The true wealth of the people!

I don't disagree with that statement but I'm optimistic that things will continue to improve.

Your not wrong but that's a choice to spend your money on luxuries rather than save. Your base needs have still declined though.

Well you've already said rent is £550 for a £210k property. SO for a £250k property it is likely to be at least that yes? So at least £6,600/annum.

Over 50 years that'd be £330k - so change my £300k to £330k. That just strengthens my argument doesn't it...?

And thats assuming ZERO rent increase over the next 50 years. Do you think thats a safe assumption? Do you think rents over the next 50 years will rise or fall?

Well people in the developed countries struggle. In the US, half the population struggle. In China, half the population are definitely poor. In India, half are definitely poor. In the UK, half the population struggle. Greece, Italy, Spain, Portugal, Eastern Europe half are living in substandard conditions.

I know capitalism cannot deliver and tbh the future is bleak if capitalism continues as the global economic system. When everything is automated it will be very clear what the choices are. Capitalism needs people for now. The rise of finance capital exemplifies this trend. Finance capital makes money from money. Now they have programs that pick options at quicker rates than humans. This concept will be applied to manufacturing, health care etc....

Robotics will either make us or break us. Jobs will be scarce then what will capitalism have for us. Death. Yes this may happen after I am dead but humans will suffer and I would rather be part of the solution than part of the problem.

Capitalism advocates survival of the fittest. It will be clear at that moment who is the ruling class and who is the subservient class. The majority of the middle class will realize that they are in fact poor in comparison to the rich upper class. The ruling class will only need robotics engineers and computer programmers. They will make a system which enables them to live their lives and then the rest of use are left to die. This one of the two possible outcomes. The other is a socialist world where robots reduce the cost of labour to basically zero and allows humans to change their focus from labour intensive work to other types of work. It may sound farfetched but it makes sense. This system does not care about humanity as a whole. Obviously, using my revelations, I could advocate for violent revolution but people are dormant until they start feeling it. That's why I root for the Tories. They will squeeze the poor, both working class and middle class and then it will allow ideologies like mine to enter the fray.

Capitalism is not fit for purpose. We should transcend it before it consumes us.

Clearly, you just want to prove me wrong. I could have said rent is 200k for the 50 year period.

What do you think will happen?

I was sitting in my kitchen this afternoon, reading the papers and munching on a succulent clementine satsuma and it occurred to me how privileged I am, and indeed wealthy, compared to someone sitting in their kitchen in 1949.

In 1949, for the average working family, eating a satsuma was a wondrous treat, perhaps only done once a year; working class families often gave their children as their Christmas present a piece of fruit. For your average working man, a satsuma was an expensive indulgence, it would cost as much perhaps as much as a few packets of cigarettes (for comparison, imagine it cost 15 pounds in today's money)

On the other hand, today I can pick up a whole bag of clementines for a couple of pounds. Indeed, I can easily purchase more clementines than I care to eat, and it a very low price. That my fellow TSRians is true wealth; or rather, it's a true increase in wealth.

Another example is when my Mum first moved from Australia to the UK as an adult in her early 20s (she was born here, then the family moved to Australia), she could usually afford to make one international long-distance call home a month. It was astoundingly expensive, the lines were often fuzzy (they were passed over communications satellites) and they had to be short and sweet. Now, I can call home to my Mum, or anyone, on Skype, with full view of one another, for nothing. I call that a true increase in wealth / living standard.

If an average working man of the 1940s were to peer into my life today, he would think in some ways I live the life of a millionaire of his day. In fact, I can do and enjoy many things a millionaire of his day could not (my access to general open-source information, for example, exceeds that of any man in 1949 in terms of speed of provision and volume). The average person today is healthier, freer, longer lived, better clothed, better housed, better educated and safer.

When you look at many aspects of our lives today, our society and political structure (social democratic capitalism; a free market consensually saddled by a safety net and regulatory oversight) has delivered astounding increases in the wealth. The material comforts of the average person today would suggest that the aims of the politicians of decades ago were, on the whole, successful; they created a remarkable society, much more comfortable, tolerant, peaceful and free than 'ere it was. I do believe that inequality and wealth gaps are important, but it does bear thinking about the absolute increases in the material wealth and comfort of the ordinary person.

I say this to attempt to give some perspective to the people who moan that all politicians are completely corrupt and incompetent, that everything is awful and everyone is part of a conspiracy. In actual fact, the society the politicians of the 50s, 60s and 70s promised us (as far as the conditions of the average man, or average family) has been fulfilled. The important thing now is to recognise what a remarkable and precious society we have created, and ensure we can both conserve what we have now and continue to evolve in the way that has brought us such prosperity, safety, comfort and freedom.

Why is it so different for the working classes?

I remember the estate I grew up (mining community) very few people could afford cars. After thatcher ripped the heart out of it car ownership, life expectancy and foreign holidays went up.

This

What we observe and what people ignore is that there aren't really that many people who are going to be truly "poor", these days a "poor" person will be somebody who has a standard of living (or quality of life, never can remember which way round they are) lower than the average person, or at the level of some time in the past.

The majority of the time, wages grow quite a bit faster than inflation, or at least compounded over several years or decades substantially higher. What we see now is the government being attacked because that long term trend isn't holding over the short term, but that's irrelevant.

Yes, there are some expenses that go up out of our control, the likes of bills and, where applicable, rent, but for the most part we are better off than our parents and grandparents.

More than once my father has said about how when he was at school there was only one person in the entire school who had been on holiday abroad, compare that to today when what? 50%, 60%, 75% of people have? Back then it cost hundreds, and now it costs <£100, and easily done within a couple of hundred for a weekend or something, and those few hundred are worth a lot less. You would get very few children who would get new bags and clothes over summer, now a hell of a lot do.

When he started work there were something like 8000 people working there. A small car park for maybe a couple of hundred cars, owed by those at the very top, and about 50 buses in and out every day for the majority of workers, buy the time he left a decade or so later there were two buses and a multistory car park because by then wages had gone up enough and car prices, at least relatively, had come down enough that the majority of people either owned a car or could car pool. And then you got it that those at the very top would be some of the select few rich people that would have a mobile phone, rather large ones, and now these days almost every adult has one, and far too many children have phones worth hundreds.

A decade, maybe a bit longer really, not that many people had access to the internet, and most of those who did barely touched it. I can't particularly remember it, but my sister does, and we had to basically know before connecting what we wanted to find out and do it as efficiently as possible because the data costs were rather high, and back in the dial-up days where the max speed was what? 76kbps or something like that, and now most people have cheap access to the internet, with no cap on data for a couple of hundred quid a year and up to gigabit speeds.

A couple of years ago 4k TVs were tens of thousands of pounds and only the very rich could have them, by the end of the decade they will be really affordable and, let's be honest, most people will probably have one; just the same as with LCD TVs taking over from CRT, and 16:9 (or 8:5) widescreen instead of 4:3.

--------------------

Of course, the downside of some of this, particularly the internet, is the dissemination of knowledge, well, no, that's a good thing, more the harsh realities and truths of the world and above a lot of things, terrorism. A lot of this tech makes terrorism worse because terrorists now know that they have more power than ever before to spread their message of hate, while in the past they could in theory do something, but the knowledge of the act would spread slowly, perhaps being somewhat censored by the media and governments, now that's impossible.

-------------------

To say that over the last 5 years people are worse off is, questionable. Yes, relative to 5 years ago a lot of people aren't better off, but they're perhaps setting their benchmark a little bit too high.

This

What we observe and what people ignore is that there aren't really that many people who are going to be truly "poor", these days a "poor" person will be somebody who has a standard of living (or quality of life, never can remember which way round they are) lower than the average person, or at the level of some time in the past.

The majority of the time, wages grow quite a bit faster than inflation, or at least compounded over several years or decades substantially higher. What we see now is the government being attacked because that long term trend isn't holding over the short term, but that's irrelevant.

Yes, there are some expenses that go up out of our control, the likes of bills and, where applicable, rent, but for the most part we are better off than our parents and grandparents.

More than once my father has said about how when he was at school there was only one person in the entire school who had been on holiday abroad, compare that to today when what? 50%, 60%, 75% of people have? Back then it cost hundreds, and now it costs <£100, and easily done within a couple of hundred for a weekend or something, and those few hundred are worth a lot less. You would get very few children who would get new bags and clothes over summer, now a hell of a lot do.

When he started work there were something like 8000 people working there. A small car park for maybe a couple of hundred cars, owed by those at the very top, and about 50 buses in and out every day for the majority of workers, buy the time he left a decade or so later there were two buses and a multistory car park because by then wages had gone up enough and car prices, at least relatively, had come down enough that the majority of people either owned a car or could car pool. And then you got it that those at the very top would be some of the select few rich people that would have a mobile phone, rather large ones, and now these days almost every adult has one, and far too many children have phones worth hundreds.

A decade, maybe a bit longer really, not that many people had access to the internet, and most of those who did barely touched it. I can't particularly remember it, but my sister does, and we had to basically know before connecting what we wanted to find out and do it as efficiently as possible because the data costs were rather high, and back in the dial-up days where the max speed was what? 76kbps or something like that, and now most people have cheap access to the internet, with no cap on data for a couple of hundred quid a year and up to gigabit speeds.

A couple of years ago 4k TVs were tens of thousands of pounds and only the very rich could have them, by the end of the decade they will be really affordable and, let's be honest, most people will probably have one; just the same as with LCD TVs taking over from CRT, and 16:9 (or 8:5) widescreen instead of 4:3.

--------------------

Of course, the downside of some of this, particularly the internet, is the dissemination of knowledge, well, no, that's a good thing, more the harsh realities and truths of the world and above a lot of things, terrorism. A lot of this tech makes terrorism worse because terrorists now know that they have more power than ever before to spread their message of hate, while in the past they could in theory do something, but the knowledge of the act would spread slowly, perhaps being somewhat censored by the media and governments, now that's impossible.

-------------------

To say that over the last 5 years people are worse off is, questionable. Yes, relative to 5 years ago a lot of people aren't better off, but they're perhaps setting their benchmark a little bit too high.

I find it hilarious that someone claims that living standards have gone up from 1949 to 2014 based on oranges & global broadband infrastructure. Its like you've based the entire worlds prosperity based on Florida & Silicon Valley.

In the real world the cost of housing, energy, transport and education has soared beyond belief and most of it is the fault of politicians.

1. Housing.

Thatcher created right to buy and didn't replace the sold stock with new housing developments. She robbed the country and created a bunch of Thatcherite Yes men that have uphold her beliefs to this very day. Due to this we have a social house shortage which has allowed the Buy to Let rentier class to push up house prices though endless speculation.

2. Energy.

The anti-EU babble of the Tories and the far-right will be one of the many mistakes which we have made with our foreign policy. The EU are the gate keepers to cheap oil/gas/petrol which our power stations run on. If leave the EU we lose our cheap fossil fuel. And we also stand to lose the cheap fossil fuel from Russia with our participation with Nato. Russia have made it clear they don't want war but they will defend themselves from endless western aggression though economic sanctions. The only thing Russia would need to do is turn off the tap. That is it. Game over for the UK.

But I saved the big one till last. Our endless alliance with America is the major reason why oil prices have been so volatile. It seems every time one country stops using the Petrodollar they get bombed by the Anglo-Saxon Fascists. We try and dress it up as spreading freedom to the middle east but that is just the cover story for the Sheep to believe.
And this is why we have ISIS now in the middle east causing trouble. They want to reclaim their land from the west. And if it interrupts the flow of oil so be it.

3. Education.

The UK education system is nothing more than a big joke in terms of social mobility. Politicians increase tuition fees not in line with costs of the Universities but in line with how much profit they can make. The jump from £3000 to £9000 per year was a clear indication of this. The Conservative party saw that they could milk foreign students and native Britons into a life time of debt. And then the Student loan book was privatized. This was nothing more than a give away to the Tories rich mates who need a couple of Bentleys at the expense of the British people.

4. Transport.

As well as the instability of petrol prices and the huge amount of fuel duty which us Brits pay we have a army of financial insurance firms wanting extortionate sums every year. Then there car tax, followed by MOT and £500 to £1000 worth of repairs each year to meet Government standards. Then there are bridge tolls, parking tickets and the traffic wardens who will destroy your life!

Simple fact is owning a Car these days costs more than providing for a child.

And don't get me started with the railways. You have privatized railways companies running on public tracks. And the funny thing is there are no nationalized companies using them tracks.

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In the real world the fact is the overall living standards haven't increased. The gap between the rich and poor has got larger.

Now we do live in a democracy so I'm all well and truly okay with you sitting on the street curb eating a Satsuma and making a long distance phone call on your mobile phone. I don't think the majority of homeless people happen to share your opinions.

And here is something for you to ponder.....

The Earth has finite resources which are decreasing every second. Money/Wealth is just a representation of the proportion of these finite resources which we have access to. We are near to peak oil production so it cannot be argued that there is plenty more energy to go around. The gap between the rich and poor is at a all time high and poverty is wide spread across this planet. Some regions suffer more than others. But one thing holds true in the UK.

1. We are part of the top 1% of rich people of the Earth.
2. The working class of the UK have seen their overall standard of living drop from 1949 to 2015
3. Less wealth is being made in the West and more wealth is being made in the East.
4. Middle class shoppers have downgraded to budget supermarkets. Why is this?

Wow, the only post i found that i truly agree with. An individual holding financial intellect.
May i ask how old are you and what do you study/jobs in the past?

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Actually it doesn't. There are dozens of idiots who have brought into this wealth religion and some have even spent 50 grand on wealth gain courses. Its hilarious to be honest. Watch this video.

[video="youtube;DPARaL3F498"]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DPARaL3F498[/video]

One needs to define struggling. Somebody on an average wage has no problem covering their needs in the UK in most of the country, they struggle because they often leverage themselves or choose to make stupid purchases. One can call me out of touch for saying that but I've grown up in a benefits household so I know exactly how much it costs to survive before you can start buying luxuries. I actually funding it ignorant when people say that 13 million are in poverty and what not, hell one report defines poverty as not taking a holiday.

That's a possibility and indeed I think that when space mining is common capitalism will have serious problems (sustained deflation reduces the motivation to consume) so I'm open to eventual changes in economic model (indeed space mining will likely be loss making due to the increased supply and few barriers to competition once business can afford to get into space and so may require the state). But that's no reason to change now when the system is still making progress for the masses.

Not really, I just think you're wrong. Your numbers are fair and demonstrate the point. Not sure where you can rent a £250k place for £4k/annum - 1.6% yield is pretty rubbish!

Well I'm confident rents will rise in absolute terms, if not compared to inflation/salary. Say 2% a year.

House prices I've no idea, I can't see major increases in price, I suspect they'll fall say 10% over the next decade.

As with you though, its crystal ball stuff. Pretty confident on the rents though.

If the government places caps on rent you could.

An important point is rent isn't stable, so people buy their home to avoid this. If it was stable and a quarter of mortgage payments, people would rent all day.

I don't see that happening. For sure it could, but not in the next five years at the very least.

Yeah it won't. It will cause a financial crisis again. Maybe after the next financial collapse a government will have the balls to implement such a policy.

Banks are actually better capitalized so the next financial crisis may not be as bad as the last.

While help to buy is currently pushing us towards the next crisis, the BOE will have the power to abolish it and the government could sell the unfunded liabilities. The question is whether the BOE will actually act.

Personally don't think we need socialism, we should prevent rampant household credit growth though.

But not you, you earn over £100k/annum for the love of trading.

Earning 100k is not the same as making 100k.