No it isn't - but as a society we should endeavour to find balance to the inequality. Otherwise we are no better than animals.
Tories lost the 2019 election among working age adults
- Thread starter cheesyboy
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No it isn't - but as a society we should endeavour to find balance to the inequality. Otherwise we are no better than animals.
Soldato
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A large number of houses were taken out of the market by Thatcher's right to buy which forced people who would have gotten a council house to compete with others for the stock available. People are also living longer due to medicinal advances so these houses did not come onto the market. There was growth in the population for a time, these people are now at an age where they are in the housing market.
Soldato
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That is the job of Govt but we have had Govts who have done the opposite, making people poorer. This can only do so long before the people go against the Govt and no amount of Tory spin in the tabloids will help.
Caporegime
You lost me in your first sentence, my mum and dad are not real people? what the actual **** are you smoking? im a tiny bit upset that the **** life, thousands of hours he worked doesn't match what ever you think is real..
I know it wasnt probably your intention but seriously... They came from the council **** holes of postwar inner London. ill just leave it there. Honestly im miffed.
All true, plus the changing make up of families means that many families that would have historically live in one home are now split across two due to divorce etc.
Almost none of that is true, Right To Buy has almost zero effect on the affordability of houses. The houses that would have been bought via RTB would have been replaced and the relevant people are still eligible for council or housing association housing. These people also would not have been competing for the same type of housing as white collar professionals.
Most of the lack of affordability of housing is due to credit rules becoming much more lax and being able to borrow against two incomes not one. Up until around 2005-07 the norm was 3.5x “main” income + 1x the partner’s income. These days you can borrow 4.5 - 5x joint income. This means if you are single, like me, then you are boned as you can’t compete unless you’re on 60k+.
Life expectancy has plateaued and is even decreasing slightly.
Agree that the population of the country has increased.
Edit - when I say ‘replaced’ in respect of RTB houses I mean via the billions of pounds of funding for affordable homes via Homes England, not replacement within the confines of the RTB scheme.
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Soldato
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This whole thing is just the tabloids taking on a new target. It was doctors before the Pandemic, teachers are a favourite and they decided to target the older generation due to the housing problem. You should have read the rest of the post. Read Alan Johnson's books of when he was a postman to get an idea of what life was like. He was also in London to begin with. My intention was not to doubt your parents but to counter the current tabloid driven myth that life was so much easier and better. It was not, by a long way.
The only thing keeping us from being animalistic is the power hierarchies that assert control over that instinct.
If the only way to provide for oneself was the same as everyone else (complete fairness), what do you think will happen? Anything other than total equality is not equality but equity (take from others). We are animals, but very advanced and cruel ones.
Caporegime
Agree above with stu999
YEs its a bit of supply and demand but reality is Mortgages and credit is almost Endless and limitless and that fuels ridiculous growth and inflation.
You cant endlessly keep building houses and apartments unless you want everything to be state owned and controlled, which is what it sounds like from a few people.
Private companies are not going to build worthless housing at cost prices, its just not reality.
Mortgage Debt is meaningless, as meaningless as the trillions and quadrillions world governments owe.
I've lived now close to ten years in Sweden and seen a more sensible approach to housing, all be it as ridiculously rampantly overpriced in the larger cities, that is pure supply demand vs opportunity..
IF you are 1 person or a couple, you find a 1 bedroom apartment or very small dwelling.
If you have kids you move into a bigger 4 or 5 bedroom house.
When you get older, you downsize back to a smaller house.
In the UK this just isn't the case is it, hence the nonsense of bedroom tax and other ridiculous schemes. You are constantly trying to upscale and move up the ladder and rarely never back down... Your final goal is to be left with a huge asset you give to your kids or use to pay your care home bill. You could retire early and sell the 6 bedroom asset.
No government is going to openly tackle the housing market and subsidise a huge pump of sensible affordable housing because it will destroy regular peoples investments.
The UK is built on the cliche every Englishmans home is his/her (PC) castle....
Its hardwired, generationally ingrained.
You wanna fix the UK. Raise taxes by 5%, reform the tax system entirely and then get a coalition government. that will remain for 16 years to break the cycle of red blue red blue red blue.
YEs its a bit of supply and demand but reality is Mortgages and credit is almost Endless and limitless and that fuels ridiculous growth and inflation.
You cant endlessly keep building houses and apartments unless you want everything to be state owned and controlled, which is what it sounds like from a few people.
Private companies are not going to build worthless housing at cost prices, its just not reality.
Mortgage Debt is meaningless, as meaningless as the trillions and quadrillions world governments owe.
I've lived now close to ten years in Sweden and seen a more sensible approach to housing, all be it as ridiculously rampantly overpriced in the larger cities, that is pure supply demand vs opportunity..
IF you are 1 person or a couple, you find a 1 bedroom apartment or very small dwelling.
If you have kids you move into a bigger 4 or 5 bedroom house.
When you get older, you downsize back to a smaller house.
In the UK this just isn't the case is it, hence the nonsense of bedroom tax and other ridiculous schemes. You are constantly trying to upscale and move up the ladder and rarely never back down... Your final goal is to be left with a huge asset you give to your kids or use to pay your care home bill. You could retire early and sell the 6 bedroom asset.
No government is going to openly tackle the housing market and subsidise a huge pump of sensible affordable housing because it will destroy regular peoples investments.
The UK is built on the cliche every Englishmans home is his/her (PC) castle....
Its hardwired, generationally ingrained.
You wanna fix the UK. Raise taxes by 5%, reform the tax system entirely and then get a coalition government. that will remain for 16 years to break the cycle of red blue red blue red blue.
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Caporegime
I honestly have no idea what you are on about in context to my post but. Thanks?
I dont fully agree or disagree, in respect of life being better then, arguably it was better if your outcome was to own a house and raise a family. People had less expectations and less aspirations other than simply living...
The houses bought on right to buy are not replaced with new affordable housing, in fact the government of the day explicitly prohibited the proceeds of right to buy being used to build more stock.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Right_to_Buy
If you want to pinpoint the single biggest driver of house prices in the UK it's constrained supply due to the nature of UK planning regulations.
Soldato
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You missed the other parts of that Bill which forbid councils building more council houses. Why would councils build more houses anyway when the tenants could buy the still new houses cheaply a few years later. The houses 'that would have been bought via RTB' were not replaced. That also removed players from the housing building market and added to the shortage. There has never been enough houses. There has been a lot of houses where people do not want them like the new towns and shortages elsewhere. Life expectancy plateauing and decreasing has only happened during this Tory rule, so in the last decade.
Yeah, old people have tonnes of money and out-compete the young. I've been the youngest male homeowner on my street for the entire 10 years I've lived here! (I'm 39)
Caporegime
Do you think the next socialist leaning government will readdress the situation and streamline the process to make it easier and faster to approve building? Or, is that political suicide like tax system reform?
I have skim read a few reports and an article quoted above and it would seem we should also thank the tough planning laws as many think without them we could also be living in some Cairo/Mumbai sprawling, urban wilderness.
Realistically the "north south" uk divide needs to be rebalanced and areas other than the SE of England need to be more attractive. the UK is more than big enough to build a few million new residences and the supporting infrastructure of all sizes.
The private rental stock increased by 1.7m homes between 2007 and 2017, to a total of 4.5m. Meanwhile the total housing stock, currently around 24m homes, increased by.... About 1.7m homes
Landlords (who are overwhelmingly non young) are out-competing young people for the limited housing stock, which pushes up prices: great for investors, bad for potential owner-occupiers, and forces young people to rent (again, great for those investors).
Coincidentally (!), landlords are vastly over-represented in the house of Commons, with nearly 20% of MPs being landlords (compared with 3% of the adult population)
Even in terms of pure economics various think tanks have said that growing inequality will result in a worse national economic position than addressing it/keeping it in check.
Gross inequality is actually quite inefficient, so they say.
It won't get better with the current policies, and simply denying that there is any problem won't help drive change.
There is no hope if current trends continue. Most of us can see the situation getting worse not better.
Preaching false hope makes me angry, I'll readily admit. Which is what you do. Preaching that everybody can improve their situation and there's no reason they can't have it just as good as the boomer generation. Most can't, and you probably know it. Why you preach false hope I have no idea.
Being happy and content with life isn't just about material things, nor is it about keeping up with a benchmark you obsess over. That is a route to anger and convincing yourself and others they are helpless and worthless. I am genuinely sorry you seem to have convinced yourself of this.
You also seem to think I wouldn't change the status quo, which isn't true. My argument against your position isn't anti change, but anti the irrational and misplaced hatred you express towards others that colours your change plan, because the problems you see, the blame you place, is largely misplaced, and will result in forcing changes through that will make life worse for everyone as you try and punish those you see as the problem.
Jealousy is an ugly emotion that can consume people if they let it. It blinds you to the good things you have, to opportunities for change, and to the good you can do for others as an individual. Don't let it.
Commissario
Yup
When my parents first married they lived for about a year in a caravan in a farmers field near where he worked (both in Insurance at the time, mum was one of the women who did the calculation/looked up the actuarial tables in the days before computers) so they could afford to save up the hefty deposit for a mortgage on their first house, which was based on his income.
They moved to their second property a few years later during the fuel crisis because they worked out that whilst the mortgage would be higher they could save more than that in the fuel costs, and save about an hour a day in travel.