Britons believe that now things can only get worse

According to Ipsos Poll, Britons believe that now things can only get worse

The polling shows that only 23% of Britons now believe that their children will have a higher quality of life than they enjoy, while 35% think it will be lower.

More generally, only 32% now think it likely that today's youth will have a better life than their parents, while twice as many say it is unlikely.

Three in five (61%), now say that Britain is getting worse as a place to live, up from 49% in June 2010, while only 6% say it is getting better.

The change in national mood has accompanied a decline in the real incomes of many people on low to middle earnings.

The Ipsos Mori figures show, however, that even before Osborne's attempt to shake people to their senses, they were getting the message for themselves. Rather than thinking the misery would be short term, they were beginning to entertain the prospect of a long-term decline that could have a negative effect on living standards – including those of their own children.

These findings are too much diverse of the state of optimism in 1997 when the slogan "Things can only get better" was the catchphrase that helped to propel Tony Blair's New Labour to power on a wave of national optimism. 

These findings show an even higher level of pessimism in the UK than when the same question was asked in the United States in April this year.

There Gallup found that 44% of Americans thought it likely that today's youth would have a better life than their parents, and 55% thought it was unlikely.

Read more: guardian