To find my elderly relative’s attitude to money very wearing

[definitelybothered]

I help an elderly relative (late 80s) with various admin tasks, paying bills, ordering shopping, etc. It can be time consuming but she is virtually blind and can no longer do this herself.

But I find it really hard to bite my tongue as she is constantly complaining that she doesn’t have enough money, can’t afford to put the heating on in the winter and is one of those people who says young people today have more money than she ever did but they spend it all on holidays, coffee and concerts etc. She honestly believes it was harder financially in her day and young people today are just spoilt.

When I try and disagree with her she shouts me down. But what really irritates is she pleads poverty but it’s rubbish, she has an income of £4.5k every month (after tax) and barely spends a grand of it. She has an eye watering amount in savings too. Her latest grumble is she doesn’t think she should be in the higher tax band (she’s just been taxed 40% on something) but I said she must be based on the maths but she won’t listen.

No, the OP was not about an elderly lady feeling the need to save her money actually, but well done on the attempt at emotional manipulation.

The OP was about an elderly lady complaining about having to pay a higher rate of tax and complaining about young people having it better than she did. It’s interesting not wanting to pay into “the system” that’s actively supporting you, isn’t it?

Again, it doesn’t matter, because we cannot build our social welfare policy on Differentforgirls’ specific needs. This is not about you. But I do like how you have ignored everything I said in the post you have quoted. Why bother quoting me if you’re not going to engage with the conversation in any meaningful way?

You could tell her you can't do it anymore as you are needing to work more hours? Honestly, I would stop if all she ever does is rant at you. Why are you putting yourself through it? She has enough money to pay for help but she'd rather use your help for free. It's fine to go and see her occasionally but don't set yourself on fire to keep her warm. Caring for aged relatives is different now because far more women are working and not retiring as early, and people live much longer, often in ill health as advances in medicine prolong lifespan, not necessarily life span in good health so caring duties often last much longer. A man would never put up with it.

Surely 'boomers and baby boomers' are the same. There's not two different generations here. According to Wikipedia they were born 1946-1964. That also means that the youngest baby boomers are still likely to be working (and thus contributing) and will continue to do so until they are 67.

The older you get, the smaller your life becomes, in general. Especially by one's late 80s.
Not that I've reached 70 I'm trying really hard to not let that happen to me, but I'm lucky at the moment that as well as having adult children and young grandchildren, I also have lots of young friends. So I'm in touch with their struggles, and I'm using some of my savings to help my kids.

But to be honest, I'm just as irritated by some younger people assuming that everything was roses for us when we were their age! But I try not to let it wind me up, in the same way that I just try to change the subject when my 97 year old aunt doesn't get what it's like for my kids.

There are far more older people banging on about how easy young people have it than the other way around. And I’m an older person myself but I see how hard things are for my sons’ generation. To be told how lucky you are when you can’t get a job, afford a place, and are still paying off your student loans while younwill never get a pension is a bit rich. Particularly when it’s from people living in their five bedroom houses with their triple lock state pensions, their final salary pensions and their multiple holidays abroad.

This thread itself is full of people saying how easy boomers had/have it!

She enabled the start of banks acting more recklessly with less oversight, but Blair/Brown kick started property Ponzi economics for the modern age.

And seriously @Speakeasier , your friends might fit the description of people living in their five bedroom houses with their triple lock state pensions, their final salary pensions and their multiple holidays abroad. but most boomers do not fit that.

Many of my boomer colleagues were on minimum wages, and spent decades working in jobs with no pension plan, and no spare money to buy into a private pension (also private pensions were very sketchy back in the day, without the safeguards that are around now, so many lost their money)
Final salary pensions were only for a lucky minority (I'm very grateful to be one of them) but now that those colleagues are retired, those bus passes and prescriptions are very much needed by them.

So you wouldn't help someone in their 80s because they say something you don't agree with

True, but younger people need to wake themselves up, stop putting a car on monthly payments, stop going to "Uni" for a piece of paper that will get you a job at Tesco but costs 50k, stop even thinking about borrowing for property until the whole sorry mess collapses.

We're lucky enough to have earned and saved enough money to put three DC through university including masters. We gave them each a car. Two have had house deposits the third will have a deposit when he's ready to buy somewhere. A lot of older parents do this rather than them waiting for an inheritance decades down the line. It annoys me as boomers that we're accused of saving money. Maybe we'll need a nursing home and would prefer a nicer one so will pay more.

Because there is no point. You have victim mentality imo, which isn’t helping you progress. You can’t keep blaming older people for your situation.

I’m not the one attempting to use emotional manipulation by constantly referring to my own financial situation on a thread about generational wealth inequality: that’s you. I’m not even referring to myself when I talk about young people, I’m nearly middle aged. But then I do have the ability to think about the needs of others and not apply every single point directly back to myself.

👍

I agree with this. It’s a poor excuse for behaving like this. It’s draining and frustrating.

£1150 state pension? How? I thought police pensions were ‘final salary’ therefore contracted out? Was he born before 1951..,thus reducing state pension even further. Anyway… just think of the tax these people pay!

Still like to know how the figure of £4.5k is reached… and she must be a higher rate tax payer!

I realise this… I’m not financially ignorant! I’d just love to be able to pay the amount of tax she obviously does!

Absolutely, people really need to start doing some basic maths and stop using a war that ended 80 years ago as an excuse for not just poor but nasty behaviour.

The OP is not annoyed that the person she is helping has these funds. She appears to be annoyed that this person - while having all this money directly as a result of having lived in arguably the most stable and prosperous period of time this country has ever seen and will ever see - is lamenting having to pay a proportionate amount of tax, and is also complaining about young people being feckless. That is outrageous.

Well exactly. I have no idea why it's hard for some people to admit this obvious fact.
Some older folk, like the OP's elderly relative are professional moaners and just not very nice people. Being elderly is no excuse for unpleasantness. After all, there are plenty of wonderful elderly people who were born during WW2 and aren't nasty, negative or constantly bitching about the young.

Are you a pensioner with a £3k a month income and no rent or mortgage? If so i dont consider you 'rich' but you have a lot more than me coming in (assuming thats after tax) still more if its taxable but not as much more obviously and I need to pay for mortgage and wrap around childcare from that. So COMFORTABLE and a lot better off than many younger people are now or expect to BE wgeb they retire

Sympathies - dh had a loaded old aunt who was incredibly mean with money.

Also I think that re costs, their thoughts are often harking back to prices from years ago, so everything nowadays seems extortionate. Not that that should be an excuse, but…

Admittedly there was dementia involved, but when I once visited my DM in her care home, some of the ladies were having their nails done. I remarked to one of them what a pretty shade her nail polish was.

‘Yes!’ she beamed - ‘and do you know, it was only one and six!’ (One shilling and sixpence, so 15p! 😂

Are you able to pin point where the pp has shown 'a victim mentality'? I've seen no hint of that. You seem to be twising things because you are unable to respond to the valid points raised. On the other hand, the women described by the OP is displaying a stellar victim mentality. Not only that, she is also nasty about others who are less fortunate.

I agree we’re comfortable. Yes, no mortgage. We pay our biggest one off bills eg council tax, car stuff, season tickets for sports etc yearly from savings interest. It’s after tax which comes off at source and we’re a few years off state pension age.

BUT, we have been that couple searching through pockets and bags etc for a tenner two days to pay day when we were young parents.

But we’re not as loaded as people on this thread appear to think we are.

It took us 43 years of working and paying into our pensions to get here.