What was life like in the 80s?

Wonderful 😆

I was early 20s, own fashion business that had me meeting & dressing loads of "slebs" meaning free entry to gigs & clubs & hanging out & work with the coolest & most colourful of people

I was lucky though, I made my own work, lots of friends really struggled at the time & did longer stints in college as a result

The Cold War & nuclear threat was always a bit of a dark cloud in the background of life & the IRA were a very real threat in that our family car was bomb checked every night, no street bins anywhere etc etc

Up north, the Ripper was a big scary shadow on our teenage lives too

I was 14 in 1980. For me, personally, the 80s were ok, but for the society I lived in it was a terrible time.
I was out on the streets every weekend protesting about nuclear weapons , about they way the miners were being treated, about so many other things.
One of my clearest memories is the constant flow of RAF planes flying over my school because planes flew to the edge of Soviet airspace every twenty minutes or so and then back again. The cold war tension was very, very high.
Unemployment was everywhere, wages were low, poverty was just a fact of life.
I knew a good few families who lost husband's, father's, sons to suicide because of pit closures and factory closures. The industry in my own town was decimated by Thatcher's policy and this place has never recovered.
When I was at uni, which was free and for which I got a grant, I was the only Scottish person in my class and the only person who wasn't privately educated.
At school, girls did home ec, boys did technical subjects. We were taught how to cook, clean, iron, mend, see, lay a table, make beds, work a washing machine....There was no expectation really that girls would go to uni, the careers officer directed most of us to nursing or secretarial work. The very bright ones, like me, were pushed towards Craigie or Jordanhill teacher training colleges.
Striking was rife. Everyone from teachers to ambulance men. I remember being at uni and people out collecting in the streets for the ambulance drivers. I knew people who, during the miners strike, shot pigeons, crows and stuff like that, to feed their families.
It was a hellish time in Scotland. One of the benefits of that, though, was all the really good protest music that sprang up.
Another common thing was that no one checked your i.d. in pubs or for buying fags. I started clubbing at 14, when I got my first Saturday job. I would be horrified if any of my kids had done that.
People here were much more engaged in politics than they are now. No one seems to care much anymore and you never see the kind of rallies and marches that I was part of as a teen and young adult.
Around here sectarianism was even worse than it is now. No one in my school would admit to being RC. And as for being gay, that was even worse.
Oh, and the make up was horrendous, hair even worse, and the fashion, if you were into that kind of thing, was ridiculous. Thankfully, most of that passed me by because I was to busy campaigning and protesting about stuff.
Of course, by 1990, I was married with a baby. It was still almost impossible to get a job and there was the poll tax to deal with!

I used to talk for hours to my friends in the phone, sitting in our hall wrapping the cord round my fingers.

We made arrangements in advance and just stuck to them because we didn't have constant text conversations.

I was aware of the back drop of extreme poverty in some places, and of the miner's strike but it didn't affect me personally. I was lucky as I had a nice life I think.

We all had ridiculous curly perms and I seem to remember wearing a lot of dayglo yellow clothes.

The food we ate was similar to now really, a lot of oven ready food, stews, casseroles.... Chinese takeaway on a Saturday evening.

@GreenTulips We have window cleaners, I thought everywhere had.

Yes cheques were still in regular use. If you were paying a bill by post, you could screw up your cheque and then flatten it out and stick it in the envelope. The reason was that the machines the banks used would reject it and it had to be processed by hand which took a few extra days. So was a great ruse if you were a bit short of cash before payday.

I remember campaigns for a minimum wage that highlighted security guards being paid £2 an hour. I am not sure of the year in the 80s, but using an inflation calculator for 1989, that is the equivalent today of £4.89 per hour. So some wages were much lower than today.

Don’t forget the green shield stamps, don’t know where they came from but you had to lick and stick them in books to get money off in the shops.

We had a one bar fire in the whole house and it was cold! Couldn’t wash your hair in the morning in winter as you’d have caught your death.

We had milk men and window cleaners, dont really see them anymore!

I remember going to restaurants that had a smoking and non smoking section, and planes had the same. British people still did fruit and veg picking for money. Also at work a lot of people went to the pub at lunchtime. I worked in a nursery for a bit and we used to go to the pub at lunchtime. I remember wondering if any of the parents could smell we had been drinking alcohol, but nobody seemed to care, or if they did, they did not say.

Leg warmers!! Don’t think anyone’s mentioned those yet!

I have been watching classic Eastenders sluj and we are currently in 1989 ,I realise it's a soap but it does show real life at the time ,and whilst I'm sure London was great for yuppies etc ,poor people were poor everywhere ,by contrast I lived in the Northwest I still do, my parents both worked for the Gas Board in secure employment we lived in an affluent area the high unemployment of the 80,s didn't affect our family it really depends on a great many things as to whether you had a good lifestyle or not ,it's not just about the North/ South divide

Also, DH's parents got a video recorder just before we married. DH wanted something recorded and we had to buy a tape. A 1 hour, vhs, (before lp was a thing) cost £11. I was earning £35 a week and was considered to be on a reasonable wage!
Someone mentioned the Diary of an Edwardian Lady - we were given a tablecloth and matching napkins in that design, possibly from M&S, and it's still in daily use. Washes beautifully and other than the deign being a bit old fashioned now, doesn't look a day older than when we unwrapped it almost 40 years ago. Not sure that a big standard set of table linen purchased today would still be going strong in 2059!

Remember my mum paying for the weekly shop with a cheque.

If you ever had to knock on the staff room door at school, you were met with a wall of cigarette smoke!

I was 16 in 1980 and a student nurse by 1983. I remember being asked by the ward sister to go to the finance office on my way to my break one day as there was an issue with the wards budget. It was quicker for me to take a memo with the queries than putting it in internal post and it was difficult to get through on the phone. No email, hadn't been invented. That's another thing about that era, things moved more slowly. I was on a late shift and it was my tea break so would have been about 4.30. Once I'd recovered from my amazement that there was a finance office, I was so naive I had no idea about budgets etc, I eventually tracked it down. It was just like the police offices in Life on Mars and Ashes to Ashes. Those shows really brought back this memory. No one could hear me knock due to the noise of phones constantly ringing, several people on phones, typewriters & calculating machines clattering. I entered and it was a fug of smoke. Mainly men and the few women seemed to be secretaries. Everyone appeared to be smoking. Eventually was directed to a corner office, handed over the envelope with the queries to a portly man with a fag in his hand and a glass of whiskey on the desk! Offices and wards were so much noisier then, phones ringing and ringing (they still do on wards but not as much as then) typewriters and even photocopiers etc seemed to be noisier. Otherwise memories the same as others, great music, came from a working class background so money very tight, difficult to go shopping doing nursing shifts as shops were 9-5 with half day closing but as I trained in London you could find somewhere open but it would be dear. Nursing very badly paid but we had great fun. Lots of venues let you in free as a nurse and London cabbies often didn't charge and refused to take money even when offered when taking you back to the nursing home. Less TV, more reading, knitted a lot of oversized mohair jumpers!

I was at senior school in the late 80's. Life felt less stressful than it is now, but I guess that could just have felt like that as I was young.

There was much less awareness of bullying. I remember a lot of kids who had an awful time at school because they were "weird". Looking back, many of them probably had undiagnosed autism.

Sexual harassment was rife. I remember being groped by male colleagues in one bar job. In a retail role, the all female checkout staff were nicknamed 'cashier bimbos' by the male managers (we were all uni students). When I hit my first full time job at 21, the male manager told me I'd got the job because I had 'great tits'. This was all 'banter' obviously and totally acceptable 🙄

Gay people had a tough time too. There was no one 'out' as gay when I was at school. The bullying would have been merciless.

Some of the music was good, a lot of it was shit. Like now really. I much preferred 90's music.

Sunday's were really boring as there was nothing to do and nothing on TV. I used to do my homework on Sundays, so I guess that was a good thing as I didn't have the distractions of social media and Netflix!

The 80s was a shit time in many areas of the country because of poverty, a shit time for the disabled, lesbian and gay people, black people, and many women. Things are much better now.
I suspect anyone who had a happy childhood thinks when they lived was great. But as an adult for a lot of the 80s I saw and knew of things that would be shocking now.

So people talk about how poor mental health provision is now. It was much worse then. They were closing down the old mental hospitals, but I visited a friends sister in a short stay ward before they closed down. Old stained formica tables where people played cards all day. The only "therapy" was a daily group meeting. No community psychiatric nurses, no short term NHS counselling, no crisis team. People had monthly psychiatrist appointments and GP, nothing else.

For physically disabled there were some charities providing provision. For example trying to help people live independently, providing respite. But this was very dependent on where you lived, was very limited and very heavily dependent on volunteers. A friends mother was disabled. She could do very little and my friend cared for her. She got no help as the person who came to assess her said she did not need it as her daughter was caring for her. No extra benefits either.

The 80s is also when short term tenancies were introduced for renters. I remember having a hell of a time trying to find somewhere to live as for about a year landlords were all waiting for the change of the law and would not rent to you.

Wow, this thread is amazing and should be moved to Classics.
It’s very eye opening to hear about the effective North / South divide caused by Thatcherism.
I was 10 in 1980s
I think my decade was defined by Princess Diana. Loved the royal weddings!
Taping the top 40 on Sunday
I had my hair permed at least 3 times. Hair mousse.
Denim jackets
Underage drinking in pubs.
Everyone watching the same TV channels. I remember going into school the next day, after Boy George first appearing on Top of the pops, asking whether it was a boy or a girl!

Yuppies. Watched Wall Street in i think 1984 and I solemnly told my best friend, I was going to be a Yuppie when I left school.

Also remember when I went for interviews I would always wear a skirt as plenty of older managers thought women wearing trousers was not okay. Some schools still would not let wear girls wear skirts. Also my first factory job, I started at the same time as other girls and boys from my school at 16. All the boys were automatically given a higher paid job than the girls.

In some areas negative equity was a big issue. House prices went up in some areas, but in other areas they fell. Repossessions also increased massively as unemployment rate went up.

Having a phone put in if there was not already a landline where you were living was very expensive. I seem to remember it costing £150. I lived in a bedsit for a bit so could not afford it. Instead phoning meant going to the local phone box where there would sometimes be a queue. Good manners meant you were not supposed to take too long if others were waiting. If they were, someone would knock on the door and tell you to hurry up.

This is the era when metal shutters started to appear in shops in poorer areas. I also remember areas of housing so run down and poverty stricken and crime ridden. I don't think there is anywhere as bad as those areas these days. Or I hope not.

Could be boring. No computers or social media so much harder to make friends and the fashion was hideous. But then I could get a house for £15,000. I much prefer life now. Work was an endless round of groping and discrimination and you needed your husbands Co signature for expensive purchases.

The music was obviously fabulous but also you could be an individual & have your own look. Teens weren't identikits like they are now.

Absolutely. I remember my History A Level class in 1985.
We had a punk, several Goths, me going through my Afflecks Palace/ Smiths phase, (so wearing my dad's shirt from the 60s and an old brown suede jacket of my gran's ) and a few Casuals in farrah trousers and Pringle sweaters.
And the History teacher saying "Good morning class! And what have we all come as today?"

I agree there was far less pressure at secondary school.in the 80,s and they didn't really discuss exams until fourth year( year 10) but it's swings and roundabouts in my school if you didn't work the teachers didn't really care ,also they didn't care much about the lower sets ,whereas at my sons school ( he's just coming to the end of year7 ) we get a progress report at the end of every half term ,he's always struggled academically and is in lower sets but the teachers seem to put in the effort so that kids can achieve to the best of their abilities.

My first real interactive computer game (apart from Pong type consoles) was called The Hobbit.
It was entirely text based.
You had to get out of certain situations by writing things like "dig a hole". The computer would come back with "you dig a hole". It was very frustrating.
If you took too long it would keep writing "Time passes, you wait".
That phrase still pops into my mind even now when I am waiting for something .

Razzle Dazzle and Chelsea Girl

I also remember all the stuff you can get in poundshop/the Works now being really expensive and only available from WH Smith. Drawing paper, pencils, felt tips, poster paint, pencil cases, paint brushes, etc. All that lot would have cost you £30 not £3

Thatcher and the miners’ strike which destroyed whole communities. There was nothing put in place to help and she come down on them with an iron fist. She took milk away from school children and we thought she would never go.

There were no mobile phones so no way of checking if family were okay.
If you wanted to change something like an insurance policy you had to wait for them to ring you back.
If you went for a job you had a straight forward interview which didn’t involve jumping through hoops. You applied directly in writing or even in person.

In the 80s I trained as a hairdresser through a YTS scheme earning £29.50 weekly in the first year and £35 weekly in the second year.
Terrible really.
I used to listen to records every single day. There was a time when my dad was unemployed for 6 months and we really struggled as a family. We always had home cooked meals- liver & bacon, toad in the hole etc. Never had McDonald's but did have fish and chips from chippy every Friday night and shellfish from pub shellfish stall most Sundays. I never went abroad until I was 18 for first time with my friends in 1990.