Nick
Administrator
...or have to spend everything on nursing care
I worry too, for the 'I struggled to get where I am, so everybody should have to struggle too' mentality. I don't think you mean it to come out that way, btwso take this in a more general sense... but in my view that's part of the problem - an expectation that those dealt with worse cards at the beginning of their lives should have to work harder than those lucky enough to be born into financial security etc.
And when it comes to credit, that doesn't help when people (again, not you) spend their cash just to show they have cash to spend. That, then, increases an illusion that you have to spend to keep up. Now I'm not justifying the spending to keep up, but I am empathising.
Now, personally I'm either lucky or unlucky enough that material considerations come lower in what I want, to a comfortable working environment with decent managers (have done the opposite for more money and it most certainly is not worth it!), and a decent home life. It's amazing how much pleasure I can get from English Heritage membership, and that's cheaper than a holiday in the Cayman Islands.
But... it's a shame that instead of offering credit so easily for cars etc, we can't get towards a culture that recognises funding each others' imrovement helps us all, rather than it being a threat to our particular lifestyles. And whilst mortgages have become a little more flexible, it's maybe time to recognise that there has to be a certain amount of risk offering better mortgages more easily to those who are cursed with temporary contracts, and moving from job to job annually.
It's not saying that everybody should struggle though, just that maybe they should be a bit more realistic and instead of saying they don't like managers or their job or that they don't earn enough money to get what they want to better themselves / their job. Sometimes things are a struggle to start with and then they pay off further down the line. One of my mates decided he wanted a change from being a labourer and put himself on a night course to be an Electrician. A few years later he is earning probably triple per day that he was a few years ago and the struggle of having to study as well as work full time and kids etc is benefiting.
Not everybody is born into financial security and won't live as nice lives as the Beckham kids or Abramovich but if people spend all their time moaning about how it isn't fair how far will that get them? It's not going to change anything that my parents weren't millionaires and I have to graft and Brooklyn Beckham can just stroll about damaging supermodels without ever having money worries.
It's just life.
(end trainspotting type post).