Baby Boomers scrimped and saved and spent their money on bricks and mortar rather than luxuries. So it's a combo of stable permanent contracts, working hard (to get the decent pensions) and investing in properties that have helped them to comfortable 'elder' lifestyles.
Yep. Because my Boomer parents had a single wage. They lied about mum being pregnant so they could get a mortgage on two wages, even then they were grilled about howling mum would stay working before she became a Little Housewife. She couldn't go on the pill before they married, wasn't welcome back to work after she had me. So dad worked many hours to pay for everything. Was known as the Tuity Fruity man because me and mus sister only saw him on Friday's when he cam hime early from work with sweeties. My sister was often scared of him, thought he was a stranger. And he had a second job over the weekend. My parents tried to be the new upwardly mobile youth the adverts promised so much to.
They bought everything on the never never - as everyone seemed to back then. So we had all mod cons until the shillings ran out and the Rumbelows van came and took something away. Then a couple of months later they would go out and re hire purchase a similar item, that may or may not stay until it was paid off or replaced. That included the house. Dad got a new job and sold the house for almost exactly what he paid for it. So he may as well have rented. He did from then on.
They had no private pensions. they relied upon the state, the promises they were made about hard work and retirement reward. Mum worked for enough years to qualify in her own right - we were latchkey kids from the first day we were both at school.
But remember these are parents of many of us who would not have had the heating on more than minimally (if indeed they had CH in their properties), would not have had baths/showers daily, wouldn't leave lights on all over the house, and for whom the word 'tumble dryer' would have been unknown until well into middle-age. We can learn a lot from them about 'making do' in the context of conserving energy!
Never had CH. Always had one room that was heated, kids given the bedroom above it. Weekly baths, best ones were after dad as it would have been deeper and hotter than one drawn specifically for us. Mum was always the last in. Daily 'cat's lick' (which is fucking disgusting when you think about it). Door closed behind you every time, ights only on if really needed and truned off as you closed the door on leaving a room - on pain of what seemed like death. No tumble dryer. No fridge for a few years - cold shelf in the pantry did for us until about 1970, daily shopping made fridges and freezers unecessary. Twin tub and mangle, all that good fun stuff.
I think I was about 16, 17 years old by the time they had what everyone now thinksis the norm. And still they lived in a council house - until in his 50s Dad bought a small doer upper, which they lived in until circumstances meant they couldn't afford that and DSis took them in.
They are now mid 70s in a rented flat, state pension and no other funding to fall back on.
That is the reality of many Boomers. In fact of all the Boomers I know.
No matter what cobblers is sold to us via various media outlets, 'experts' here, my parents live the lives of many Boomers. Hard working, constantly living on the edge of earnings, more mobile than previous generations but having to be to chase work. They lived as kids and adults through major depressions and brought up Gen X kids to be hard working, self reliant and, often , philanthropic, socially minded adults.
Not quite the same as the balderdash spouted so often across MN!