Austerity was slowly lifting, World War Three with Russia was a possibility and an Etonian disliked by Tory backbenchers held the post of Prime Minister.

No, this was not last week; this was the 1950s.

An age of rationing and respect to your elders, an age of stiff collars and even stiffer upper lips; an age where those with front doors were happy to leave them open.

It was also an age when Prime Minister Harold Macmillan was delighted to tell the nation that “most of our people have never had it so good”.

Five decades on and those born into this buoyant period have evolved into baby boomers.

Gone are the wartime stories on the wireless and rationed bread; instead, we have wireless internet and rye bread by the bucket load.

And it is these people – those who grew up never having had it so good – that Macmillan’s Conservative heirs are falling over themselves to woo.

Nowhere was that more obvious than the latest Budget which chancellor George Osborne aimed at “the makers, the doers and the savers”.

The message was then hammered home by David Cameron as he somehow found himself in Peacehaven, bigging up the benefits of the changes to pensioners and those on the verge of retirement. It may have been because the event was sponsored by Saga.

It may have been because it was held at 10am on Monday morning.

It may have been because it was packed with true blue Tories.

But beyond the blue rinse brigade there was a notable exception: young people.

And yet this is the section of society which is expected to keep the country’s economy going when the baby boomers decide when they want to stop.

Speaking as a young person I’m fed up with being patronised by those who sit at home every day and think they know best.

Those of us who have a working life ahead of us are constantly addressed as “young man” and told that we don’t know we’re born.

“We didn’t have these me-pads when I was younger”, I was once told.

Quite.

But then your fathers didn’t have motor cars or televisions, did they?

As for free bus passes, well, we should be so lucky.

I’m not making excuses for young people; life is far from a breeze.

But surely endeavour and hard work should be rewarded at all levels.

Is it right that a young professional with a steady job cannot afford to get into the housing market until in their mid-30s?

Is it right that a 60-year-old father can earn more with a pension and a part-time job than a youngster in their 20s working 70-hour weeks?

Is it right that some can retire at 60 while those just starting their careers must work into their 70s before they can even afford a pair of slippers, never mind wear them?

Could it be that those who grew up in a world where they had never had it so good are forgetting what it was like to be young?

This week saw hundreds of teachers across Sussex go on strike.

Many of them were in their 50s and 60s claiming it is unfair to work until they are 67. How?

I’ll tell you what is unfair – making those in their 20s work until they are 80 to ensure that the current retirement age is maintained for a few years.

I make a simple plea to baby boomers.

Instead of preaching to anyone that will listen – your partner, the postman, the cat – about how the world is going downhill, why not put down the rose-tinted spectacles for just a little while.

Why not peel pack the lace curtains in your four-bedroom house and look at what is happening in the world.

The age of a job for life has gone, as has the potential to coast into an easy retirement.

Away from the luxury of spare bedrooms for the grandkids and Sky TV, there are |people out there grafting so you can read magazine articles about why your 60s are like the new 20s.

And for you to maintain this leisurely lifestyle, people like me may end up having to work until we’re 80 – which, according to latest life expectancy figures, will give me approximately one year of retirement before the grim reaper comes calling.

Some of you may say that I’m writing this eating sour grapes; to you I’d say you are the ones who simply don’t know you’re born.