To find this very depressing

[jungledoc]

Read this article today

www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-03-24/u-k-s-wealth-gap-and-housing-costs-risk-civil-unrest-bnp-says

"Britain is the second most unsustainable of 36 major economies, with tensions from high housing and childcare costs coupled with wealth inequalities undermining social mobility and threatening to provoke civil unrest."

Obviously it's just one organisations measure but to come almost bottom!

Would there really be civil unrest though? I did think furlough was also used to maintain civil order, people understandably wouldn't sit at home happy being unable to earn.

Civil unrest on the say -so of a French Bank? I wouldn't put money on it!!

Yeah the civil unrest bit is a bit 🤔, after all "we" are not French.

However the findings in the rest of the article aren't great.

This makes me think of the summer riots in 2011. Although the trigger was the killing of Mark Duggan, I seem to remember that much post-riot analysis attributed widespread feelings of social injustice amongst the younger generation as one of the longer-tern causes. This was a couple of years into coalition austerity so I can see where the link was made.

If it happened in 2011 then it can definitely happen in today's context. Summer is also coming and we all know about the links between summer time and rioting. I would not be surprised OP if civil unrest were to come about, which is just awful.

Forgot about the summer & I do remember the 2011 riots.

Very depressing OP.
Social mobility is dead.
Young people are stuffed, unless they have wealthy parents who can help them pay their rent, get on the property ladder and generally supplement their very low income whilst they get started with a career.
I'm 37 and just got on the property ladder, without help, in time (2010), before prices went insane.
DH and I aren't fussed about having kids, but when we've thought about it over the years, it's always been childcare costs that have put us off. £600 a month for our mortgage, but £1000 a month for childcare? Yeah, no thanks.
I doubt we'll see rioting though. Through the covid restrictions the nation revealed themselves to be a compliant and docile bunch. I think people are now so conditioned into self-censorship on social media, it's made people more passive in real life too 🤷🏼‍♀️

Yes it's ridiculous that in order to get on the housing ladder it's more important to have who parents can help eg live at home/deposit rather than rely on work. It's ridiculous that wages have such little growth & the best way to improve ones prospects is inherit.

We also have the ageing population issue & young people that can will likely head abroad for opportunity which will exacerbate the burden on the young.

I have 2 dc & the birth rate has crashed. Tbh young people probably can't afford them.

Civil unrest doesn’t necessarily mean riots. The article specifically mentions protests which I could absolutely see happening.

That law was passed recently to clamp down on 'noisy' protests. I suppose it was passed in anticipation of unrest caused by all this inequality. What a Government!

@CallMeDaddy58

Civil unrest doesn’t necessarily mean riots. The article specifically mentions protests which I could absolutely see happening.

Yes, I agree that civil unrest doesn't necessarily mean riots. When I read the article, though, the first thing I thought of was the 2011 riots. These happened during austerit. I appreciate they were linked to other factors such as police violence and opportunism but what worries me is that it feels that some families and young people are struggling even more now than in 2011. I feel this because of a number of factors which include the impact of COVID on livelihoods, the rising cost of living/NI contributions and the fact that whilst the nation locked down, some in government were at parties in Downing Street. I do worry that there is a brewing national anger but I am hopeful that the end result will nor mirror 2011. Protests, however, I fully support. Interesting point upthread about the docile British public though. We do indeed have a very different national character than France!

Morality is a higher order need. When people feel unsafe, are hungry and don’t have security then morality may no longer be important - if you watch the film about that festival for the rich that turned out to be nothing you see what human nature is really like. At the end of the day survival instincts kick in - more strongly for some. I think in the coming years there will be a lot more civil unrest unless we make some drastic changes now.

Thinking about the war I was reading about all the billionaires buying up bunkers etc & a few spoke of civil unrest as motivation as opposed to nuclear weapons because they are probably very aware of the increasing gap & the potential to revolt.

I was only about civil unrest today I don't know why.

The cost of utilities, the last two years and all the instances from the government where it's been a case of do as I say not as I do etc.

I think if fuel prices are still this high or higher when it gets colder is when we might see the start of unrest.

I think unrest is fairly certain to be on the cards, and not in the sense of a march on parliament. People have been marching throughout the summer every year since 2016, and it's had no effect.

People have been squeezed through austerity for years and with the cost of everything rising, there's no where left to make cuts but to essentials. If you can't eat or turn on lights because your money had to go on petrol for work so you can make rent...

Thievery comes next, and people start to feel less safe at home and like no one is listening. So someone thinks "I'll make them listen", and does something violent and others join in.

It does all feel a bit hopeless

I can see it happening in the next few years. And I encourage it. It’ll be the only way to effect change. People have been squeezed for so long they have nothing left to give. Unrest happens when people have no hope and a bleak outlook...currently a large section of UK society. Particularly amongst the young.

Personally I find riots far more depressing than anything else - we're not happy with things so lets go round smashing stuff up and setting fire to shit. Yeah that's the answer.

I was in Canada when there were riots there over ice hockey, it was just awful especially for the people living where it was all kicking off. All the local people went out afterwards to help clean up and show that not everyone was a violent knobhead that thought destroying stuff was the answer to anything. Thankfully I live far away from the sort of places or people that think civil unrest is a suitable response to their issues.

If people really wanted change they wouldn't have voted in bloody Boris. What a joke - all the racist northerners that wanted Brexit hopped over to the Tories and this is the result. They got Brexit and everything else to be expected from the Tories and they're surprised?

Inequality is massively destabilising to society, it isn't sustainable for long.

@Gowithme what is a suitable response to not being able to afford food, or adequate housing?

Civil unrest might look like people stealing food and sitting round a bondfire in the street because they won't have money for food or power.

The 'racist' northerners were the ones voting Tory?

I don't think so.

No one can be arsed to riot.

@GreenNewDealNow It wasn't passed, it was defeated in the Lords.

We need to bring back grammar schools and build many more houses neither of which will happen.