Future Daze 5 - The Nuclear Family Unit

The manager had his regular morning meeting with the nurses in the office of the old people's home.
"The new coalition government have put up the minimum wage to £15 an hour," he said, "and that includes trainees."
"Does that mean that some of us are facing redundancy?" asked a middle aged man called Stanley.
"No.  Modern managers don't make people redundant.  They understand the benefits of flexible working.  There are times during the working day when people are not working as hard as they might be.  Flexible working allows you to employ more staff at peak times.  I want 4 nurses here, for 2 hours in the morning, to get all the patients out of bed.  I want 4 nurses here, for 2 hours in the evening, to put all the patients to bed.  I want one nurse here, for 2 hours every day, to do all the cooking.  I want one nurse here, for 2 hours every day, to do all the laundry.  I want one nurse here, for 2 hours every day, to put as many patients as possible in the shower."
"Like split shifts," asked an old lady called Julie.
"Split shifts, Julie?  What century are you living in.  Nobody works split shifts, anymore.  It's a two hour day, and that's it."
"You need somebody to be here all the time," said Stanley.
"Indeed I do need one person to be here all the time.  Expect to work a six hour day shift once a week and a twelve hour night shift once a month.  For the other four days of the week, you're working two hours a day."
"Does that mean we'll have more money?" asked Michael.
"For the apprentices it will mean a pay rise.  You will be paid £1000 a month instead of £650 a month, a pay rise of 54%, entirely affordable, as prices have gone up 70% since the last government introduced a minimum wage of £10 an hour.  I will send each of you an email with your hours for this week."

 

"What do you think of that?" Michael asked Roxanne.  "More money for working shorter hours."
"Not really," said Roxanne.  "We'll have to work a lot harder and a 54% pay rise, when inflation has devalued our wages by 70%, is a pay cut."
"At least we'll get kept on at the end of our apprenticeships."
"You're right," said Roxanne.  "There's no incentive to sack people."
"If we have more money we could get somewhere to live together," said Michael.  Roxanne smiled.
"That would be good, Michael.  Have you thought of somewhere we can live together?"
"There's a company that provides ex-rental mobile homes.  They used to be rented for holidays.  When they're more than six years old, they rent them to people who want to live in the centre of London.  Now that they have self drive taxis, all the parking spaces in London are abandoned, so this company fills them with mobile homes."
"Sounds fantastic."
"The mobile homes will even come to your flat, pick up all your luggage, and drive themselves into the part of London where you work.  You save an enormous amount of money by not having to pay 25p a mile for the self-drive taxi every day."
"There's some parking spaces down the street," said Roxanne.  "We can park it right outside the old people's home.  How much do the vans cost?"
"£650 a month.  We can afford one with 2 pay packets of £1000 a month."

 

Michael and Roxanne moved in together, living in a van parked on the same street as the old people's home.  It had 2 beds, a shower and a toilet, a tiny fridge, a kettle, a microwave oven and two spacious cupboards (as the landlord's website had described them.)   The van was quite large and, compared to the bedpipes they had both lived in before, seemed a luxury.  Then, one day, Roxanne showed Michael a long, thin object that looked like a piece of wax.
"I've pulled this out of my arm," she said.  "It's my contraceptive implant."  Michael beamed a wonderful smile.
"Oh wonderful," he said.  "We're going to have a baby."
"I'm not pregnant yet," said Roxanne.  "It'll probably take a few months for my body to adjust to not having the implant and for my periods to start again."
"You can claim Universal Credit to be a full time parent."
"You can claim precious little of it.  I'm entitled to £65 a week for myself, £35 a week for the first child, £30 a week for the second child, and then nothing more."
"They'd pay the rent, as well.  We'd have one of those Nuclear Family Units that are being built on the M25 ring road.  They're £600 a month."
"They wouldn't pay all the rent, Michael.  The maximum income a family can have on Universal Credit is capped to £20,000 a year.  With you earning as much as you are now, they'd pay the first £230 a month of the rent.  I'd be better off working here.  I'll ask the manager to put us on different shifts."

 

When Roxanne was 6 months pregnant, Michael and Roxanne went to visit one of the new apartment blocks that was being built near the M25.  Julie, the estate agent, opened the front door of the apartment and right behind it was a double bed.
"Julie, I think you misunderstood me," said Michael.  "We wanted to see a Family Unit."
"This is a Nuclear Family Unit."
Michael looked shocked.  ""But it's just a bedroom with an ensuite shower.  On the assumption that we are a young couple looking for a room, you might have brought us here."
"This is a family unit because it has an extra children's bedroom." Julie led them into the apartment and opened the door to the children's bedroom.  Behind it were two single beds, some cupboards and some shelves on the wall.  " The apartments on the other side of the block don't have a children's bedroom.  A Common Law Marriage Unit is just a bedroom with an ensuite."
"How soon can we move in?" asked Roxanne.
"You can move in straight away," came the shout of a middle aged man from behind them.  "I moved in last week.  I live here already."
"There might be 5 other people bidding for the flat," said Julie.
"You don't have to worry about that.  Just give them six months rent up front.  They're bound to accept you.  My name's Nigel.  I'm a Bank Manager.  I earn £50,000 a year but after I pay income tax, pension and student loan I only have £20,000.  The coalition government put the standard rate of income tax up to 40%, and they put the top rate up to 60%.  Don't they realise that the rich pay 10% of their income into their student loan and another 10% into their pension?"
"We don't have any deductions from our wages," said Roxanne.  "We don't earn enough."
"No you don't and you can only retire if you fail a medical."
"I voted for the Socialist Party," said Michael.
"The government had no choice," said Nigel.  "The World Bank are knocking on the door.  They can't borrow any more money.  Half the population don't pay income tax anymore.  They don't earn enough.  Got to take twice as much money from those that do.  The Conservatives can't pay out benefits with money that comes out of thin air, or you end up with 20% inflation, like we've got now."
"You should be the Governor of the Bank of England," said Roxanne.  "You seem to know more about the recession than he did, when he was on the news last week."
"Not a job I would ever want to do.  They wouldn't let me.  I'm too honest."
"What do you mean, you're too honest?" asked Michael.
"I'm the Monitor-Evaluator type.  I can see when something is heading for the edge of a cliff, and other people can't.  Lucky people.  The science of winning elections and running the economy belongs to people who think that things can only get better, like Tony Blair, if you ever see his 1997 Party Conference on Freeview."
"I really want this flat," said Roxanne.  "Julie, can we transfer the money right now?"
"All you have to do is pay a deposit on your credit card.  £600, right here, right now.  Then all other reservations are cancelled.  The people who were coming to see the flat tomorrow will be told that it's gone to someone else.  We keep the property open for a month.  You must pay six months rent by the end of that month."
"Can you be any more lenient if my wife and I both pass a credit check?"  Roxanne burst out laughing.
"Michael, just what century do you think you're living in?  A credit check, when you're renting a brand new flat? You won't get any credit if there's half a dozen people who want to rent it."
"I was offered a credit check when I rented the bed pipe."
"Yes Michael, but that's a room in the beehive, there's plenty of them to go around.  To get a decent property you have to be first in the queue, and you have to pay all the money up front."

 

Michael and Roxanne went on to have 2 children.  Bringing children up in a such a small flat proved difficult. One day the children were having a fight in the bedroom.
"Why did you just do that?" asked Simon.
"Didn't," said Emily.
"Did."
"Didn't."
"Did."
"Didn't."  Simon started jumping on the floor.
"Will you two be quiet," shouted Michael.  "The whole building is shaking, all 25 floors of it, and it's 150 yards long.  I'll send you to the 24:7 homework club."  When he mentioned the 24:7 homework club the children were quiet.  The library in the shopping arcade in between the tower blocks provided a homework club for children that was open 24 hours a day, mostly for the benefit of single parents who worked unusual shifts.  All the children used the homework club, as there was nowhere else to do their homework.  Parents would threaten their children with extra time in the homework club as punishment.

 

Nigel invited Michael and Roxanne and their children around to his flat for dinner.  Nigel rented a whole Nuclear Family Unit to himself.  He had converted the children's bedroom into a kitchen, where there was a dining table and some chairs, along with a washing machine, a small fridge and a microwave oven.
"Welcome to my humble abode," said Nigel, leading the family into the kitchen.  "I hate doing my cooking and my washing in public places, so I have created an old fashioned kitchen."
"You rich pig," said Simon.
"Simon, that's not very nice if the man is letting us have dinner in his flat," said Roxanne.
"Say what you like, young man," said Nigel, "you're parents have got more money than me.  Doubtless they work harder."
"Well, I think it's a very nice kitchen and it's very nice of the old man to ask us to have dinner with him," said young Emily.  A drone appeared at the window carrying a cardboard bucket full of hot food that smelt like chicken.  Nigel inserted his plastic card into the drone.
"Enter the PIN number," said an electronic voice.  Nigel entered some numbers on the keyboard on the front of the drone, which then flew towards the kitchen table, where it deposited its cargo and flew out of the window.
"A big bucket of take away food like that costs £13.50," said Nigel.
"How much does it cost them to farm the chickens?" asked Michael.
"Don't be stupid," said Simon.  "That's not real chicken.  That's Textured Vegetable Protein.  It's grown on the airship."
"He's right," said Nigel.  "And the people who own the airship live in Monaco, they pay no tax."
"They must pay VAT," said Michael.
"The thing with VAT is that you can claim it back again," said Nigel.  "They buy diesel for the airship from a local supplier.  Of course, it'll be taxed to death.  Then the accountant says, I've paid all my VAT already, I paid it when I bought the diesel, I don't have to pay it again.  That's the only tax they pay to the UK government, the tax they pay on their diesel."
"Isn't helium very expensive?" asked Roxanne.
"Mam and Dad, don't you know anything?" asked Simon.  "They haven't used helium in airships for 25 years.  There's a world shortage of helium.  Airships are now hot air balloons.  They use a diesel fired radiant heater, with tin foil around the inside of the balloon to reflect the radiant heat, and two foot of loft insulation packed around the outside, to keep the heat in.  Far cheaper than using helium."
"He's quite right," said Nigel, "and once they're up there, at 30,000 feet, they'll use their solar panels to generate lots of free electricity." 
"The drones are electric," said Simon.  "Bear in mind they have a range of only 20 miles anyway.  They charge them up from the solar panel."
"What happens if you order something at night?" asked Roxanne.
"Oh Mother," said Simon, with a look of despair.  "They use the solar panels to charge an accumulator, and the accumulator holds enough electricity to keep going through the night.  It keeps the drones charged up all the time."
"Well," said Roxanne, "if they're charging one battery in the airship, and then charging another battery in the drone, there'd be huge losses and there'd be no energy left in the drone."
"Not much of a problem nowadays," said Nigel.  "The whole process is about 90% efficient."
Nigel unpacked the food, which looked and smelt like Kentucky Fried Chicken, and divided it between them.
"That's very nice," said Emily, taking a bite from one of the pieces.
"Thank you," said Roxanne.  "At least Emily says what she thinks, Simon, not like you who just sit there and eat it."
"Simon says what he thinks all the time," said Nigel.  "What he thinks is very good.  You're very intelligent, Simon.  Perhaps, when you get a bit older you will learn some diplomacy."