Past Recessions - what were your experiences?

Snooze

bo_drinker wrote: »

They say 3 of the first things to be turned off will be Internet...

:huh:

How exactly does one "turn off" the internet? Is there a central on/off switch somewhere then? :rotfl:

For the internet to be "turned off" as such, they'd have to take away everyone's modem and/or cut off everyone's phone line - something that would simply never happen. :rolleyes:

And by the way, who is "they" ?????? Source?

Rob

drbeat

dopester wrote: »

The trouble is.. that is what your Labour party loves.. wealth redistribution to their main clients. Rome first introduced the dole... with free food for the mob. They learnt to their cost that the mob got rougher and courser and more aggressive - ever more difficult to control - in their demands each time they were given an increase in their "allowance".

I can't imagine our client state "mob" taking kindly to a cut of their benefits and transfer payments.

Dopester, I thought you'd realise by now that I am not a Labour supporter. In fact I do not like any political party and if they were a section on the ballot paper that said "none of the above" I would gladly put my X on it!

My comments on monetary economics were probably a bit vague. I accept your explanation on the past i.e. the arab world and the romans. But what is different today is that our form of currency is linked to nothing! And just about everything depends on trade. I have read that the decline of the Roman Empire can be explained by their decision to move away from an economy based on conquest, plunder and exploitation to one that was based on maintaining the frontiers and engaging in trade.

drbeat

Snooze wrote: »

:huh:

How exactly does one "turn off" the internet? Is there a central on/off switch somewhere then? :rotfl:

For the internet to be "turned off" as such, they'd have to take away everyone's modem and/or cut off everyone's phone line - something that would simply never happen. :rolleyes:

And by the way, who is "they" ?????? Source?

Rob

All that will happen is that some !!!!head captain of a huge ship will "forget" that his anchor is still down. He'll then proceed to drag it along the sea/ocean bed and slice through every fibre-optic cable he comes across. That is what happened in the Med a few weeks back! The Middle East nearly got switched off! Luckily out of 4 cables 1 managed to escape being sliced!

Paulgonnabedebtfree

lovethymini wrote: »

As we seem to be entering into another recession, what's your stories from past periods of recession in the uk?

In particular, how did you feel about it at the time, and how you feel about now in hindsight, as this may be helpful for us today.

I feel this is going to be a bad one, and feel concerned for the future, as I expect many of us do.

I was a teenager during the last recession, so I don't have much to judge the current situation against, although I do remember one year Dad telling us that the Christmas turkey was actually a pigeon as it was so small.

I was made redundant three times in two years in the last recession (late 80s early 90s). The first redundancy was from a job I held for 13 years. Aftyer that it was easier to be redunded because I was one of the last in. I got fed up with it in the end (had two brief spells on UB (now known as JSA)). I was left with an old banger and a couple of hundred quid. so I borrowed a ladder from a plumber, bought a few bit from a janitorial shop and went and knocked on doors to clean people's windows until I could find a job. Seventeen years later, I am still self-employed and cleaning windows. I would hate to work for anyone else these days. It was painful at first but the last recession was a great liberator for me.

oldMcDonald

Squish_21 wrote: »

I've never experienced a recession before.

Just wanted to say my Gramp still drinks Camp coffee!!!!

OK, only got halfway through this thread so far but I now have to chime in....

...why are you all so against Camp coffee? I love the stuff and have a huge bottle sitting on the worktop right now. Made with milk it is the most wonderful comfort drink.

I remember a little of the 70s recession, I was 3 or 4 and I remember my nan looking up in the paper to see when our electricity would be cut off and then wrapping me up in a blanket whilst she lit candles and oil lamps.

I remember the 80s a lot better. We had very little money and would often run out of 50pences for the electricity meter towards the end of the week. I knew few people who were working and it seemed very depressing and bleak. People who I knew left school and just signed on - there were no jobs locally. I left school in 1985 and went onto a YTS scheme - hated it, but it was either that or sign on.

In the 90s I was a manager of a shop and lost my job when they went into recievership. I was lucky as I was still living at home but I saw lots of friends who were a few years older lose their homes and their families fell apart with all the stress. A really sad time.

I'm scared about the coming recession. I'm scared it will be a depression, I'm scared there will be no jobs, no money, no food.....I'm scared for my children. I'm scared it will end in a war.

Maybe I spend too much time lurking on HPC!

I am worried about what is coming, and I am getting our finances very much in order now.

fc123

John_Pierpoint wrote: »

In the past, the little recessions were the "fault" of the UK living in cloud cuckoo land relative to the rest of the world. If there is one country in the world that needs to realise it lives by its wits, it is the UK.
We cannot feed our 60 million population. Our natural resources are mainly mined out
(coal, gas and oil are all long past their peak). Our "workshop of the world" manufacturing industry is a shadow of its former self. Other countries are turning out well educated motivated graduates. There was one activity where our workers were world leading was finance, but this is looking bombed out by bad debt now.

We are in uncharted waters. 1973 gives some pointers as this was caused by a world wide oil shock, itself caused by USA's deficit financing of the Vietnam war.

1928 became world wide too, because the USA did exactly the wrong thing in response to the Wall Street crash (compare the global response to 1987: pump money like now and have a recession 3 years later when inflation gets out of hand).

As individuals all we can do is pay off debt and adjust our life styles to austerity living: Make do and mend, Self build & DIY, "Holiday" at home, reconsider life time choices (big home ? family ?) Get back to the traditional family, which acted as an economic unit (eg grand parents used to realise that their role was to look after the children so that their sons and daughters could work).

In the last 60 years the State has become everyones grandparent figure. So we have a nation of people who think they can stay in adolescence or be kept in their old age by the state. Politicians encourage this by buying votes using state money.
However the state has no money of its own, just what it can tax or print.

John.

BTW what are GHD's

Mind you, teen daughter feels her life is empty as she doesn't own a pair of GHD's

OMG john...I love this post...except I have had a little (very little) drop of wine (Lidl Cotes du Rhone @ £3.10 yum) and I can't type or think right now.

I will come back later after home made Indian (beats a takeout hands down) and a strong Nescafe espresso coffee (direct from the devil himself) to respond.

amcluesent

>I'm scared it will be a depression, I'm scared there will be no jobs, no money, no food.....I'm scared for my children. I'm scared it will end in a war.<

I'm also expecting a global pandemic of Flu or the like. The Four Horseman of the Apocalypse will ride!

oldMcDonald

amcluesent wrote: »

>I'm scared it will be a depression, I'm scared there will be no jobs, no money, no food.....I'm scared for my children. I'm scared it will end in a war.<

I'm also expecting a global pandemic of Flu. The Four Horseman of the Apocalypse will ride!

:rotfl:

As I said, I have spent far too much time lurking over at HPC.

I can easily be convinced that the world is about to end when I read over there. You lot are a little more sane.

Kenny4315

I left university, in 1992, in the depth of the last downturn. It was hellish getting a proper position, it took ages over 1 year. Went to one second interview once when it was down to the last 12 for 3 graduate positions, they said that they had had several thousand applicants at the start.

fc123

amcluesent wrote: »

>I'm scared it will be a depression, I'm scared there will be no jobs, no money, no food.....I'm scared for my children. I'm scared it will end in a war.<

I'm also expecting a global pandemic of Flu or the like. The Four Horseman of the Apocalypse will ride!

You know what Amc? You are on my list of New Years resolutions. I am going to award myself a prize if I can dig you out of the doom feeling by Dec 2009.

A sample post by Amc in Nov 2009 will read so positively by then, he will be in shock himself.