Morning Line: Forget university, job, house, retirement

Or just leave the country... I know of many people from university who no longer live in the UK. They have a better life for it.

It is happening, and the UK will not realise until it is too late (it happens over decades). You will see the only people left will be indigenous benefit claimants, immigrants, those wanting to leave and the non-working wealthy from property inheritance.

Yup, everything has changed and the future is uncertain. Son just left university with an average degree but he had the sense to do one that had relevance in the job market, but it will be very tough for many now leaving uni. Debts £25000 but he does not worry about it! Anyone who can predict where this is all going - let me know.

A lot of problems for everyone in this country seem to because of housing,i wonder what would happen if the gov reintroduced Regulated tenancies? It would upset landlords but would allow the population to become more mobile and reduce housing costs to put more money into the economy and spread the wealth more through out the country?

I think for a lot of people there will be an inheritance to receive, which will be a very handy boost to their retirement funds in their 40's or 50's.

However, overall I think the tone of this article is negative. Of course home ownership is a great thing, and will provide a great deal of financial security for people who won't have to worry about paying rent for the whole of their lives.

I feel that the problems facing the young generation, mainly housing, then, financing retirement, appear huge to me. I am retired and live with a partner. one son has his own property, my other son and daughter, after broken marriages have not enough finacne to afford buying a house. Hopefully from my point of view, I am not feeling like kicking the bucket for some time, affording them the finance to buy property. one thing i am aware of is that, like the markets, new ways of surviving are thrown up and life goes on. Maybe not as we know it, but life goes on. I lie awake many a night like most parents with our children's problems.

This is going away a little from the article, but...on broader front.. regarding 'university, job, home....

We are having this conversation, because simply put...the education system opened up in the 80-90s to offer any conceivable course... to an increasingly 'un-socially aware or caring ' public.

Any thing goes.

[Aside: One society change... just look at the peer driven, drinking issues facing our young people and the effect now and in future on our health services.

At one time, it was shameful to be seen drunk...now, it seems to be fine to be in such a state]]

So, What is education for?

On the individual front: To learn, to have a skill [or skills] that will sustain one in life , to be able to communicate and live well with others, to have a home, to be able to look after one's family through all ages, to contribute/ build to a stable, healthy society, ....

On the government front: to have a health population which is able to work and provide for a stable society in UK, competing and building with an increasingly educated world population, for future.

we seem to have de-focussed from these basic values ....

On all fronts, we need to look how to set up conditions for a new world status quo..

is the government taking this challenge and looking at all our areas to ensure britain moves / grows into a new society which fit s in a new world order which is emerging?

All we hear about is cutting...

From my year only two people went to Uni now half the school im 40 what happened to going out and getting a job is it shameful to be a manual worker balls to university its not necessary i cant wait to buy my son a van he will be home not miles away learning how to get drunk and screw around and no doubt he wil earn more than most graduates.

As for house ownership you work your whole life to pay it off and leave it to your kids so is hiome ownership all its cracked up to be probably not.

I must comment on retirement this is one thing that should not be tinkered with 65 is substantual this nmotioon that we are living longer does not wash where my mum is buried the average age is probably 67 the majority sem to bve early 50s.

P.s Anonymous 1 has hit the nail on the head our self obsession with Uni has left us open to mass immigration on the grounds a graduate does not want to touch a manual job

@Frankie Dee

There could be an obsession with University, but I would argue there is nothing wrong with trying to learn more and increase the knowledge/skills base. Having said that, the knowledge base can also be increased by employing apprentices in skilled manual job. The problem, as I see it, is that people cannot afford to survive, without being dependant on the state, if they pursue a manual job rather than university.

With average housing at ~GBP250k, to buy comfortable, you need to be on GBP70k+. Only 10% of the population earn that (or more), if memory serves me correctly. More of them are likely to be bankers (with degrees), than plumbers with skilled hands.

The baby boomers have all the money, jobs, houses, pensions, wealth

The young have a very poor deal

Young face leaving Uni hugely in debt with no job, income or assets...and a mountain to climb just to buy a 1st home...and punitive taxation if they dare to be even modestly successful

Best not to work at all and live off benefits, as many now do...or work in a non-job in the public sector with cushy pay and conditions and a fat pension, happily insulated from harsh commercial reality

Or emigrate. Cannot think why any bright young thing under 30 wants to stay in UK just to subsidise the bloated public sector...

There is a difference between the baby boomers with final salary pensions and those who are the youngest of this species who have money purchase pensions which have deteriorated significantly since 1997. The latter have little chance to repair the damage done to their pensions if they have been made redundant and are regarded as too old to be accepted for any job. It is not easy to find work when you are 50+, even if you have a lot to give.

If we are struggling to provide university places and affordable homes for our own generation of young people why oh why does this government allow so many foreign students into the country to take places at university which should be going to our own young people. A lot of these foreign students enrol and then don't turn up for the course as they have ulterior motives and those that do complete the course never leave the country which means less jobs for our kids and less houses as well. I just don't get it i really dont.

Jon G - It's because the tuition fees paid by foreign students to our universities are much much higher than the fees paid by British students. Why is this? Simply because universities can get away with it.

Off course the real "elephant in the room" in this discussion is the inability or unwillingness of any post war government to address the outrageous income inequalities in this country. When a champagne socialist like Mandleson can be "comfortable in the company of the filthy rich" there can be no hope for the mid-percentiles of the income distribution. The lie told by successive governments that entrepreneurs have to be rewarded to create jobs and wealth for the rest of the population may have a kernel of truth - but I don't recognise many entrepreneurs amongst the ranks of bankers, hedge fund managers, FTSE 100 company directors, BBC executives, Hospital consultants, GPs, Quango executives, MPs, Judges and all the other apologists for their inflated incomes. These extortionate, often obscene, rewards deprive the rest of the population of the income necessary to enjoy the benefits of university education, house ownership and pensions which a civilised society would regard as a universal right

Young people should ditch the idea of working in corporate employment on PAYE

Corporate employment is high risk, and does not provid an income for life as most large employers just want cheap labour and will not want you when you become more senior. Also PAYE is a huge rip-off from a tax point of view - the HMRC will be the biggest beneficiary of you going to work and tax rates are punitive even at quite modest rates of income.

Set up your own business - that is the only way - then you pay yourself first. See Kiyosaki on this. Why do they not teach entrepreneurship at school / university? Because the corporate elites in Government, the public sector, FTSE 100 companies and the banks want the poor and middle classes to remain poor and needy all their lives. Time for a social revolution

Labour has by design created a greater dependence upon the state, in order to buy votes.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eCcPhdfoNyw

Interesting first sentence.

Yes very good and true.

Id we have had a university boom, why does DIgby Jones and Vince Cable say that capping immigration from outside the EU will deprive industry of vital skills.

What are these skills? why have they not been taught during the last 13 years when LAbour shaped education for the young from 5 to 18? Why don't they say what they are? What is so very special that we can't find them among the 500 million citizens of the EU?

I am sick of hearing apparently authoritative statements not backed up by facts.

Has Frankie Dee never employed a plumber? Who says they don't make a packet? They are part of the greatest tax evasion plot in the country - forget the tricky city types with PAYE.

I wonder what result Mr Barber would have got if he had said to his assembled followers "- put up your hand if you have never paid cash to a window-cleaner, a car mechanic, a builder, an electrician, a decorator, the man next door for looking after your cat when you're away, or the chaps who say it's cheaper if you don't want a receipt?"

I reckon that in London alone, there is a loss of more than £1bn That is tax evaison.

In a TV series millionaires were helping poorer families - one of them ran a caravan site, set up with money from his rich father - a plumber.

A course in plumbing recently announced that amongst their students were men who'd given up working in the city - they were fed up with getting up ar 6 in the morning and ruining their health sitting in front of a computer screen - one said he wanted a job where he could please himself when he worked - and no PAYE.

Had problems with your boiler Bernard?

No, Chris. But I certainly had problems when part of the ceiling in the bathroom fell down. Here is a measure of the incompetent overmanning that has hit productivity.

I informed the insurer, though | could once have done this simple job myself, but at 85 I am told not to climb ladders.

THey passed me on to a supervising company in Manchester (I live in London). They made an appointment for a loss adjuster from one company and a supervisor from an other to inspect the accident. They discussed it at length and drew up a plan. The supervising company then instructed a firm of builders, who made an appointment at 9.00 am for an operative to do the job. At 11.am he had not arrived, so I called the builder's secretary; she called back to say he was delayed by a domestic problem. He arrived at noon and explained that he'd been finishing off another job. When I showed him to the bathroom, he was, shall we say - taken aback - I've come to point the ceiling not put it up. Reluctantly he removed the debris, and called the office to make another appointment two days later. He came and put up the plaster board - it was a terrible job, with gaps along the edge. I complained to the builder's secretary; one of their managers came to inspect - he agreed it was bad and arranged for someone else take it down and do the job again. A few days later another operative arrived, a much older man, who took trouble and did the jop well, though i did have to point out that he'd left smears of paint on a down-pipe to the radiator..The manager came a few day later to check and I signed the job off.

A competent DIY bloke could have done this job in two hours. How many people were actually involved?

Secretaries and office staff of four companies.

A loss adjuster.

Supervisor.

Manager of the building company (came twice).

Two operatives.

Four letters and six phone calls

I know exactly how you feel. Take a look at the poem "The land of lost content" by A E Housman. It sums all I feel up exactly. I suspect it will strike a chord with you and many others over 60.

Not being over 60, I am still with you...it comes down to values...

A society works to develop themselves , AND to produce taxes which better all our country [hospitals, education, roads, rubbish collection, water, etc].

I think we all agree we need these ..

If a good society develops, there is no corruption, and there is no need to avoid tax, etc.

We are all dependent on each other...PAYE or not....public workers or not...

Do we want to be like what is happening in Africa?

I still want to see in the forthcoming 'cutting' proposals from our government, what will be invested in for UK future, so that our young will know what areas to acquire skills in, to grow in knowledge and become part of a contributing people.

I do not want our learned people going elsewhere, except perhaps in providing development to other nations where our people can then bring funds into UK.

[This too is inter-dependency - we buy goods from China and China pays for our skills].

'The land of lost content' can be regained, if our new workforce is moved to achieve the lost , but in new way...

It is high time the Government should start creating jobs for university graduates.It is not right that graduates are forced to throw away all the education achieved at huge financial cost to become plummers,or worse.

Communism failed. Socialism(or name it as you like) could help everyone

in the present situation by providing jobs for everyone, with equal economic

conditions, housing for everyone.I lived in such a country for a few years in the past. Of course, this would not be palatable to the rich, to the speculants, to the Den-type of business "entrepreneurs", to the Bankers,etc.

This seems to be the beginning of the end of Capitalism.