What's the British standard of living like in 2008?

[astro]

I know that the UK went through some tough times in the 60's and 70's, but all I really know about the everyday lifestyle issues in the UK are the glimpses I've gotten into British homes via British TV shows over the years.

What's life in Britain really like? Do most families own a house, and have 2 cars etc. etc. I know London is a dynamo, but is the average British person relatively well off these days?

[PaulParkhead]

I'm British, lived in the USA since 2005.

And I think the basic answer to your question is that the standard of living in the UK is more or less the same as the USA. There, just as here, of course, it depends on how wealthy one is.

Things are, in general, a bit more expensive there. There are exceptions, of course, and also folks tend to get slightly higher salaries for the same jobs, so that evens out.

Houses are often smaller than in the USA, and since the country is a lot more urbanised, many more people live in city apartments or condos (the word "condo" is not used in the UK).

My parents run two cars, and while they're certainly not broke, they aren't outrageously rich either. So I wouldn't raise an eyebrow if a British person told me their household had two cars - it's reasonably common.

Welfare payments there are more generous and cover more people, so there are far fewer people in crushing poverty than in the USA. Of course, taxes are higher as well.

London is different - living there is ridiculously expensive. The six years I spent in the city, I live in dilapidated apartments just so I could pay the rent. Many people who work there live in suburban "dormitory towns", and so spend a huge amount of money on their train commute. Lots of London employers offer interest-free season ticket loans to staff - my commute from Rochester to the City (London's financial district) ran about US$5000 per year. The expense of living in London can be a real problem for modestly paid workers, like teachers, nurses, police officers and firefighters.

So the basic answer is that, if you were to move to the UK tomorrow and have a reasonable job, you wouldn't likely notice much change in your material standard of living. However, you would have to get used to a smaller house and denser population in most areas.

[Ximenean]

To give a specific answer to one of the items you listed, more than half of households with two or more adults do have two or more cars. From http://www.statistics.gov.uk/cci/nugget.asp?id=1770, about %30 of households had two or more cars in 2006, while from http://www.statistics.gov.uk/cci/nugget.asp?id=818 the 2002 figures show about 55% of households having two or more adults (and that figure has probably fallen since then). Assuming that very few single-person households have more than one car, that's more than half.

London and the southeast is better off than the rest of the country. I read somewhere that if it were a separate country it would have the highest per capita GDP in Europe.

[MarcusF]

There is no doubt that the British standard of living has risen dramatically over the last 10-20 years - if you dig around on the website Usram linked to you'll find stacks of information on housing and ownership of consumer items. According this article in The Times living standards in the UK and now higher than those in the States Not sure I believe that - too much averaging for it to be meaningful.

[Colophon]

Houses are expensive here, particularly in the southeast. The national average house price is now just over £218,000 ($430,000). In the southeast it's £263,000, and in Greater London as a whole the average price is nearly £360,000 ($710,000).

The average household income (after tax) was about £27,000 per year in 2006, depending on which stats you believe.

My impression is that owning a house is more difficult in the UK than in the US, in that it tneds to be more expensive relative to income, but I could be wrong - judge for yourself from those figures.

[Ximenean]

Originally Posted by MarcusF

According this article in The Times living standards in the UK and now higher than those in the States Not sure I believe that - too much averaging for it to be meaningful.

I'm dubious too. Those claims seem to be based on the absolute value of the pound vs. the dollar rather than PPP-based per capita GDP, which places US per capita GDP well ahead of ours. And it's difficult to take into account the effect on living standards of the markedly different levels of taxation and public spending.

[Wendell Wagner]

Note that the article says that the spending power of Americans is still somewhat greater than that of Britons. Although Britons now make somewhat more money on average, they pay quite a bit more than Americans for nearly everything. The really noticeable difference between the U.S. and the U.K. is that the average wages of Britons is somewhat more compressed than in the U.S. That is, there is somewhat less poverty in the U.K. and somewhat less wealth. It's not a huge difference, but it's noticeable.

In any case, the idea that the U.K. went through tough times is not just out of date but wildly out of date. The tough times were the late 1940's through maybe the early 1970's. Since then the U.S. and the U.K. have been roughly the same in terms of living standards. The U.S. has been consistently ahead in terms of spending power, but the U.K. has nearly caught up now.

[aruvqan]

Do you have the same issues with consumer electronics that we have? We have an older house with issues -- not enough individual circuits in many rooms, or multiple rooms sharing a single fuse so we have to be careful [especially in the kitchen, we cant use the microwave and any other appliance at the same time as every plug except the one for the refrigerator and cooker are one single circuit. If we try to make coffee and run the microwave, or the dishwasher it pops the fuse.]

Modern life is very electricity oriented...

[Wendell Wagner]

aruvqan, did you post to the wrong thread?

[PaulParkhead]

Originally Posted by aruvqan

Do you have the same issues with consumer electronics that we have? We have an older house with issues -- not enough individual circuits in many rooms, or multiple rooms sharing a single fuse so we have to be careful [especially in the kitchen, we cant use the microwave and any other appliance at the same time as every plug except the one for the refrigerator and cooker are one single circuit. If we try to make coffee and run the microwave, or the dishwasher it pops the fuse.]

Modern life is very electricity oriented...

That does happen in some older British houses, but it's getting less and less common. Most old houses (say, 1960s or earlier) have been fully rewired.

[Alive At Both Ends]

Originally Posted by Wendell Wagner

In any case, the idea that the U.K. went through tough times is not just out of date but wildly out of date. The tough times were the late 1940's through maybe the early 1970's.

I think the extent of the problem in the 70's was wildly exaggerated by the media outside Britain. My parents were severely embarrassed in around 1974 to receive a food parcel from my sister who had emigrated to Australia in 1968. Apparently the Australian media were playing up British economic difficulties to the point where she thought we were starving.

[Colophon]

Originally Posted by PaulParkhead

That does happen in some older British houses, but it's getting less and less common. Most old houses (say, 1960s or earlier) have been fully rewired.

My house was built in the 1960s and hasn't been rewired, and yes, it is a problem. I have put in some new sockets in the bedrooms (each bedroom had only one or, at most, two single sockets), but we have the same problem with the kitchen - accidentally switching on the dishwasher at the same time as the washing machine results in a tripped circuit breaker.

Also, the lighting circuit is not earthed, which is not a problem in itself but means we can't install certain types of lighting - anything with a metal housing is out, as are metal switchplates, I'm told.

[The Stafford Cripps]

Originally Posted by Alive At Both Ends

I think the extent of the problem in the 70's was wildly exaggerated by the media outside Britain. My parents were severely embarrassed in around 1974 to receive a food parcel from my sister who had emigrated to Australia in 1968. Apparently the Australian media were playing up British economic difficulties to the point where she thought we were starving.

Yes, I don't remember anybody in the 1970s ever talking about consumer items that people could afford to buy in the USA or Japan or wherever but not in the UK. I think the only big differences people were aware of were the big cars in America, which was more of a taste thing, and multi channel cable TV, which didn't spread until the late 80s. We did not see ordinary Americans as being richer than us.

[Cunctator]

Originally Posted by Alive At Both Ends

I think the extent of the problem in the 70's was wildly exaggerated by the media outside Britain. My parents were severely embarrassed in around 1974 to receive a food parcel from my sister who had emigrated to Australia in 1968. Apparently the Australian media were playing up British economic difficulties to the point where she thought we were starving.

I remember the media coverage here during the 'Winter of Discontent'. Was that in 1974? The UK was portrayed as falling apart at the seams, with massive waves of strike action; uncollected garbage rotting in the streets; power cuts; unburied dead bodies; shortened working weeks etc.

[jjimm]

Having lived in both the US and the UK, I'd say that, while we have the same stuff available to buy, the frequency of consumerism is somewhat repressed in the UK due to price. Most Brits count pennies a lot more, whether buying the latest AV equipment or laptop, a car, or doing grocery shopping. Three reasons: higher accommodation cost, greater proportion of our income dedicated to fuel and private transport, and everything we buy is somewhat more expensive.

The amount of living space we deem necessary is much smaller than the US, too, because of land costs due to our size.

There are other things that (in my observation) in the US that are seen as fundamental that are still considered luxuries here: tumble dryers (though this is dying out) and dishwashers, for example, and hardly anyone has air conditioning - though this is mostly climate-related.

Also, eating out is less common here - once a week would, in my experience, be considered quite fancy.

But in general, it's pretty similar.

[PaulParkhead]

Originally Posted by Colophon

My house was built in the 1960s and hasn't been rewired, and yes, it is a problem. I have put in some new sockets in the bedrooms (each bedroom had only one or, at most, two single sockets), but we have the same problem with the kitchen - accidentally switching on the dishwasher at the same time as the washing machine results in a tripped circuit breaker.

Also, the lighting circuit is not earthed, which is not a problem in itself but means we can't install certain types of lighting - anything with a metal housing is out, as are metal switchplates, I'm told.

My parents had to rewire their new (to them) 1960s built house when they bought it in 2002. My house in Rochester, Kent was built in 1890, and it had been partly rewired. I kept looking to add sockets, lights and so on, and finding ancient rubber-insulated cables. And yes, the breakers kept popping.

Fixtures that are double-insulated should be OK on a 5amp lighting circuit, and I certainly have used metal switchplates, though again, I suspect they were also double-insulated. It's also possible to add a 3amp fuse to a 30amp ring main, and set up lights that way. 30amp rings are always earthed. I did something like that with a garden shed, with the approval of our electrician neighbour. (I was about 14, any time I proposed meddling with the electrics, my folks made me tell him what I planned to do and make sure I wasn't about to burn the house down )

What I did was take a 30amp line from the garage, as a spur off a regular socket, fuse it down to 5amps and then add a regular lightswitch. It all worked fine when the house was sold 20 years later.

[PaulParkhead]

Originally Posted by Cunctator

I remember the media coverage here during the 'Winter of Discontent'. Was that in 1974? The UK was portrayed as falling apart at the seams, with massive waves of strike action; uncollected garbage rotting in the streets; power cuts; unburied dead bodies; shortened working weeks etc.

It was 1978-1979. Here's some info:

http://libcom.org/history/1978-1979-...-of-discontent

I'm too young to remember much about it (born in 1972), but I think I would have recalled if my family and I had been starving. Not the best of times, all the same.

[amarone]

Originally Posted by PaulParkhead

It was 1978-1979. Here's some info:

http://libcom.org/history/1978-1979-...-of-discontent

While Cunctator got the name wrong by using "Winter of Discontent", he is indeed correct about there being issues in the winter of 1973-4. A miner's strike led to a 3-day working week and frequent power cuts. I remember revising for my mock O levels by candlelight.

The miner's strike led to the fall of the Edward Heath government and ultimately his loss of the leadership of the Conservative party, being replaced by Margaret Thatcher.

[PaulParkhead]

Originally Posted by amarone

While Cunctator got the name wrong by using "Winter of Discontent", he is indeed correct about there being issues in the winter of 1973-4. A miner's strike led to a 3-day working week and frequent power cuts. I remember revising for my mock O levels by candlelight.

The miner's strike led to the fall of the Edward Heath government and ultimately his loss of the leadership of the Conservative party, being replaced by Margaret Thatcher.

Thank you - I cannot remember 1973-74, and my knowledge of that period of history is not much better than "OK". I do recall that there were two elections in 1974, February and October, ISTR. Labour won both, but unconvincingly, and this set up Callaghan's disastrous fall in 1979. Well, it was disastrous for Callaghan and the Labour Party, I guess Thatcher wasn't complaining.

Wasn't there an oil crisis around that time also? That can't have helped matters.

[The Stafford Cripps]

Originally Posted by jjimm

There are other things that (in my observation) in the US that are seen as fundamental that are still considered luxuries here: tumble dryers (though this is dying out)

We had a tumble dryer in the 70s, and we weren't rich.

[PaulParkhead]

Originally Posted by G. Odoreida

We had a tumble dryer in the 70s, and we weren't rich.

We got one in the early 80s, and we weren't rich either. But my parents didn't have a dishwasher until I was about 25 or so. Not sure that had to do with their available income, though - they could probably have afforded one. It's just that my Dad hates to spend money unnecessarily, and I suppose he felt that my sister and I washed dishes just fine, and were free Once we went off to college, his priorities changed, hee!

[MarcusF]

I remember 1974 alright, but I was a student - I expected to live in squalor with no consumer durables We had the power cuts andthe three day week but they didn't make that much impact on me personally.

Actually an interesting comparison: Marcus Junior is now at university in Manchester, as I was 30+ years ago, and his expectations are a lot higher than mine in terms of the standard of house he is renting and the equipment it contains. (That's quite apart from the satellite tv and wi-fi internet connection that we didn't even dream of.)

[Rayne Man]

The reason that many UK households don't have a tumble-dryer is that they still line-dry their washing. They probably don't feel it's necessary to have one, especially as these machines are large consumers of power.

[MarcusF]

Another reason for the relative lack of tumble dryers has already been mentioned - British homes are often a lot smaller than American ones. Combined washer/dryers are generally not very good and many of us just don't have room for another machine. If it comes to a choice, the dryer is the gadget that you can manage without more readily than the washer, the fridge, the freezer, or even the dishwasher.

[An Gadaí]

Originally Posted by Rayne Man

The reason that many UK households don't have a tumble-dryer is that they still line-dry their washing. They probably don't feel it's necessary to have one, especially as these machines are large consumers of power.

Clothes lines seem very uncommon in the US, which strikes me as bizarre in areas where clothes would dry rather quickly outside. It is, I would guess, partly down to closed backyards being less common than in the UK or here.

[aruvqan]

Originally Posted by Wendell Wagner

aruvqan, did you post to the wrong thread?

No, just curious about british home infrastructure - with other questions about standard of living, it makes perfect sense. I have stayed in bed and breakfasts in different european countries and seen various little hand lettered signs with various cautions about electrical use, and seen some places that had a single power point in a hallway for 2 or 3 different rooms to use with extension cords ...

[amarone]

Originally Posted by An Gadaí

Clothes lines seem very uncommon in the US, which strikes me as bizarre in areas where clothes would dry rather quickly outside. It is, I would guess, partly down to closed backyards being less common than in the UK or here.

At least around here, clothes lines are viewed as being unsightly and there are often restrictions on their use. In what should be another thread, the residents of this "Land of the Free" seem remarkably happy to subjugate themselves to Home Owners Associations that place lots of rules on how you may live. From the covenants that I must abide by:

No clothesline of any kind shall be displayed to the public view on any Lot.

[amarone]

Originally Posted by PaulParkhead

Wasn't there an oil crisis around that time also? That can't have helped matters.

Yep. Note from the graph at the top of that article that oil prices were still lower than they are today. There was another oil crisis in 1979. From what I recall, the oil crises had moe of an impact in the US than the UK - probably because of the much greater dependence on cars.

[Nava]

Originally Posted by An Gadaí

Clothes lines seem very uncommon in the US, which strikes me as bizarre in areas where clothes would dry rather quickly outside. It is, I would guess, partly down to closed backyards being less common than in the UK or here.

It's got a lot to do with clotheslines being perceived as "a sign of poverty" in the US, so that many locations forbid their usage even in a back yard which cannot be seen from the street or from neighbor's yards unless said neighbors are climbing the fence. Heck, a few weeks back I read about an "ecoposh" development where megarich people are building nth-residence "ecohouses" and where one of the conditions to live there is "no clotheslines:" apparently the ecological advantage of a clothesline vs a dryer isn't enough to make up for the loss of poshness.

My team just rented several flats in Glasgow; all of them came with washer-driers but also with foldable clotheslines.

The problem about "not enough sockets for everything" happens pretty much everywhere, I think. In Spain one of the things people are being told to check if they're buying homes that aren't still built is to count the number of sockets, as too many architects still put one or two sockets per room. Master bedroom with only two sockets + two table lamps + two cellphones that need charging +... = oops!

[Nars Glinley]

How big would the average sized family of four dwelling be in the UK? I'm not sure what the overall average in the US is but when we had our home built in the suburbs in 1992, it was hard to find a floor plan much under 2000 square feet.

[Mangetout]

Interesting question - because total floor area simply isn't often quoted on property details, except perhaps for newly-built houses.

[Ximenean]

Yes, the emphasis in British property listings is usually on number of bedrooms rather than floor area. Doesn't seem to matter if the rooms are tiny, because four beds is better than three, right? Anyway, 2,000 square feet would be considered a large home here I think. We sometimes squeeze three bed/two bath homes into 1,000 square feet.

[NajaNivea]

Originally Posted by An Gadaí

Clothes lines seem very uncommon in the US, which strikes me as bizarre in areas where clothes would dry rather quickly outside. It is, I would guess, partly down to closed backyards being less common than in the UK or here.

I have this idea that line-dried clothing is stiff and scratchy. Plus, doesn't it get dirt and stuff on it if the wind is blowing? We actually do have T-poles for clotheslines in my backyard, but there are a couple trees grown up around them so I couldn't use them, even if I wanted to.

Houses without closed backyards are extremely rare, in my limited experience (West coast, US).

[Mangetout]

I just picked out a random 3 bed semi-detached at about the price Colophon stated as the average for my area - only the rooms themselves had dimensions listed (not the hallways, porches, stairs, closets and cupboards, garage, etc) - so bedrooms, bathroom, living room, dining room and kitchen came to 65 square metres in total (700 square feet) - this would be a property that would be described as neither 'spacious', nor 'compact' - it's just a house.

[Mangetout]

Originally Posted by Usram

Yes, the emphasis in British property listings is usually on number of bedrooms rather than floor area. Doesn't seem to matter if the rooms are tiny, because four beds is better than three, right?

Indeed - last time I was in the market for a house, some of the rooms described as '3rd bedroom' were large enough to accomodate a single bed - as long as you decide, before installing the bed, whether you want the door always open or always closed.

[jjimm]

Originally Posted by Usram

Yes, the emphasis in British property listings is usually on number of bedrooms rather than floor area. Doesn't seem to matter if the rooms are tiny, because four beds is better than three, right? Anyway, 2,000 square feet would be considered a large home here I think. We sometimes squeeze three bed/two bath homes into 1,000 square feet.

Indeed, when I was selling my house in Ireland (not the UK, but a similar situation), the addition of a really crappy stud wall in the large back room added more than €10,000 to the price, because it added a room.

[Ximenean]

Originally Posted by Mangetout

bedrooms, bathroom, living room, dining room and kitchen came to 65 square metres in total (700 square feet) - this would be a property that would be described as neither 'spacious', nor 'compact'

All that extra stuff, plus the thickness of the walls, does add quite a lot, to be fair.

[Nars Glinley]

Originally Posted by Usram

All that extra stuff, plus the thickness of the walls, does add quite a lot, to be fair.

But the US figure only includes "air conditioned" space so porches, garages etc aren't included.

[GorillaMan]

Originally Posted by KRM

But the US figure only includes "air conditioned" space so porches, garages etc aren't included.

...and in that case, most UK houses would be zero sq.ft.!

[Mangetout]

Originally Posted by Usram

All that extra stuff, plus the thickness of the walls, does add quite a lot, to be fair.

Maybe - although in a lot of average houses, hallways and landings are no larger than functionally necessary. It might add 25% to the floor area - but it won't double it.

[Desert Nomad]

Originally Posted by jjimm

the addition of a really crappy stud wall in the large back room added more than €10,000 to the price, because it added a room.

You mean like a normal American wall.

I have an apartment in central Europe and while not the UK, it is a similar construction. We have 2 bedrooms, of about 15'x12' and 12'x11'. There is one large walk-in closet, one bathroom, a WC and a main living/dining/kitchen. The total sq ft is 920 I think. All the floors are hardwood... I have never seen a carpeted floor here.

This is in a central area and is worth perhaps $500K (helped in large part by the weakness of the USD).

The building is about 3 years old and is considered a rather spacious apartment here.... and there is no drywall anywhere in the building as it is all solid concrete frame with brick and plaster.

I cringe at how cheaply American homes are built - just wood and drywall... it feels so flimsy.

[chowder]

Originally Posted by KRM

How big would the average sized family of four dwelling be in the UK? I'm not sure what the overall average in the US is but when we had our home built in the suburbs in 1992, it was hard to find a floor plan much under 2000 square feet.

I have 3 bedrooms, a living room. lounge, dining room, kitchen, bathroom, toilets upstairs and down.

I live alone

Jebus, I really must think about flogging this place

[Nava]

Originally Posted by NajaNivea

I have this idea that line-dried clothing is stiff and scratchy. Plus, doesn't it get dirt and stuff on it if the wind is blowing?

Wrong idea. Promise. Among other reasons, because in most of Europe people live in townhouses/condos/flats, so you're not hanging your clothes close enough to the floor to get dirt in it unless you're on the Northern shore of the Mediterranean and the wind in question is sirocco (which brings in Sahara sand as far as Northern Spain, my mother has brought in sandy linens during sirocco and she's in a tenth floor near Pamplona).

Unless you're in a very dry place and have very fine soil with no appropiate vegetation cover, a height of about ten inches from the floor to the bottom of the clothes is enough to ensure there's no dirt in them.

It's also one less place to get color transfer between items of clothing, or shrinkage. With a clothesline, the maximum temperature your clothes face is the one you choose for the water in the washer; with a dryer, it's the temperature of the dryer, which can't always be chosen as clearly as that of the water.

I always find it cute/funny/rolleyesey when I'm in America and I see an ad for fabric softener that shows clothes on a line.

Desert Nomad, I've seen carpeted floors in Germany, but only in hotels. Same as in Spain, they seem to be about the only place where you see carpet. Many Europeans get fits of De Yuck when thinking of trying to keep carpet clean. One of the reasons my Glasgow flat is cheaper than others is that it has carpet in several rooms.

[Some Whelks]

Wall to wall carpeting throughout is very common in British homes though Nava. It's the norm really, although hard flooring has become very fashionable in the last 10 years or so. The idea of your flat being cheaper because it's carpeted seems slightly odd even so .

I've lived where I do now for about 12 years and started out with the standard format of carpeting in all bedrooms and everywhere else except the conservatory, bathrooms and the kitchen/utility room. Now I only have carpet in the living room ,1 of the kids bedrooms and the spare bedroom. I like the look of wooden flooring though, it is easier to keep clean and getting rid of the carpet really helped my asthma.

I have a washer/dryer and a retractable clothesline in the garden. In the winter I never hang anything out to dry but in the summer I dry as much as I can outside. It's nicer and fresher that way.

[GorillaMan]

Originally Posted by Some Whelks

Wall to wall carpeting throughout is very common in British homes though Nava. It's the norm really, although hard flooring has become very fashionable in the last 10 years or so. The idea of your flat being cheaper because it's carpeted seems slightly odd even so .

It's a whole different matter in rented accomodation - the carpet is full of previous occupants' god-knows-what, and was probably cheap and scratchy to start with. Very different to putting your own new carpets in your own home.

[Some Whelks]

I confess I hadn't thought of that one

[Colophon]

Originally Posted by Some Whelks

in the summer I dry as much as I can outside. It's nicer and fresher that way.

Agreed. If you've never encountered line-dried clothes, you won't believe how much nicer and fresher they smell than tumble-dried stuff. (Although I'll allow that in cold weather you can't beat a towel still warm from the tumble-dryer.)

Originally Posted by Desert Nomad

I cringe at how cheaply American homes are built - just wood and drywall... it feels so flimsy.

Which brings me to a slight hijack: what's the American equivalent of the phrase "bricks and mortar", meaning property in general especially when considered a (safe) investment?

[GorillaMan]

Originally Posted by Colophon

Which brings me to a slight hijack: what's the American equivalent of the phrase "bricks and mortar", meaning property in general especially when considered a (safe) investment?

I was going to say I'd never heard it used here, but a quick Google shows the Telegraph' saying 'Bricks and mortar can make a firm investment foundation', and the Times going with 'Don't get back into Bricks and mortar yet'. Which I suppose goes to show that I don't read the financial pages much, and that there's not much point in doing so anyway

[ultrafilter]

Originally Posted by Colophon

Which brings me to a slight hijack: what's the American equivalent of the phrase "bricks and mortar", meaning property in general especially when considered a (safe) investment?

We use the phrase "brick and mortar", although I haven't heard it in an investment context. I'm not aware of any term for that sort of investment other than real estate.

[GorillaMan]

Originally Posted by ultrafilter

I'm not aware of any term for that sort of investment other than real estate.

There's always the simple 'property', as in 'he made his forture in property'.