'Close this site for the recession?' blog discussion

asimports

I think that 'Martin' should stick to what he knows and offer advice on which mortgage or credit card offers what deal. But telling people what to buy or not to buy is massivly irresponsible. ALL companies do have to make money, thats how they pay their staff who in turn spend their money somewhere else thus keeping those people in jobs and money. To tell people to stop buying Christmas presents or delay until the new year will without a doubt cost jobs and millions of them. he should be talking the economy up not down. After all the vast majority of people will keep their jobs at the end of this. Hands up all the people who have less money this month than last month, no-one, except the Wollworths and MFI employees and the other retailers that have gone to the wall that have been talked onto the dole queue by 'Martin', "dont spend now wait for the sales" Dont forget Martin there a whole industry of retail, manufacturing, transport, banking and many more that are directly affected by your insane comments. Please please stay out of the stuff you dont know about and for every time you say IUO get a present in January 10,000 people will loose their jobs.

Sleep well

Paul Johnson

MSE_Martin

asimports wrote: »

I think that 'Martin' should stick to what he knows and offer advice on which mortgage or credit card offers what deal. But telling people what to buy or not to buy is massivly irresponsible. ALL companies do have to make money, thats how they pay their staff who in turn spend their money somewhere else thus keeping those people in jobs and money. To tell people to stop buying Christmas presents or delay until the new year will without a doubt cost jobs and millions of them. he should be talking the economy up not down. After all the vast majority of people will keep their jobs at the end of this. Hands up all the people who have less money this month than last month, no-one, except the Wollworths and MFI employees and the other retailers that have gone to the wall that have been talked onto the dole queue by 'Martin', "dont spend now wait for the sales" Dont forget Martin there a whole industry of retail, manufacturing, transport, banking and many more that are directly affected by your insane comments. Please please stay out of the stuff you dont know about and for every time you say IUO get a present in January 10,000 people will loose their jobs.

Sleep well

Paul Johnson

Thank you for that Paul. I sleep very well at night. And by the entire nature of the debate you've entered, and the fact you're worried about the impact I have, to say I understand the dilemma is rather bizarre.

Yet if you're worried about jobs and retail economy I suggest you speak to

The CBI
The British Chamber of Commerce
The Federation of Small Business
The huge number of local business associatoins
The British Bankers Associations
Your Local Business Angels.

As for me. My job is to try and help consumers with their cash. Of course its important to nod to the bigger economic picture as it helps us all - yet I am an agenda'd campainging consumer journalist that's my roll. This is an adversarial society - there is huge power on the business side and I'll leave them to protect business

As for your "delaying christmas technique" - its been a standard in my christmas technique for nine years I've been doing this. Jobs cuts haven't been caused for eight prior years; if they happen this year, I think laying them at my door is just a touch overblown.

Merry Christmas.

JimmyTheWig

asimports wrote: »

he should be talking the economy up not down.

No, he should be telling it how it is. And I believe, by and large, that this is what Martin and this site does.

You see the problem is that we, as individuals, need to do what is right for us and our families. I know that sounds selfish, but we don't have much choice.
Whether in recession or whether in a boom companies will do their best to do what's right for them. So I don't see why, when recession comes, that we should let them have it all their way.
If, when times were good, companies shared out their profits between their employees (as bonuses, etc) and their customers (as price cuts, etc) then I could see yuor point that now would be our turn to do our bit. But they don't, so I don't see why we should be expected to.

I do think there is a need for increased spending during this recession. But I believe that this should come from government and other public bodies (schools, etc) rather than from individuals. As individuals we have too much to lose. The government can smooth things out over a longer period than we can afford to.

I don't believe for one minute that Martin Lewis caused the downfall of Woolworths or MFI. But what I do hope is that employees of these places have been onto this site. I would expect the ones that have are now in a better position to cope with the coming months than if they hadn't. Without Martin's advice, these people would be in a worse situation than they currently are in.