries that could have helped, Steel, Mining and ship building. I lived through the Thatcher years and for us baby boomers it was like our version of the blitz. She finished the days when you left a job Friday to start a new one Monday, so many companies fell and dole ques grew with estate agents doors being blocked by the numbers of keys returned.


They where the problem unions had pushed the costs beyond what they could produce and refused any attempts to modernize them so they didn't hemorrhage money you blame Thatcher but she was dealing with the problem she had been left with labours attack on business with there extortionate tax levels causing any business or individual that could move abroad did! But ultimately it came down to who ran the country unions or the government!


----------



## doctor Bob (17 Jan 2021)

deema said:


> Never has there been such an opportunity to make money so quickly. The youth enjoy the advantage that no other generation has ever enjoyed, a truly global market that can be accessed from a bedroom. The richest people in the world, made their money in their own lifetimes, something that that could only be dreamed about................................................



Due to social media the young see these get rich quick people and feel like they are missing out. Not realising that life is quite tough for everyone. Very few breeze through unscathed.
As I said previously, I hope my son has bucket loads of happiness and very little stress in his life. I really don't care how wealthy he is or if he owns a house.
The person I'm most envious of is a school friend of mine, so I have known him for 50 years. He has put enjoyment of life ahead of assets, I think he has got it right.


----------



## Droogs (17 Jan 2021)

You are very right Dr Bob, a happy life is about who you are not what you have


----------



## billw (17 Jan 2021)

Billy_wizz said:


> Stop letting other people set the limit for your earning potential and start your own business! Or go back to university and get a degree that leads to a job paying 150k a year! There are generally 2 reasons why some get more than others and it comes down to hard work and talent hard work being the most important



I AM at university.


----------



## billw (17 Jan 2021)

Droogs said:


> You are very right Dr Bob, a happy life is about who you are not what you have



Correct.


----------



## Jelly (17 Jan 2021)

Billy_wizz said:


> They where the problem unions had pushed the costs beyond what they could produce and refused any attempts to modernize them so they didn't hemorrhage money you blame Thatcher but she was dealing with the problem she had been left with labours attack on business with there extortionate tax levels causing any business or individual that could move abroad did! But ultimately it came down to who ran the country unions or the government!


I will agree to a point that elements of the trade union movement spurred on by militant did not do industry any great favours...

Of course labour didn't actually support the unions on that, hence why we had a snap general election which was intended to shore up support for Callaghan's government to introduce pay restraint and industrial reform...

But having got wind of it, militant called out strikes to cause government popularity to drop, assuming they could bully the conservatives too as no-one would intentionally destroy British industry.

That was a gross miscalculation asThatcher's solution threw the baby out with the bathwater, and now we're left with a negative balance of trade because most of our volume exporters are gone.

In personal terms:
It's like having your car break down because your mate who you give a lift to work put the wrong fuel in for you, then selling it for scrap, using the money to get taxis, and then realising you have no way to get to work one day.​


----------



## Billy_wizz (17 Jan 2021)

Jelly said:


> I will agree to a point that elements of the trade union movement spurred on by militant did not do industry any great favours...
> 
> Of course labour didn't actually support the unions on that, hence why we had a snap general election which was intended to shore up support for Callaghan's government to introduce pay restraint and industrial reform...
> 
> ...


Unfortunately labours constant support of appeasement towards the union's gave the union's affective control and a belief that they would always get there own way! It's the workers I feel sorry for as I believe that if the union's hadn't gone to political war using its members as cannon fodder reforms and retraining could of occurred!
The simple truth is that it's rare that people running union's have the business acumen or intelligence to understand that bleeding a business dry will always lead to its self destruction usually leaving the staff as it's biggest loser


----------



## Billy_wizz (17 Jan 2021)

Billy_wizz said:


> Unfortunately labours constant support of appeasement towards the union's gave the union's affective control and a belief that they would always get there own way! It's the workers I feel sorry for as I believe that if the union's hadn't gone to political war using its members as cannon fodder reforms and retraining could of occurred!
> The simple truth is that it's rare that people running union's have the business acumen or intelligence to understand that bleeding a business dry will always lead to its self destruction usually leaving the staff as it's biggest loser


Or more worrying perhaps they don't care as long as they've had money first


----------



## Spectric (17 Jan 2021)

The thing is that without the unions the company owners would just have got richer whilst the workers got poorer whilst enduring really awfull working conditions. The issue is that the unions got too powerful and before governments worked this out it was to late. Thatchers solution was no different to Hitler, Musolini or any other despot, declare war and destroy rather than sit down, talk and compromise.


----------



## Jelly (17 Jan 2021)

Billy_wizz said:


> if you remove the rewards of hard work and self sacrifice then there becomes no reason for it



That's a good "It stands to reason that..." argument, but it doesn't hold up to well tested theories within behavioural psychology.





Maslow's hierarchy (and Herzberg's two-factor theory) illustrates how humans are motivated by deficiency needs (Food, Security, Relationships, Recognition) up to a point, but when these essential needs are met, growth needs in the form of self-actualisation take over to drive motivation to even higher levels.

If a human is placed in a stable environment where their needs are met, they naturally become increasingly driven to better themselves and achieve mastery of the things that interest them in a positive feedback loop.

Consequently, by creating a society with a robust social safety net, we set up a much greater number of people to make the very most of their skills and talents.

In the study of human factors and reward behaviour this is often described as "the motivation becomes the work itself".


----------



## Spectric (17 Jan 2021)

This raises a question that I have often thought about. If you win a sum of money, upto a certain amount it will probably be of benefit in your life. But what happens if you win a huge sum of money? Ok people immediately think great, wonderful and how lifes going to be so much easier but is it. At the moment you get up with a purpose of some form and although some jobs you may not enjoy they still provide motivation and purpose in your life. With so much money what would you actually do, once you have exhausted the spending spree and maybe done a few holidays and are back at home then what. Would you bother to make anything in a workshop or just think I can get the best furniture maker there is to make it for me and you could become like the queen in a bee colony where you expect all your needs to be met by others.


----------



## doctor Bob (17 Jan 2021)

Spectric said:


> This raises a question that I have often thought about. If you win a sum of money, upto a certain amount it will probably be of benefit in your life. But what happens if you win a huge sum of money? Ok people immediately think great, wonderful and how lifes going to be so much easier but is it. At the moment you get up with a purpose of some form and although some jobs you may not enjoy they still provide motivation and purpose in your life. With so much money what would you actually do, once you have exhausted the spending spree and maybe done a few holidays and are back at home then what. Would you bother to make anything in a workshop or just think I can get the best furniture maker there is to make it for me and you could become like the queen in a bee colony where you expect all your needs to be met by others.



It's why I don't do the lottery. Work for me is a life structure, I have proved to myself in the past that without a life structure I can self destruct quite easily. I think I could handle £1m but £150m would be the end of me.


----------



## Billy_wizz (17 Jan 2021)

Spectric said:


> The thing is that without the unions the company owners would just have got richer whilst the workers got poorer whilst enduring really awfull working conditions. The issue is that the unions got too powerful and before governments worked this out it was to late. Thatchers solution was no different to Hitler, Musolini or any other despot, declare war and destroy rather than sit down, talk and compromise.


The union's declared war with there strikes and seeing the deposition between the management and union bosses with management pointing out that the union's wage demands would take the mine from a profit of 10k a month to a loss of 25k a month and the investors wouldn't stand the loss with no likelihood of an increase in the mined product's value, the union came back with not our problem and if we don't get the rise we're all going on strike! Unsurprisingly the mine shut 3 days later !
The union's had reached a point where they believed themselves to be untouchable and there is no negotiating with someone who believes that


----------



## Droogs (17 Jan 2021)

@Spectric it is know as the "curse of the lottery" look it up makes very interesting reading


----------



## Billy_wizz (17 Jan 2021)

Spectric said:


> This raises a question that I have often thought about. If you win a sum of money, upto a certain amount it will probably be of benefit in your life. But what happens if you win a huge sum of money? Ok people immediately think great, wonderful and how lifes going to be so much easier but is it. At the moment you get up with a purpose of some form and although some jobs you may not enjoy they still provide motivation and purpose in your life. With so much money what would you actually do, once you have exhausted the spending spree and maybe done a few holidays and are back at home then what. Would you bother to make anything in a workshop or just think I can get the best furniture maker there is to make it for me and you could become like the queen in a bee colony where you expect all your needs to be met by others.


Personally it would allow me to chase perfection on many varied rolls although I know for me the achievement of perfection would be the end in itself and then I would move into something else! Although I'd probably build a sawmill from the ground up first!


----------



## Droogs (17 Jan 2021)

water powered or windmill powered


----------



## Jacob (17 Jan 2021)

Jelly said:


> ........
> 
> If a human is placed in a stable environment where their needs are met, they naturally become increasingly driven to better themselves and achieve mastery of the things that interest them in a positive feedback loop.
> 
> ...


The amazing thing about this is that it still needs to be explained at all. Even if explained as "investing in human capital" people still don't get it. 
This sort of attitude is really common: Tory MP forced to deny he said free school meal vouchers 'spent on crack dens'


----------



## Billy_wizz (17 Jan 2021)

Droogs said:


> water powered or windmill powered


Wood chip powered lol wind is to inconsistent and water would be very limiting on site selection


----------



## Jacob (17 Jan 2021)

Billy_wizz said:


> The union's declared war with there strikes and seeing the deposition between the management and union bosses with management pointing out that the union's wage demands would take the mine from a profit of 10k a month to a loss of 25k a month and the investors wouldn't stand the loss with no likelihood of an increase in the mined product's value, the union came back with not our problem and if we don't get the rise we're all going on strike! Unsurprisingly the mine shut 3 days later !
> The union's had reached a point where they believed themselves to be untouchable and there is no negotiating with someone who believes that


Management have the power and the money. Unions only have the strike. If they are forced to use it then management has failed.
Arthur Scargill didn't close down the coal industry - Thatcher did. Bad management and underinvestment finished off the UK car industry, not red Robbo! Thatcher closed down large parts of UK industry - remember ICI?
Weird that people blame the unions, students, the unemployed, foreigners, trouble makers, single mothers on benefits, you name it, but don't blame the people with the power to change things!


----------



## Billy_wizz (17 Jan 2021)

Jacob said:


> The amazing thing about this is that it still needs to be explained at all. Even if explained as "investing in human capital" people still don't get it.
> This sort of attitude is really common: Tory MP forced to deny he said free school meal vouchers 'spent on crack dens'


To be fair my experience has been the opposite as soon as most people feel safe they become less productive and self destructive I've also noticed it's almost always driven by jealousy of people who have more I wonder if we've hit a point where social media has driven expectation to the point that many will never be satisfied and therefore whilst there needs may be met there expectation hasn't


----------



## Jacob (17 Jan 2021)

Billy_wizz said:


> To be fair my experience has been the opposite as soon as most people feel safe they become less productive and self destructive I've also noticed it's almost always driven by jealousy of people who have more I wonder if we've hit a point where social media has driven expectation to the point that many will never be satisfied and therefore whilst there needs may be met there expectation hasn't


Yeah! Being homeless incentivises people to buy houses!


----------



## Billy_wizz (17 Jan 2021)

Jacob said:


> Management have the power and the money. Unions only have the strike. If they are forced to use it then management has failed.
> Arthur Scargill didn't close down the coal industry - Thatcher did. Bad management and underinvestment finished off the UK car industry, not red Robbo! Thatcher closed down large parts of UK industry - remember ICI?
> Weird that people blame the unions, students, the unemployed, foreigners, trouble makers, single mothers on benefits, you name it, but don't blame the people with the power to change things!
> [/QUO
> ...


----------



## Jacob (17 Jan 2021)

You are saying that comfort, having needs met, de-motivates people and they become less productive. Presumably you think discomfort will do the opposite?


----------



## doctor Bob (17 Jan 2021)

Trouble is people don't like strikes these days.
Ever since the class system broke down in the 70's, and the working man realised that he didn't have to be working class anymore, held back in effect.

Unions are great until they become extreme with leaders over estimating their self importance.


----------



## doctor Bob (17 Jan 2021)

I have 2 young guys working for me both about 25, they drive cracking cars GTI and Focus ST bought new. One has just bought a house the other is looking. I wouldn't say they are earning a fortune but they work hard and do overtime. They chose to work from 17 rather than university avenue, I sometimes wonder if 50% going to uni is beneficial overall.
I suspect if you spend 3-4 years at uni you'd want to be earning more than the guys who chose not and feel hard done by if that wasn't the case, but if there arn't sufficent high end jobs then someone is going to lose out.
When my son said he wanted to be a scaffolder I was all for it. University would not have been for him. I sometimes wonder if the kids know what they are getting into on certain careers, for example, being a doctor, it's a life time of learning and studying, great for some but the pressure must be enormous, as opposed to being a happy go lucky tradesman. The other truth which is painful is that a good trade may well be out earning middle management. I think this factor is a bitter pill for university kids and university parents.


----------



## Billy_wizz (17 Jan 2021)

Jacob said:


> You are saying that comfort, having needs met, de-motivates people and they become less productive. Presumably you think discomfort will do the opposite?


I think your trying to argue a different point I pointed out that in my experience having needs met is no longer enough for many people! although personally if I was homeless or suffering discomfort it would most definitely drive me but the likelihood of me homeless or in discomfort is also limited!


----------



## Billy_wizz (17 Jan 2021)

doctor Bob said:


> I have 2 young guys working for me both about 25, they drive cracking cars GTI and Focus ST bought new. One has just bought a house the other is looking. I wouldn't say they are earning a fortune but they work hard and do overtime. They chose to work from 17 rather than university avenue, I sometimes wonder if 50% going to uni is beneficial overall.
> I suspect if you spend 3-4 years at uni you'd want to be earning more than the guys who chose not and feel hard done by if that wasn't the case, but if there arn't sufficent high end jobs then someone is going to lose out.


I think the problem is that because anybody can now go to university and get a degree a degree now holds less value but a large number think that a degree automatically increases there value! I worked alongside a lad who worked whilst at uni and demanded a pay rise on completion and couldn't understand why the gaffer suggested that if ha wanted a pay rise it would be advisable to get a job relating to his art degree rather than the manual handling job he currently had


----------



## Blackswanwood (17 Jan 2021)

I don’t know what %


doctor Bob said:


> I have 2 young guys working for me both about 25, they drive cracking cars GTI and Focus ST bought new. One has just bought a house the other is looking. I wouldn't say they are earning a fortune but they work hard and do overtime. They chose to work from 17 rather than university avenue, I sometimes wonder if 50% going to uni is beneficial overall.
> I suspect if you spend 3-4 years at uni you'd want to be earning more than the guys who chose not and feel hard done by if that wasn't the case, but if there arn't sufficent high end jobs then someone is going to lose out.
> When my son said he wanted to be a scaffolder I was all for it. University would not have been for him. I sometimes wonder if the kids know what they are getting into on certain careers, for example, being a doctor, it's a life time of learning and studying, great for some but the pressure must be enormous, as opposed to being a happy go lucky tradesman. The other truth which is painful is that a good trade may well be out earning middle management. I think this factor is a bitter pill for university kids and university parents.


I think you are onto something there. University has become a “rite of passage“ and for many does little to make them more employable or better skilled.


----------



## Jelly (17 Jan 2021)

Jacob said:


> Thatcher closed down large parts of UK industry - remember ICI?



Oh boy, did we kill the golden goose there! 

The story of what killed ICI is sufficiently complex that I suspect a lot of people wouldn't have any interest in following it, but suffice to say deregulation plays a major role and the grubby fingerprints of shady Thatcherite grandees is all over it.

Always sticks in my craw when I see BASF going from strength to strength, showing us what could have been for ICI; especially given that chemicals is the only UK industry sector which survived the 80's and 90's as a net exporter




Jacob said:


> Weird that people blame the unions, students, the unemployed, foreigners, trouble makers, single mothers on benefits, you name it, but don't blame the people with the power to change things!



Not really, from the moment our head of state told the nation "There is no society" on in the die was cast.

People have been assiduously looking out for number one ever since... 

_"Yet what force on earth is weaker than the feeble strength of one"_

More than one generation has been brainwashed into believing neo-liberal claptrap that was literally doodled on a bar napkin by a half-cut Regan advisor in a Washington D.C. bar room, to justify tax cuts for wealthy republican grandees, all the while blissfully unaware that solidarity with one's fellow man was the only way to ensure their security and that of their families.

When you consider that context, it's not surprising that people feel so disempowered that they will naturally gravitate towards "punching down" in order to feel good about their lot, and can be persuaded via emotive arguments in that vein to vote against their own interests to give a bloody nose to those they feel are looking down on them.


----------



## Jameshow (17 Jan 2021)

As many have said money dosen't bring happiness. 

A large detached house income of £160k two decent cars on the drive is of no comfort for a weekly visit to the pharmacy for the carrier bag of meds and a bouquet of flowers for when the consultant as the condition has deteriorated -
Living with a chromic illness is no fun. 

Just be happy to with some 2x2, a No4 plane, three chisels and a sharp handsaw....

Cheers James


----------



## Spectric (17 Jan 2021)

Well thinking of the younger people they should actually be unaffected by the lockdown and not notice much change because they don't have real freinds just virtual ones that follow them in the dark world of the "smart phone" and unsocial media.


----------



## Jacob (17 Jan 2021)

Jameshow said:


> As many have said money doesn't bring happiness.
> ....


Depends what condition you are in. For some people even a small amount can make a huge difference to the quality of their lives and "happiness".
Good welfare benefits/services are probably amongst the most cost effective way of improving lives and bringing happiness. UBI could be a major winner on that score - instead of a continual struggle to survive people could get on and do more interesting things, possibly of benefit to society in general.


----------



## Jelly (17 Jan 2021)

Blackswanwood said:


> I think you are onto something there. University has become a “rite of passage“ and for many does little to make them more employable or better skilled.



As a graduate and (in my role as a manager in a large corporate entity) an employer of graduates, there's a significant element of truth to this. 

Higher education is now a prerequisite for many jobs where it's not needed; Simultaneously universities haven't adapted their curriculum to the new paradigm, meaning many graduates in fields where that level of education is a neccecity aren't getting the preparation for applying that knowledge in the real world, whilst increasing financial pressures mean all but the largest employers don't have the resources to train them on the job, meaning it's sink or swim trapping many in entry level jobs for years.

There was a grand dream under new labour that the UK could become a "knowledge economy" wherein *all* the children of people who bought their houses under "right to buy" coukd cement their family's middle-class status by going to uni and becoming professionals.

That was wholly divorced from reality, and has instead effectively created a weird blending of the class structure which has only served to further fragment society.​


However,

I do think that attending university gives young adults some excellent opportunities for personal growth and development outside the classroom, which the UK doesn't provide to its (chronically under-valued) vocational learners.

By contrast, certain German guilds still seek to send newly minted tradesmen to go practice in other Lander (German states) as journeymen after their apprenticeships in order to formally finish their qualification process, and large employers seek to replicate this with company wide (and international) training programmes.

Which offers those apprentices the same opportunities to grow as uni students get, and contributes to greater social cohesion (along with vocational skilled trades having similar social capital as academic qualifications, which is a huge cultural difference between Germany and the UK).​


----------



## AJB Temple (17 Jan 2021)

I've employed a lot of graduates over the years, including Oxbridge recruitment when I was in the professions. 

Anyone, including graduates, who thinks that employers value degrees with any equivalence whatsoever, is deluded. Employers grade the universities, degree subjects and candidates. Non-vocational degrees or any with no professional relevance are largely disregarded. Many graduates have added debt but no value to their lives in terms of earning capacity. 

There will be a hard reckoning as post C19 jobs will be scarce and entitled youngsters will find themselves in competition to a far tougher extent than we have seen in the past decade.


----------



## Trainee neophyte (17 Jan 2021)

Perhaps a discussion on the value of money may be in order. Interest rates set the future value of money (I give up the benefit of owning £100 by lending it to you - what do I get back at the end of the year to make up for that?). If interest rates are zero, then the value of money is zero. Interest rates need to be back up around 5% before the economy can ever be anything other than a zombie. 5% interest rates would destroy most large businesses, who have loaded up on debt to fund share buybacks and other silliness. It would cause chaos, but clear out all the mal-investment. It may never be allowed to happen, so expect a planned economy USSR style for ever more.

House prices are mainly where they are because of the low interest rates. Fix the rates, and you fix the housing market, to a large extent.

Also not helpful is government planning rules and various other laws which make a resource scarce on purpose. Seeing as government also fixes interest rates, you can blame high housing costs squarely on government (both left and right)

Another reason for high house prices is demographics - more single parent families, lots of immigration (population rising from 55 - 66 million). You could even argue with some merit that government policies have exacerbated this, too.







Who wants to bet that the net population will keep rising, post coronavirus, post Brexit? Will housing costs keep rising? Lots of oldies looking to downsize to extract some capital, lots of immigrants heading home, theoretically lots of job losses, although government borrowing to pay UBI seems to be papering over that for the moment. I would expect a lot of houses becoming available for sale over the next few years, but will prices just keep rising? Inflation is also mainly a government controlled issue. 

Let's just blame government for everything. It works for most other subjects, so why not this one. Until government stops messing with the market who can possibly know what the true value of a house actually is?


----------



## Jacob (17 Jan 2021)

Trainee neophyte said:


> ....
> 
> House prices are mainly where they are because of the low interest rates. .....


Not so.They were shooting up when interest rates were very high.
The issues are a combination; the cessation of council house building and the sale thereof, deregulation of the rented sector and financial rules over mortgages etc, low taxation particularly capital gains and death duties etc, inflationary stimuli such as "buy to let" mortgages.
Basically complete absence of government policy and reliance on the mythical efficacy of the "free market". In other words a policy intended to crank prices up as high as they can go.
Lots of books on the topic - here's another: Broken Homes - Troubador Book Publishing
PS just re read the above  - if you think the value of money is zero just send any you have to me immediately. I promise to replace it with something worth more than zero. Not sure what, perhaps some old clothes? Or a chisel? A tin of beans?


----------



## Trainee neophyte (17 Jan 2021)

Jacob said:


> Not so.They were shooting up when interest rates were very high.


When? Show me.


----------



## Terry - Somerset (17 Jan 2021)

By the 1970s the UK was known as the sick man of Europe. Inefficient businesses being destroyed by both employers and unions. Successive governments of both hues incapable of providing effective leadership.

Thatcher changed that. 

She neutered the unions who believed the rights of workers trumped absolutely the rights of business owners. 

She forced businesses that still believed "we won the war so we must be right" to recognise the world beyond the UK which was increasingly capable of producing much that the UK could at a lower cost.

Steel, coal, cars etc were mature technologies at which the UK would increasingly be uncompetitive. They declined leaving only the higher value added - special steels, design, precision manufacturing etc. 

Introduction of container ships made global trade far easier. Some may remember the disruption during implementation of containerisation.

The only material area in which MT was deficient was in training and support for the development of new skills and businesses. She should not have assumed that entire communities would have the energy, skills and initiative to improve themselves, but needed constructive suppoort.

Without her leadership the UK may easily have declined into bankruptcy being passed rapidly by India, China over 30 years ago.


----------



## Jacob (17 Jan 2021)

Trainee neophyte said:


> When? Show me.


You could find out for yourself if you think it's worth effort. Personally I recall very high rates in the 70s but have no recollection of falling house prices. This could help your research; UK Interest Rate History / Graph


----------



## Jacob (17 Jan 2021)

Terry - Somerset said:


> By the 1970s the UK was known as the sick man of Europe. Inefficient businesses being destroyed by both employers and unions. Successive governments of both hues incapable of providing effective leadership.
> 
> Thatcher changed that.
> 
> ...


Now Johnson has finished the job she started and we are finally the sick man and laughing stock of Europe.


----------



## doctor Bob (17 Jan 2021)

Jacob said:


> Now Johnson has finished the job she started and we are finally the sick man and laughing stock of Europe.


      every country in europe would love our GDP (germany excluded). I bet they would all like our vaccine roll out as well, Macron must be spitting feathers.
I hope they all improve, as it's a worldwide issue.
I do wonder if Jezza had won the last election if he would take his brothers advice...............


----------



## Trainee neophyte (17 Jan 2021)

@Jacob 

Bear in mind correlation is not causation.





__





Average House Price Vs Base Rate


Graph showing how the bank Of England Base Rate affects the average house price. The average prices were taken from Nationwide’s house price index.




www.propertyinvestmentproject.co.uk





I bought a house for £42,000, with interest rates at 8% in 1989. 6 months later it was worth £60,000 (housing bubble courtesy of Bank of England). Rates then went to 15%, and the value of my house dropped to £30,000 over the next two years. I can't remember how many years it took to get back to positive territory again, but lesson learned.

I say again. When? Show me.


----------



## Terry - Somerset (17 Jan 2021)

> Now Johnson has finished the job she started and we are finally the sick man and laughing stock of Europe.



Glib but simplistic. I would not argue with your assessment of Boris (neither would I wholly agree) but it is worth noting the Labour lost 4 elections in a row, the last by a landslide.

They evidently lacked the leadership, competencies and policies to persuade any but died in the wool longstanding supporters.


----------



## billw (17 Jan 2021)

Spectric said:


> Well thinking of the younger people they should actually be unaffected by the lockdown and not notice much change because they don't have real freinds just virtual ones that follow them in the dark world of the "smart phone" and unsocial media.



You just described me and I’m 50 this year.


----------



## billw (17 Jan 2021)

Trainee neophyte said:


> @Jacob
> 
> Bear in mind correlation is not causation.
> 
> ...



if you’re living in the place what does it matter what it’s worth? It’s a home notan investment.


----------



## Trainee neophyte (17 Jan 2021)

billw said:


> if you’re living in the place what does it matter what it’s worth? It’s a home notan investment.


Except when interest rates double, the recession bites, and you have to weigh up sending the keys back or selling your children for medical experiments. 

It was a hard couple of years. I gave all my money to the bank. They didn't seem particularly grateful.


----------



## doctor Bob (17 Jan 2021)

Trainee neophyte said:


> or selling your children for medical experiments.



Is this possible, how much do you get ............................ errrmmm asking for a friend.


----------



## RobinBHM (17 Jan 2021)

Billy_wizz said:


> As labour had bankrupted the country who was going to keep footing the bill?


A bit of an old trope, largely untrue.

Labour was doing quite well with debt until the global financial crisis....which was caused by banking deregulation.


Both parties actually have done about the same with the economy.....but the truth is it's hard to measure.


----------



## Billy_wizz (17 Jan 2021)

RobinBHM said:


> A bit of an old trope, largely untrue.
> 
> Labour was doing quite well with debt until the global financial crisis....which was caused by banking deregulation.
> 
> ...


I genuinely didn't know they deregulated the banks twice! I was referring the first time they where in! Although considering the global crash was being predicted for a few years before it happened why did they keep borrowing more and more when being solvent would have limited it's impact and there way of handling it was to just keep borrowing more!


----------



## rafezetter (17 Jan 2021)

Jelly said:


> *At no point have I actually blamed the older generation.*
> 
> [snip]



Yeah you pretty much did:

Jelly - "There are *lots* of things stacked in favour of the older generations"

Stacked = deliberate. Stacking something is a deliberate action, things DO NOT "stack" under naturally occuring random events.

Your line above sets the flavour for the rest of the post, and then becomes a /rant at how it sucks to be a young person and how you beleive a lot of it is because of the older generations.

My post was to remind you that most of the BS the young are having to endure simply HAPPENED, and that the people who were alive then, are now older, but the two ARE NOT exclusively linked.

Is it unfair that you have to pay for university fees now - compared to older generations? Yes it is. Is it unfair and a little hypocritical that those who set that legislation very likely had FREE university education themselves, also YES.

However the real picture is that the cost to the UK taxpayer was UTTERLY UNSUSTAINABLE, and would have had only TWO outcomes.

1) many universities close as the state has to reduce numbers and move to a scholarship style system - which in and of itself is "unfair".
or
2) those that WANT the extra education, the diploma and *all the benefits that come from that* are asked to PAY FOR IT, and the financial burden is *removed *from "joe schmo the garbage lorry driver, and his wife Bettina the cleaner" whom DID NOT go to university.

Now try to tell me again how it's unfair you have to pay for university fees, that only YOU (and potential partner / children) get the financial benefit from - without sounding "entitled". Frankly you should be bloody thankful the taxpayer is still picking up the tab via Govt loans that you DON'T EVEN HAVE TO PAY BACK until you hit a specific earnings threshold.

Shall we talk next about how much of those Govt loans are currently outstanding? Google that, remembering it's TAXPAYERS MONEY then get back to me mmkay?

I'll tell you and the rest of the readers *ONE HUNDRED AND FORTY BILLION POUNDS.*

£140,000,000,000

another small fact - there are more people going to university now than at any other time in history.

Shall I continue to tear apart the rest of your post or shall we leave it there?


----------



## Deadeye (17 Jan 2021)

Jelly said:


> *Edit:*
> ​_My point in making this post was mainly *to highlight the hypocrisy of many people advocating against the current lockdown* because of the "Young People"._​​_As part of that, I have listed below the myriad complex reasons that for the first time in hundreds of years, people aged under 39 (which is hardly "young" by normal standards) will be significantly less well off that their parents; and pointed out that (as an overall group) older people have been net beneficiaries of many of those policies._​​_Quite a few people have taken this as some kind of attack, or some kind attempt to blame older people for the current situation... *It isn't intended as one* that's just how things stand from a factual point of view_​​_I can full understand it might be arresting or uncomfortable to read, and it may be outright aggravating to be generalized about if you're an older person who hasn't in fact seen any of the benefit personally whilst being impacted by some of the negatives below... But please don't have a go, accusing me of blaming you when I have not done so._​​
> 
> 
> ...




You've changed your title to suggest older people aren't "to blame".

Yes, we are. Really.

Even if we forgive ignorance (and, by and large, we shouldn't; the law doesn't for example) people that are now in their 50s, 60s and 70s - which includes me - have:

1. built an economic model of debt-fuelled growth that is fundamentally unsustainable and unstable
2. ingrained a dogma that fulfilment and "success" are derived from material/wealth accumulation and actively diminished the value of community and contribution to community
3. continued to pursue greenhouse-gas rich interests waaaaaay after the incontrovertible science to the contrary
4. allowed, facilitated or supported a growth of inequality in everything - economic, educational, health, recourse to law, *everything* - that is utterly immoral

Most of this has happened through pursuit of self-interest by said 50s-60s-70s, but we should not lose sight of the important role of immediate self-gratification within that. 

Am I guilty? Yes... and ashamed and angry. We've let our young people down.
And if the life purpose of one generation is not to make the world better for the next, what the hell is it?


----------



## Terry - Somerset (17 Jan 2021)

In the 1970s ~8% of school leavers went to universities, polytechnics also awarded degrees - total ~ 10%. Currently ~50% go to uni.

In the mid 1970s - free tuition and a grant. Totally different today!

Those who went to university were the cream of the intellectual crop (they may have/lack other qualities). Higher education at taxpayers expense removed barriers to individual achievement if you had the ability. It provided a talent pool for careers which justified a higher level education.

50% now going to university includes not only the potentially able, but also the very average. Their are insufficient jobs needing graduates, hence employment lower paid jobs, not the professions as may originally have been the case.


----------



## RobinBHM (17 Jan 2021)

doctor Bob said:


> every country in europe would love our GDP



I doubt it, like all things, nuance counts for a lot and GDP is a pretty poor metric.....maybe you might want to take your Brexit goggles off 

Here's a bit of meat on the bone:

*Household net adjusted annual disposable income of European countries 2019*

UK is not exactly top:

Luxembourg
Switzerland
Germany
Norway
Austria
Finland 
Sweden
Belgium
Netherlands
France
Denmark
UK

Life expectancy, UK is in 15th place
Poverty: UK is in 20th place
Healthcare: UK is 16th place


----------



## RobinBHM (17 Jan 2021)

Billy_wizz said:


> I genuinely didn't know they deregulated the banks twice! I was referring the first time they where in! Although considering the global crash was being predicted for a few years before it happened why did they keep borrowing more and more when being solvent would have limited it's impact and there way of handling it was to just keep borrowing more!


Even in the 70s Labours economic record wasn't that bad.....have a look the info is out there.

I'm not sure your argument that Labour could've predicted the crash or even prevented its impact.

I'm no leftie I just don't like seeing these old tropes keep being repeated.

To be honest our tribal two party system is more to blame for poor economic performance more than any one party.


----------



## Jelly (17 Jan 2021)

rafezetter said:


> Yeah you pretty much did:
> 
> Jelly - "There are *lots* of things stacked in favour of the older generations"
> 
> Stacked = deliberate. Stacking something is a deliberate action, things DO NOT "stack" under through naturally occuring random events.



That isn't the only way that can be interpreted, nor the spirit in which it was intended; stacked was chosen because there's a multitude of issues at play which add up to have an impact which is greater than the sum of their parts.

But if that's how you interpret it, I'm never going to change your mind; you're clearly sensitive about this, given you yourself have highlighted that you've had a raw deal from many of same issues, which is fair do's.

I can empathize with that, but let me be entirely clear though that empathy doesn't mean I think the aggressive tone you're taking is appropriate.



rafezetter said:


> Now try to tell me again how it's unfair you have to pay for university fees, that only YOU get the financial benefit from - without sounding "entitled". Frankly you should be bloody thankful the taxpayer is still picking up the tab via Govt loans that you DONT EVEN HAVE TO PAY BACK until you hit a specific earnings threshold.



See there's the rub, I paid for my undergraduate out of pocket by working in a sawmill, because for personal reasons I needed to go part time and SLC wouldn't fund me...

I then did my my master's via distance learning, paying out of pocket again, because I needed the competitive edge to get out of the hole I found myself in after being made redundant repeatedly during a huge industry downturn.

So your assumptions are dead wrong, and your accusatory statements say more about your own emotional reaction to the issues I'm raising than it does about me, or the substance of my posts.



rafezetter said:


> Shall I continue to tear apart the rest of your post or shall we leave it there?



Do whatever lets you sleep at night, but I stand by my analysis of the issues and the data I've linked backing that up.


----------



## RobinBHM (17 Jan 2021)

Terry - Somerset said:


> Glib but simplistic. I would not argue with your assessment of Boris (neither would I wholly agree) but it is worth noting the Labour lost 4 elections in a row, the last by a landslide.
> 
> They evidently lacked the leadership, competencies and policies to persuade any but died in the wool longstanding supporters.


Yes indeed.

Divided parties don't win elections.

Tories value power above all else and it keeps them united, at least as far as the public is concerned.

Labour are in a permanent state of tribal division. If we ever get PR, Labour would split instantly.


----------



## Jelly (17 Jan 2021)

RobinBHM said:


> To be honest our tribal two party system is more to blame for poor economic performance more than any one party.



I would hope that's a sentiment we can all get behind, regardless of other issues.

Certainly both labour and conservative governments contributed to the issues raised in my initial post.


----------



## Billy_wizz (17 Jan 2021)

RobinBHM said:


> Even in the 70s Labours economic record wasn't that bad.....have a look the info is out there.
> 
> I'm not sure your argument that Labour could've predicted the crash or even prevented its impact.
> 
> ...


Me and friends where discussing several years before the crash when it would happen also several small businesses I dealt with where discussing what they where putting away ready for the crash so I seriously doubt the government and there advisers didn't know! Gordon brown had his chance to be a hero when he borrowed a load of money at the start of the crash had he told builders to keep building and the government would buy the houses at X% retail for housing schemes then jobs would of been kept and the economy would of kept on ticking that with a reduction of borrowing before the crash would of left the UK in a much better position


----------



## Billy_wizz (17 Jan 2021)

RobinBHM said:


> Even in the 70s Labours economic record wasn't that bad.....have a look the info is out there.
> 
> I'm not sure your argument that Labour could've predicted the crash or even prevented its impact.
> 
> ...


To be fair I don't see how turning a budgetary surplus into huge borrowing is not that bad to be fair!


----------



## rafezetter (18 Jan 2021)

Deadeye said:


> You've changed your title to suggest older people aren't "to blame".
> 
> Yes, we are. Really.
> 
> ...



I would refute most of that with a simple caveat aded to the beginning of each of your points: "some".

Your posts reads like it's 100% coverage when that is simply untrue and frankly an incredibly egregious oversimplification of very complex matters.

Not everyone lives way beyond thier means. - Banks have the majority share of the blame for both the ability of the people to have debt fuelled growth, it's how they made money and also in part for the ingrained dogma that success is derived from material wealth.

"Want a NICER car? Have a loan". "Want a larger pool than your neighbours? Have a loan." "exotic holiday? loan" "cosmetic surgery? loan"

"Need a new oxen? I'll loan you some sheckels against your harvest this year".

This is not new, infact this hasn't been new since the first "coins" were minted thousands of years ago.

We still use fossil fuels because solar and other non nuclear forms of energy are not even close to performing as needed - even solar "net zero" houses are rare, almost all of them are still tied to the grid to compensate for low power days, and almost all of those net zero houses are in countries with LOTS OF SUNSHINE. Yet despite ALL of this undeniable proof that "green power" is a long way off being a serious, vaible alternative, nuclear is universally reviled by "the greens" - because they are idiots and most importantly, despite it being the ONLY form of CURRENT technology that can replace fossil fuels kilowatt output; yet because of some unfortunate incidents, numbering only a few in the last 50 years and several of which could have been prevented, suddenly, nuclear power is anathema - well... guess what? Planes crash all the time - one only very recently, yet people still fly (or did) in thier millions every year, so what's your (the greens) point exactly?

LESS people have died from nuclear incidents in it's entire history than have died in plane crashes for the same period of time, 66 years - but apparently that fact "isn't relevant" when assessing the dangers of nuclear power.

There are nuclear power plants now so small and self contained they practically manage themselves - they are on submarines.

One teenager in the USA MADE ONE IN HIS GARAGE!

I'll also point out "the greens" age group HAS ALWAYS spanned 10-100, with as many if not MORE of the younger generation among them - so your claim this situation is on those 40 or older is so much poppycock.

I'll also state that the goal of "the greens" is noble insofar as reducing the pollution of the atmosphere and global warming and abunch of other stuff, HOWEVER, ignoring the realities of TODAY, and the energy needs of TODAY for the dream of a reality that might not be feasable for decades is incredibly naive, and energy shortages are going to be even more commonplace, lol and we now have electric cars to feed as well.... you couldn't make it up.

as to 4) - Oh my... where do I even begin.... are you actually stating you are of the opinion that "inequality in everything" is a NEW phenomena, having happened in the last say 80 years - or are you even vaguely aware that "inequality in everything" has been happening since the dawn of life itself?

Inequality is inherent in nature, and always has been - stronger, fitter, faster, smarter - weaker, less able, slower, less intelligent - maybe you should familairise yourself with the work of Charles Darwin, he's quite well known for a book he wrote a while ago.

Are the ones gifted with natural talents supposed to ignore them, at the cost of thier own quality of life, as long as it doesn't upset the snowflakes - or should they be allowed to tap that resource and be the best they can be?

Should we remunerate a highly gifted brain surgeon the same salary as a dentist?

What about sport - say - racing drivers - should we ban that because they get paid millions for risking thier lives (and deaths still happen).

Should we stop all forms of entertainment lest they become "too rich" - as an example should we limit the sales of music to only a few thousand copies, so the singer and writer doesn't earn too much? Not feasable, as those copies will themselves become worth a great deal - collectors items like art - so we've no choice but to allow open, unlimited sales - so then where does the rest of the money go? Can't go to the publisher or they will become billionaires... how about charities? Ok WHICH charities - there's not enough money earned by all the entertainers on earth to be meaningful if spread out among ALL charites, so WHICH CHARITY - WHO makes that choice - randomly like bingo, or based on merit - ok merit - so then WHICH is the MOST meritous - Cancer - heart disease - all the different forms of childrens charity - parkinsons - poverty in the 3rd world (no because we already throw billions at that and it's done FA)

and on and on and on

Didn't take me more than a couple of minutes to prove how ridiculous that viewpoint is.

Humanity uses the universally exchangeable currency of money - because gold is limited, and the barter system hasn't been viable for any sized conurbation population over a few dozen people for oh 1000 years give or take.


I REALLY wish people would learn a bit more history - it would help an awful lot.

Edit - before you start accusing me of being part of the problem and a "capitalistic pig" - I fully agree that there are far too many people paid sums of money that are so far in excess of their actual worth it's obscene.

However as the saying goes - "Capitalism is rubbish - but it's still better than all the other options." and we will always have inequality for as long as humanity exists, because "survival of the fittest" in ALL IT'S FORMS is hardwired into every species on earth and none of us are born equally.

This is the world you live in - maybe you should pay a bit more attention.


----------



## Terry - Somerset (18 Jan 2021)

We have a convention in the UK of holding ministers and governments accountable for that which that happens under their control.

This is often unfair as they may have no knowledge, or relied upon their civil servants to alert, advise and correct. 

However, if a party has been in power for 10 years or more they must accept full responsibility. They cannot fairly blame their predecessors. 

The Tories are wholly responsible for failings in contingency planning, lack of PPE etc which resulted in a high early death toll in the pandemic. 

Similarly, Labour under Blair and Brown are wholly responsible for failings in financial governance which lead to the 2008-10 financial crisis.

Both are global in nature, both could at the time have been assessed as fairly high risks requiring action, and in both cases they failed.


----------



## Trainee neophyte (18 Jan 2021)

Terry - Somerset said:


> Both are global in nature, both could at the time have been assessed as fairly high risks requiring action, and in both cases they failed.


I have have a bit of sympathy for the various governments not being prepared for a pandemic - USA and UK were deemed by the experts to be the _most_ prepaired of _all nations in the world. _It turns out that experts aren't worth the paper they write on, especially
ly when they change the rules mid crisis. (The Countries Best And Worst Prepared For An Epidemic [Infographic])

As for financial crises - these are created by the system, and therefore happen on a regular, predictable timescale. Claiming that you couldn't see one coming just confirms you as being completely incompetent. Or a liar who benefits from the perpetual boom/bust cycle. (If you are in on the timimg there is lots of money to be made).


----------



## Rorschach (18 Jan 2021)

Trainee neophyte said:


> I have have a bit of sympathy for the various governments not being prepared for a pandemic - USA and UK were deemed by the experts to be the _most_ prepaired of _all nations in the world. _It turns out that experts aren't worth the paper they write on, especially
> ly when they change the rules mid crisis. (The Countries Best And Worst Prepared For An Epidemic [Infographic])
> 
> As for financial crises - these are created by the system, and therefore happen on a regular, predictable timescale. Claiming that you couldn't see one coming just confirms you as being completely incompetent. Or a liar who benefits from the perpetual boom/bust cycle. (If you are in on the timimg there is lots of money to be made).



I wrote about it on the other thread. UK was very well prepared for a flu pandemic. Unfortunately mother nature was rather sneaky and sent us something less deadly but far more transmissible for which we had no effective treatment at the time. It was like we were prepared for a rain storm with umbrella and sou'westers, then we had a heatwave.


----------



## RobinBHM (18 Jan 2021)

Trainee neophyte said:


> Claiming that you couldn't see one coming just confirms you as being completely incompetent



On the same basis a dead clock is right twice a day.


----------



## RobinBHM (18 Jan 2021)

Terry - Somerset said:


> Similarly, Labour under Blair and Brown are wholly responsible for failings in financial governance which lead to the 2008-10 financial crisis



I disagree, as does ex Bank of England governor:

"The former Bank of England governor Mervyn King has denied that the previous Labour government was responsible for the financial crash, saying there was a shared intellectual responsibility across the political parties and financial institutions for failing to foresee the problems.

Saying his view on the cause of the crisis had evolved, he said he doubted any single one country could have found their way through the crisis."


----------



## RobinBHM (18 Jan 2021)

Billy_wizz said:


> To be fair I don't see how turning a budgetary surplus into huge borrowing is not that bad to be fair!


On that basis, this Tory government have massively increased borrowing in the last 12 months.

Maybe context is important.......


----------



## Suffolk Brian (18 Jan 2021)

There are a lot of conflicting views here, which imho all carry a certain amount of weight. My wife and I own our own home; partly through footslog on our own part, and partly through inheritance. I do feel sorry for the younger generation, though. My great grandson is manager of a store in the construction world, responsible job, married with two small boys - I hate the word kids - and is trapped paying £1K+ a month rent for a crappy little newish build 2 up 2 down. His wife works part time, but I cannot see them being able to get on the housing ladder soon, if ever. Another point I noticed in this thread, my wife is dyslexic. Didn’t hold her back. She was manageress of a hairdressers back in the day. But I know when she is struggling because her writing becomes a scribble that even she cannot read. Some words are phonetically spelt, which may seem nonsense unless you know what she is trying to say. But she can communicate, and that’s what it is all about.


----------



## Jacob (18 Jan 2021)

rafezetter said:


> I would refute most of that with a simple caveat aded to the beginning of each of your points: "some".
> 
> Your posts reads like it's 100% coverage when that is simply untrue and frankly an incredibly egregious oversimplification of very complex matters.
> 
> ...


Just did word count of the above - 1021!!! 
I think that's about 800 too many. Can't be bothered to read any of them!


----------



## Deadeye (18 Jan 2021)

rafezetter said:


> I would refute most of that with a simple caveat aded to the beginning of each of your points: "some".
> 
> Your posts reads like it's 100% coverage when that is simply untrue and frankly an incredibly egregious oversimplification of very complex matters.
> 
> ...



Gosh, where on earth did you find most of that in my post? I obviously put 10p in the rant machine. 

I believe that collectively my generation has been asleep at the wheel (at best; at worst it's actively and knowingly pursued these things) and allowed a system to develop that is very harmful long-term. You don't.

Oh, and it's a long time since I've seen a less credible use of the word "proved".

But, hey, be as patronising and narrow thinking as you like. I've got the perfect pigeonhole for you, and it's not the one you think!


----------



## Petehpkns (18 Jan 2021)

Rorschach said:


> I wrote about it on the other thread. UK was very well prepared for a flu pandemic. Unfortunately mother nature was rather sneaky and sent us something less deadly but far more transmissible for which we had no effective treatment at the time. It was like we were prepared for a rain storm with umbrella and sou'westers, then we had a heatwave.


Not less deadly......








Covid deaths three times higher than flu and pneumonia


Office for National Statistics data looked at the underlying cause of death in England and Wales.



www.bbc.co.uk


----------



## Rorschach (18 Jan 2021)

Petehpkns said:


> Not less deadly......
> 
> 
> 
> ...




Just wait till we get the real data in a few years time.


----------



## billw (18 Jan 2021)

rafezetter said:


> LESS people have died from nuclear incidents in it's entire history than have died in plane crashes for the same period of time, 66 years - but apparently that fact "isn't relevant" when assessing the dangers of nuclear power.
> 
> There are nuclear power plants now so small and self contained they practically manage themselves - they are on submarines.
> 
> One teenager in the USA MADE ONE IN HIS GARAGE!



Chernobyl is estimated (conservatively) to have killed 16,000 people, Fukushima 18,500. Since 1970 the annual total number of deaths from air crashes has never breached 400, and rarely exceeds 200. Therefore even using a probably way too high average of 300 for the last 50 years gives a total of 15,000 deaths. The suspicious explosion in the Russian Arctic recently had unknown effects but was likely nuclear.

People have indeed made nuclear reactors at home although 1) they consume more energy than they produce; 2) they're very dangerous - you need a 40kV DC supply (for comparison the UK train network runs on 25kV AC) which I'm pretty sure is going to sting if it touches you


----------



## Petehpkns (18 Jan 2021)

Rorschach said:


> Just wait till we get the real data in a few years time.


That is real data, it is the best available at a given point in time likewise from this..









COVID-19 vs. the Flu







www.hopkinsmedicine.org





Governments, agencies et al are reacting to information derived from available data. In time as more data becomes available then those agencies simply review and inform, it is a constantly evolving process.


----------



## Rorschach (18 Jan 2021)

Petehpkns said:


> That is real data, it is the best available at a given point in time likewise from this..
> 
> 
> 
> ...



Yep and at the moment the data is flawed. We have no idea what the true level of infection vs deaths of C19 is so our mortality rate is inflated (but we don't know exactly how much). Conversely flu, we vaccinate every year and almost never test for it, so our mortality figures are a best guess and are deflated. I think we are probably pretty close with our numbers of the IFR for flu, but our IFR for C19 is probably at least 10x higher than the real number (not my estimates, that of scientists). As I say, in a few years we will have much more accurate data and it will almost certainly show that C19 is less deadly than flu, or possibly comparable.

Using confirmed infections, I absolutely agree, C19 looks to be several times more deadly than flu but that rate has been dropping since last years estimations and will continue to do so as more data becomes available.

EDIT: A simple example, on July 1st 2020 in the UK, the CFR was 14.2%, today the CFR is 2.6%. That's a significant drop.


----------



## Jelly (18 Jan 2021)

billw said:


> People have indeed made nuclear reactors at home although 1) they consume more energy than they produce; 2) they're very dangerous - you need a 40kV DC supply (for comparison the UK train network runs on 25kV AC) which I'm pretty sure is going to sting if it touches you



I think you're thinking of cold-fusion reactors, which I would classify with tesla coils as cool but highly impractical and slightly terrifying hobby projects.

I think he was referring to David Hahn "the nuclear boy scout" who tried to make a breeder reactor using geology samples, disassembled smoke detectors, and camping lantern mantles.

Whilst he never achieved fission, Hahn did manage to build a potent neutron source, and cause a major pollution and radiological incident in the process.

Whilst I believe nuclear power is an important part of the energy mix, Hahn's dangerous and misguided experiments are not anything I'd chose to use in a PR exercise for it, as they couldn't be further from the tightly controlled, hyper safery-concious, slow moving leviathan that is the nuclear industry.


----------



## Jacob (18 Jan 2021)

billw said:


> Chernobyl is estimated (conservatively) to have killed 16,000 people, Fukushima 18,500. Since 1970 the annual total number of deaths from air crashes has never breached 400, and rarely exceeds 200. Therefore even using a probably way too high average of 300 for the last 50 years gives a total of 15,000 deaths. The suspicious explosion in the Russian Arctic recently had unknown effects but was likely nuclear.
> 
> People have indeed made nuclear reactors at home although 1) they consume more energy than they produce; 2) they're very dangerous - you need a 40kV DC supply (for comparison the UK train network runs on 25kV AC) which I'm pretty sure is going to sting if it touches you


Chernobyl was very close to becoming a world changing disaster for a huge area downstream, into the Mediterranean and all coastal countries. 
"International Nuclear Information System" website says: "The accident at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant could have been worse. Only one reactor was affected and only a small percentage of the core was released. The effect of fallout was less than it might have been because the initial plume did not encounter rain until it reached Sweden, so that much of the radioactivity dispersed over the Arctic and oceans. Also the wind direction meant that less radioactivity was deposited over Western Europe than was potentially possible. It is concluded that the Chernobyl accident could have been much worse with 200 to 400 times the radiation consequences. This would have had severe social consequences as well. "


----------



## Selwyn (18 Jan 2021)

RobinBHM said:


> I disagree, as does ex Bank of England governor:
> 
> "The former Bank of England governor Mervyn King has denied that the previous Labour government was responsible for the financial crash, saying there was a shared intellectual responsibility across the political parties and financial institutions for failing to foresee the problems.
> 
> Saying his view on the cause of the crisis had evolved, he said he doubted any single one country could have found their way through the crisis."



Well if he did he would find he would have been culpable as well


----------



## Mark Hancock (18 Jan 2021)

Selwyn said:


> Well if he did he would find he would have been culpable as well


It was interesting hear Mark Carney's take on this subject recently in the Reith Lectures.


----------



## RobinBHM (18 Jan 2021)

Rorschach said:


> As I say, in a few years we will have much more accurate data and it will almost certainly show that C19 is less deadly than flu



I see you persist in repeating the same misinformation.

There has been massive intervention to reduce infection spread of Covid.
Millions of people have been shielding, millions have taken considerable efforts to reduce risk of infection.

You cannot compare deaths from Covid that occurred DESPITE massive intervention with any other metric.

Please can you explain why you continue to repeat the same lie?


----------



## Rorschach (18 Jan 2021)

RobinBHM said:


> I see you persist in repeating the same misinformation.
> 
> There has been massive intervention to reduce infection spread of Covid.
> Millions of people have been shielding, millions have taken considerable efforts to reduce risk of infection.
> ...



Intervention to reduce spread does nothing to reduce the case fatality rate.


----------



## RobinBHM (18 Jan 2021)

Rorschach said:


> As I say, in a few years we will have much more accurate data and it will almost certainly show that C19 is less deadly than flu, or possibly comparable



Covid has kilked around 700 healthcare workers UK
Covid has killed many many essential workers in UK
Covid has filled hospitals and nurses and doctors are struggling to cope
Covid has left many people with severe long term health issues.

Only a person not paying attention or being deliberately dishonest still believes Covid is no worse than flu.
Which are you?


----------



## Rorschach (18 Jan 2021)

RobinBHM said:


> Covid has kilked around 700 healthcare workers UK
> Covid has killed many many essential workers in UK
> Covid has filled hospitals and nurses and doctors are struggling to cope
> Covid has left many people with severe long term health issues.
> ...



As you love to say STRAWMAN! lol
The number of people you mention there killed by C19 has nothing to do with how deadly it is compared to flu and you know it.

Anyway you should probably move any criticism to the other thread, it's not fair on the OP.


----------



## Jelly (18 Jan 2021)

Mark Hancock said:


> It was interesting hear Mark Carney's take on this subject recently in the Reith Lectures.



Those have been excellent, even by Reith Lectures standards with quite nuanced viewpoints you hear broadcast all too rarely these days.


----------



## RobinBHM (18 Jan 2021)

Rorschach said:


> Intervention to reduce spread does nothing to reduce the case fatality rate.


Yes it does.

Vulnerable people have been shielding and are thus at lower risk of exposure.

Therefore more Covid tests returned positive will be younger people that have a massively lower fatality rate.

Why don't you understand that?


----------



## RobinBHM (18 Jan 2021)

Rorschach said:


> The number of people you mention there killed by C19 has nothing to do with how deadly it is compared to flu



Yes it does, it has everything to do with comparisons with flu.
Please stop lying.


----------



## Rorschach (18 Jan 2021)

RobinBHM said:


> Yes it does.
> 
> Vulnerable people have been shielding and are thus at lower risk of exposure.
> 
> ...



Oh dear. I think I am just going to have to stop replying to your nonsensical arguments. It would be ok if you were entertaining like rafezetter but you aren't.

My apologies to Jelly for the thread drift, I won't reply on this topic again as it will just cause trouble.


----------



## doctor Bob (18 Jan 2021)

Just to get the thread back on track.

It's never too late Jelly, I was 33 before I knew what I wanted to do properly. It's all turned out alright.
Honestly my adice is chill a bit more about life, try and make the most of it. I could have done better without doubt, I nearly borrowed £600,000 a few years ago to expand the business, take on more staff, open big swanky showroom, buy a commercial lease etc etc then you think about extra stress, the worry, the agro from staff, more projects to manage and it's not worth it.

If you think life is unfair for the young, well at least you are all in the same boat. Maybe no consolation but maybe a consideration that it's not you on your todd, which is how I felt at 33.


----------



## Jelly (18 Jan 2021)

doctor Bob said:


> Just to get the thread back on track.



Thanks Bob!



doctor Bob said:


> It's never too late Jelly, I was 33 before I knew what I wanted to do properly. It's all turned out alright.
> Honestly my adice is chill a bit more about life, try and make the most of it.


I'm very calm about most things in life, (I doubt I will ever be "chill" though, I think the ADD ensures I'm always going to be a very driven person, whether I like it or not), and for the most part life is turning out pretty well these days.

But, I'm not ashamed to admit that I've been extremely lucky that things have turned out well, sure I've put in hard graft, made tough choices and all the other "pull yourself up by the bootstraps" cliches...

But, I know dozens of people just like me, all equally worthy individuals who are still struggling to attain the basic security that lets you really appreciate the good things in life.

Seeing (and empathising strongly with) that unnecessary, harsh and capricious social inequality; whilst increasingky seeing that it's predominantly been caused by short term thinking on the behalf of a series of equally (but differently) dismal politicians, really boils my blood.

Which is why I'm so passionate about some of these issues, in a more intense kind of way that is wholly normal for me.



doctor Bob said:


> I could have done better without doubt, I nearly borrowed £600,000 a few years ago to expand the business, take on more staff, open big swanky showroom, buy a commercial lease etc etc then you think about extra stress, the worry, the agro from staff, more projects to manage and it's not worth it.


Right about now that's looking like excellent foresight!

I'm aware of a number of highly geared businesses which were on a strong growth path until recently, where life is currently proving very stressful indeed for the management, and I don't doubt some of them will unfortunately become veritable Icarus's, whilst others will make it though all the while leaving their MD's looking like the portrait of Dorian Gray into the bargain

None of it seems awful pleasant!




doctor Bob said:


> If you think life is unfair for the young, well at least you are all in the same boat. Maybe no consolation but maybe a consideration that it's not you on your todd, which is how I felt at 33.



There is that, I definitely get the impression that there's a certain sense of solidarity that some of my older colleagues weren't fortunate enough to have at my time in life. 

But then as I said, I've been lucky and I know it, so it could just be me being fortunate again.


----------



## D_W (19 Jan 2021)

Billy_wizz said:


> Personally think rent should be capt at X of market value as we've now reached the point of stupidity where renters affectively buy houses for people who can afford a deposit because rent costs more than mortgage repayments



In places where property values aren't bonkers here, that's effectively all rent. Rent pays the mortgage and fees and if it didn't, nobody would rent their properties. The high cost of living accommodations is due to increasingly thick layers of building codes, zoning and moratoriums on development of open land for more property. 

The attempt on the latter is to get yuppies to redo downtrodden areas, and when they do, they seem to build even more expensive properties and push the urban residents to a different area.


----------



## D_W (19 Jan 2021)

Thinking further about this (outside of covid where it's just used as a crowbar), I'd like to compare things using figures from here (vs. there). 

In the 1950s and 1960s, a typical house in the US cost about 2x a buyer's salary. I don't know if this was median or mean
By the time the last real estate explosion was done (just prior to 2008), the average home price was 7-11x the annual salary of the buyer. 

I stuck with a house that was 2x when I bought mine because I have a fear of running out of money (just due to upbringing). I'd rather be ashamed of my house a couple of times than be out of money, or car or whatever. 

At the same time in the 1950s or 1960s, you could get a job at the elevator factory in town for more than the annual average earnings - not right away, but the apprenticeship program at the (union) factory paid more than the average job itself, so you wouldn't starve the first couple of years. That factory is relocated and closed now. But the town is littered with retirees from it who earned well and retired early. If they're smart, they live in the 2x salary house. 

What is an equivalent for everyone now? If the notion is that nobody works hard, that's just inaccurate. Some people don't and the message to kids is more complex. College is more expensive (my dad's first job paid 1.5 times his college cost - one year of salary vs. all 4 years of college). My job was just under 1 times college cost. Now, that figure for a _good job_ is 3-4x for public colleges. My parents paid for my college and I'm going to do my best to pay for my kids' college if they have something gainful they want to learn (no humanities degrees unless they think they're going to be a professor - well rounded and incapable of anything economically gainful makes no sense to me). 

When my wife got into her profession (physical therapy), the education requirement was going from bachelor's degree to that plus 2 year masters program. Now it's 3 years after bachelors, but salaries haven't changed a whole lot. The job is far more complicated than it was 20 years ago thanks to economic and documentation requirements. 

It's possible to live better now than anyone has ever lived probably in the history of man, but the barriers to entry are also greater than they've ever been at any time after the industrial revolution (prior to that, what would you invest in, anyway? fraud was rampant here in the states in the gilded age and only the wealthy had access to legitimate investment in anything other than property). 

We also have "experts" around everywhere who can tell you that any profitable profession is unethical and you'll be taking advantage of someone else if you do it. Apparently blogging opinions and selling ads to do that isn't unethical, but whatever. 

It's not much of a surprise to me that if someone doesn't know exactly what they want to do, the idea of buying a house that they'll never really pay off (but will get to pay to repair in the interim), etc, doesn't look at that attractive. Even typical contractor jobs here (subs, etc), require licensing and harassments that was never present 30 years ago. The people crying loudly about income inequity and complaining about "Big business" are chief in charge of the things that make it hard for the average person to create a business in the first place.


----------



## Terry - Somerset (19 Jan 2021)

In the 50 years since I left school much has changed.

Houses cost more, but are generally much better equipped. Household income spent on food has declined, as has the cost of travel. What we spend our money on has changed - media, smartphones, computers, travel, consumer durables etc either didn't exist 50 years ago or have grown in ownership whilst unit costs have fallen.

Employment and jobs have changed - mining, steel, secretarial and manufacturing jobs have largely gone. IT, media, games, marketing, health and safety, gym subscriptions etc have replaced them.

In a macro sense we are much better off. C19 aside, the loss of employment has been more than offset by new opportunities.

The only thing remaining relatively unchanged is that most people spend most of what they earn. Only the points of stress have changed.

There may be an argument to rebalance the the way stresses impact different age or other groups. But the broad proposition that older folk who have worked for (say) 40 years should be able to enjoy the fruits of their labours remains unchanged.


----------



## billw (19 Jan 2021)

I think @doctor Bob has pretty much hit the nail on the head, certainly I have been a LOT happier (well, ignoring the long-term Cilatopram prescription  ) since I effectively quit the rat race and stopped obsessing about material possessions. Life's about the experience, and I think gen Z seem to be going down this path too, which is all the better for them mentally.

Of course one of the reasons they like experiences rather than possessions is that hardly any of them have a house in which to put any possessions.


----------



## RobinBHM (20 Jan 2021)

I've noticed in recent years an awful lot of 20 somethings driving around in nearly new cars, often a Merc or BMW.

I have heard anecdotally that young people that see house buying so far from reality that they don't bother, stay living with parents and spend on things like cars....with the super cheap finance that's been around.


----------



## Amateur (25 Jan 2021)

Observations

I find it difficult to define, YOUNG today. 

All I can see is opportunity at every turn. 
Maybe that's because I'm old?
The guidance isn't there today I will say that.
Maybe that's the problem enlightenment?
But will they listen?

Be blowed if I'd pay uni fees and then spend it in the pub or a year or two back packing.

I'd be badgering any engineering company to sponsor me, or a supermarket, or a civil engineering company.....roads and bridges the way to go right? 
But there are loads of FT 100 companies out there.
I'd pick the right course for the job I wanted, a degree the employers want.
I'd work three days a week because lectures are only two days a week. Course work at weekends or at night.
I'd pick a uni I could travel daily to and live at home to save money.
And I'd save.
I'd eventually move north and buy a home.
Then a bigger house.

If I picked the wrong job? 
Tough. I stuck an apprenticeship for 6 years hated every minute but if held me in good stead whatever I did. 
So I'd stick at it. Head down stuck in.


Don't go hiding behind I was a late developer, or I didn't know what I wanted at 30.
It just doesn't rub. Get stuck in.


So this is my plan 
Might sound a load of rubbish to you. 
But its a plan and without a plan you will only look back when your old and say,
If Only, I wish that I'd..........If I'd only........


----------



## doctor Bob (25 Jan 2021)

Amateur said:


> Observations
> 
> I find it difficult to define, YOUNG today.
> 
> ...



I was a late developer, I've done great in life. I've hated jobs and stuck with them, I should never have done this, life is for happiness not detesting every minute to prove a point.
I went to Austrailia for 2 years and still 30 years later think wow, 2 years in the outback best experience of my life.

I say if you are young, just have the time of your life, grow up later in life. Fun and happiness are everything.


----------



## Amateur (25 Jan 2021)

doctor Bob said:


> I've got to say that's a load of rubbish. I was a late developer, I've done great in life. I've hated jobs and stuck with them, I should never have done this, life is for happiness not detesting every minute to prove a point.
> I went to Austrailia for 2 years and still 30 years later think wow, 2 years in the outback best experience of my life.
> 
> I say if you are young, just have the time of your life, grow up later in life. Fun and happiness are everything.



And that's your view which I respect, but I don't agree with it either.
Today's people may not not be so lucky as you were, which is one of the reasons for so much hostility with older people.

PS I said you might think its a load of rubbish near the end.


----------



## doctor Bob (25 Jan 2021)

Amateur said:


> .....................which is one of the reasons for so much hostility with older people.



I am probably lucky, but I just don't ever see this.
It's been mentioned before but all my sons mates are good funny kids, all the football kids are sound, all my young lads at work are pleasant.
I see it on the news but in real life (my life) I don't see it.

P.S. yes I have been lucky with my work later in life, I don't think if you saw my life as a whole you'd describe it as lucky.


----------



## Droogs (25 Jan 2021)

There are 3 things I have learned the most about my life:
Most of the people I meet don't actually believe I have seen and done the things I have seen and done
Most of them will never have the opportunity to experience even half of them
Most of all, I would not change a thing


----------



## billw (25 Jan 2021)

Amateur said:


> Observations
> 
> I find it difficult to define, YOUNG today.
> 
> ...



What a great plan if it was 1971 all over again.


----------



## D_W (25 Jan 2021)

billw said:


> What a great plan if it was 1971 all over again.



mathematics curriculum was a bit too busy for that here. I tried to work friday and saturday nights at one point (i know, real party boy) but working late into each one set me back for catching up on course work saturday and sunday and I had to drop it eventually. Working several days a week is something for cheesy colleges or easy majors.


----------



## Amateur (25 Jan 2021)

billw said:


> What a great plan if it was 1971 all over again.



1971
ibrox disaster
angry brigade bombed sec states home, bomb planted in department of employment.
Postal workers go on strike.
Rolls Royce go bankrupt.
immigration bill to strip commonwealth immigrants of their rights to stay in uk
repatriation scheme demanded.
250,000 kill the bomb protesters went on strike
rioting in north Derry
UNEMPLOYMENT reached post war high of 815,000
morris marina launched
free milk to schools stops
harvey Smith gives V sign to judges
90 Russian Diplomats expelled for spying
house of commons voted in favour of joining EEC
More killings in Belfast
More soldiers killed in Ireland
inflation stood at 8.6% a 30 year high

Yeh the good old days you mean?


----------



## RobinBHM (25 Jan 2021)

Amateur said:


> Yeh the good old days you mean



Imagine looking back on 2020 and 2021 in a decade or 2


----------



## billw (25 Jan 2021)

Amateur said:


> 1971
> 
> Yeh the good old days you mean?



Congratulations on being able to use google, but it was flippant and more suggestive that your "plan" belongs in the past. When I was a lad I had to eat coal etc etc. 

*All I can see is opportunity at every turn.
Maybe that's because I'm old?*

Also because you can magic "opportunity" out of thin air because you're probably not the one trying to get a job out these supposed "opportunities". 

*The guidance isn't there today I will say that.
Maybe that's the problem enlightenment?
But will they listen?*

Hopefully not to you.

*Be blowed if I'd pay uni fees and then spend it in the pub or a year or two back packing.*

Ah fees. Did your generation have to pay them? I mean I *technically* do but it's all of government loans and the chances of them seeing much of it back are probably.....slim.

*I'd be badgering any engineering company to sponsor me, or a supermarket, or a civil engineering company.....roads and bridges the way to go right?*

They do exist, but rare. I know someone who's on a 6 year apprenticeship with JLR, but he had to jump through hoops to get it and a lot of applicants didn't. A LOT of applicants didn't.

*But there are loads of FT 100 companies out there.*

There's 100 of them.

*I'd pick the right course for the job I wanted, a degree the employers want.*

You know strangely enough I think many students do just that, certainly the brighter ones. But they're mostly 18 when they go to uni and trust me they really don't have much idea what they want to do, even less what they'll be able to do. 

*I'd work three days a week because lectures are only two days a week. Course work at weekends or at night.*

When I did my accountancy qualification I worked a 9-5 then did study from 6-10 5 days a week, then studied at weekends occasionally. It burned me out and doing that for three or four years? Come on. Young people want a bit of a life too you know.

*I'd pick a uni I could travel daily to and live at home to save money.*

Most students want to get away from their family to start to work towards independence. Something they might not be able to achieve and have to go live with their parents again after uni. Give them a break!

*And I'd save.*

Not as a student you wouldn't.

*I'd eventually move north and buy a home.*

Good plan when most of the jobs are down south. Also you need a deposit for that. No savings, remember?

*Then a bigger house.*

This plan is just going great. I'm amazed it's so easy. Swimming pool? Perhaps a billiard room? Maybe a bit of land so you can build a runway for your private jet?

*If I picked the wrong job?
Tough. I stuck an apprenticeship for 6 years hated every minute but if held me in good stead whatever I did.
So I'd stick at it. Head down stuck in.*

That sounds like the way to form a perfectly well-rounded individual. Nothing like 6 years of sheer hell in your early career to really give you a rosy feeling about the next 40-ish years of employment.

*Don't go hiding behind I was a late developer, or I didn't know what I wanted at 30.
It just doesn't rub. Get stuck in.*

Well thank the lord that there's a booming global economy and jobs are so plentiful some people are taking two and then just not turning up for one  

All the lower-paid jobs that young people often do to get experience are all going because retail's dying, the leisure sector is currently in stasis, graduate schemes still take people on but they're few and far between, it's all good and well saying "well start your own business" but not everyone's got the skill/ability/confidence to do that. 

Jobs are increasingly at risk of automation and AI taking them over, the future is not looking rosy whatsoever for a lot of the job market. Older people are now more likely to stay in their roles for longer to make up for the pandemic and lack of money for retirement, so that removes the career progression for people underneath unless firms expand, which right now they don't seem to be.


----------



## Rorschach (26 Jan 2021)

@billw great post. Unfortunately Amateur is just another boomer who think the problems are youth are caused by their laziness, love of lattes and avocado toast and if they could just stop looking at their phones they would be able to get a mortgage no problem


----------



## RobinBHM (26 Jan 2021)

Sadly the drive to make University available for all has led to a proliferation of non vocational courses and degrees are now 10 a penny.

The only sustainable way to make this country wealthier is to make it more productive.

Higher productivity comes from better management, better technical skills.

This country should invest massively in further education, technical, skills not universities.

And highly vocational degrees, like medicine should get bursaries.


----------



## RobinBHM (26 Jan 2021)

billw said:


> it's all good and well saying "well start your own business" but not everyone's got the skill/ability/confidence to do that



Judging by the millions of young people with YouTube channels, I'd say young people are often highly motivated and work day and night to get a career out of it.

Although the less said about "influencers" the better.


----------



## Amateur (26 Jan 2021)

billw said:


> Congratulations on being able to use google, but it was flippant and more suggestive that your "plan" belongs in the past. When I was a lad I had to eat coal etc etc.
> 
> *All I can see is opportunity at every turn.
> Maybe that's because I'm old?*
> ...



It does disturb me with replies like this to a post that offers maybe a different approach.
On every point you have a negative response.
Because you have a fixed view of how you see things maybe and don't wish to change that view?
Yet you bring no alternative suggestions?
It's as it is and that's it?
Kids will never own a home or have a decent retirement fund for old age if they don't plan early enough.
That's a fact..
And having a de feated view will never achieve that and only make you bitter and angry as you Get older.
it will always be someone else's fault, I was young, you had it easy.
false objections.


A couple of non post related observations.

There are just short of 130,000 Asian students studying in the Uk.
Their mind set is far different from our own.
All they see is opportunity, not negativity.
You don't see them drunk on the streets of our university cities, or drug taking and partying their university privileges away.
They are the same age as our students but are more likely to be studying engineering, sciences,, medicine and not art or interior design.

The food industry employ a vast number of people.
While people shun working in supermarkets as below them the opportunities are vast.
From accounting , to outside company product development, sales and marketing to specialised buyers. Etc. It's not just shelf stacking and supermarket management. There are good career paths here.

The same goes for engineering. Rolls Royce, British Aerospace, thousands of individual supporting companies diversified into different sectors.
And if you live in the South all the jobs are not down there.

Never a better time to become a medical professional either.
Or civil engineer.

That's for starters.


----------



## Amateur (26 Jan 2021)

RobinBHM said:


> Sadly the drive to make University available for all has led to a proliferation of non vocational courses and degrees are now 10 a penny.
> 
> The only sustainable way to make this country wealthier is to make it more productive.
> 
> ...



I agree on most of your comments.

I can only hope this Power House of the North concept will come to fruition.
At the moment Asia pumps out all the muck from their foundries while we all turn a blind eye.
It will be interesting to see how they will tackle the raw material conversion vrs pollution output if we start manufacturing.


----------



## billw (26 Jan 2021)

_"You can't become an expert in most fields in 3 years, so while the things you learn during your degree are certainly important, probably the most important skill you pick up is how to teach yourself to fill in the gaps. That's why courses get less and less didactic as you progress - the student becomes ever-more proficient at teaching themselves, to the point that they can deal with new concepts, technologies, frameworks etc. independently in their career. Most important thing the majority of people get out of university, often without realising it. " _(from a Professor)

Subject matter isn't necessarily the most important aspect. Also add on teaching life skills, independence meeting new friends (a lot of people meet their partner at university for example). Even people on "pointless" degrees can go on to do things not related to their field of study and get a good living out of it. One of my friends did a history degree and her dissertation was on the FBI and the Black Panther movement. I am pretty sure she'll never need to use that in a job, but that's not the point of writing it.

@Amateur I'm not being negative, I am being realistic. Your view of the world as being full of opportunity and it's the fault of the young for not taking them is just misguided. I don't want to be too broad or stereotypical (but probably will be), but opinions about the issues of the younger generations from people who are retired, have no mortgage, have a guaranteed pension income (possibly final salary based), and live in a comfortable home that was bought when house prices weren't 11x earnings...... they just usually smack of complete ignorance.

@RobinBHM Indeed the country does need to be more productive, the problem being that the people with the capital see higher productivity translating into less people and more machines so they can make more profit. I also TOTALLY agree about "influencers" but they make a lot of money for doing very little, or having a nomadic lifestyle. I saw one of them in action in Bali once, she spent about an hour in the pool, which had been covered in rose petals trying to get a perfect shot of her eating breakfast. Skinny little Russian girl she was. Had a team of three with her. She also didn't actually eat the breakfast and had two slices of toast afterwards. I never saw the final Instagram post but I bet she didn't mention what it took to get it.


----------



## Billy_wizz (26 Jan 2021)

billw said:


> _"You can't become an expert in most fields in 3 years, so while the things you learn during your degree are certainly important, probably the most important skill you pick up is how to teach yourself to fill in the gaps. That's why courses get less and less didactic as you progress - the student becomes ever-more proficient at teaching themselves, to the point that they can deal with new concepts, technologies, frameworks etc. independently in their career. Most important thing the majority of people get out of university, often without realising it. " _(from a Professor)
> 
> Subject matter isn't necessarily the most important aspect. Also add on teaching life skills, independence meeting new friends (a lot of people meet their partner at university for example). Even people on "pointless" degrees can go on to do things not related to their field of study and get a good living out of it. One of my friends did a history degree and her dissertation was on the FBI and the Black Panther movement. I am pretty sure she'll never need to use that in a job, but that's not the point of writing it.
> 
> ...


The need for mechanisation over people isn't necessarily a choice but rather a necessity in order to be able to afford wages that will enable you to employ staff that are prepared to work and more importantly turn up 5 days a week more often than not! Most of the businesses I deal with have staffing issues the biggest being you just don't know if there going to turn up from 1 day to the next


----------



## Droogs (26 Jan 2021)

dont use 0 hours contracts and pay at least a living wage rather than minimum and the staff will turn up


----------



## selectortone (26 Jan 2021)

Amateur said:


> 1971.....Morris marina launched



So it wasn't all bad news then


----------



## Jacob (26 Jan 2021)

Billy_wizz said:


> The need for mechanisation over people isn't necessarily a choice but rather a necessity in order to be able to afford wages that will enable you to employ staff that are prepared to work and more importantly turn up 5 days a week more often than not! Most of the businesses I deal with have staffing issues the biggest being you just don't know if there going to turn up from 1 day to the next


Probably because they are cr*p employers.
Slaves are some of the least willing to turn up - in fact were notorious for trying to do runners and avoid recapture!
n.b. Mechanisation is cheaper. That's why production is mechanised.
Recommended reading The Many-Headed Hydra the most interesting book I've read for a long time. Makes Marx look like an amateur.


----------



## Amateur (26 Jan 2021)

Jacob said:


> .b. Mechanisation is cheaper. That's why production is mechanised.



And in China. People are cheaper.
And in the food industry where output/ speed to feed an over populated planet is required primarily. 
And in Farming where immigrant workers pick the produce.



The main driver for mechanisation is greater profit.


----------



## billw (26 Jan 2021)

Billy_wizz said:


> Most of the businesses I deal with have staffing issues the biggest being you just don't know if there going to turn up from 1 day to the next



Which businesses do you deal with?


----------



## billw (26 Jan 2021)

Amateur said:


> And in China. People are cheaper.
> And in the food industry where output/ speed to feed an over populated planet is required primarily.
> And in Farming where immigrant workers pick the produce.
> 
> ...



China - people are cheaper because the economy is "cheaper". Have you ever wondered why you can buy a beer for the equivalent of 50p in Budapest? It's because 50p to them is the equivalent to £4 for us. We're distracted by the fact the world seems "cheap" because most people have zero comprehension of WHY things are "cheap".

Food industry - if you think we're overpopulated now then the next 50 years are going to be a shock. Not for you obviously, unless immortality becomes real.

Farming - immigrants do the work because they'll work long hours for less money, which is what many British people are "too good" to do. Yes I've seen anecdotal evidence disputing that on here, but it's exceptions, not rules.


----------



## Amateur (26 Jan 2021)

billw said:


> I'm not being negative, I am being realistic. Your view of the world as being full of opportunity and it's the fault of the young for not taking them is just misguided. I don't want to be too broad or stereotypical (but probably will be), but opinions about the issues of the younger generations from people who are retired, have no mortgage, have a guaranteed pension income (possibly final salary based), and live in a comfortable home that was bought when house prices weren't 11x earnings...... they just usually smack of complete ignorance.



I'm afraid if that's the way you see things its very sad.
But everyone to his opinion...right?

I'm out.


----------



## Amateur (26 Jan 2021)

billw said:


> China - people are cheaper because the economy is "cheaper". Have you ever wondered why you can buy a beer for the equivalent of 50p in Budapest? It's because 50p to them is the equivalent to £4 for us. We're distracted by the fact the world seems "cheap" because most people have zero comprehension of WHY things are "cheap".
> 
> Food industry - if you think we're overpopulated now then the next 50 years are going to be a shock. Not for you obviously, unless immortality becomes real.
> 
> Farming - immigrants do the work because they'll work long hours for less money, which is what many British people are "too good" to do. Yes I've seen anecdotal evidence disputing that on here, but it's exceptions, not rules.



You said that Mechanisation is cheaper.
I was pointing out that in some areas it isn't.
Irrespective of prices in Budapest for a beer....
and in Scotland last year the predominant race picking Strawberries were the Scots and English themselves.


----------



## billw (26 Jan 2021)

Amateur said:


> I'm afraid if that's the way you see things its very sad.
> But everyone to his opinion...right?
> 
> I'm out.



Truth hurts.


----------



## Amateur (26 Jan 2021)

billw said:


> Truth hurts.



If the truth hurts , what is the truth?
Enlighten us all.


----------



## Billy_wizz (26 Jan 2021)

billw said:


> Which businesses do you deal with?


Mostly small manufacturers who's selling price is set by cheap mass produced/imported competition most people want there better quality but only if they match the cheap prices alot are based around sawmilling and fencing!


----------



## billw (26 Jan 2021)

Amateur said:


> If the truth hurts , what is the truth?
> Enlighten us all.



The truth is the world is a very different place to what many members on here will have experienced. The era of parents having grown up in the devastation of two world wars has gone, the younger generations have no concept of the Berlin Wall, communism, the Cuba missile crisis, none of the Cold War era. They've often not even known life without mobile phones, the internet, a globalised economy. 

It's worrying that a large segment of the population wants thing to go backwards, not forwards. Kids glued to phones? NORMAL. Multiculturalism? NORMAL. Economic hardships due to recessions and crises? NORMAL. Stop trying to make the world go back to what's comfortable for you. Yes, bank branches are closing - so what! Who the hell needs them exactly? The older generations who panic about fraudsters? As if fraud and scams are new. My mum got wound up by the fact NSI wanted her bank account details to pay her premium bond winnings into because they were going to stop cheques CHEQUES! Wow, I'm nearly 50 and I think cheques belong in a museum. 

It's a shame that the older generations shape the world into their comfort zone and not into the world that's best for their kids and grandkids. That's the truth.


----------



## Nigel Burden (26 Jan 2021)

billw said:


> It's a shame that the older generations shape the world into their comfort zone and not into the world that's best for their kids and grandkids. That's the truth.



That's the way it's always been throughout history, and will always be.

Nigel.


----------



## Droogs (26 Jan 2021)

> billw said:
> 
> 
> It's a shame that the older generations shape the world into their comfort zone and not into the world that's best for their kids and grandkids. That's the truth.


That's the way it's always been throughout history, and will always be.

Nigel.




No wonder, have you ever had to sit in a primary school chair for a parents evening


----------



## Nigel Burden (26 Jan 2021)

Droogs said:


> That's the way it's always been throughout history, and will always be.
> 
> Nigel.
> 
> ...



Long time ago Droogs.

Nigel.


----------



## billw (26 Jan 2021)

Nigel Burden said:


> That's the way it's always been throughout history, and will always be.
> 
> Nigel.



I don't think the world changed fast enough for this to matter until the last century. Now the pace of acceleration is so rapid that it's way more noticeable than ever before. Struggling to see that in the 17th century there were jokes about "when I was a lad". 

Will it always be that way? Only if we persist in seeing older as wiser with no pushback. If older people were truly wise, they'd stop thinking the past was the way forward.


----------



## Jacob (26 Jan 2021)

billw said:


> I don't think the world changed fast enough for this to matter until the last century. Now the pace of acceleration is so rapid that it's way more noticeable than ever before. Struggling to see that in the 17th century there were jokes about "when I was a lad".
> ..


17C was one of the most turbulent periods in British history - most of the country bemoaning how things were, in between riots, land expropriation, clearances, enclosures, assassinations, transportations as slaves, revolutions (Levellers, Diggers) huge mobs of the dispossessed roaming the country and being persecuted or transported as slaves. Witch burnings. Not to mention the plague (two years 15% of the population dead), Fire of London, regicide, Cromwells massacres in Ireland, the African slave trade expanding as the supply of British and Irish slaves diminished
It was all go, never a dull moment!
It was the violent birth of capitalism as we now know it.
Read all about it Verso


----------



## billw (26 Jan 2021)

Jacob said:


> 17C was one of the most turbulent periods in British history - most of the country bemoaning how things were, in between riots, land expropriation, clearances, enclosures, assassinations, transportations as slaves, revolutions (Levellers, Diggers) huge mobs of the dispossessed roaming the country and being persecuted. Not to mention the plague, Fire of London, regicide, Cromwells massacres in Ireland, the slave trade expanding.
> It was all go, never a dull moment!
> It was the birth of capitalism as we now know it



I wouldn't classify those as progress, then again in the 23rd century most of what we do now won't be classed as progress either.

And from what you've described I'm pretty sure people weren't going to reminisce about the good old days.


----------



## Rorschach (26 Jan 2021)

Jacob said:


> 17C was one of the most turbulent periods in British history - most of the country bemoaning how things were, in between riots, land expropriation, clearances, enclosures, assassinations, transportations as slaves, revolutions (Levellers, Diggers) huge mobs of the dispossessed roaming the country and being persecuted or transported as slaves. Witch burnings. Not to mention the plague, Fire of London, regicide, Cromwells massacres in Ireland, the African slave trade expanding as the supply of British and Irish slaves diminished
> It was all go, never a dull moment!
> It was the violent birth of capitalism as we now know it.
> Read all about it Verso



Well it seems it was all go because we look at the historically important bits. I suspect, like 99% of human history it was just dull life as normal for most people.


----------



## Jacob (26 Jan 2021)

billw said:


> ...
> 
> And from what you've described I'm pretty sure people weren't going to reminisce about the good old days.


They certainly were going to reminisce- the loss of the commons (England), clearances of the Highlands (Scotland), the violent purges in Ireland, were all fresh in peoples' memories of a relatively peaceful previous existence.
The death rate from the plague alone was equivalent to 9 million covid deaths today i.e. 90 times higher.


----------



## billw (26 Jan 2021)

Jacob said:


> They certainly were going to reminisce- the loss of the commons (England), clearances of the Highlands (Scotland), the violent purges in Ireland, were all fresh in people's memories of a relatively peaceful previous existence.



OK well does that put into perspective the reminiscing these days about being able to speak to your bank manager in person whilst writing a cheque, or buying sweets by the quarter-pound, or family Sunday dinners, or "everyone being white" (as my mum likes to point out). There hasn't been any chronic devastation post-WW2, it's just a load of people who think Britain still has a bloody empire and runs the world.


----------



## RobinBHM (26 Jan 2021)

Nigel Burden said:


> That's the way it's always been throughout history, and will always be.
> 
> Nigel.


Bah....it wasn't like that in my day


----------



## davedevelopment (27 Jan 2021)

billw said:


> It's a shame that the older generations shape the world into their comfort zone and not into the world that's best for their kids and grandkids. That's the truth.



A lot of my thinking boils down to a mixture of selfishness and lack of faith in other people. Any day of the week, I'd back myself to make my small bubble of the world better for my kids and grandkids to follow on with, rather than successive governments to make the whole world better. Sad, but true.


----------



## Rorschach (27 Jan 2021)

davedevelopment said:


> A lot of my thinking boils down to a mixture of selfishness and lack of faith in other people. Any day of the week, I'd back myself to make my small bubble of the world better for my kids and grandkids to follow on with, rather than successive governments to make the whole world better. Sad, but true.



I think it boils down to what do you consider "better"? That answer changes depending on the person. Clearly there are some who think it's "better" if we all worked 8 hours down the pit then had a scrub up in the tin bath, put on our flat caps and go down the pub for a pint of mild and a bag of pork scratchings. Then die of COPD at 40.


----------



## rafezetter (27 Jan 2021)

billw said:


> I don't think the world changed fast enough for this to matter until the last century. Now the pace of acceleration is so rapid that it's way more noticeable than ever before. Struggling to see that in the 17th century there were jokes about "when I was a lad".
> 
> Will it always be that way? Only if we persist in seeing older as wiser with no pushback. If older people were truly wise, they'd stop thinking the past was the way forward.



My counterpoint to your last point would be "if only the youth would pay attention to the lessons of thier forefathers".

The whole "doomed to repeated them" thing

oh and read more bloody history so that they don't go on a rampage pulling down statues of people they think are the sole reason for slavery in the 16th & 17th centuries when the black people themselves have a lot to answer for in that regard (and the arabs and pretty much everyone else - oh and the christians advocated it as well, go check for yourself - have they ransacked any churches? nope.)

One of the reasons why the youth get such a bad rap is simply because they almost ALWAYS fail to take all aspects into account - one of the reasons why a lot of society is shaped by thier elders is because they have learned (mostly from bad experiences) that the situation is *far more nuanced* than most youth is capable of grasping.

Take Greta Thunberg for example - she is just a mouthpiece for those doing the talking, OLDER PEOPLE, she may have started on her own, when no-one was listening, in an "outraged precocious child" kind of way, but once she started getting traction, you think she's writing all those long speechs by herself? Get real, she's getting help, a LOT of it, from older, more experienced sources. 

Youthful exuberance only gets you so far, after that you need wiser, more experienced hands - ignore those and your failure is certain.

Here's a question - whom is the youngest world leader today (not including any Dalai Lama style resurrected 5 yr olds)

nvm found it - youngest of someplace important is Austria 34.5 yrs old (ruled by germany mostly IMHO), North Korea (nutter) 38 and NZ's Jacinda Ardern at 40.

While 40 isn't considered "old" by modern standards now, it's plenty of time to get some mileage under your belt (or skirt in her case  ) The majority of western people under the age of 30 really don't have much of a clue about anything - they THINK they do, but they don't.

Whomever mentioned it about the asians being serious about their future and subjects studied, he's right 100% - they don't study "art history" because an "art history" degree is a fast way to poverty and starvation.

They don't study *what they like,* they study *what will get them ahead*. This is the fundamental reason behind Asias explosive growth economies.

Western "art history" or "classical literature of the 1500's" or "abstract dance" or "the life and times of someone we've never heard of" is also the reason why western society is struggling to keep up . (and also why until not very long ago working class northern men would refer to "that lot in oxbridge" as "a bunch of ponces").

Can't expect to stay in the game if you don't understand the rules of how to win and too much ground has been given already to the bleating voices of those whom want to study "art history" on the taxpayers penny that has led to an almost complete annihiliation of trade apprenticships and places to learn the trades.)

The YOUTH did that, not the old, and only now 20 odd years later are they realising thier monumental mistake.

Give the world to the young to control? no thanks.


----------



## doctor Bob (27 Jan 2021)

You do know kids are supposed to be rebels and annoy their elders.


----------



## rafezetter (27 Jan 2021)

If that's for me Dr Bob, sure I'm not saying they shouldn't be independant "free spirits", but they can't have it both ways - if they want to be young and free and rebellious, fine, just don't be surprised when you wake up at 35 with nothing to show for it but some interesting tattoos, then complain to almost everyone who will listen how they can't get a house "because of the older generation", or the 35 yr old asian landlord whom now has 5 houses because he kept his head down, worked hard and was clever with his life choices.

The asians policy of "study hard *in a field that will actually get you a job*, then work hard, no pulling a sick day _ever_, be reliable, punctual, and most importantly value that job (or both jobs or all three in some cases), _regardless of whether you like it or not_" seems to be working for them pretty well.

you'll find it hard to argue with that reality.

I'm not saying that's ALL it comes down to, but that's a big portion of it - if you want a house in the south which is essentially "the posh part of town", you'll have to work harder for it than the person next to you - if you can't (or won't), then have a transferable skill (like the asians) where you can work almost anywhere, and move north where it's cheaper. It's not a hard equation to solve.

It's not exactly been a secret that housing in the south has always been more expensive, yes the prices have outstripped wages by a ridiculous margin in the last 20 years, but that too, isn't "new" information - everyone in their 30's complaining about this situation has had access to this information and could have changed thier "life choices" to suit, but clearly many just didn't bother paying this rather vital information any attention** until they were nose to nose with it, by which time it was far too late.

too busy with beer pong / clubmed holidays / gap year(s) "to find myself" / clubbing it / other self indulgent BS and generally pissing it against the wall.

I don't care how you cut this cake, they "the youth", CANNOT wheadle out of the fact all the information was there for them to act on, if they so chose, and some of the blame rests squarely on thier own shoulders.

This is yet another reason why "the youth" (western youth anyway) as a collective whole cannot be trusted with the future - they are far too shortsighted.


----------



## Rorschach (27 Jan 2021)

@doctor Bob I am glad we have someone someone older and wiser to guide us like rafezetter. The stories he has told of us how how he paid of his mortgage at 25, bought several more properties to let out, retired at 40 to live in a Spanish villa and writes books just for fun. They really make me feel better about the world and how if you just put in a little work you too can have it all like he does. We should all follow his lead so we can be happy and contented like he is.


----------



## doctor Bob (27 Jan 2021)

rafezetter said:


> too busy with beer pong / clubmed holidays / gap year(s) "to find myself" / clubbing it / other self indulgent BS and generally pissing it against the wall.



you forgot "fanny" .................. great days.


----------



## Jelly (27 Jan 2021)

rafezetter said:


> Can't expect to stay in the game if you don't understand the rules of how to win and too much ground has been given already to the bleating voices of those whom want to study "art history" on the taxpayers penny that has led to an almost complete annihiliation of trade apprenticships and places to learn the trades.)
> 
> The YOUTH did that, not the old, and only now 20 odd years later are they realising thier monumental mistake.



I'm just going to put aside the vitriol about art history (although, I would note it's not that far removed from the history of furniture or interior joinery, which I think _a few_ people on the forum have more than a passing interest in) and assume you're unlikely to be convinced of the value of scholarly research in anything which can't immediately be translated into money, or by the concept of transferable skills in a "knowledge economy".



Having done that I can safely say that your assertion about apprenticeships is entirely inaccurate.

I've had more than passing involvement with trying to establish new degree apprenticeships (it's very difficult and horrendously burecratic) and have spent a fair bit of time speaking to older colleagues who were heavily involved with CITB and PROSkills (The process industries skills council) about the decline of apprenticeships.

In their estimation the end of the craft apprenticeship came about as the result of ongoing political meddling by people who wanted to turn everything into neat qualifications, whilst not listening to the voices of Industry Representatives who actually hired apprentices and skilled workers.

That's got damn all to do with young people, but at least a bit to do with who their parents and grandparent's voted for.


Also, even if we suddenly got the old apprenticeship schemes, and all the poly's and technical colleges which supported people who started via an apprenticeship route to develop into foremen, (and managers, and engineers, and even directors) back tomorrow...

_We just don't have the industry sectors which could support a huge number of skilled apprentices anymore_, because of... 

Wait for it...

Political and Economic decisions made as far back as 40 years ago.



Like it or not, when it comes to the big issues around access to well paid, skilled employment and the vocational training which enables that in the UK; the die was cast a long time ago... 

In fact there's a good chance that the root causes stem from decisions which were being made in westminster back when you were still in short trousers! 

Decisions which had become largely irreversible by the time I was born, but wouldn't fully materialise for decades


----------



## Jelly (27 Jan 2021)

doctor Bob said:


> you forgot "fanny" .................. great days.


----------



## Billy_wizz (27 Jan 2021)

Jelly said:


> I'm just going to put aside the vitriol about art history (although, I would note it's not that far removed from the history of furniture or interior joinery, which I think _a few_ people on the forum have more than a passing interest in) and assume you're unlikely to be convinced of the value of scholarly research in anything which can't immediately be translated into money, or by the concept of transferable skills in a "knowledge economy".
> 
> 
> 
> ...


To be fair the engineering firm my dad worked for stopped taking on apprentices a few years after he Finnished his because they got fed up of training people for them to leave as soon as they where qualified!


----------



## doctor Bob (27 Jan 2021)

Jelly said:


> I'm just going to put aside the vitriol about art history (although, I would note it's not that far removed from the history of furniture or interior joinery, which I think _a few_ people on the forum have more than a passing interest in) and assume you're unlikely to be convinced of the value of scholarly research in anything which can't immediately be translated into money, or by the concept of transferable skills in a "knowledge economy".



I spent a good half an hour looking at "a bike wheel on a bit of white woodchip wall paper" in the MOMA, New York. By heck it don't half make you realise what it's all been about, I was absolutely delighted my wife decided we should spend the whole day there, just to really really understand it all, my day was topped of when a group of dancers in body stockings started to do a dance workshop. A modern interpretation of childrens games, it was at this point I had an epithany and became enlightened and one with the piece,, unfortunately they threw me out when I tried to join in.


........ they didn't really throw me out.....  but they did want punters to participate.


----------



## Droogs (27 Jan 2021)

You have my sympathies Bob


----------



## Jelly (27 Jan 2021)

Billy_wizz said:


> To be fair the engineering firm my dad worked for stopped taking on apprentices a few years after he Finnished his because they got fed up of training people for them to leave as soon as they where qualified!


That usually points to them not paying them what they were worth in the labour market.

It's a common enough pitfall for employers to fall into, the normal story being either:


The company has rules restricting pay progression for staff, but other companies will pay a premium to get a skilled person right now...

Or


People trained in house are subject to the "rusty halo" effect, because everyone remembers a time before they were competent, whilst someone joining fully trained doesn't have to deal with that, and gets ahead faster. When everyone coming up behind them sees that happening they think "stuff that, I'm not staying" and get out at the first chance.


----------



## Jelly (27 Jan 2021)

doctor Bob said:


> I spent a good half an hour looking at "a bike wheel on a bit of white woodchip wall paper" in the MOMA, New York. By heck it don't half make you realise what it's all been about, I was absolutely delighted my wife decided we should spend the whole day there, just to really really understand it all, my day was topped of when a group of dancers in body stockings started to do a dance workshop. A modern interpretation of childrens games, it was at this point I had an epithany and became enlightened and one with the piece,, unfortunately they threw me out when I tried to join in.
> 
> 
> ........ they didn't really throw me out.....  but they did want punters to participate.



Modern art isn't exactly my cup of tea either, but you can't argue that people aren't making a decent whack from it... (Or rather from being persuasive enough to part the pretentious from their money).

You think of the profit margin on that "installation" you saw, hell you could fish the bike wheel out of the canal, a fragment of woodchip from a skip on the street, it's pure profit!

The question remains... Did you actually join in with the dancing, we've got to know!


----------



## Billy_wizz (27 Jan 2021)

Jelly said:


> That usually points to them not paying them what they were worth in the labour market.
> 
> It's a common enough pitfall for employers to fall into, the normal story being either:
> 
> ...


They got fed up of being out competed by firms that incurred no extra costs training people but offered a small wage increase to newly qualified staff according to my dad firms where constantly trying to poach people directly from school grounds so everyone stopped training and the skills went!


----------



## Jelly (27 Jan 2021)

Billy_wizz said:


> They got fed up of being out competed by firms that incurred no extra costs training people but offered a small wage increase to newly qualified staff according to my dad firms where constantly trying to poach people directly from school grounds so everyone stopped training and the skills went!



Sounds like the apprentices were looking out for their own best interests which is entirely reasonable, whilst the various companies were fighting amongst themselves as they are wont to...

In principle this is the kind of thing the apprentice levy is meant to prevent, by forcing all large companies to fund training at the same level of, and redistributing a portion of that funding to smaller firms to level the playing field... 

Unfortunately the process of developing and delivering apprenticeships which qualify for funding is phenomenally burecratic, which pairs with a 20+ year break in delivering "proper" apprenticeships has made the results so far underwhelming to say the least.


----------



## Billy_wizz (27 Jan 2021)

Jelly said:


> Sounds like the apprentices were looking out for their own best interests which is entirely reasonable, whilst the various companies were fighting amongst themselves as they are wont to...
> 
> In principle this is the kind of thing the apprentice levy is meant to prevent, by forcing all large companies to fund training at the same level of, and redistributing a portion of that funding to smaller firms to level the playing field...
> 
> Unfortunately the process of developing and delivering apprenticeships which qualify for funding is phenomenally burecratic, which pairs with a 20+ year break in delivering "proper" apprenticeships has made the results so far underwhelming to say the least.


I wonder how many are left that can teach high lvl apprenticeships especially in engineering?


----------



## Jelly (27 Jan 2021)

Billy_wizz said:


> I wonder how many are left that can teach high lvl apprenticeships especially in engineering?


At least in Sheffield there's a huge number of people and resources, with a number of strong programmes running.

The integration between the University, the UTC (University Technical College, an FE college focused on engineering supported with resources and staff from the two uni's), the Advanced Manufacturing Research Center, AMRC Training College, Rolls Royce, Boeing, McClaren, Kyrocera and Sandvik are pretty tight, delivering HNC and Degree level apprenticeships for about 7 years now.

Sheffield Forgmasters maintains a full range of craft apprenticeships in all aspects of forge, foundry, fabrication and machining work.

LUK/Schaffler have craft apprenticeships in metallurgy and machining, with high performing apprentices offered the opportunity to go on for a HND, Degree, or management trainee program on the company...

What's notable however is that they're all tied to gigantic well resourced companies of the sort that are comparatively rare as employers in the UK these days.


----------



## Billy_wizz (27 Jan 2021)

Jelly said:


> At least in Sheffield there's a huge number of people and resources, with a number of strong programmes running.
> 
> The integration between the University, the UTC (University Technical College, an FE college focused on engineering supported with resources and staff from the two uni's), the Advanced Manufacturing Research Center, AMRC Training College, Rolls Royce, Boeing, McClaren, Kyrocera and Sandvik are pretty tight, delivering HNC and Degree level apprenticeships for about 7 years now.
> 
> ...


Judging by the firm's involved there looking for the 1 percent! So how much work are the apprentices actually doing? Are we going to end up with another generation of school based learners that can talk the job better than they can do it?


----------



## Jelly (28 Jan 2021)

Billy_wizz said:


> Judging by the firm's involved there looking for the 1 percent!


It's been that way for as long as I can recall, when I left school the people going on to apprenticeships in desirable engineering disciplines tended to have done A-Levels or a mix of A-Levels and a B-Tech.

At this point it's substantially harder for a school leaver to get one of those apprenticeships than it is to get a place at a good university on a related course.

I'm aware that Unilever at Port Sunlight had several hundred applicants in a week all applying for a single apprentice vacancy in Process Engineering when they launched their apprenticeship program, which highlights both the desirability and relative unavailability of those opportunities.





Billy_wizz said:


> So how much work are the apprentices actually doing? Are we going to end up with another generation of school based learners that can talk the job better than they can do it?



I know someone who apprenticed at LUK in metallurgy, who did 4 days a week working and one day a week at college, and a couple of month-long training courses in Germany.

Started out initially very heavily supervised, but by the end of his apprenticeship (5 years) was assigned to teach and supervise uni students on summer placements.


Similarly the Forgmasters Apprentices are properly craft trained, because there isn't really another option.

With SFI being one of only 4 or 5 companies in the world who can do what they do, and working projects one or two orders of magnitude bigger than anything you might see elsewhere in the UK, they have to teach a bunch of those skills in house.


Rolls Royce is a similar deal, they're probably the single biggest employer of engineering apprentices in the UK (predominantly at Derby) and the Sheffield site specialises in a single-crystal casting process which is extremely niche, if not the only plant with those capabilities worldwide.


It's notable that most of these opportunities are looking to take school leavers to at least QCF level 4 or 5 (HNC/HND) which would previously have been an indentured apprenticeship + Night School afterwards; so there's a significant academic component in addition to the on the job training. By all accounts it's quite intense, but we'll rewarded with excellent opportunities.


----------



## Terry - Somerset (28 Jan 2021)

We are in danger of applying lessons learned during our lives (I left school 50 years ago) to a very different very different world today. It is at best only partly helpful, and at worst completely inappropriate.

Young people need to think about what the world holds in the next 30-50 years, not what happened and expectations 30-50 years out of date.

Traditional career paths will become increasingly rare. Career success will rely on product design, product development, promotion, logistics etc. Service industries will continue to thrive with greater leisure time.

The rewards will likely go to those who have very good social and service skills, and are responsive to changes in their market and business sector.

As work will favour the bright, innovative, responsive, articulate, imaginative, the opportunities for lifes "plodders" will become more difficult. A life working in mundane but sound jobs (eg: railways, retail sales, building, assembly lines, etc) will become scarce.

This transition is the reason for current debates over "universal basic income" payable to all to provide a minimum standard of living.

The balance between material success and other of lifes pleasures may also be changing. Covid may have made people increasingly appreciate the value of friends, family, community, health etc, and the relative triviality of material goods once basic needs are met.


----------



## Shane1978 (28 Jan 2021)

rafezetter said:


> oh and read more bloody history so that they don't go on a rampage pulling down statues of people they think are the sole reason for slavery in the 16th & 17th centuries when the black people themselves have a lot to answer for in that regard (and the arabs and pretty much everyone else - oh and the christians advocated it as well, go check for yourself - have they ransacked any churches? nope.)


If you are referring to Edward colston a statue in bristol I can assure you nobody thought he was the sole reason for slavery. Also the crowd was made up of a large range of ages - lots of over 40s. Bristolians understand that he was just one slave trader, but he’s the one who built bristol. He’s the one who had his statue put up 100 years after he died and that’s the same statue that Bristolians campaigned to remove for 20 years. Where are the people campaigning to put it back? There are none. The colston society voluntarily voted to disband. Sounds like democracy to me. Like every other civic monument - the people decide if it stays there, not ‘history’. 
Ps. Edward colston was a Christian - that’s the moral justification for his actions and he gave lots of his money to the church. Its not either/or with colston and the church, they’re the same. 
Sounds like you need to read more history.


----------



## billw (28 Jan 2021)

Terry - Somerset said:


> We are in danger of applying lessons learned during our lives (I left school 50 years ago) to a very different very different world today. It is at best only partly helpful, and at worst completely inappropriate.
> 
> Young people need to think about what the world holds in the next 30-50 years, not what happened and expectations 30-50 years out of date.
> 
> ...



Exactly this. A voice of reason!


----------



## Shane1978 (28 Jan 2021)

I don’t like the constant critique of ‘influencers’ while simultaneously championing ‘production’. There seems to be something missing here:
The older generation have created a world is mass production and mass consumption. To sustain it they’ve created a sophisticated advertising and communication network that allows them to sell more of the stuff they’re making more of. 
‘Influencers’ are people who take manufactured products and make them look desirable. That’s why they exist. The same producers who you all champion are funnelling products into the hands of ‘influencers’ in order to sell more and charge a premium. And it works. 
Yes, many of them are idiots. So are many factory managers and CEOs. Humans sometimes are idiots. But young people with YouTube channels are not misguided youth wasting their lives, they’re the driver of all the production you’re hankering for.
At the moment, one of the best ways to make British-made ‘products’ and brands profitable is if they/their names end up in the hands and on the lips of ‘influencers’.


----------



## ivan (28 Jan 2021)

Interesting to read comment from all ages.

When leaving school (early '60's) we were advised to go for subjects that interested us. Getting a degree then meant you were in the highest 2.5% academically, and advisers said any pure subject degree would tell a future employer about your relevant transferrable skills. Job specific stuff called training came after you got the job. Mind you there were a lot of badly managed firms then, and a decade later Training Boards were set up to push more companies to train. Many didn't change and died in the Thatcher years - her lame ducks. Others blamed the unions, but a one time director af a Clyde side family of shipbuilders confessed recently that he now recognised how poor they were at management, and consequently they got the workers (attitudes) they deserved.

Now were're global and stuff gets made where it costs least - that's the market economy - so it's inevitable that only firms making higher order stuff can survive here, and higher order stuff requires higher order staff. There will be fewer jobs for those with low skills and abilities, and the education system has not begun to address this problem. Unfortunately my grandchildren appeared to take the view that the world owes them a living. Often soon with partner and 2 kids, renting, and claiming that should be entitled to move into a house just like mum and dad's with all the white goods and a good car or two. Reality came as a huge shock, from which some have not yet recovered, and still cannot see why their fractured employment record will make gaining an interview increasingly difficult.

Indeed it is now a different world...


----------



## houtslager (31 Jan 2021)

Spectric said:


> But at least we had the industries that could have helped, Steel, Mining and ship building. I lived through the Thatcher years and for us baby boomers it was like our version of the blitz. She finished the days when you left a job Friday to start a new one Monday, so many companies fell and dole ques grew with estate agents doors being blocked by the numbers of keys returned.


Roy . as I am a " boomer " child born in 1961 I can can say that I had a lucky childhood an a Cumquats teenager period, growing up with the fuel crisis, armsrace , fear of the 3rd WW possiblities of a thermo nuclear war. Top that with my generation entering the workplace in 1977/8 into massive young peoples unemployment and very few oppertunities for work.
I was lucky in that I was accepted into the Army, so as a young soldier through the end of the Cold War I matured, never earned enough to buy a house, though managed with my then g/f to buy a flat, which on a posting to NI I had to sell as she walked out on me, leaving me on a squaddies salery to pay a mortgage of 100k at 15% = sold and had to give her 40%.
Since then I have never been able to buy a place of my own in the UK.
IMHO Maggie killed the UK by selling everything to her friends and friends of friends. UK Plc, ruined the country for the workers, the bosses got richer and still are getting richer, on ther peoples sweat.
Now after 25 years in civi street working as a sawdust manufacturer, I get by here in Europe, I gave up chasing money , and switched to a lifestyle where peace of mind, ability to pay ALL my bills and get a couple of weeks a year where the sun shines [ Greek islands]
Sorry to be long winded, just had to add my 2 pennyworths.
karl aka the woodbutcher


----------



## Rorschach (31 Jan 2021)

I know I have mostly defended the young against the boomers but I am going to concede something today.

I am a member of a lot of facebook local "free" groups, occasionally I get useful items that no-one wants but mostly I use them to help others or give away items no longer needed.
Recently these groups have been cut down to essentials only due to C19 and a lot of what I am seeing being given away is food. This is not a bad thing of course, it's great to see people preventing food waste which really winds me up. But it's what is being given away that makes me sad, the thing I see multiple times a day is people giving away items from their free school meals boxes provided by the government, and they are giving away fruit, vegetables (and usually yoghurts weirdly). It's lovely looking stuff, apples, pears, oranges, melons, cabbages, potatoes etc, all lovely and fresh, quite a lot of value to it if you were to go to the supermarket and buy it, between £5-10 worth I would guess on average and it's all "unwanted". Even worse of course, you look at the people giving it away and they definitely look like they could do with eating a bit more fruit and veg shall we say.
Whether it's lack of knowledge of how to cook it or simply not liking "real" food it is a sad thing to see of the youth and even sadder to think of their children being brought up like this.


----------



## Jameshow (31 Jan 2021)

ivan said:


> Interesting to read comment from all ages.
> 
> When leaving school (early '60's) we were advised to go for subjects that interested us. Getting a degree then meant you were in the highest 2.5% academically, and advisers said any pure subject degree would tell a future employer about your relevant transferrable skills. Job specific stuff called training came after you got the job. Mind you there were a lot of badly managed firms then, and a decade later Training Boards were set up to push more companies to train. Many didn't change and died in the Thatcher years - her lame ducks. Others blamed the unions, but a one time director af a Clyde side family of shipbuilders confessed recently that he now recognised how poor they were at management, and consequently they got the workers (attitudes) they deserved.
> 
> ...



I don't know what you mean by influencers.... 

All I know is whatever Paul Sellars or Rob Cosman et al.. recommends I buy..... 



Cheers James


----------

