Any other millennials fancy a moan?

[MoscowMules]

I know everyone says, the generation before you had it harder, all the way back to the Crimean War probably.

But

Is anyone else who is a millennial just a bit fed up? Fancy a pity party?

I reflected this evening on things that have happened.

I was born in the very early 90's, so am pretty much smack bang in the middle of the millennials.

We've lived under pretty much unstable governments in adulthood. Mainly conservative.

We've had 2 global recessions

An illegal War

Brexit

A global pandemic

Housing Crisis

Cost of living crisis

Possible collapse of the NHS or if not collapse it continues to limp on with poor care

Russia invade Ukraine and global tension.

To mention but a few calamities, and now here we are, trying to raise Alpha Generation typically, in the midst of all this.

I just feel a bit like "wtf" how much more can we take?

Yes there were good things on a social level, we were the first to learn and grow from the internet and become digital. LGB rights moved forward with same sex marriage, education improved especially with the removal of Section 28 from the education act towards the end of some of our schooling.

But my god! What a generation to belong to and try and navigate in.

I totally accept if I'm having a pity party for one here tonight though 🤣

Doesn't change anything anyway.

It's depressing reading how you feel. My kids are 26 and 22, and a bit more optimistic. We've been able to support them so far, saving for them when they were kids.

I was born in 1970, grew up in the shadow of daily IRA terrorism- we had no public bins for a while because of it, and checked under cars before getting in them. Shortages of bread, toilet roll. General strikes, blackouts.
Cold War- get under a table if the siren goes stuff.
Then miners' strikes, poll tax riots, race riots.
Yugoslavia- genocide in Europe.
Black Friday. My mortgage tripled over a weekend. Luckily that settled again.
Iran/Iraq
Kuwait
Twin towers.

It's always the same. Those things don't seem like a big deal, because with hindsight they passed.
At the time it was destabilising and scary.
This is reasonably normal. I don't think I remember a winter when we haven't had news stories about ambulance queues and flu crises.

A cave would have been better.

Stuff is so cheap now. Like, really cheap.

Reusing wrapping paper wasn't an old person's quirk, it was a normal and sensible habit. New paper was expensive. Paper and pencils were expensive. It wasn't the freely available waste resource it is now.

You just didn't have coffee and drinks out. You took a flask and a bag of sandwiches. Gosh I sound old.

@picklemewalnuts ok stuff is cheap, but you know what isn’t? Fundamental stuff like housing, heating and bills. Stuff you can’t cut back on.

I’d trade cheap ‘stuff’ for being able to afford a family home and without both me and DH working full time to the bone and paying a fortune in childcare.

Dont moan doing something about it

I don't understand why people use this as an argument, it doesn't matter if paper and pencils are cheap when housing and energy are so expensive. You can't pack lunch your way onto the housing ladder when the average property price is 10x the average wage and average rental prices are over £1k a month. That's without considering childcare costs are like a second mortgage, and 'unprecedented' events on a yearly basis have caused financial chaos.

Oh I thought 1985 was the start of millennial, I'm not fussed though 'Wanders off to make some avocado toast and some kind of syrupy latte'.

@LivingDeadGirlUK and @Mushroo you're both absolutely right.

I think I get distracted by all the 'stuff'. Other things were expensive too- food, fuel, getting a landline installed etc.

I remember when 'stuff' got so cheap. It upset a balance, staffing costs are outrageously high in comparison to supplies in school, so it's staff that get cut.

Everything is all deeply out of kilter at the moment.

In the 80s, chilblains were normal. Blue tack, scissors, sellotape, hair elastics, cartridges, rationed by mum.

I think maybe we've had a window of prosperity rather than now suffering unprecedented hardship.

But that's just anecdotal, my own experience rather than data.

Of course you can't pack lunch your way onto the housing ladder but certainly from my admittedly anecdotal observations there is a grain of truth insofar as the choices that being made by 20 somethings when it came to spending. I am heavily involved in the grad recruitment and training at my company. We take on about 18 grads each year and it is fascinating watching how their spending habits vary. They are all starting on pretty good salaries, you had one group who did utilise the previously mentioned packed lunch, drank instant coffee, cycled to work, used the local park for exercise, lived in flat shares in a less salubrious part of town, wore an off the peg suit, drank down the Wetherspoons or similar and took basic holidays. The latter did the opposite, within a few months of starting their new jobs were rolling into the office in leased BMWs, eating out most days for lunch, buying coffee, using latest smart phones, ear buds, top end garmin watches, gym memberships and electing to rent in the swish parts of town. Over the course of a year there is several thousand pounds worth of savings to be made between the two. I was hardly surprised that there was a strong correlation between the frugal group and first home ownership.

@picklemewalnuts

Yes you do sound old. My daughter is 11 and she has chilblains on her toes and it’s 2023. I never had chilblains when I was a kid.

Lucky you. You were perhaps the first generation for whom it was not normal. It's a shame we've regressed, but I don't think progress is ever constant, surely? Hopefully it's a blip.

Blair and Brown got loads wrong (and I can remember railing against PFI and marching against Iraq). They also got lots of things right, or at least better- Sure Start, investment in education, NHS spending, I could go on and on. It honestly seems like a different country now.
I mentioned upthread that the Blair years were the best.
I'm a labour voting boomer who's teens and 20s were overshadowed by the IRA and the threat of nuclear war. My childhood was properly poor.
None of the earlier labour governments improved life, Thatcher we all know about. But Blair - I hated for Iraq but I actually worked in the NHS during those years and it was in pretty good shape when they finished.
I didn't buy a house until I was 32 and I still live in it. While it will have increased in value it's not money in my pocket and will probably not pay for care as I live in an area of very low house prices.

I was born in 1953 and have never had chilblains in my life. Nor has anyone else I know. Perhaps you mean the 1880s?

@Blossomtoes

My daughter has them. She is 11. Took her to the pharmacist and he told me they’re due to toes heating up too quickly from the cold. It made sense as I do put my heating on so I was a little confused.

Her school have cut down on the heating and she was complaining of cold feet and then coming home and warming them up too quickly.

Really, @Blossomtoes? Are you sure?

My sister had them on her fingers when she learned to crawl.
We both had them throughout our teens. Other people at school had them.

They weren't interesting or unusual in any way.
Perhaps you have excellent circulation!

We need to do something about secure, sensible rental. It's an 80s expectation that we all tried to buy our own homes. Ridiculous that we can't afford to buy or rent.

What made long term renting less secure, can anyone remember? At some point property became an asset instead of a home. I know council housing was sold off in the late 80s. Lots of ordinary people made a killing then.

Yes. We used to have a thing called council housing. Mrs Thatcher sold them cheaply to people who rented them.
They then sold them on and many sold it them to landlords. Who purchased whole roads of them. And then the landlords rented them back out to people at high prices.

We used to have decent housing for modestly earning people or those down on their luck. They got sold. To private landlords.

Yes and now they’re too expensive to buy back. So 🤷🏼‍♀️

And the answer is to bring them back really.

Perhaps I do. I’ve never heard of anyone I know having them.

They can give some annual amounts away tax free (provided they don't die in the next 7 years is it?)

But the main problem is not knowing how long you're going to live and how much care you will need. Keeping the big houses until they absolutely have to downsize does make good financial sense.

Multi generational living is probably the answer but not many people want to live with their elderly in laws.

@MoscowMules I am a later millennial but I can't agree with the pity party
We've had 2 global recessions
An illegal War
Brexit
A global pandemic
Housing Crisis
Cost of living crisis
Possible collapse of the NHS or if not collapse it continues to limp on with poor care
Russia invade Ukraine and global tension.

But....

Mine and DHs grandparents were holocaust survivors .... I am glad that I only had to deal with Iraq wars/Russia Ukraine

My Dad was injured in the 1996 Manc. Bombing

Parents were in negative equity my dad lost his job in the 1980's/1990's recession

NHS was in the shit way before now

Food has been artificially cheap for decades, but other costs were higher

Fewer opportunities for those from WC backgrounds re uni etc.

We really don't have it that badly

Oh and had I been born earlier I likely wouldn't have my 2 IVF kids (NHS treatment)....