General News Thread

[CornwallFox]

5 hours ago, Jon the Hat said:

It's not that hard to encourage people to have kids.  They need a house they can afford, affordable childcare which makes going back to work actually pay money, and child benefit that doesn't go away because one of you has a good income.

This. 

We've gone from one earner being able to run a house, kids and have a two week foreign holiday at normal pay levels a generation or two ago, to now both adults working, childcare through the roof, food through the roof, energy through the roof, housing through the roof. Everybody is knackered, nobody can take on any more. 

I hate to add this, but capitalism has failed the people.

That's not to say I'm arguing for socialism, I'm arguing for something new and different and fair.

[kenny]

3 minutes ago, CornwallFox said:

This. 

We've gone from one earner being able to run a house, kids and have a two week foreign holiday at normal pay levels a generation or two ago, to now both adults working, childcare through the roof, food through the roof, energy through the roof, housing through the roof. Everybody is knackered, nobody can take on any more. 

I hate to add this, but capitalism has failed the people.

That's not to say I'm arguing for socialism, I'm arguing for something new and different and fair.

I have none of these issues but only have 1 child.

 

I just don't like them all that much. I think this is a driver for lots as much as anything, in this day and age, there are more interesting things to do than have babies.

[fox_up_north]

This is an area I'm interested in. 

 

Numerous studies, based on countries that have attempted to boost birth rates through subsidies and payments, have found a few things:

 

1 - growth of education and careers for women has significantly impacted their desire to have children

 

2 - the expectations of what a parent should do has shifted. "Making do" and not providing a range of activities and experiences is seen as a negative, compared to 3 children sharing a bedroom in the 1970s.

 

3 - concerns about the costs are less a factor than the others. In Scandi countries and Asia, where many benefits were trialled, they still did not noticeably influence births to replacement rate

 

 

The summary is that to get the genie back in the bottle, you would have to significantly scale back rights for women, lifestyle expectations and manage the "home workload".Or, to put it another way, take society back to the 1950s. I do not see this happening.

 

Would dearly love to cite the studies and provide links but I'm on my phone during work. This is an area I am keenly interested in as it will significantly impact my industry over the next 30 years. 

[CornwallFox]

5 minutes ago, fox_up_north said:

This is an area I'm interested in. 

 

Numerous studies, based on countries that have attempted to boost birth rates through subsidies and payments, have found a few things:

 

1 - growth of education and careers for women has significantly impacted their desire to have children

 

2 - the expectations of what a parent should do has shifted. "Making do" and not providing a range of activities and experiences is seen as a negative, compared to 3 children sharing a bedroom in the 1970s.

 

3 - concerns about the costs are less a factor than the others. In Scandi countries and Asia, where many benefits were trialled, they still did not noticeably influence births to replacement rate

 

 

The summary is that to get the genie back in the bottle, you would have to significantly scale back rights for women, lifestyle expectations and manage the "home workload".Or, to put it another way, take society back to the 1950s. I do not see this happening.

 

Would dearly love to cite the studies and provide links but I'm on my phone during work. This is an area I am keenly interested in as it will significantly impact my industry over the next 30 years. 

Really interesting, thanks.

Number 2 on that list is a shame. I do think my generation and possibly the one before has ruined childhood. 

I'm mid forties. My childhood was going out in the morning with my mates and coming back at nightfall. 

These days kids aren't allowed out. Playdates have to be arranged things with parents. Kids don't get to be kids. 

Edited 9 December 2025 by CornwallFox

[kenny]

5 minutes ago, fox_up_north said:

This is an area I'm interested in. 

 

Numerous studies, based on countries that have attempted to boost birth rates through subsidies and payments, have found a few things:

 

1 - growth of education and careers for women has significantly impacted their desire to have children

 

2 - the expectations of what a parent should do has shifted. "Making do" and not providing a range of activities and experiences is seen as a negative, compared to 3 children sharing a bedroom in the 1970s.

 

3 - concerns about the costs are less a factor than the others. In Scandi countries and Asia, where many benefits were trialled, they still did not noticeably influence births to replacement rate

 

 

The summary is that to get the genie back in the bottle, you would have to significantly scale back rights for women, lifestyle expectations and manage the "home workload".Or, to put it another way, take society back to the 1950s. I do not see this happening.

 

Would dearly love to cite the studies and provide links but I'm on my phone during work. This is an area I am keenly interested in as it will significantly impact my industry over the next 30 years. 

Great post

[Tommy G]

3 minutes ago, CornwallFox said:

Really interesting, thanks.

Number 2 on that list is a shame. I do think my generation and possibly the one before has ruined childhood. 

I'm mid forties. My childhood was going out in the morning with my mates and coming back at nightfall. 

These days kids aren't allowed out. Playdates have to be arranged things with parents. Kids don't get to be kids. 

Most people with kids would probably not feel safe and / or irresponsible for doing that these days, the country feel much less ''safe'' particulalrly since 2000 onwards.

 

I agree with you, it's what I used to do when I was a kid, albeit 10 years younger than you. 

[Tommy G]

To summarise there isn't enough cash for people to have more than 2 kids - for reasons mentioned above. The cost of almost everything is completely out of control, so just to keep your head above water you have to be on a decent wedge these days - without many luxury's. 

[leicsmac]

1 hour ago, kenny said:

The WFH culture will make it worse too, particularly those that vehemently believe that working in an office and meeting people is a complete waste of time.

 

Now I am in my 40s, my new friends are typically people I work with or people I meet through my child. I attend work networking events purely as a social event with people I like being with.

I think this very much depends on the person and more flexibility on such matters (where feasible) can only be a good thing. 

 

8 minutes ago, fox_up_north said:

This is an area I'm interested in. 

 

Numerous studies, based on countries that have attempted to boost birth rates through subsidies and payments, have found a few things:

 

1 - growth of education and careers for women has significantly impacted their desire to have children

 

2 - the expectations of what a parent should do has shifted. "Making do" and not providing a range of activities and experiences is seen as a negative, compared to 3 children sharing a bedroom in the 1970s.

 

3 - concerns about the costs are less a factor than the others. In Scandi countries and Asia, where many benefits were trialled, they still did not noticeably influence births to replacement rate

 

 

The summary is that to get the genie back in the bottle, you would have to significantly scale back rights for women, lifestyle expectations and manage the "home workload".Or, to put it another way, take society back to the 1950s. I do not see this happening.

 

Would dearly love to cite the studies and provide links but I'm on my phone during work. This is an area I am keenly interested in as it will significantly impact my industry over the next 30 years. 

Erudite, thank you. 

 

I have to repeat the point once more though that even though declining birth rates at the present time will lead to a difficult bottleneck, I'm not sure there are any better options. The others appear to be a massive scaling back of rights for half of the human population, and/or a boosted birth rate through that or another means that causes resource scarcity issues and then a unmanageable population crash anyway. 

[leicsmac]

2 minutes ago, Tommy G said:

Most people with kids would probably not feel safe and / or irresponsible for doing that these days, the country feel much less ''safe'' particulalrly since 2000 onwards.

 

I agree with you, it's what I used to do when I was a kid, albeit 10 years younger than you. 

Yeah, this is true, even though the numbers show that violent or other nasty incidents towards children and teenagers have actually declined in that time frame.

 

Just goes to show how social media and the like has altered perception in spite of facts. 

[Tommy G]

Just now, leicsmac said:

Yeah, this is true, even though the numbers show that violent or other nasty incidents towards children and teenagers have actually declined in that time frame.

 

Just goes to show how social media and the like has altered perception in spite of facts. 

I'd be interested on the data behind that? - I don't want to believe that's it's true but it might be better reach from the media. 

[kenny]

8 minutes ago, leicsmac said:

I think this very much depends on the person and more flexibility on such matters (where feasible) can only be a good thing. 

 

Erudite, thank you. 

 

I have to repeat the point once more though that even though declining birth rates at the present time will lead to a difficult bottleneck, I'm not sure there are any better options. The others appear to be a massive scaling back of rights for half of the human population, and/or a boosted birth rate through that or another means that causes resource scarcity issues and then a unmanageable population crash anyway. 

Im on a Teams training call right now.

 

Its probably a good time to point out just how pointlessly sh*t they are.

 

I am loving the flexibility of doing something else while its on though.

[CornwallFox]

33 minutes ago, Tommy G said:

Most people with kids would probably not feel safe and / or irresponsible for doing that these days, the country feel much less ''safe'' particulalrly since 2000 onwards.

 

I agree with you, it's what I used to do when I was a kid, albeit 10 years younger than you. 

Do you think it isn't as safe, or just people don't feel as safe? That's the question I keep coming back to. It feels like stuff like internet predators are shown on social media etc and everybody is convinced their kids are unsafe playing football down the road, but I kinda struggle to see why playing football down the road would be less safe. It feels like fear over reality to me, but I don't know that I'm right, it's a genuine question I have.

Edited 9 December 2025 by CornwallFox

[CornwallFox]

29 minutes ago, leicsmac said:

Yeah, this is true, even though the numbers show that violent or other nasty incidents towards children and teenagers have actually declined in that time frame.

 

Just goes to show how social media and the like has altered perception in spite of facts. 

Ah saw this after, that's kinda what I think. Kids are better behaved than in my day. I think the world is no more dangerous or safe. Perception is the word I was looking for. I feel like the generations before mine have ruined the young financially, and my generation have ruined them socially.

[Tinman]

TFFT.

 

[JonnyBoy]

3 hours ago, kenny said:

The WFH culture will make it worse too, particularly those that vehemently believe that working in an office and meeting people is a complete waste of time.

 

Now I am in my 40s, my new friends are typically people I work with or people I meet through my child. I attend work networking events purely as a social event with people I like being with.

 

We just don't hire people who want to WFH, especially trainees. You have to earn the right, and the higher you move up a company, the more flexibility and trust you earn to WFH a couple of days a week. Trainees should want to be in an office environment absorbing every conversation, learning, decision making face to face with peers etc. That cannot be replicated at home 

[fox_up_north]

The flip side of that is in the office they can get caught up in gossip, bad habits, etc. My company is 50% fully remote. 

 

There is no "one size fits all" and no one way of learning. Excluding applications from those who want to WFH is potentially removing good workers.

 

I'm WFH 3.5 days a week. Best results in my team, which includes those who do minimal WFH. 

[st albans fox]

30 minutes ago, Tinman said:

TFFT.

 

Start building an ark ……..

[leicsmac]

9 minutes ago, fox_up_north said:

The flip side of that is in the office they can get caught up in gossip, bad habits, etc. My company is 50% fully remote. 

 

There is no "one size fits all" and no one way of learning. Excluding applications from those who want to WFH is potentially removing good workers.

 

I'm WFH 3.5 days a week. Best results in my team, which includes those who do minimal WFH. 

Why this isn't obvious to everyone is baffling to me. 

 

Offer the choice and accept that everyone has different ways to be productive. 

[JonnyBoy]

26 minutes ago, fox_up_north said:

The flip side of that is in the office they can get caught up in gossip, bad habits, etc. My company is 50% fully remote. 

 

There is no "one size fits all" and no one way of learning. Excluding applications from those who want to WFH is potentially removing good workers.

 

I'm WFH 3.5 days a week. Best results in my team, which includes those who do minimal WFH. 

 

Maybe it is job dependant, a large part of my role is speaking on the phone/sales/business development etc. You simply cannot learn the skills to be good at this by WFH by yourself learning from a teams training course

 

WFH can work if your only job is say data entry and requires no/minimal human contact, or have progressed within a company where you know your trade well and earn't the flexibility 

[JonnyBoy]

19 minutes ago, leicsmac said:

Why this isn't obvious to everyone is baffling to me. 

 

Offer the choice and accept that everyone has different ways to be productive. 

 

If we offered the choice and they WFH from the start, they most likely wouldn't be making money for the company as they wont have learnt the required skills, this would mean they wouldn't have a job in 3 months so wouldn't benefit them in any way 

 

 

 

[leicsmac]

1 hour ago, Tommy G said:

I'd be interested on the data behind that? - I don't want to believe that's it's true but it might be better reach from the media. 

https://youthendowmentfund.org.uk/reports/beyond-the-headlines-2024/summary/

 

This one shows that violent crime among children is going down, but I'll hold my hands up here and say the picture is more complex than just that and there are other factors at play. 

[leicsmac]

17 minutes ago, JonnyBoy said:

 

If we offered the choice and they WFH from the start, they most likely wouldn't be making money for the company as they wont have learnt the required skills, this would mean they wouldn't have a job in 3 months so wouldn't benefit them in any way 

 

 

 

Oh, no disagreement there. I was making the point that at least after a probation/training period, the option should be offered if at all feasible, rather than rejecting the idea wholesale. 

[CornwallFox]

56 minutes ago, JonnyBoy said:

 

We just don't hire people who want to WFH, especially trainees. You have to earn the right, and the higher you move up a company, the more flexibility and trust you earn to WFH a couple of days a week. Trainees should want to be in an office environment absorbing every conversation, learning, decision making face to face with peers etc. That cannot be replicated at home 

I've been working in, recruiting staff to and training staff for a 95% WFH environment. Since moving to this, as my team is very geographically spread, we feel much closer together, it's easier to work across areas, we are far more productive, everybody is happier. Why on earth would I want to drag everybody into an office to then hold teams meetings with clients? 

Some people like the office, fair play of that's you, others work better away. I think the push to get back there is really poor management based on fear. Put in place proper metrics, performance and quality processes and stop worrying.

[kenny]

43 minutes ago, leicsmac said:

Why this isn't obvious to everyone is baffling to me. 

 

Offer the choice and accept that everyone has different ways to be productive. 

You are correct. The ones that like WFH can choose to work elsewhere.

 

It has moved away from the point that it's grim for mental health and isn't helping with the societal problems under discussion.

[kenny]

2 minutes ago, CornwallFox said:

I've been working in, recruiting staff to and training staff for a 95% WFH environment. Since moving to this, as my team is very geographically spread, we feel much closer together, it's easier to work across areas, we are far more productive, everybody is happier. Why on earth would I want to drag everybody into an office to then hold teams meetings with clients? 

Some people like the office, fair play of that's you, others work better away. I think the push to get back there is really poor management based on fear. Put in place proper metrics, performance and quality processes and stop worrying.

I'm not worried about WFH. It just doesn't work for us.

 

I'll stick with full time office based work with reduced hours working as they are typically 20% more productive in than at home.