Baby boom generation starting to retire in or around 2030

Well, OK. I think people are getting hung up on the labelling. However, the main point of the OP is that people retiring in the next 10 years or less will be "looming burden on society in terms of state and public service pensions" and "It's also a generation that has accumulated a lot of wealth so will younger people who will be running the country be resentful paying for this generation and will we see calls to tax them (or cut benefits) and get them to help finance their own golden years?"

When I stated that I will have paid tax for 45 years (40 at higher rate), paid into private/company pension for 35 and AVS for 20, I was labelled A self-entitled whiner.

The fact is people are forced to choose to have less/no kids because they can't afford it. End of. It has fuck all to do with "progressives", or women in a career, or abortions.

Things have gotten so far out of control with regards to what things cost these days, that the basic life expectations of the past have become unattainable luxuries of today. Something like a basic home, or having a couple of children aren't open to lots of people, because they don't have the money for those luxuries, sometimes even if both partners are working.

People are hocking themselves into debt until they're OAP's just to buy a modest 3 up 2 down that probably only cost about 10 grand to build originally, because the price of housing is absolutely absurd. They often don't have the financial capacity to add a kid into that mix. Having a child is expensive. It isn't something that comes cost free.

People are thinking twice, and rightly so, about having kids because of the money factor and "encouraging" people to become parents is going to take a whole new approach to how we handle economics. Many people are starting to wake up to the disaster that right wing/neo-liberal, laissez faire, attitudes to markets have had on their lives.

It's those attitudes that have us where we are today. Everything overpriced and boom'n'bust faux economies that only benefit the well off.

this is not really true, this has being going on for decades in countries where housing hasn't been an issue and the same with cost of living

Many women don't want to go through having the numbers of kids needed to keep the birth rate high now they have a choice in the matter and they did not before

they want to have lives outside the home, jobs, financial independence

its easy out being a dad of 12 1950s but not a mom of 12

You are incorrect

In fact back in the day the people having lots of kids were the ones least placed to afford them

It's the same now, people who cpuld have as many kids as they want weirdly choose not to

No to have sex meant kids

And the person who had the kids often didn't get that much choice

So of course housing is any issue across the board, but it's not the primary factor it's social

They can afford them, I think you missed the point

And even though you might see yourself as an expensive burden I assure you yer mammy did not

1987 snap!

Leaving college, permanent job by 19 and mouse in a wheel since then:

Don’t think I will last another 5 years working for the man, it’s already impacting my health and I want to enjoy life having paid my dues.

And let there be no mistake, anyone contributing 40 plus years is well owed their state pension.

I come from a typical family of the 60s, 70s, 7 people sharing a 3 bed, 1 bathroom house.

My mum legally had to give up her job when the first one came along, so there wasn't anything to do except have kids.

We never had a holiday, except an attempt at camping which was aborted because of typical Irish weather.

That was the norm then so no one felt they were any better off.

I've 10 kids in a 3 bedroom house and the wife, Mary, is run off her feet.

F the begrudgers - you well deserve it.

Rightt, upstairs mammy making you chips and beans downstairs as we speak

Some people are only happy when they're post snide nonsense 

From this..

to this..

If I can't afford children and the misery accompanying them,

Talk about Pot Kettle.

Frankly, thank christ we don't still have Mick and Mary, who've no idea what contraception is, knocking out 10 kids and not being able to look after them properly in their 3 bedroom house. There's nothing wrong with those days being a thing of the past.

Is there?
I can understand from purely economic reasons perhaps but each to their own. I am not judgemental.

You're not judgemental?

🤣

Well having lots of kids is not a moral failure.

I think you are engaging is the mythical 'ah the good ol'days' fallacy of nostalgia.

Well, think again.

It isn't me who's harking back to the days when women knew that their place was in the home and placing the blame for low birth rates on their shoulders, simply because they're in a job.

If "nostalgia" is where you think my point is, then you have completely missed that point.

Again, you are a man. It appears to be usually men trotting you this
line of argument about the good old days when men were the breadwinners.

This is not my line of thinking at all.

Why is that?

It's that way because house prices and the general cost of living has been let get out of control. It's absurd that a modest house in Dublin costs upwards of half a million…yet again (like nothing was learned from 2008). It's doubly absurd that we have a situation whereby even two working people still can't even dream of owning a home and that's a reality for a lot of folk.

But again, why is stuff so expensive? Who and what is the cause of this?

It's this way because we live in boom and bust fake economies and this has been the "norm" for about 40 years. Our own "Celtic Tiger" being a perfect example blowing up a good thing until it explodes in your face, and modern governments have been far too eager to absolve themselves of social responsibilities, one of which is housing.

We also have entities that bump up prices at a whim, especially in cornered markets, and people end up having little choice. As far as our housing "market" is concerned, we have no capacity to cool the jets of that. We don't build public housing any more and our rental situation is a bloody nightmare. Therefore we have this crazy scenario whereby people are forced to hock themselves in debt until they're near retirement age just to be able to buy a modest home, because there are no other realistic options. And thousands of people outside of that group will NEVER own their own home.

That's an absolute recipe for disaster right there.

It isn't me who's harking back to the days when women knew that their place was in the home and placing the blame for low birth rates on their shoulders, simply because they're in a job.

But you are, you more or less alluded to it.

There is a correlation between women getting more educated and joining the workforce and lower birthrates. Are you denying this?

This is not my line of thinking at all.

Then why engage in nostalgia about those days when the men brought home the bacon, where everyone was happy with their 3 up, 2 down house that could be paid for on one man's income? Those days are gone, so why do you want to go back there?

It's that way because house prices and the general cost of living has been let get out of control.

And why is that?

It's this way because we live in boom and bust fake economies and this has been the "norm" for about 40 years. Our own "Celtic Tiger" being a perfect example blowing up a good thing until it explodes in your face, and modern governments have been far too eager to absolve themselves of social responsibilities, one of which is housing.

So you blame central bankers? We dont control the ECB.

We don't build public housing any more

Over 10,000 social and affordable homes were built last year, the most since the 1970's.

Therefore we have this crazy scenario whereby people are forced to hock themselves in debt until they're near retirement age just to be able to buy a modest home, 

Eh, this was the case for most going way back, or do you think people bought their homes in cash?

An interesting stat from the podcast that was linked.

In 1970, during the good old days, only 1/3 of homes in the UK had central heating. The situation in Ireland was probably worse as we were poorer.

Look, one can make valid arguments about the housing situation and how young people in particular have been left behind. But to hark back to a golden age is a fallacy.

Who told you that? Wrong on both counts; reversing a century of decline, Ireland had sharply rising fertility rates in the 1945-1964 period (see here), peaking in 1965 and falling once again after that. And the total population over this period was not falling; it was more or less static, with a slight rise over the period (see here). The reason it didn't rise more was not low birth rates; it was high emigration rates.

The population fell in the 1950s. A baby boom is different from a high fertility rate. The population here only began to rise in the 1960s and 70s.

And what about me? When im retiring in 20-30 years time will I also not deserve it? Problem is though it wont exist due to the current retirees refusing to accept its not sustainable in its current form and instead trying to force younger people to prop it up for them.

Over the period 1945 to 1965, the baby boom era, the population rose (modestly). This isn't refuted by pointing to shorter periods with that era during which the population fell; it's the overall trend that matters. And a baby boom is not different from a high fertility rate; it is literally a rising fertility rate — a boom in the number of babies being born.

During this era, the combination in Ireland of a high fertility rate and a high emigration rate meant that the average age of the population fell sharply, even faster than was the case in countries with a high fertility rate but low emigration. So Ireland during this period exemplified some of the characteristics of a population undergoing baby boom more strongly than most other countries. By the mid-1960s Ireland had one of the youngest population profiles in the western world, and the economic, social and demographic consequences of this were the subject of much discussion, both in Ireland and internationally.

By the time the baby boom generation reached adulthood, emigration rates had fallen signficantly — in fact while they were in their 20s/30s, in the 1970s, Ireland had net immigration for a few of years. By the time emigration rate were high again, in the 1980s, it was largely the young adults of the following generation that were emigrating. So Irish baby boomers never emigrated at the rates that either the generation before them or the generation after them did.

It absolutely is meaningful to talk of the baby boom in Ireland, and of the generation shaped by that phenomenon.

What "that the basic life expectations of the past" are you referring to, and when?

100 years ago 25% of Dublin lived in Tenements.