To think that people are actually getting more ridiculous in their expectations??

[Youmadorwhat]

I mean ffs, 9.99 for Netflix per month Is justified because it’s entertainment but never mind the fact that you are in deficit every month🙄

Childcare, anything medical (including hospital car parks), education, school dinners and housing should all be subsidized substantially or FREE (and 24/7) I mean should the government not just collect the babies from the maternity ward and hand them back at 18!

I even saw a thread a while back where someone stated that all extra curricular activities should be subsidized for children 🙄

I know people are struggling I get that but the government CANNOT afford to prop up everyone!! Especially when a lot of people are actually at a tax deficit anyway!! Rant over!!

Even if this were true, I still don't see how you can't understand that the very air you breathe is dependent on society to keep it safe. A strong society is how you can be sure that nobody is dumping chemical just off the boundaries that would make your water undrinkable and your soil contaminated.

Or you know, just taking over your land and home and keeping it for themselves because they fancy it because without society, and in particular a peaceful society, anything goes.

And well, able to produce the tools you need to stitch a wound and keep it free of gangrene.

Here's a shovel so you can keep digging but of course, I'm sure you have your own mine on site to extract metal and forge to work it.

I think an interesting way to look at this is to flip it and ask the question: why do people feel the need to pay for Netflix (and sky etc)?

What's really noticeable about today, compared to the pre-television era, is that the advent of television pretty much wiped out older forms of evening and weekend leisure entertainment.

Back in the 40s, 50s and 60s, say, a small market town would have dances held three times a week. The local cinema would have showings every night that didn't break the bank. There were clubs and societies for all age ranges: male voice choirs, boys and girls brigades, amdram, reasonably priced sports clubs etc. My own grandparents used to go out to a "night club" or the local working men's club every weekend when they were in their 40s.

When you look back at old records, it's astonishing how much was going on at a local level every evening and weekend.

All that pretty much died in the 80s. Now in the evenings, there's not really much to do except watch TV or maybe go to the pub (which is pricey).

So people really don't have much else apart from TV in a lot of areas of the UK.

Bloody hell I’ve seen some nonsense on here before but this thread is something else. It is not really desirable to have people stitching themselves up. Even the world bank and the world economic forum are saying that inequality is bad and more should be done to equalise opportunity. They are not fluffy institutions. There is a cold, hard economic case for spending money on poorer members of society.

Poor people really, really arnt the problem.

So people really don't have much else apart from TV in a lot of areas of the UK
People used to do chores most evenings. They did them together and didn't question whether they enjoyed them or not. It was then a case of dad listening to the radio or reading the paper whilst mum knitted or read. They went to bed much earlier and were up at the crack of dawn needing to do more chores before starting the day.

People with views exactly like yours, OP, have since 1979 created a society in which normal people coming up cant afford a house, working people have to spend 80% of wages on rent/bills (before other essentials) and workers have no guarantee of actually getting hours or any protection at work. Anbody who wants a higher education has to pay up to £50,000 for it and dead people are being classified as fit for work. How about you talk those who are too rich off others backs to care- who pissed it all up the wall for normal people and still collected their bonuses?

The reaction to the report on UK poverty this week has been eye opening. People like you really dont have a fucking clue.

OP I'm child-free. I'd happily pay more taxes if it meant children not going hungry. You know, those kids that will one day grow up. If society invests in them then they'll invest in society, (I hope.) I also had free school meals, so in a way I'm paying back all the money that was spent on me as a child.

I think our government are mostly shit and very good at wasting money. I'm not going to blame the people at the bottom of the heap for the country's problems.

It was then a case of dad listening to the radio or reading the paper whilst mum knitted or read

And how are these people who would be wickedly extravagant to pay for Netflix supposed to be able to afford a paper?
Or knitting wool?

You have just proved your point: people did have access to entertainment. And on top of that the kind of public entertainment mentioned by PackingSoap.

Gosh yes, daily paper subscription is wildly extravagant vs Netflix!

@Youmadorwhat I can see your point that people need to spend within their means. However, everyone is entitled to a bit of enjoyment in their life.

The disparity between rich and poor is increasing and it needs to be reduced. Unfortunately many people seem to know the cost of everything and the value of nothing. There are lots of low paid jobs in society, which people have for a variety of reasons. Do you really think those people deserve to live in joyless poverty? It's not a race to the bottom.

It's 2019 not the 1980s. The structure of the country and economy have changed considerably. There are far fewer public free resources widely available. Closures of libraries and council run leisure centres, which had more free activities for children available for all. The service sector is the largest part of the UK economy. If everyone starts saving and tightening their belts, this leads to the economy contracting, service businesses failing and job losses. Manufacturing never returned to the pre 2008 level after the economy's supposed recovery, unlike the service sector.

House prices have inflated considerably more than employment income. So fewer and fewer people will own their own home. How do you expect pensioners to afford private rent? The state pension was introduced at 65 when life expectancy was 66 for men and 71. The 2014 life expectancy for people aged 65 is 84 for men and 86 for women. Even a reasonable private pension probably won't cover private rent for this period of time. This is why it's important to own a home, as you can downsize/ retirement flats in order to release capital to cover retirement. I would rather have my money in a house than a pension pot that the likes of Philip Green could trash.

Keep in mind that none of these things are "free". The cost has to come from somewhere. That somewhere would be your taxes.

Are you prepared to pay much higher taxes? Do you realize that this would still impact your take-home pay?

But the paper is Approved Of of course

“Are you prepared to pay much higher taxes? Do you realize that this would still impact your take-home pay?”

Of course. Do you think people who think people in need should be supporting are thick?

*supported

Type 2 diabetes cost the nhs billions. Not millions but 1,000 million. Type 2 diabetes is due in a last majority to obesity. We need to seriously tackle the rise in obesity and going back to getting people to cook properly and making unhealthy food what it used to be: treats. And no more listening to the proven to be totally untrue yet always thrown as an excuse that eating healthily is more expensive.

The daily paper would entertain only the adults in the family. Netflix has plenty for everyone. I don’t think it’s all that pricey. And it is equivalent of the old cheap weekly trip to the cinema. We’ve got many things going on in the evenings around us that are fairly cheap too. WI, cadets, Scouts, lots of amateur dramatic groups, book clubs, running clubs, parent and toddlers etc.

Absolutely we do not need to dial back the NHS - what we need to do is sort out how inefficient it is.

Stop health tourism, bring health and social care under one umbrella to stop all the fighting over money which takes up loads of money to argue about, have GPS specifically for older people, etc etc. Stop Brexit, put the money into the NHS, retain EU staff...

There's an expectation that if health care is needed it should be right now and people get huffy if they have to wait for an op when really they should think themselves lucky they're able to get the op for free and are not (unless Trump has his way) under an insurance based system.

Same with social care. I'm in the sector and all I hear is 'the social worker did nothing' when in reality that is not the case - they just didn't act in the timescales people think they are entitled to!

/rant

And well, able to produce the tools you need to stitch a wound and keep it free of gangrene.

Even if everything in society were free, do you believe that nobody would create anything anymore, that nobody would volunteer their time out of compassion and a sense of fairness - I take so I give back, as you say it's part of being responsible right? I think without basing everything on trade, without such a huge focus on money, with more people being able to live decently, that they would have more "space" in their minds for creativity and work, for compassion and helping others.

For anyone wanting to look at an ordinary family life and leisure in the 1950s, there is a lovely diary by the teenage Margaret Drabble which includes a good account of spare time activities.

Having a child is not a human right and the vast majority of people in this country have no reason to have more kids than they can afford

So...only rich people can reproduce...WOW!!

Uk has the most expensive childcare in the world: www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-42966047

Yes, there are other countries where childcare is not cheap either, but still the UK is more expensive. There are plenty of countries where childcare is way, way, way cheaper than here, Scandinavian countries, Spain, France, Italy....to name a few. It is actually so much cheaper than when telling people from those countries how much it costs here, they wouldn't believe you. Yes, that's right, they don't think what you are telling them is expensive, they think you are kidding, they think it is a joke.

I think Netflix is really good value for money. Plus it actually saves me money because I leave the house less, plus I look at Ebay and other selling sites less and save money.

The NHS and education is not free, we all pay for it with our taxes. I don't think either of these things should ever be privatised.

School trips, childcare and housing should be cheaper than it is. Things we don't need as much should be more expensive.

Childless couples still use the emergency services and NHS so they don’t get ‘nothing’ from the tax system. They also need roads to be maintained, bins to be collected etc. We all pay tax for good reasons and we don’t pay it selfishly for ourselves hence why we have the NHS and the state school system in the first place. If you want to be selfish, move to a country like the USA and pay health insurance.

Netflix is cheap for what it is. I used to pay for a sky TV subscription which was at least four times the price. I ditched both that and my TV licence years ago and save a fortune.

I've dealt with a social media rant today where someone was complaining they had to wait 4 hours for an X-ray in a&e last Friday night. Lots of outraged people! Seriously, 4 hours really isn't bad for someone not in a life-threatening condition. Public expectations are often ridiculous.

Re Netflix, I remember growing up and all the poorer kids in the class would have the full sky package and brand new games consoles. People hate stereotypes but those judgements have come from somewhere to start with.

Stop health tourism, bring health and social care under one umbrella to stop all the fighting over money which takes up loads of money to argue about, have GPS specifically for older people, etc etc. Stop Brexit, put the money into the NHS, retain EU staff...
Sorry to say but that is quite an ignorant view of the nhs. Health tourism is a drop in the ocean when it comes to cost to the nhs. As said already, type 2 diabetes is the biggest cost to the nhs, over a BILLION. The nhs would be in a much better position if people stopped taking their health for granted and actually looked after it, realising that is the best investment they can make in life.