How much will a lifetime cost you?

We’ve all felt it, that moment when you look at your bank balance and think ‘I’ve spent how much?’

But what if you looked at an entire lifetime’s worth of spending? What would the damage be and how painful would that number feel?

According to a recent piece of research by Atom Bank, the cost of living an entire near 81-year lifetime in 2021 would be a whopping £1,543,834.

That includes £169,159 spent on children, £266,742 on buying the average house and £69,793 on Christmases.

The bank compared the figures to what the same lifetime would have cost at a 1971 snapshot, with £14,738 on children, £2,371 on the average house, and £4,177 on Christmases.

Beyond highlighting just how much house prices have skyrocketed in 50 years – if they had only kept pace with standard inflation the average home would cost £38,000 – what does this tell us?

On this week’s podcast, Georgie Frost, Lee Boyce and Simon Lambert discuss that and why a snapshot like this – vaguely precise as it may be – can help us understand how inflation works and how it can drive up prices.

Lee picks out the inflation across each decade to show that and Atom’s figures that see the cost of the average lifetime rise to £19.2million by 2071 sharpen the mind.

Inflation is looking large again, but Omicron has made it look like a Bank of England interest rate hike may be back off the table this month. 

The team discuss that and whether the variant and restrictions to tackle it will cause more economic problems and what those with travel plans can do.

Next up is the Great Resignation – another phenomenon thrust to the foreground by the pandemic – what’s going on, why are people quitting and should you stay or go to get a pay rise and better working conditions?

And finally, is your home hotter than Lanzarote? It’s cold and frosty outside, but inside a surprising number of British homes it’s shorts and t-shirt weather.