The Boomers Have Had It Too Good?

Fallingstar

Have raised this before on another thread. Is quite an age difference in the group of older people labelled baby boomers. Some of us are old enough to have retired and received a state pension aged 60, as well as a bus pass. But for those born in the early 1960s up to 1964 they will have to wait until they are 67 to get a state pension and a bus pass throughout most of England. They will not enjoy what many of us have enjoyed having to work for longer, sometimes with ill health. A point worth noting when all baby boomers are lumped together.

Actually I was born at the end of 1958, I had to wait til I was 66 to get my SP

Just as an aside, all of our 5 adult children work.

2 out of the 5 are in their 40’s, both with good jobs and mortgages, the next two down are 26 and 28 and both are just waiting for their respective house contracts to exchange and complete. They stayed at home to save, and save they did, the older one is married and both she and her wife lived with us for over three years so they could save for their house and their IVF treatment. They’ve not been abroad and had very modest self catering holidays once every 6 months, they work and save hard.

Our 26 year old is buying alone, she chose not to go to University so went straight to work in the Civil Service, after A levels and has been promoted several times and again saved and saved. Neither of our younger daughters drive, nor drink alcohol. They wanted their own homes and have made sacrifices in order to do so, our “contribution” has been to have them living here making a very small contribution to their food.

To go back to the topic, it’s simply that whilst some did very well during this period, many didn’t. Not too much different really to all and any generation.

Each generation faces its own difficulties and struggles and each have their own challenges.

Throughout all generations there will be some who simply sail through life without insurmountable issues, these people don’t always recognise just how lucky they are nor realise that there are folk from all generations who have and are suffering financially.

Graphite

That wasn’t really the point of the programme though. It was about how we respond to people who hold opposing views and whether we can be persuaded by argument and find common ground. It’s worth a listen.

It was worth a listen, but it highlights the point that those who think others “had it better” find it harder to find common ground.

MayBee70

I haven’t listened to it ( will do later) but wonder if young people now would live the way that we did when our children were young. Hand me down clothes, saving up for things that we needed. Raging inflation at one time that we had to negotiate. No nursery provision if we wanted to return to work. Constant worry of unemployment during the Thatcher years etc.

Hand me down clothes? Yes we benefited from those. What about jumble sales?
Back in the seventies and early eighties, jumble sales were a really big thing. Certainly in Manchester where I grew up. It was part of your childhood to be dragged along to the local village hall and queue with all the other mums and rush on in when the doors opened at 9am. Most of my childhood clothes were from such stalls. Colour coordination? forget it. Right size? You’ll grow into it. Musty smell? It’ll come out with the fourth wash. Every item was 10p or similar. No one made a profit I don’t think as bags were donated. People loved to rifle through stall after stall piled high with absolutely any item of clothing known to man ( or woman). Do we now class such stuff as “vintage”? Surely there’s a need for recycling clothes. We should bring them back. I know charity shops sell clothes but some of these shops are bloody costly! Plus jumble sales had literally hundreds and hundreds of clothing on the one day available.

Different from car boot sales.

Few people seem to mention how well Gen X have done. I have 2 children who are Gen X and one who is a millennial but one born within 3 years of being Gen Z (20 years between babies 1 and 3).

When DD1 was buying a house in the 1990’s some of her friends wouldn’t even consider one that didn’t have a conservatory and en-suite shower and they were all first time buyers in their mid 20’s.

It's loke comparing apples to oranges.
We often had less, but we didn't care, because most other people were also lacking what today would be seen as essentials.

And today, a lot of things are essential - we cantput that particular genie back in the bottle.

Miss A spot on.. my grandparents thought I was extravagant when I bought a small fridge on hp in 1968
My parents were thrilled we could drive to France in the early nineties to euro camp with the children. They’d rented an old farm house in north wales when we were children, much posher than their childhood week in Blackpool.
Life is different for each generation and different again within those generations, where some have better luck than others

Cossy I am in total agreement with you.

HP, Iam64!
You flibbertygibbet, you!

My mum would have been exactly as your parents were.

Expectations among the young are so much higher - own home (low rate mortgage, help to buy) complete with all mod cons, central heating, fitted carpets and blinds; all new furniture.

Public transport is failing because they all drive a car or even 2, and then complain about fuel prices.

Then they have children, get a paid year off and expect child care vouchers and campaign for free meals.

And then have the nerve to suggest pensioners are a burden

I only know of one woman my age (she's around 80) who managed to buy a property (a flat) on her own as a single woman in the 1970s and she said it was a struggle convincing a building society to take her seriously.

Although women's salaries weren't taken into account, everyone else I know bought as a couple so there were two incomes, at least for a while until they may have had a family.

Some Councils used to offer house loans in the 1960s, I remember my brother and sister-in-law had one, and that was after living with her parents for a couple of years while they saved for a deposit.

I so agree with you. I remember being hungry as a post war child. We were all skinny. A trip to the beach was a treat. We had to have a polio vaccination and our reward for the injection was a total luxury: “ a peach”. As it turned out we were given a suger lump but my lovely mother honoured her promise and we got the peach. What a treat.

NittWitt I did listen to this but felt neither were really listening to each other... so it didn't work.

Yes, I think they did say on the programme that they'd really need a longer time to use the method properly.

I think it is more difficult now for anyone, not only young people, to get housing and jobs than it was in the 60s and 70s.
The redundancies and high interest rates after that were disastrous for many, tho .

We got a mortgage from the council in the 80s. They would lend on properties that building societies wouldn't.

What do you think of the points made by both participants?

They weren't the best chosen people for this programme.
To be honest I found it surprisingly annoying!

My favourite whinge from the younger generation is the one about how much our houses are worth. It is a complete irrelevance to me if my house is worth £1 or £1,000,000. I have to live in it - and if I move I would need to pay the same, or spend many thousands on downsizing. Who is going to benefit from the value, we ask? The whingers of course. ( I should add that my children encourage us to spend what we have and enjoy it)

NittWitt

We got a mortgage from the council in the 80s. They would lend on properties that building societies wouldn't.

We did the same in the early 70s. We were buying a perfectly ordinary small detached house in a village centre, close to all amenities. The building societies were more than happy to lend to us until we told them the house was built in 1901. At which point they reduced the amount they would lend us and shortened the loan period, making the house unaffordable to us.

We had read somewhere that LAs would lend on older houses so we asked and the LA offered a bit more than we asked for over 30 years rather than 25. As we knew we would not be living in the house for 30 years we accepted the extra money and extra long mortgage

JenniRen

I only know of one woman my age (she's around 80) who managed to buy a property (a flat) on her own as a single woman in the 1970s and she said it was a struggle convincing a building society to take her seriously.

Although women's salaries weren't taken into account, everyone else I know bought as a couple so there were two incomes, at least for a while until they may have had a family.

Some Councils used to offer house loans in the 1960s, I remember my brother and sister-in-law had one, and that was after living with her parents for a couple of years while they saved for a deposit.

I missed your post earlier. You make some very interesting points.

My sister and a dear friend both bought property as single women in the early 1970s and each needed a male guarantor, even though my friend was a fully qualified solicitor. This was stopped by the Sexual Equality Act, passed in 1975.

When we bought our first house in 1968 the building society took half my income into account

However the taking of second incomes into account meant those with 2 incomes could get bigger mortgages he mortgage and as more and more properties were bought on 2 people contributing to the mortgage, all it did was was to drive the price of houses up until demand and affordability brought the market into balance again and, of course make it doubly difficult for those buying with only one person paying the mortgage

Essentially what decides the price of houses is the general rule that mortgage payments should not exceed 25-30% of net income. This means that when interest rates are high and more of that monthly payment is interest, the size of mortgage a lender will offer on the same income will fall. If interest rates are low and a large part of the monthly payment is capital repayment, the amount lent for a given income will rise.

Around that will be other factors, Currently, with the economy being so fragile, people are slow to decide to buy, even if they have the money. The opposite happens if the economy is doing well.

But sooner or later everything circles back to what proportion of your income you can afford to pay each month for housing, and how much loan that is equivalent to.

Cossy

To go back to the topic, it’s simply that whilst some did very well during this period, many didn’t. Not too much different really to all and any generation.

Each generation faces its own difficulties and struggles and each have their own challenges.

Throughout all generations there will be some who simply sail through life without insurmountable issues, these people don’t always recognise just how lucky they are nor realise that there are folk from all generations who have and are suffering financially.

I agree.

Everyone has their own difficulties and challenges.

I feel blessed we've never moved since purchasing over 65 years ago when we married, whilst some would never understand our thoughts.

We're all quite different.