On tonight's episode they sent in some youngsters to compare with the 70-year-olds from yesterday. The plumber Ashley was outstanding from the first second he walked onto the job. The rest of the
20-year-olds were such a appalling example of "today's yoof" they could be poster-childs for any Daily Wail young benfer scrounger scum campaign.
If it appears on BBC, then yes, I agree. These two programmes have attempted to show how we can all work into our 70s, as that is what the government keeps telling us is going to be necessary. But the truth is that even with healthy pensioners, they just don't have the stamina and cannot be expected to be as flexible as 20-year-olds.
The results of the programmes are going to throw the government's plans haywire. The pensioners shown were probably above average. There are going to be many thousands who canot stand for longer periods, do not have the dexterity to manipulate small items, cannot concentrate too well and so on, exhibiting all the signs of natural aging in fact. Imagine 75-year-old bus drivers driving your kids to school? They could have a heart attack or stroke any minute.
No, what is needed is a fundamental re-think of the whole concept of capitalism, because it is now coming to the end of its useful life as fewer and fewer jobs are available due to mechanisation and robot processes.
As for the young people in the second programme, what a bunch of dropouts, largely!
The pension age will doubtless drift upwards. I will get state pension at
65 and after various increases in age my wife will now get hers a week before her 65th birthday. Fortunately we can get by on savings and private pensions since neither of us is now working. There is a big difference between people continuing to work through rather than having 8 years retired and then going back as happened in the TV programme. Personally many years of stress did my head in and I gave up before I reached 60. Similarly a lot of people would be incapable of demanding work by late 60s I suspect. Of course if the government did not have its dogma over immigration we would only need a third of anticipated austerity measures and the retirement date would not have to go up so quickly.
Any bus or coach driver over 65 has a compulsory medical every year, and the slightest doubt about their fitness to drive removes their licence. We have a few drivers over 70 working for us, and they are as good at their job, within their limits, as the younger ones.
They normally potter around on school contracts and local work for a few hours a day, leaving us younger ones to get on with the touring and other jobs that need more stamina.
They also seem to have less trouble with the kids' behaviour than the young drivers, but that's another thread.
Well, yes. But these proposals are of course from politicians. And it would make no difference to anything if they had a heart attack or stroke on the job. Apart from the noise level in the H of C, possibly.
There is no way I can do what I do now when I am 70 at the same speed.
Could I still do it? Why not?
BTW we have a new apprentice. There is something seriously wrong with this one. He is interested in what he does, he is a quick learner and is good at his job. And for some reason I liked him the moment I met him (just the way he spoke to me when we met did the trick).
He cannot afford to insure a car so he takes the train to Doncaster and then bikes it from the train station to the unit. He is an absolute pleasure to talk to and is just superb in every aspect of his work. In fact he is causing problems because he is fitting the gear faster than we can get it delivered! And everything he has installed is perfect.
Much better than the tosser that was fired yesterday (that was the one I punched in the bollocks a couple of months ago).
It won't be a matter of whether you want to work at 70. It will be a matter of necessity (for most people). However you slice the cake, you have retired people and working people, and all pensions (whether funded or not) involve a transfer of income from workers to retired. If that imposte becomes too great, the workers will simply revolt and refuse to pay it. Apart from an annual cull, the only way to keep down the proportion of retired people in the population is to raise the retirement age.
I've just done some insulation and boarding in my son's loft. A cross between carpentry and yoga with all that stretching and crouching etc. I reckon 3 hours maximum at my age (69) if I want to be able to move next day.
Balls, sorry to hear that Dave. I hope you are making plans to burn all your money doing as many fun things as you can before it takes the best of you?
They don't say what job exactly they expect you to be doing.
I suspect it'll be pensioners working for free in Poundland on the tills or stacking shelves via the workfare scheme.
Probably will be nothing at all for younger unemployed who will have to scrounge of mum and dad (if they can) or be left to rot dossing on the streets.
Back in 2005 I advised on recruiting a helpdesk operator - I gave them a technical test. The guy we chose had just finished Uni. In the holidays, he advertised a PC-fix service, and because he couldn't drive, picked them up and dropped them off by bus. He was very keen, very quick, and in the space of a year got into developing, and then had a guy under him.
To be fair, my then boss was so impressed, he paid for him to have driving lessons (passed first time).
If we start working on a time machine now we can go back to the 90s and have at least some hope of getting some clean ones or maybe someone has Alexander Shulgin's phone no?
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