The pros and cons of times gone by as Peter Pan generation claim it has never been tougher

"You've never had it so good" and "you don't know you are born" - just two of the phrases I would often here from my own parents when I dared to momentarily wallow in any self pity about my financial circumstances or career.

And in many ways they were right. Growing up on the council estates of South Tyneside in the 50s and 60s where many people faced the hard labour of the shipyards, my mam and dad often recount a childhood of gas lights, bed bugs and getting a bath in-front of the fire.

As a child who grew up in the 80s and 90s it sounded more like something out of a Dickens novel than the image portrayed of the swinging 60s.

While social change may have been gathering pace in London, the reality for many of my parents' generation in the North East was one of predominantly council rented properties, one income households and without the luxury of a television, motor car or even a fridge.

My mam became the first person in her family to go to university when she trained as a teacher, although following the birth of my first child she would often remind my wife - then on maternity - about how she had to give up her job to look after myself and my brother after only being entitled to six weeks paid maternity leave.

After meeting my dad, they again became the first generation in their families to purchase their own property when they bought a semi-detached house in Washington in 1973 - the same house in which they currently live.

I'm in my forties, so older than the Peter Pan generation, but with just one wage coming into the household I had a happy childhood but it was one of trips to a caravan at Haggerston Castle - rather than the Costas - in a rather battered old family car which my dad often seemed to have to resurrect.

So can the Peter Pan generation in their 20s and early 30s really lay claim to never having had it so tough when it comes to getting on the property ladder and a financial foothold in society?

It's certainly fair to say that while my parents' generation had it tough growing up, they have benefited from a more favourable system later in life.

When I was a child, my dad worked as a teacher at South Tyneside College, while my mam was a stay at home mother until myself and my brother finished primary school.

Perhaps they are from a generation more in tune to the mantra of you don't spend what you don't have, but we never went into debt - preferring to save first than buy on credit - and they always paid their mortgage payments on time.

Once my mother returned to teaching, I certainly noticed a big difference in our disposable income and both my parents were able to retire before their 60th birthdays - something of a pipe dream for many today. They were also the last generation to benefit from a final salary rather than career average pension scheme and could access their old age pension at 60 and 65.

For my generation and younger it will be more like 68.

However, you could argue that this is more than balanced out by the fact, unlike my parents' parents, far more people are now home owners rather than renters and so their offspring stand to potentially inherit a windfall previous generations could only dream of.

When it comes to mortgage rates and getting on the property ladder there is no doubt that today's fist time buyers are currently being dealt a difficult financial hand.

The current five year fixed mortgage rate is hovering around 5%, where as the rate I'm currently benefiting from is less than 2%, having moved into our current house just six months before the rates rocketed thanks to the botched mini budget of Liz Truss and Kwasi Kwarteng.

However, it's also fair to say that mortgage interest rates have always fluctuated, with buyers in the early 1980s facing rates of a jaw dropping 10 to 14%.

Where today's 20 somethings are certainly being hit hard is leaving university with the burden of student loan debts. With course fees of around £9,000 per year, before event taking into account living costs, in 2023 students were on average graduating with an average debt of £45,000 - a mini mortgage in itself.

When I was a student in the late nineties course fees were much lower and while I did leave with student loan debt, even in relative terms, it was not the same millstone around my neck as it is for today's graduates.

The what feels like an alien concept of my mother's generation being paid a grant to go to university is probably beyond the economic comprehension of today's debt laden graduates but this also needs to be balanced by the vast difference in the number of people going to university, which was initially built on the principle of elite academic education.

Currently around 36% of 18-year-olds are being educated at university compared to eight percent in 1970. This undoubtedly raises the question of whether it remains the right path for a large proportion of young people who may benefit from a less financially draining pathway.

In essence it is fair to say that while we are all currently experiencing an economic pinch-point, the severity of which is amplified by each household's own financial standing, the course of history shows that each generation has experienced their economic pros and cons.

Where one generation may have gained in one aspect, they have undoubtedly lost out in another.

What is also fair to say is that, rightly, people's expectations of what they expect from a liveable salary today is very different from the council house hand to mouth existence experienced on the backstreets of Sunderland and the North East when my parents were children.

And if you are working hard having gained qualifications or a trade, then why shouldn't you expect to be able to enjoy a holiday, family day out or indeed your own roof over you head rather than paying someone else's mortgage. Otherwise, in many ways you are existing rather than truly living life.

In a country currently ranked as having the 6th highest gross domestic product in the world, you would like to think this is attainable for everyone, whatever your generation.

Sadly it doesn't seem to be the case.