Question time next week

Masomnia

My take on it is my generation (I'm 24) has unprecedented opportunity, but that has come at a cost.

My sister is a good case in point trying to get a training contract to train to be a solicitor. You've got to get loads of work experience (often unpaid), go through a long application process, psychometric testing, telephone interviews, face to face interviews, and then you might get a (unpaid!) work experience placement where you can prove yourself. And if you're good you might get a further interview and round of testing which if you pass you get a job.

For the boomers the process was 'So, he's a good egg is he? We'll have him then.'

It is massively more competitive than ever, but someone like my sister would never have had the opportunity to even apply in years gone by. So who's in a better position?

From where I'm standing now the outlook is pretty bleak, but you never know what's round the corner. Conrad may be right and we may be about to see another boom!

MobileSaver

Jason74 wrote: »

There is this idea that younger people are lazy and not interested in getting on, and my own experience is that this could not be further from the truth.

Sadly my opinion is based on my own real-life experiences.

We've been having major renovation work done for the last 12 months or so and employed a lot of tradespeople and labourers over that time. All the under-30s have been a nightmare, not wanting to work weekends, not prepared to get their hands dirty and "muck-in" when needs must, oversleeping, "can't make it today cos I don't feel well", simply not turning up for work and never hearing from them again... the list goes on.

We've then got friends and family who come to stay over with their late-teen/early-20 children who don't surface from bed until lunchtime!

I have friends in the building industry and they ALL say the same "the youngsters just don't want to work" - they want it cushy and when it suits them.

I don't know who is to blame: parents for spoiling them? too-easy-benefits? simply lazy kids? But whatever the reason, I have seen and experienced first hand that too many of the current generation are not prepared to work hard.

HAMISH_MCTAVISH

Jason74 wrote: »

Employment - This is worse in part due to the lack of stability you mention. Things like the exploitative use of zero hours contracts (rather than in cases where they are genuinely useful on both sides) impacts disproportionately on the young.

The thing is though, I don't believe zero hours contracts are exploitative in the vast majority of cases. More flexible, for sure, for both employer and employee. But really this is just a new way of working and moving towards greater efficiency and competitiveness.

Which will ultimately benefit the vast majority of people.

You only have to look at how much better the overall employment picture was in this recession than in previous ones to see the benefits of increased working flexibility.

There is also nothing like the established apprentice system of 30 years ago (and this has implicatiions both for young people and the skill base of our economy).

And yet internal training within most companies is far greater now than it was in the past. Employees as a whole are better educated, better trained, and have a higher emphasis placed on career development than they ever did even in my day, let alone my parents.

I think the average skill level of employees is markedly higher today than it was when I started out. Perhaps not in dead industries, such as mass market manufacturing, but certainly in most segments of the economy.

Reduced job security also tends to have a disproportionate impact on younger people, and certainly unemployment over the last 30 years has been consistently higher than the previous 30. There is little to suggest that this wont continue.

I'm not sure I agree with any of that.

I'd be interested to see the stats though, if you could dig some out?

Higher education - I can't agree that this is better now than in the past, even though you are right that more people are going. The cost of going leaves graduates in debt before they start, and "credential inflation" (largely because more people are going of course) means that a good degree is no longer the near guarantee of a successful career that it once was.

Hmmm.... Can only agree with some of that.

Yes, more people are going, and yes, we have a better educated and trained workforce and society as a whole.

Yes, it's also true that a degree is not now the 'golden ticket' it once was, simply due to increase levels of participation. But it's still leaps and bounds ahead of the prospects of the those who didn't pursue HE in the past.

And again, student debt isn't debt, it's more like a Graduate Tax. But this pays for itself many times over, and if it doesn't, you don't pay it back. And even with this 'tax', workers today pay less of their income in tax than they did in the boomer years.

Pensions - We agree that in itself, pension provision is poorer for the young than for previous generations. You believe that this is offset by better earning opportunities, while I take the view that this is aggravated by generally poorer career prospects

Agree to disagree there.

Housing - You are right that homes are generally more comfortable and better heated / insulated than they have ever been. That is part of progress. My point however is around the issue of housing affordability, and for me there is a very clear linear progression in this regard. Broadly speaking, the younger you are, the worse your long term housing affordability is. Yes, the monthly payments are relatively affordable at the moment thanks to historically low interest rates. However, at some point, rates are likely to noramlise (if they don't we're in even more trouble longer term!). When they do, housing affordability will plummet, and it is the younger generation who will bear the brunt of this.

Again, I can see your point but we'll agree to disagree.

For my reasons why I think you're overestimating the impact of the bits in bold, which have been posted at length, read here....

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/4808041

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/4797182

You made the point in your post that every generation has challenges, that they then overcome. I truly believe that the challenges faced by those reaching adulthood in the past few years are such that the game is effectively rigged against them (albeit by !!!!-up rather than conspiracy imho) in such a way that in huge numbers, they have no realistic prospect of prospering.

The thing is, similar things were said in every recession, in every generation.

They've all been wrong so far.

And I think they'll be wrong again this time.

The young generation today will inherit skills, education, wealth and opportunity vastly greater than the boomers could ever have imagined.

It remains to be seen whether or not they'll squander it, but I rather suspect they won't.

And that in 50 years time, some other generation of young people will be having a go at those "Lucky Millennials"...:D

Those who can rely on inherited wealth from parents will be fine of course, but in terms of home ownership in particular, the chances of young people "bettering themselves" are significantly poorer today than at any time since WW2 imho. And that loss of social mobility is extremely damaging for our society.

This isn't about individuals.

As a generation, in the round, the young of today will inherit the biggest pile of wealth in history.

And will be the most educated and technologically progressed generation, with the most access to information, ever.

What they choose to do with that is up to them.

But they're mad if they think changing places with a boomer would be a good idea....

Masomnia

MobileSaver wrote: »

Sadly my opinion is based on my own real-life experiences.

We've been having major renovation work done for the last 12 months or so and employed a lot of tradespeople and labourers over that time. All the under-30s have been a nightmare, not wanting to work weekends, not prepared to get their hands dirty and "muck-in" when needs must, oversleeping, "can't make it today cos I don't feel well", simply not turning up for work and never hearing from them again... the list goes on.

We've then got friends and family who come to stay over with their late-teen/early-20 children who don't surface from bed until lunchtime!

I have friends in the building industry and they ALL say the same "the youngsters just don't want to work" - they want it cushy and when it suits them.

I don't know who is to blame: parents for spoiling them? too-easy-benefits? simply lazy kids? But whatever the reason, I have seen and experienced first hand that too many of the current generation are not prepared to work hard.

You need to expand your social circle.

LydiaJ

I agree that young people coming out of school/university today have much bleaker prospects than my generation did. (I was born in 1969.) I worry about my nephews, who are young adults now, and my kids, who will be young adults in 5-10 years.

However, there is also an element of change of attitude. A month or two ago I was talking to a young man who works running kids' parties and teaching training sessions at a warehouse that's been converted to hold several climbing walls. He likes the parties, but doesn't enjoy training adults, and isn't fundamentally interested in climbing. He'd like to be a children's entertainer, but he hasn't really decided what he wants to do with his career going forward. I said I wondered if maybe primary teaching might suit him if he likes working with younger children. Then he said "But I'm only 23. I'm too young to settle down and get a proper job yet."

That was the sentence that suddenly made me feel there was a huge gulf between his attitude and mine. At 23 I certainly did not feel too young to settle down. I was married and self-supporting. My husband was working full-time, and I was full-time doing a PhD. Everyone I knew of that age was similarly "settled down" either working or studying, and the ones who were studying went into full-time work when they got their qualifications. There were one or two who didn't get fixed up with a job or course to go to when they left university, or who had to take a year out when they failed a course or lost a job or something, but nobody got all the way to the end of university without at least deciding what to apply for and putting in some applications. My nephew, OTOH, didn't give any thought to his future until he'd finished his degree, and is now living with his parents again, thinking he might work on his music for a while before thinking about a job or a career.

LydiaJ

I remember about 15 years ago reading and hearing a lot about post-modernism, about how Gen X were so different from anyone who had gone before. People said that Gen X-ers couldn't or wouldn't settle to a career for life but all wanted portfolio careers of many dissimilar elements, and that they wouldn't commit to institutions - political parties, religious denominations, community organisations etc. Further back, the boomers, I'm sure, were regarded as hedonistic and irresponsible compared with the war-time generation who went before them. I wonder what today's young adults will think of their kids' generation when it is their turn?

ukcarper

It's good to have a reasonable discussion fort a change and being a boomer myself I find myself disagreeing with people on both sides of the argument.

As Hamish has said food clothing etc was much more expensive and housing prices do go in cycles although over the last few years they have been very high but even so the proportion of earnings going towards does not reflect this. I don't believe tuition fees are quite the problem they are made out to be as repaying is more like an additional tax than a conventional loan and direct taxation is a lot lower than it was in the 70s.

Where I agree with Jason is I believe the opportunities for young people especially those without a degree are not as good as they were for me in the 60s and I'm not convinced that the apprenticeships on offer now compare to the apprenticeship I did in the 60s.

I also agree with Lydia there is big difference in the conditions facing someone born in the late 40s early 50s compared to someone born in the early 60s

BobQ

HAMISH_MCTAVISH wrote: »

That is actually quite a well argued post.

However I think it suffer from two things.

1) A bit of a rose tinted view of the life most boomers led.

2) An overly pessimistic view of the life most youngsters today will lead.

I'm not a boomer. My parents on the other hand were though, both born shortly after WW2, in the absolute peak of the baby boom.

They couldn't afford to buy a house without help from their parents, and they couldn't afford to heat it for many years once they did buy one.

The cost of the house they bought was at just under 4 times joint income, and that was in the late 60's, and they were crippled by high mortgage rates soon enough.

Despite being a dual income couple, working as an engineer for the old GPO and a qualified teacher, they spent the first few winters huddled around a coal fire with blankets, with 'hand-me-down' furniture and salvaged bits and pieces for other contents, and it wasn't until many years after I was born and my mother had returned to work, that they could afford to get central heating. I was almost 10 before they could afford to install secondary glazing.

The high inflation you view as such a benefit, they viewed as a curse.

Wage rises always lagged inflation, so they always felt poor, and whilst the debt did reduce in real terms, the high interest rates ensured it sucked up a huge portion of their income. Far higher than than is paid today in mortgage payments as a percentage of income.

Furthermore, interest rates never kept up with inflation, so the value of savings was wiped out, and while wages rose more quickly than they did today, that lag between inflation and pay rises meant earnings often reduced in real terms.

This was a worse position by far to be in than the young of today go through.

And they had to suffer through the 70's. That time of the winter of discontent, years of industrial action reducing incomes, while high interest rates crippled spending power.

I vividly remember my mother in tears more than once because she had to choose between putting fuel in the car to get to work, and putting food on the table to feed her family.

Anyway....

Being born in the Gen X years, I can quite clearly see both the hardships and benefits of the boomer generation, and also the hardships and benefits of Generation Y and the Millennials.

And if I had to choose between those two, so which generation I could be born in, I'd pick Gen Y or Millennial over Boomer every time.

But if any Generation could accurately be called the lucky generation, I'd say it was Gen X...

An excellent critique. You were obviously one of the richer families of your generation. These days a GPO engineer and a teacher would be viewed as quite well off and you had a car as well!

There were many of the same generation who were much poorer. My parents did not get CH until the 1980s!

But I do think that many of those under 30 today have a very rose tinted view of the way boomers lived in their under 30s years. Arguments that they were lucky to live through good economic times are so unfair. They never seemed that good in those days, life was only easier when compared with the problems faced by the previous generation.

Where I would disagree with you is that those who slate union power forget that so many of the social reforms we enjoyed were the result of working people organising to campaign (and yes strike) for those benefits including pensions. While there is always a case to be made that these reforms became too generous, too many of them were swept aside without protest.

GPO engineers (and teachers) enjoyed a much better standard of living as a result of their unions.

BobQ

LydiaJ wrote: »

I agree that young people coming out of school/university today have much bleaker prospects than my generation did. (I was born in 1969.) I worry about my nephews, who are young adults now, and my kids, who will be young adults in 5-10 years.

However, there is also an element of change of attitude. A month or two ago I was talking to a young man who works running kids' parties and teaching training sessions at a warehouse that's been converted to hold several climbing walls. He likes the parties, but doesn't enjoy training adults, and isn't fundamentally interested in climbing. He'd like to be a children's entertainer, but he hasn't really decided what he wants to do with his career going forward. I said I wondered if maybe primary teaching might suit him if he likes working with younger children. Then he said "But I'm only 23. I'm too young to settle down and get a proper job yet."

That was the sentence that suddenly made me feel there was a huge gulf between his attitude and mine. At 23 I certainly did not feel too young to settle down. I was married and self-supporting. My husband was working full-time, and I was full-time doing a PhD. Everyone I knew of that age was similarly "settled down" either working or studying, and the ones who were studying went into full-time work when they got their qualifications. There were one or two who didn't get fixed up with a job or course to go to when they left university, or who had to take a year out when they failed a course or lost a job or something, but nobody got all the way to the end of university without at least deciding what to apply for and putting in some applications. My nephew, OTOH, didn't give any thought to his future until he'd finished his degree, and is now living with his parents again, thinking he might work on his music for a while before thinking about a job or a career.

I agree with most of this. Being 15 years older, I had a very similar attitude, when I left university I wanted to have a stable job with a good employer, with a potential career in the same fielf. I wanted a career with a pension and I wanted to buy a house as soon as I could save the deposit. I saw saving for the deposit as more important that wasting money in pubs and clubs for example or on consumer products.

I too am concerned about those leaving university today, particularly when they complain about their student loan ( = graduate tax). They forget that people of my age (and I suspect yours) regarded it as a privilege to go to university. Alright it was free but only 5% even got the chance. People from my social background only got there on academic merit. These days people almost expect to go to university as a right. But with so many going its bound to be the case that their prospects are less certain since the number of jobs that require degree level education have not really increased, only the number of employers who use a degree as a selection criteria for a less stretching job. My friend's daughter thinks she has a very responsible graduate job arranging (not designing) corporate training courses: when I graduated this would probably have been filled by someone with 5 O-levels.

BobQ

MobileSaver wrote: »

I disagree with this - I think the younger generation have an even better chance of achieving wealth and security. For those willing to put some effort in, the entire world is their oyster thanks to the benefits of the internet and cheap travel.

The problem is that, in my opinion, the younger generation are simply not prepared to put the effort in. Whether this is the fault of the parents for poor upbringing and/or too much spoiling or whether the youth are just lazy I don't know but in my experience the majority are not prepared to work hard and make sacrifices; they only want to do jobs that interest them, pick and choose when to work when it suits them, clock-off at "home time" on the dot regardless of whether the job is finished but still have all the latest gadgets, nice car and brand spanking new home filled with shiny new appliances.

It's this sense of entitlement from the younger generation that we should all be worried about - they don't seem to realise the hard work and sacrifices their parents made to get to where we are today.

As a generalisation I think this is unfair but I do recognise some of the traits and attitudes that you describe in some young people. I also ask myself if it was really any different when I was their age. There are always lazy people, people who are unwilling to put in the effort, people who prefer to let others do the work etc. Is it more common today than 30 years ago? Possibly, but I think its more to do with people being more ambitious and materialistic than in those days, so consciously focus on themselves.