to question if the squeeze on living standards will not be temporary?

[bindud]

"British families are facing the biggest squeeze on living standards for 30 years as surging prices and tax rises take their toll."

"The Bank of England forecast a 2pc fall in incomes after tax this year – the worst since its records began in 1990. In 2023, they’re set to fall 0.5pc."

Apparently things will get better in 2023, but will they?

We have the frozen income tax bands, ageing population, & most likely more wage stagnation after a decade of it after the 08 crash.

Is life just going to be more & more expensive going forward for the vast majority of people? or am i being too pessimistic?

I'm on benefits but I'm really worried, my Civil Service pension will go up in April by at least 3% but the DWP take half of the increase off my benefits, I just can't get in front. I don't have any option but to came benefits because I'm disabled & housebound.

You're right OP, we are doomed, everyone has replaced "the future" with "going forward" - I can't stand any more.

🙄

I do think we’ve become so used to everything being cheap that’s it’s now such a shock at the rising cost of everything.
I can remember a weekly food shop in the late 1980’s costing £40-£50 and we were probably only earning £1000 a month back then, if that. Clothes were also relatively expensive, as were white goods and electronics. We paid more for a washer in 1992 than we did last year.

@HeyBlaby

Oh it will be temporary, we're transitioning into a high-wage economy, Boris said so!

Well if Boris said it, it must be true !!

@BorgQueen

I do think we’ve become so used to everything being cheap that’s it’s now such a shock at the rising cost of everything. I can remember a weekly food shop in the late 1980’s costing £40-£50 and we were probably only earning £1000 a month back then, if that. Clothes were also relatively expensive, as were white goods and electronics. We paid more for a washer in 1992 than we did last year.

It's rent or mortgage that's the killer

Buying clothing often and getting takeaways wasn't such a big thing when I started work. I'm still seen as tighter than a gnat's arse by many.

But equally I remember stuff actually being built to last. Now the planned obsolescence will stuff up the washing machine quite quickly. Gah.

Yes, we will be returning to the days when the basic goods of food, energy and housing take up most of the average pay packet. To be fair, the situation with cheap food prices in this country could not go on forever.
It's interesting though, about how this one will play out. People need to keep buying things they don't need to keep the cogs of capitalism turning (at least the current brand of it we have in the West). What happens when people get out of the habit of it (whether through choice or necessity)?

@MasterGland

Yes, we will be returning to the days when the basic goods of food, energy and housing take up most of the average pay packet. To be fair, the situation with cheap food prices in this country could not go on forever. It's interesting though, about how this one will play out. People need to keep buying things they don't need to keep the cogs of capitalism turning (at least the current brand of it we have in the West). What happens when people get out of the habit of it (whether through choice or necessity)?

I asked myself this question when consumer culture exploded but everyone told me it would never end. I guess it has to when we fill all the landfill, so to speak!

But rich people who regularly spend a lot must be the biggest % of that money and they will carry on spending I guess.

Something has got to give.

Multi generations sharing homes will increase. It's started as seen by the rise in average age of people leaving home.

Uni students, more will commute to their local one probably.

Billionaires are doing very well, their wealth has grown hugely.

Meanwhile in the real world, since 2010 life expectancy is actually falling (pre covid) in parts of the country.

And the government reduced the taxes for banks, so defo all in this together 🤔

And travel. Petrol costs through the roof and I sometimes have to ration myself on when I use the car. The days of cheap air flights seem to be dead/dying too. Train prices have risen in some areas too. In my local area the train services have been reduced and replaced with buses due to low passenger numbers - probably due to many folk losing jobs or working from home. It's all a domino effect and the average person is stuck in the middle.

I feel really down about it. Just got a better job and all it will do is just fill in the rising bills and the cost of food. There is nothing to look forward to, the future looks bleak! Guess what, if you want to escape it's not so easy anymore as no freedom of movement. So utterly, utterly depressing. The only good thing that may come out of this mess is people will open their eyes and finally vote the Tories out after all the damage they've done to this country whilst lining their own pockets and making their chums richer.

The 0.1% will be fine.
The rest of us, not so much.

Petrol and 20 cigarettes were the same price all through the 1950s to the 2000s
A gallon of petrol is now cheaper than 20 cigarettes £11 compared to £6.75 for a gallon of petrol

Well there are a lot of people who willingly voted for this. Despite a decade of unnecessary austerity, they voted for this saying short term pain was worth it. Anyone who voted for this lot, need not complain.

It has been getting steadily worse in most areas for the last 40 years.

The Tories always went on about how amazing and wonderful the Victorian Age was: when most of us were servants and gross inequality was justified in the name of God and the Queen. Just to be clear, that term “inequality” means the difference between lives that aren’t worth living and are very short, spent living in squalor and hardship, and lives that are spent taking baths in champagne and being able to order poor folk to lie down in mud to be stepped on.

How quickly the lessons about just how little some people possess pass, every single time.

Well there are a lot of people who willingly voted for this.

Indeed because MSM told them the alternative would be dreadful, whilst it would indeed be dreadful for their owners and pals, it wouldn’t be for their readers who are now paying 3% more NI than they do

But then insulate britain want everyone to have free insulation which would save them on average £300/400 a year and people are opposed to this 🤷‍♀️

If we get rid of the tories we may have a chance but it will take years to undo the mess they've made.

but the electorate has never allowed that, nation of masochists

Energy prices are likely to keep rising. That's to some extent because we want green energy/ to tax things that produce CO2. Energy prices have a knock-on effect on prices of almost everything else as energy is needed to make and distribute goods.

Add in that the world economy isn't looking great - for which you can partly blame Covid/ restrictions, though there's a reasonable argument that we were always heading for a bit of a crash - and I don't see things improving for a while. I might be wrong of course, wouldn't that be nice?!

DH and I were saying the other day that when we were kids you went out for dinner maybe twice a year if you were lucky. Mostly for either mum or Dad's birthday and once a month we had fish and chips on a Friday.

Our kids generation eat out at least once a month. When I got my first flat I could afford to go out once a month on the lash, our kids are out every weekend on top of ordering Deliveroo and buying loads of clothes. Times have changed. On the flip side neither of our kids seem to want to prioritise renting or buying a place of their own like we did at that age.

The economy has definitely changed, I think it depends on what generation you are as to how adaptable you can be

Moving away from fossil fuels was always going to be painful. To achieve net zero, we have to consume less and that means everyone.
If we are serious about it, then people need to re-evaluate, live to a lower standard. It isn't going to be popular, ever.

Energy probably is a temporary crunch to some extent - that's why the Treasury has implemented this loan thing. The price of CO2 which impacts food is also a temporary glitch.

Other stuff, not so much.

It doesn't have to be this way, there must be a way that the government could take real steps to help the general public but the measures they're introducing currently don't seem to be doing that.

I can’t see it improving, I think the changes will become the new normal, and then prices will increase steadily as normal.