There is a group of voters typically aged 65-85 who often say I never claimed any benefits in my life. They nearly always vote and generally vote Conservative although switched to Labour or Liberals when Blair was around.
They came out of school in the 1950s/60s/early 70s when there was plenty of work on Teesside, housing was cheap when they bought in the 1960s/70s, so they now have a nice fully paid for family house or they rented a council house and then bought it for peanuts. In the late 1980s and early 1990s they bought cheap shares in privatisations and maybe started buying a few more shares possibkly started a private pension in the late 1980s.
They experienced a decent resourced education system and public sector - free school milk, new schools/colleges, free higher education with grants, NHS without queues and long waiting lists.
They benefited by the rise of occupational schemes in the 1960s and 70s and may have paid in for 30 years or more. Schemes that now do not exist for current employees.
They judge themselves different from others who claim any benefits/use food banks, but of course they don't face houses that cost eight to ten times the annual salary or high private rents, not able to join a generous occupational pension, having unstable work patterns, jobs on minimum wage, graduate loans to pay.
I have not making judgements just stating what I sometimes see. We nearly all live to some extent in bubbles of some kind. It is difficult to avoid.
In general they have done well in life and in general feel that people who struggle are not too bright, lazy, lack any ambition or just very unlucky (say develop long term illness when young or middle age).
I am not of the above generation, I left education when unemployment peaked, but I too benefitted from some of the above. I also moved away which has its advantages and disadvantages in my life.
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