The UK has a broken housing market. Literally everything else stems from that. All of the centralisation, ridiculous conditions, silly commutes, a ton of the

The UK has a broken housing market. Literally everything else stems from that. All of the centralisation, ridiculous conditions, silly commutes, a ton of the work related unhappiness. There are vast, vast swathes of the country that are just empty or used for farmland or whatever whilst others live in tower blocks. It's gone way, way beyond anything resembling reasonable. The situation, in pretty much one or two generations, for the population without excessive talent, has gone from 'buy with a partner' to 'move a bit further out' to 'buy an apartment' to 'buy an apartment a bit further out' to 'rent an apartment' to 'rent a room in a house or apartment' and for many it's now at 'curl up and die on the street'. You may also have the option of moving to a depressed post-industrial town and working in retail until the Government cuts benefits enough that no-one can afford to buy things from your shop any more. We're a 500+ year old country for christ's sake. This isn't the frontier. We're in a situation in which people can't afford the rent because our governance is thoroughly broken.