Paradises lost?

DOA I think you are getting old.. you keep harping back to the good old days of the 80s. You sound like the grumpy old gits.

It all seems to be going pear-shaped at an alarming rate. I might be wrong but the housing market has collapsed, unemployment is beginning to rise, basic living costs are going up.

Britain has replaced manufacturing with leisure and entertainment and ‘debt’ was becoming the new ‘wealth’ for many people. But we’re partying up to the eleventh hour, so it seems.

Some of the problems we have today come from the 80’s. Particularly the idea that we should give up on manufacturing because we couldn’t compete with lower labour costs abroad, especially in the far east.

Also when it was decided to privatise our publicly owned utilities, was it foreseen that 20 years later, some of them would be owned by foreign governments?

It was often said, in defence of the decline of the British motor industry, that it was too expensive to manufacture cars here. So how do Toyota, Nissan, Honda, Tata (owns Jaguar and Land Rover), BMW (owns Mini and Rolls-Royce) and VW (owns Bentley), General Motors (owns Vauxhall) and Ford manage to make cars here?

I’m not a grumpy old man looking back through rose-tinted spectacles – the 70s and 80s had problems too – strikes and other forms of industrial unrest – British Rail was not as great as some people seem to remember it – but at least you knew who wou were dealing with. Anything connected with rail travel? That’d be British Rail.

@bassingbourne55 wrote:

Another thing I’ve noticed for some time is that the older generation – I suppose I mean the elderly – 70+, have a tendency to stop and chat to people a lot more than my generation or below. It’s not just that they are older, they did this when they were younger too. My parents, in-laws and grandparents would strike up conversations in the street or in shops about some inconsequential matter.

It would never cross my mind to compliment a stranger on their garden or chat to someone about their unusual car, it’s just not something that was part of the culture of someone growing up in the 60’s.

That still happens in the town where I come from. It is the norm to say hello or give a friendly nod to a passerby as you walk down the street and it is easy to make conversation with anyone young or old. I now live in a city (unfortunately). People dont even make eye contact with you unless they are trying to sell you something, then for some strange reason they act like your best friend.

As for debt…. apart from my two houses I have never borrowed money for anything. If I cant afford it I go without till I can.
Its not the ease of borrowing money thats the problem… its the inability of people to resist temptation.
Live within your means or pay the consequences… and stop looking for a scapegoat (the government) for your own personal fu*ck ups.

@dead_on_arrvial wrote:

Well the point I was trying to make was………….

In the past we all knew people would get into debt if they had too much credit.

We had laws stopping people from going to much in the red, the banks and building societies wouldn’t lend you the money “willy nilly “ .

But all that has changed.

The only people who seem to have benefited from this is the banks.

I can’t understand why we could proved skill centres and full grants to university students in 70’s and 80 and but not now.

I can’t understand why we had massive government housing stocks in the past for people on low incomes and so few left now.

To me it seem that the Thatcher government of the 80’s not only condemn people at the time to a life of low wages and low living standards, but continuo’s to do so.

I do think people on low wages were better off before 1979 and the years that have followed have made life worst for them.

It’s a shame we don’t have a labour government

VERY well said !

and to top it all…all the honey bees are leaving- we are well and truly up the creek without a boat let alone a paddle