Ok - so this came out of another thread...but it got me thinking and gathered a few responses.
www.mumsnet.com/Talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/1743690-Please-I-NEED-to-know-if-IABU-before-I-take-a-stand-with-my-in-laws?pg=1
I have posted below as I did on the thread. What I am interested to know is if this is a really wide spread issue?
Disclaimer: Whilst I know (far) to many people this applies to, I have to confess my parents and PIL's so no signs of bonkers retirement plans (just good planning to give them a good standard of life).
Ok - so post below:
Whilst this case is at the extreme end of the spectrum, there seems to be (from the posts here and chats with friends/colleagues) a real reluctance on the "baby boomer" generation to make sustainable retirement plans.
Here in the UK many friends have parents who for years have lived off rising property values and the expectation that they can sell up or remortgage to fund what are clearly highly expensive lifestyles that can't be maintained over 20/30 years of non generation of income.
There seems to be a groundswell of entitlement often laughingly termed "spending the kids inheritance" - which in principle I don't object to - you can't take it with you and I personally would rather my parents enjoyed retirement than "save" or god forbid "scrimp" for me, but I am seeing this taken to "spend the inheritance and then let the kids bail us out".
I have lost count of friends who are now in some form or another subsiding their retired parents - parents who have "blown" life savings and house equity on mad "let's buy a house in Spain to live in half the year" or let's "travel around the US in a huge RV for 2 years" or "buy a boat and sail around the med" because they refused to really think if they could afford it.
Before I get beaten up, I don't object to people wanting to help family in desperate straights, I just seem to hear more and more stories where these situations were totally avoidable and parents have been - put bluntly - bloody selfish at worst and in denial at best.
The families involved are now making sacrifices that impact their children at the very time they should be the priority.
Do I just have an unlucky social group or is this issue becoming more prevalent?
Rant over.....hand me a !
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AIBU?
Baby Boomers - The selfish generation?
201 replies
YellowTulips · 01/05/2013 17:52
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