AIBU to feel life in the UK has worsened since Covid?

Yeh it’s all shit. 2012 was the last decent year

So you pay childcare and living costs for two/three other people on that?

Not certain about that; was in Arnhem in the Netherlands last week and the place was filthy; I don't think they ever clean their 'intercity' trains tho the local ones weren't as bad. Basically the UK is a LOT cleaner then it was there and I'm grateful for that.

Your Original Post is 100% negative and sounds like it's been 90% driven by social media and the constant drip, drip of negative articles in the media.

Get out in the world - travel by train, meet real people, see a million acts of kindness and generosity happen every day. Watch people move around London on efficient public transport - helping mums with prams on and off buses and standing up so older folk can sit down on the tube. See hundreds of thousands of people stand back to let people off first.

So many millions of people abiding the law, enjoying the free museums, safely having picnics with their families in parks, working to make our streets clean/safe/efficient, volunteering to put flowers in parks, donating to charity, litter picking, paying taxes and thinking that's the price you pay for society.

I've just traveled Britain extensively by public transport for six months. I have witnessed no crime, been taken everywhere by efficient buses and trains operated by polite, knowledgeable, kind, helpful staff. I've eaten fantastic local food and met thousands of interesting, fun, gentle people from overseas tourists to Indian waiters here to learn the language to policemen to old ladies on benches.

Not everyone is resentful, angry, entitled, lawbreaking or depressed and, if the people you meet in your day to day life are then change the people you meet.

Yes the economy is taking a nose dive for lots of reasons VERY MUCH INCLUDING BREXIT, yes some people will always be greedy, but there is SO MUCH GOOD.

Anyone who says Broken Britain is missing a lot of really good stuff that goes on right under their nose a million times every single day.

I can understand the higher earners of around £100,000 and the amount they lose to the grubby hands of the tax man because of cliff edges. They are probably people (like myself) who studied for many years to qualify in their profession. Each salary rise is worth far less becaue the system is corrupt and unfair. At my GP all the doctors work part time - and probaby pay large sums into their pension fund rather than having it filched from them.There is a temptation to drop your hours and find a cash in hand side hustle to beat the system. As a single pensioner I have put my share into the community and am still being exonomically raped to pay for services I do now want and cannot use.

Indeed. I love the concept that you can just ignore the impact of such a monumental -clusterfuck- change to our constitution and blame all the troubles on other things.

But then quite a large proportion of people expected sunshine and rainbows and ignored/couldn’t understand any of the serious messages being shared on the downsides.

So you voted Brexit OP and are now living the reality of what you voted for.

Things being more expensive haven't affected me because I live within my means. I don't buy things I can't afford. Water bill has gone up, annoyingly, but like all bills, you find a way, right?Luckily. I haven't needed to use the NHS since Covid. I never said I'm better than anyone, so not sure where you got that from? Also, plebian? Are you OK??

Funny you should ask that.

Here’s just one of the impacts of Brexit on the NHS. I bet this isn’t what you thought you were voting for, but it decimated the NHS Trust I worked for. And then we had a second wave of exits after the appalling handling of Covid by the government - we lost loads of British staff, either to non-NHS jobs or they moved abroad where conditions are better.

Slow clap for you and your “£350m for the NHS” cronies who couldn’t spot a lie if it sat on your nose.

www.surrey.ac.uk/news/brexit-has-caused-1485-additional-deaths-year-due-eu-nurses-leaving-uk

It's harder to build generational wealth now, the boom years are over.

Its now just going to be about a mega elite super rich class, and every else. Of course if you don't a flashy lifestyle it doesn't really matter. You just have to aim for average or slightly above average to be comfortable and cut your cloth accordingly.

I also agree that working from home is not good for mental health.

It’s a pretty okay salary if you live in the North, where if you are on your own, like OP, you can get a nice terrace in a nice area for less than £100k, as opposed to,possibly getting a bed in someone’s shed in 2026.

Brexit is hugely to blame.

Plus (obviously) the 2008 worldwide financial crisis and austerity that followed it.

I agree with PPs that WFH has been terrible for mental health. Great for some of us, not great for new starters or the overall workforce

Covid has definitely been partially responsible for the dire NHS. GPs liked not having to have face to face contact with patients so much during COVID, that they carried it on. Now we have a situation where doctors waiting rooms are empty because the GPs are all at home diagnosing you over the phone.

YANBU welcome to late stage capitalism 😊 COVID wasn't the only thing that happened. Remember that little thing called Brexit? It just hastened the decline a bit. It's going to get a lot worse to so buckle up buttercup.

You are woefully ill informed if you think Brexit has a minor effect on the overall economic financial and wider wellbeing of our country. The costs of Brexit were already being felt and have been compounded by the impact of Covid and then the war on Ukraine.
Also, seek out your comma key for the benefit of all readers.

£32k isn’t a good salary.

I’m older now and I can see that post WW2, people wanted to do better; intro of the nhs, better education, building social housing, more social mobility , joining the Common Market etc. Whereas Thatcher only thought of the rich and started dismantling; privatising our utilities, selling social housing and not letting councils use the money to build more but also no strategy to replace the mining industry eg she could have got us into renewables in the 80’s, created jobs for the former miners but no and we’re years behind now. Norway invested their North Sea Oil into a Sovereign Fund worth one trillion pounds that benefits its citizens but Thatcher sold ours off. She famously said that ‘there’s no such thing as society’. I’m sure that there’s more but the lack of strategic planning has continued since and I think that’s why most things are a bit shit. It’s also all made worse by our appalling billionaire owned mainstream media and social media.
Sad times but hopefully we’ll all get through it.

Very basic research ( non biased) would tell you that brexit was a key factor...

Overall
Brexit
Covid
Ukraine war
Iran war
Other shocks like tariffs and Truss
We weren't doing great before these but they have really compounded the issue

I think you are naive to the price difference between outside Birmingham and the South East, not even London, outside the M25. A terrace in London would be a hell of a lot more. Even somewhere like Clapham, you'd expect to pay well over £1m for a 2 up, 2 down.

Yes, there are global shocks to our economy beyond Brexit, but the fact we can't trade as simply and freely with our closest neighbours has meant we are less able to cope with those shocks.

Brexit would have damaged us in healthier times. It's had an even bigger impact when there are global catastrophes all around us

Thatcher was an evil witch but the UK economy still grew strongly during the late 80s and 90s, up until 2008. Cameron and Osbourne's austerity choked growth and left us with the infrastructure/ investment/ productivity crisis we have today.

Agree re 2008

They keep renaming the credit crunch but its still here 20 years later and life is worse

I think its improved since the pandemic for me - telephone appointments have been a godsend