Should I apologise ?

No ginny. I was a stay at home mum but a family member once suggested I look for a job and stop living off DH. I was supported by DH who told them in no uncertain terms that I had a job and had been doing it admirably for 45 years.
I must also be thick because I am a northerner [

I think you sound fine, ginny, but there will be some 'out there' who think you owe them something... silly, isn't it!

A couple of years ago there was a student on local radio who was advocating that us baby boomers should use the vast amount of money we had stashed away () to pay student fees. He didn't mean the fees for grandchildren or relatives but all students, he also suggested we should sell our huge homes to help pay these fees. When someone asked if that meant the students would support the pensioners once they had graduated he didn't have a reply.

I am getting fed up of being accused of being a drain on the country, I didn't have children so worked right up to my retirement (41 years) paying full stamp. We bought our house when interest rates were around 15% and now any savings we have are not earning enough interest to keep up with inflation!

I would like to admit these rich baby boomers - I have never met one and certainly am not one!

Goodness me no.
We have much to celebrate, being baby boomers and (where appropriate) being British.
I never received anything but love from my parents, they could never support me financially they didn't have the money.
My mam insisted that I go in the mills at 15 to contribute to the family finances. Fortunately my dad let me stay on at school so that I could leave home and become a cadet nurse at 16.
I was young pregnant and very poor when first married. But never went to the 'Social'. Found any work I could and eventually through damn hard work and self funded learning worked through to retirement (no employer pension though). It too makes me mad because of this building negativity towards seniors.
They too will get old.

I read an article recently where the writer detailed all the ways we baby boomers are lucky compared with the young of today (full employment, easy house purchase and then soaring profits, good pensions etc.)

He/she ended by recommending that we spread some of our wealth around instead of 'squatting on it'.

I loved that phrase. Conjured up an image of a bloated toad perched on piles of money.

Good grief woman, have you no shame? I suppose you are literate and numerate too?
I see no hope for you as a Southern expat too ( the MK postcode is north of Watford) and maybe you even have a London pension

Soutra I hardly dare walk out of the door. By the way Watford Gap is north of MK. No pension other than a state pension , of which I have lost £30,000 due to being one of those lucky women born in the early 50's.

I really don't know why anyone thinks it was easy for us to buy our own homes?It was an age when most working people rented, either from the Council or private landlord.When we got married, we both worked full time and did so for 7 years before we could think of starting a family, saving so that we could afford the deposit for a small house.No single people ever managed to buy their own house, you needed the joint income.This seems to be now an urban myth that you could just walk into a mortgage, and it was hard then to get any kind of a loan from a bank.Our generation has not had things easy in any shape or form.

We had to put a third of the price down as deposit on our £3.5k house in the early 70s, prove we could pay the mortgage by paying what it would cost us into the building society each month for 2 years as savings towards the deposit, accept a 13.1/2% APR repayment mortgage, and live on a tiny budget. No nights out, caravan holidays, plenty of DIY and no wine or takeaways. If that's us baby boomers having it easy, I apologise!

joelsnan "young, pregnant and poor when first married"? Snap!

Here in the South East putting down a third of the price as a deposit would mean saving approximately £100,000 and that would probably only buy a two bedroom house.

Many apologies (my turn!) ginny! I misread Watford Gap for Watford (the more usual point of reference, remember "Ox carts North of Watford"?) I should have read more carefully!

My first paypacket was £7 per week! I can remember the celebrations when OH got £1,000 pa. not easy to afford a mortgage.

Yes Ariadne our first house was a mouse infested two up one down, no hot water, no bathroom and toilet at the bottom of the garden, furnished from top to bottom with second hand goods. This was 1970! Luckily we managed to move on after about 18 months.

Well, I think the government should buy a Caribbean Island [I bet Tony Blairs got one to spare] and ship us all out there so we can't annoy anyone any more. OK the free childcare we provide would grind to a halt but we could grow our own food; aches and pains would disappear because of the climate so we wouldn't need the NHS [on which we're such a drain]. We could sit on the beach with our Kindles all day long and not be a constant irritation to everyone under the age of thirty . Who wants to join me?

Shall we take our hard-won savings with us, or leave them to pay for - well, for everything that everyone wishes they could afford and think that it is our fault that they can't. Like -

The house we bought on a mortgage (only one income considered) with astronomic interest and have almost paid up.
The holidays at the Great British Seaside in ratty boarding houses.
The modest wedding catered by Mum, Auntie Jean and Mother-in-law in the church hall.
The wedding dress made by our own bleeding fair hands.
The wardrobe full of clothes that lasted for years, partly because we didn't change them five times a day and beat them to death in the washing machine.
The nylons that we darned with a minute crochet hook and a wooden egg. Or painted with nail varnish so that the run didn't keep going all the way up.
The Vesta meals that we bought when we couldn't face cooking yet another meal from scratch.
The terry nappies soaking in the bucket until we wrung them out over the loo.
The weaning meals we made by mashing some of our own food and adding gravy.
The cane basket that we took with us to the shops, laddering our nylons again when it brushed against our leg.

We rented a place for £5 a week. My husband earned £63 a month and I was still training as a teacher. My parents kindly continued to pay me £5 a week 'subsistance' (supposed to pay for books etc to hep me complete my teacher training!) All our furniture was secondhand, hand me down except our bed which my family clubbed together to buy for us. My in-laws bought the bed linen!

We were married 5 years before DD1 arrived and we were lucky enough to get 100% mortgage from the GLC as we both worked for the ILEA. However we had to buy a property no other lender would give a loan on!

I identified with every line [Elegran]. So true but funny isn't is how it is conveniently forgotten the fact that it's the baby boomers who are saving this generation and government a fortune in childcare support and from what I hear and read, in many cases, financial support?

We had camping then caravan holidays; wedding was us two and three friends at a Registry Office with me wearing my friends leather boots [although I did have a new dress and then was mortified to see it in the sales soon after and realised I could have paid less for it]. Kids wore clothes that had been passed round the village; I was overjoyed to be given a suitcase full of clothes belonging to my friends sister who no longer fitted into them. Car [only one] was repaired and resprayed by my husband until the dreaded red MOT certificate became inevitable. Never had a cup of tea or cofee when I went into town [still can't get over being able to afford to do so which means my pension is far too much].I could go on....However, apart from our mortgage we never owed anyone anything [still don't].

tegan I'm with you on all that. Can so remember when our children were growing up thinking how rich people must be to take their children out to eat and go on holidays abroad. When I was expecting my first every one of my maternity outfits (and they were in those days - no showing a huge bump but a bit of discretion) was given to me by a neighbour who had them given to her - I in turn passed them on to the lady across the road!!!

If one of them was black cotton with white spots then it obviously worked it's way to me eventually [or from me to you...]...I did have a new black corduroy smock that did me through both pregnancies [at least, I think it was new ].

I do remember that they were mini- smocks!! All were winter weight which was fine to begin with but my daughter was born in June and I do remember feeling absolutely boiling for the last couple of months!

I had a bright yellow one with white flock spots and a very thin plain yellow over pinafore. The dress had a ruff styled neck.