No country for young men — UK generation gap widens

lisyloo

I don't see many benefits cuts affecting pensioners compared to working age claimants.

There's a reason for that.
If you're working age (and able) hen you're able to do something about it for yourself and SHOULD BE doing so rather than waiting for a handout. If you're working age (and able) then you should be getting a decent income for yourself rather than relying on handouts.

We are NOT all in this economic mess together !

We shouldn't be expecting our elderly who have already worked all their lives or the disabled to work.
We should be expecting younger and able people to work.
So YES it's different.

Can you not see the difference between people who've done their fair share (and offen more) and people who are of working age?

p.s. I'm working age and able.

ukcarper

Graham_Devon wrote: »

Anyone see Newsnight last night? Their opening issue was the generation gap and how it could stat skewing the country if party politics only goes for a certain vote.

It was a classic case of Baby Boomer generation against the world. Not sure if these things are setup that way... it always seems to be those babyboomers with the greatest entitlement attitude they wheel on!

They had David Willets on, the author of "How the babyboomers took their children's future - and why they should give it back". Alongside him was Esther Rantzen (I paid in) and someone in their 20's but cannot remember where they were from.

Once again, the point that "you have the internet" was put to the young person by Ewan Davies....as if the young person should therefore be eternally grateful and never utter a word about government policy again.

No real conclusion was found, other than everyone seemed to except that a specific generation did get a fantastic (relatively) serving compared to today's younger generation and that all policy was now focusing on them, being a larger group.

Hence why it could be dangerous for parties to target specific generations only and start altering the landscape to suit that generation. We risk not only backlash, but we also risk a move to hard left or right as the youth are not heard, but crucially, find they are the ones being sanctioned.

If you are looking at David Willet as the savour of the young you obviously didn't lisen to what he said. Ester Rantzen is not a boomer also if you look at figures I posted from ONS you will see that Boomers median earnings are lower than younger generation apart from the under 30s, I don't see those generations coming in for the same criticism.

michaels

lisyloo wrote: »

We shouldn't be expecting our elderly who have already worked all their lives or the disabled to work.
We should be expecting younger and able people to work.
So YES it's different.

Can you not see the difference between people who've done their fair share (and offen more) and people who are of working age?

p.s. I'm working age and able.

I sort of agree but.....current retirees are getting many more years of retirement than was envisaged when what they paid in was calculated as life expectancy has grown much faster than anticpated.

wotsthat

One fabulously wealthy person accuses another fabulously wealthy person of being lucky. Luckily a lot of our 'problems' are of the first world variety like this.

I have no doubt that the current youth will turn out to be part of the wealthiest generation ever. If by some quirk it turns out we have the richest generation ever followed by, the horror, only the second richest generation to ever walk the Earth I think I'll get over it.

ruggedtoast

fed_up_and_stressed wrote: »

Really ? I don't see many benefits cuts affecting pensioners compared to working age claimants. We are NOT all in this economic mess together !

You are sharing a bit of the slice you are currently on. But the slices before then are long gone. Perhaps the pie is too.

chucknorris

Graham_Devon wrote: »

They had David Willets on, the author of "How the babyboomers took their children's future - and why they should give it back". Alongside him was Esther Rantzen (I paid in) and someone in their 20's but cannot remember where they were from.

Well if someone can't even remember where they were from is typical of the younger generation, no wonder they are not doing so well (purposely misunderstood for humour).

Jason74

pollypenny wrote: »

Rubbish. If you are around on weekdays, open your eyes. See the grandparents pushing prams and pushchairs, in the park, waiting outside primary schools, taking grandchildren to play and toddler groups. We have to travel,to the USA to help out, but we do it, at vast cost.

Many of us who could have help our adult children with deposits, passed on cars, paid for or done work in their older houses?

We are sharing the pie!

You'll have to excuse toasty, he's our resident extremist!. In the real world, I don't think anyone is denying that many (indeed probably most) boomers who are able to be are generous to younger family members. A the child of boomers myself, I also no just how many sacrifices many boomer parents made in order to give their children things that they themselves didn't have growing up.

So I don't think anyone (apart from perhaps toasty) sees the boomers as this scheming generation who conspired to steal all the wealth from the next generation. But, through a series of events over time, we ended up with a situation where the boomer generation was almost uniquely well placed to accumulate meaningful wealth and assets.

In terms of independently generating assets, prospects for todays under 25s are much bleaker than they were for your generation, or even mine. Eveything from employment security to occupational pension facilities to house prices are worse for today's young generation than they were for those starting their working lives 40 or even 20 years ago.

None of this is your fault of course. But there's no gettnig away from the reality of it. Of course, your generosity to your family (and that of many others) addresses the situation for the recipients of that generosity. But what of those who don't have families willing and able to help in this way?. Adults working on middle incomes shouldn't be dependent on family members to be able to own a home, or working longer to fund pension benefits for others that they themselves will not enjoy.

You might say that this isn't your problem. But it is your problem. It's also mine, and everybody else's. If we don't deal with this, increasing numbers of young people will just "opt out" of playing by the rules and working hard. Indeed, there are some comments on this thread from enlightene posters suggesting that this is already happening. In many ways, the "deal" that society offers young people today is such that you can't blame young people for making that choice, and society (that's you and me as much as anyone) is as much to blame for people makint that choice as the young people themselves.

lisyloo

current retirees are getting many more years of retirement than was envisaged when what they paid in was calculated as life expectancy has grown much faster than anticpated.

Longevity has gone up for all age groups - that's a fact.

Those with "gold plated" final salary plans, whether public sector or company have done incredibly well from that turn of events.

Those with money purchase pensions have found annuity rates plummeting and whilst they get better longevity the other side of the coin is that their fixed pot of money has to last for longer or they need to work longer or live on less (just like younger people).
The average pension pot at retirement is abuot £36K, which is tiny.

Some have done really well out of it (from luck not conspiracy or crime) but it's certainly not the entire generation and it's certainly not their fault either.

lisyloo

I like your posts Jason, very sensible and balanced.

and society (that's you and me as much as anyone) is as much to blame for people makint that choice as the young people themselves

I'm a pragmatist.
What am I as a ordinary member of society meant to do?
What choices do I have in reality? (I'm not a boomer and I don't have kids).

N1AK

pollypenny wrote: »

Many of us who could have help our adult children with deposits, passed on cars, paid for or done work in their older houses?

We are sharing the pie!

And your parents generation were any less generous with their time/money? My Grandparents travel to Australia each year to see one set of grandchildren, they don't pretend its a hardship, but then they actually enjoy it. It seems a shame that you do it out of obligation rather than love for your family and enjoyment of their company; or are you trying to get credit for doing something you want to do!?

Perhaps if you weren't voting to redistribute billions of pounds from the working poor to wealthy pensioners the people you're robbing wouldn't need your 'charity' in the first place