What happens when the baby boomers die?

[LargeSquareRock]

Sorry about the title, but that’s literally it. I’ve wondered this since I was a child.

Obviously we are about to enter a 20 year spike when a smaller number of tax payers support a higher number of elderly people in healthcare and elder care.

What happens in 20 years when the spike is over? Do we have empty care homes, plentiful housing and easily available health care?

I really have no evil agenda asking this- demographics has always fascinated me.

I never understand this argument. It's not difficult to vote. It's never been easier to get a postal vote, so you don't even have to find time to go to the polling station nowadays. If younger people resent money being spent on things that are more important to older people, they need to let politicians know and vote accordingly.

People on Mumsnet would be supportive but people out there in the world won’t be. Anyway, we’ll see soon whether Labour have decided to be a proper government that can make balanced choices and decisions over a lot of issues or whether it’s back to the same old “rinse the rich” which will mean they’re out again soon.
Personally I would love a Labour Govt that could help to balance things up in the U.K. without making life worse for lots of people. I live in Aus and we have a broadly centre left govt and they seem to be able to balance the needs of the population pretty well.

e.g. perhaps assisted dying will become more acceptable than rotting away for years in an expensive care home... or extended family living arrangements might have become more widespread
@PorridgeIsNotSlimmingTheWayIMakeIt
I think these extended family living arrangements are a bit of a rose tinted fantasy that rarely works in reality.
Too many of us are aware of how stressful and difficult it is being a full-time carer for an adult who is completely dependent on you. It may have been feasible in the past when there were enough unmarried women who could be hoodwinked into doing this work (and thereby sacrificing their own adulthood, career opportunities etc) but this is no longer the case imo.

Some of us do. But it doesn't change the fact that many still don't because they don't see the point.

This last GE is a great example. No good candidates, two main parties who are out of touch with the average person and no real solutions to any of our issues. I voted, although even after all my research I still stood in the booth looking at the ballot for ages before deciding. I know many who spoiled their voting slip this time around.

Don't want to derail, but just wanted to give some insight into why many younger people may not be as inclined to vote. At least people I know.

I know our parents looked into downsizing but found the expense and the available properties made it very unattractive - so it's not like housing stock is matching the current needs now
@DancingBadlyInTheRain
This boggles my mind! Developers don't build properties that the population need and want. Instead they build properties that they want people to want so that they can make the profits that they want. But how can they be making any profit at all if no one can afford to buy them 🤷🏻‍♀️ 🤪

How can we equate people born in the 30s & 40s with people born in the 60s. They are from different generations. Placing them in the same category (baby boomers) regarding housing & tax related concerns etc doesn't make sense.

People totally missing the meaning of the term ‘baby boom’ 😂 Jesus wept.

Where did you get the idea that Boomers are healthier? People aged over 60 have a high prevalence of hypertension, type 2 diabetes and cancers (bowel, prostate, skin etc). Also, our life expectancy is now falling due to poor diet and inactive life-styles.

Would the old age pension come down? Obv not with a money saving government but always wondered in 50 years if it might decrease slightly rather than increase

True. That's where assisted dying comes in! 🤪

I suppose what I'm trying to say is that anything can happen in the next couple of decades. The whole picture might be totally unrecognisable in ways we can't even imagine.

Developers build what they can sell at most profit. But land availability is restricted by planners…so land is expensive, and limited in supply. Therefore not enough houses are built, and the ones that are are the more profitable ones. This is partly balanced by the social housing requirements on most sites, but even then the LAs and HAs prioritise ‘family’ houses, because there a shortage of property and they house more people. There’s little incentive to build bungalows or smaller detached units for single / older people because there’s not enough land to do everything. And that’s before you look at location…another planning issue.

With regards to property there won't be a sudden glut because while family size has fallen the number of households hasn't. My 'boomer' father was raised with his five siblings in a two bed flat (the four boys in the big bedroom in two sets of bunks, the two girls in the smaller bedroom my grandparents on the sofa). The same flat now is probably lived in just a couple or a couple with 1 or 2 kids (yes I know over crowding does still occur but not to the same extent). The average family size has fallen but the rise of single parents and blended families along with the increasing belief that children should have their own room means there is a rising demand for property even where populations have stabilised.

Looking on the bright side, we might invent a pill to cure Alzheimer's and vascular dementia. Stranger things have happened.

I'm not saying we're healthy in absolute terms. In comparison with the generation above ours I think we're healthier than they were at the equivalent ages, and I think we were also healthier and more active in childhood than many younger UK residents. I'm guessing, but I'd be really surprised if the healthy life expectancy of the average UK resident now aged 60-79 isn't a lot higher than what would have been calculated for somebody born before 1945 when they were in that age group.

Do immigrants not age?

And people certainly do use it as a slur however much they try and deny it.

Of course they do, but our immigration policy could work around this, by needing to be in a certain age bracket to qualify for entry.

Think Aus/NZ. Bring skills, be of the right age and prove you're useful, you can come live and work here and be eligible for our countries benefits.

I’m at the older end of the Baby Boomers (as we were originally called), and I accept it’s sometimes used as a slur, mainly I view it as a label for an age group, just as my DC are Gen X, and my DGC Gen Z.

DH and I aren’t in the well off cohort, didn’t inherit, we own a small semi which is worth much less than half either of our DCs’ homes, (no help from us) and we pay minimal tax. If we need care even the sale of our home wouldn’t fund it for long. However, our DC make up for us with their earnings. They won’t be relying on the State for their retirement.

Then prices for them WILL come down under the basic economics of supply and demand.

You're in Australia. Why are you so concerned about older people in the UK?

I'm in my 70s. I used to earn more than double that. Still paying tax now. I have been my disabled husbands carer for over 30 years saving the country a fortune. Gave birth to and brought up 4 high tax payers. I think i've contributed plenty.

The housing market will become flooded with homes. The wealth gap between those who can inherit and those who do not will become even wider.

Everyone in this family who’s needed residential care, has been entirely self funded - money coming both from the sale of their home and from savings. But the initial basis of those savings was largely legacies from their own parents, who bought their own homes pre WW2, when houses were so much more easily afforded by very ordinary people - none of my grandparents could have been described as remotely wealthy.

Anyone who’s read Raymond Briggs’ book ‘Ethel and Ernest’ (about his parents) will have seen that in the pre war 1930s they were able to buy a 3 bed house in Wimbledon on just one milkman’s wage. IIRC it cost £850. Same sort of house in the same area (well known to dh) will now go for around £1m.

So I do wonder about the funding of care in future, when so many people are forced by the cost of housing generally to rent long-term, and more and more properties are owned by landlords.

It’s looking like being an accidental landlord will be more bother than it’s worth, so I’m not sure that’s likely to happen, but yes, it’s one option.

Also inheritance tax would be due no matter what you do with the property, depending on the level the limit is set at. If it’s below the average house price, say £200,000 or even £100,000 then large sums of money are due at the point of inheriting anyway. Unless you have sizeable savings I’m not sure what else people can do other than sell the inherited home or move into it and sell the one they are currently living in. Holding both opens them up to potentially higher charges for second homes. 🤷‍♀️

There’s also the possibility of a House & Land Value Tax replacing Council Tax. This would increase yearly inline with rising house prices at roughly 0.5% and would be paid (supposedly) by the asset owner, not the tenant. Being on a fixed income but having to pay ever increasing amounts just to live in your own home is not an attractive prospect! Downsizing may push up demand for smaller, cheaper houses, so that may not be a viable option either.

0.5% on a £260,000 house is £1,300, but if house prices follow the same pattern as the last 30 years (from £58,000 in 1990 to £260,000 in 2024 - a 4.5-fold rise) then the charge on a £1,170,000 home is £5,850 - and that’s assuming the percentage charge never increases! 😳

If your house is currently worth £500,000 (which is not unreasonable in London) then in 30 years time (again assuming same rate of increase) it will be worth £2.25 million which would also bring you into the proposed mansion tax bracket!! And the 40% IHT on that if the limit is lowered to £200,000 would be £820,000. If you don’t want your descendants to have to sell up you’d need to ensure they had a very sizeable cash cushion in their bank accounts!! I’m not sure many people have £27,000 going spare to give their kids each year - nor even that the kids can stash away that much in savings annually themselves. Even £13,000 per year so they can pay off the IHT on a property currently worth £260,000 is going to be unmanageable for most.

Renting may be a choice in future, because if the local authority or housing association own the properties then you’re less likely to be hit with massive rental increases. In effect it reforms the rental market.

But then again, if our population keeps increasing (mainly through immigration as the birth rate here falls) then demand for properties will always outstrip supply.

So basically, who knows?! 🤷‍♀️

They do - but it can make it a slump not a cliff with aging.

They don't have childhood dependency years in UK as often come as adults - so that make workers vs dependent ratio better - as dependents are mostly kids + retired.

Then some may go back at retirement or some may stay few years in needed roles - but most will age adding to next lot of retirement numbers but after decades of adding to worker population.