Why does life seem to shit in the UK

[RosieLeaLovesTea]

Endless threads about schools going down the pan and poor behaviour in schools making teachers want to leave.
NHS waiting lists and quality of care medical is poor.
housing market market in crisis and affordability of housing

I read the threads and it feels like life in the UK is really shit. Plus crap weathe for 8 months of the year.

how did we get here snd what is the solution?

I totally agree
I have lived in three other countries , all liberal and supposedly ideal , but living in the United Kingdom is better.
A lot of people moan with no idea of whether the grass is greener.
Yes it’s greener , the Uk is beautiful, so many green spaces ,coastline , sunsets etc.
I appreciate it so much.

But how do you know unless you live there with no other options.

I live in NZ and yeah for the first few years it was fine because it was exciting and somethings seemed better. But the reality of living somewhere full time is very different.

Germany has just been through a period of political stability thanks to Merkel. Compared to the UK which has gone through a huge political upheaval thanks to the Tory party’s infighting + Brexit. So of course they look different.

We have average wages, used to have disposable income and enjoyed a holiday a year, days out and pub lunches. But now it's pretty much gone after all the bills and a few activities for our only child. (At least they're in school now so no more nursery bill)

Everything is just so expensive but unless you're a higher earner it's just bills and grind with not much to look forward too and the weather really doesn't help.

We're not even that badly off compared to some, we have a house (with a mortgage) at least, so some stability there.

There needs to be massive investment in the country. Proper NHS funding, nationalise energy and transport, build housing. But it won't happen because this government is still frightened to do anything just for the sake of helping the public if big business can't profit from it because they're scared to sound like Corbyn. 🫠

So we're just going to get more austerity and maybe a tickle round the edges of what needs to be done and more people will be plunged into abject poverty and then the far right will groom the disenfranchised to vote them in next...

Career politicians and a 2-party voting system, Brexit, unregulated capitalism, the class system, being an island, the weather

I've lived in lots of different countries including Germany, the US, NZ and Australia. My life in the UK is definitely not shit. It depends on individual circumstances.

We haven’t had ‘decades of unlimited mass immigration’ and you really shouldn’t read The Fail.

I totally agree - for me its the declining quality of education.
My DD’s primary teacher has gone off on long term sickness - can't be helped. In the first week of her absence the kids have had 5 different t supply teachers. The
SLT finally have a more permanent cover supply for a few weeks - hoorah only to be told today now he is off sick!!! There are too many children who have challenging behaviour and I'm sure the teachers are thinking ‘ why do I put up with this awful job’?
Don't get me started on the roads - everywhere is gridlock! Population growth of 8m people can't help this tiny Island progress and yes i did vote Brexit because I fundamentally disagree with open borders for all and sundry to enter this country.
No one berates the Us/Australia/ Canada etc for their controlled immigration - i really don't get it!! Sorry but the country is well and truly up shits creek!! The inept Government are ill equipped to solve the problems of the day IMHOP

I don't understand why people are talking about 'uncontrolled immigration'. All immigration into the country is controlled bar the small boats which are asylum seekers.

The squeeze is what I feel too. I don't even engage with the news very much at all for MH reasons, and I avoid news sources like tabloids like the plague, so it's not that I'm constantly being fed doom and gloom.

The fact is that life is such in the UK now that as PPs have noted, simply existing takes up all our wages. There is little money to actually do things.

I remember in 2015, working part time and getting by just fine; life was simple and sweet and stable. I do realise obviously my personal outgoings have gone up with more DC, but so has my income and still, the squeeze is far beyond that.

Surprisingly under the new government (who I voted for and have always voted left), we seem to be getting even less support..

It's heart achingly disappointing to read budget updates and other news articles, and see that we seem to be moving toward austerity in everything but name. We were just outright told by the last government to expect life to be more shit!

My understanding is our post covid economy has not recovered at a rate close to European counterparts. I don't know much about all of this "stimulating economic growth" stuff, but to me it just sounds like classic tory politics of favouring businesses over people.

It's depressing. I do want to move out of the south east though, as it is cripplingly expensive and is really starting to get me down now. But it costs money to relocate which I just don't have.

The UK has always had low wages and high taxes compared to similar countries, this had been survivable for a long time, but extreme austerity and a complete failure to recover from the crash in 2008 meant the buffers the UK had to get on okay with low wages was gone. On top of that a large enough portion of the population either don’t want things to improve, or they think not a single penny of their own money should be used for the good of the country. Those things are never going to create a stable economy with good public services.

On top of that a one term solution is impossible, so that prevents change as people who simply don’t understand basic economics will spit their dummy out because the UK isn’t fixed in a couple of years.

Its like the lies of mass immigration, rather than help solve an issue, for many inventing a cause is preferable.

We have left the UK, we don’t think the UK is shit, but we know its in a mess at the moment. Where we now live we earn more and pay less in taxes, we also have lower costs as childcare is extremely cheap, health care we have used has been very good (I’m currently in hospital, the care has been brilliant, food is great etc, its comparable to private care in the UK), our sons school is good, wrap around care is not just a right, there’s also no additional cost, the same with school meals. If we were on the same wage we had in the UK we would still be better off here by about £1,300 per month, this is mainly due to childcare, however we only used childcare in the UK three days a week, so it was ‘cheap’ compared to many. If any of our two decide to attend university here it won’t cost anything in fees.

We never recovered from the 2008 financial crisis.

This!

Plis lack of investment, ageing population & huge intergenerational inequality. Things aren’t going to get better either.

Well, I'd rather be here than in Palestine, Afghanistan, Iran, China, Israel etc
That's for sure, shit as it!!

Population growth of 8m people can't help this tiny Island progress and yes i did vote Brexit because I fundamentally disagree with open borders for all and sundry to enter this country.

We need immigration though as we don’t have enough workers.

On top of that a large enough portion of the population either don’t want things to improve, or they think not a single penny of their own money should be used for the good of the country. Those things are never going to create a stable economy with good public services.

yep

Well, I'd rather be here than in Palestine, Afghanistan, Iran, China, Israel etc

🙄 could we not aim a tiny bit higher?

Salaries are so stupidly low that many couples both working full time are still entitled to benefits to support a family and they could still be struggling!

If you live in a country with sunny dry summers it will also be brown land and not green fields.

I've never understood the argument, "It's more shit elsewhere."

As if you should accept low standards because they're lower in other places.

Utterly bizarre perspective.

A decline in christian 'values' is a good thing. Decent people can be decent people without a god figure.

Yeah but at least my kids are safe at school from being shot.

Where is this Utopia?

I sometimes think it’s the feel of a country, I think it’s probably been a while since I felt anyone was actually in charge. Tbf there are global events that no-one can prevent.

I sometimes think it’s like calhoun’s rats and behavioural sink.Perhaps population density causes a lot of problems and it’s creeping into our sub-conscious. The Uk seems to struggle with volume pressures on health, prisons, housing, behaviour in schools and public.

I do wonder if the consensus around progressive values has come back to bite us in the ass. It feels like the fall or rome in the west sometimes. I’m probably being melodramatic but I do sometimes think we need a good bout of common sense to drag us back to a place where people can feel a bit happier and a bit more secure. i think people are happy to contribute when they trust the system, if they have low trust that the system is actually working then they will resent it.

en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_B._Calhoun

Stop watching the BBC news.
Other countries have the same or different issues. They just don’t get reported.

Horrible underinvestment for last 15 years, town centres and services really depressed

This coupled with the rich getting insanely rich (gap between rich and poor is worst in history) and the explosion of social media so we see their excess ALL THE TIME makes it feel horrific to the average Joelle/Joe

Add in the right wing media constantly trying to get us to turn on each other to fight over scraps rather than turn on THEM (see bullshit about benefit claimants, people claiming their kids have ASC for money - ffs, that's so not true!)

It's horrific right now.

I watch a lot of German news. They have a lot of problems there too, it's not the idyll some seem to think.

Those stabbings by that Syrian teenager highlights one of those issues.