The cost of living... what can we do?

No just less efficiently than the inefficient way it used to be.

 

Off topic, but then most of it is
I've noticed on the news that we stopped training guide dogs for 5 months during the pandemic, Why????
Its now going to take 2 yrs to catch up.
We certainly are in a hole thanks to shutting everything down for 6 months or more.
And of course no body really wants to work anymore.

 

Oh Lordy! I noticed that the DWP have a backlog and that you need to apply at least 6 months before your pension is due, but I'd no idea that so much has gone to pot! Reckon you need to do some splitting off to the 'moan' thread, @ JWK @ Fat Controller ..... Meanwhile, I'll start a thread on alternative disposal methods

 

Certainly not anyone living in the real world anyway.

 

Is this part of the burial backlog or the recycling .

 

Both!

 

Could probably get the Fungi involved as well in both.

 

I get the feeling they are starting to build more council houses like they did in the old days.
For some reason you tended, and still do, get looked down upon if you live in a council house, I know a "mate" that wont even come near where I live because he thinks he will get mugged or murdered, but we tend to send our yobs to other places these days, you can get mugged anywhere. Its all part of "levelling up" as the government call it.

Seriously though, if house prices stop rising, or even falling the developers will just stop building overnight until the price goes back up, so any of the, build more houses to bring the price down, is just pie in the sky.

 

The point that the Gilets Jaunes (the genuine ones) were trying to make a few years ago was that ordinary people were being milked dry and pushed beyond the limit of passivity. What is the use of an annual increase of, say, 5% of a minimum salary or pension if all the other costs of living increase by several percentage points more? Not to mention all the hidden or not-so-hidden taxes and 'social charges' (a particularly nasty French invention). All that leaves a low-paid worker or pensioner with very little each month for frivolities like food. There are some alarming parallels with the pre-revolution situation in France. It's also no incentive whatsoever for the younger generations to work hard or even at all! Goodness knows the French don't need much excuse to skive, but you can see why if all you get in return for working hard is the privilege of contributing to 'the State' as represented by a supposedly republican President who lives like a king. It's not sustainable....which no doubt is why despite the financial and human cost of wars and pandemics, they come as a handy distraction or fear-creating tool.

 

@Fat Controller , I think you live in a very expensive area, the nurse on £32.000 would find it much easier in cheaper areas.
My BIL who worked for the Gas said years ago, people who worked in London got something called "London weighting" which he didn't get, but at the same time living further North was cheaper, so a nurse gets £32.000 where ever they live.