How long do you think the current UK economic and employment downturn will last for?

[muser]

Hello,

I am interested to read what your views are.

Cheers.

[Green Mango]

Hello,

I am interested to read what your views are.

Cheers.

Japan got into a similar debt bubble economy of public spending, private debt spending and property bubble mixed in with
some dodgy bank dealings and has not yet come out of it, that was back in the 90's.

Thus I'm thinking to get out of new Labours debt mess could take us another 10 -20 years,

[AtW]

Japan did not use "creative" solution of printing massive amounts of cash to deal with debt problem.

The end result will be much worse - instead of big property drop and bankruptcy for those who overextended themselves with debt, everyone will pay the price in form of greatly reduced living standards due to inevitable inflation.

Refueled yesterday at £1.30 per liter (BP ultimate diesel)

[Green Mango]

Japan did not use "creative" solution of printing massive amounts of cash to deal with debt problem.

The end result will be much worse - instead of big property drop and bankruptcy for those who overextended themselves with debt, everyone will pay the price in form of greatly reduced living standards due to inevitable inflation.

Refueled yesterday at £1.30 per liter (BP ultimate diesel)

I thought Japan pioneered QE...and much good it has done them ...

[moder8or]

recession end not until

Hello,

I am interested to read what your views are.

Cheers.

The downturn will end when the country is viable. In other words when we export more than we import and have a surplus GDP
We need a return to the manufacturing of goods
This has to be at a cost which sustains the workforce and maintains their health, this would mean an embargo on cheap manufacturing in China, India, and the far east
Simply we need to be making stuff along with the IT to control it
I have been in the Engineering industry since 1969, throughout I have endured STOP GO BOOM and bust economic policies, Turn arounds, redundancy, IR35, Bullying, Ageism, despite this, I have persevered and diversified under pressures of succesive establishment and government policies to earn, after all the effort I am finding difficulty in continuing to find suitable assignments to maintain my standard of living into the time when I will cease to be able.
It's all gone abroad
Is Twitter and Face book really the way to do business?
I am not a disgruntled person I am a forward thinking innovator, but frustrated with the work ethos of society, government, and the establishment
I do not want staff perks or the golden handcuff, I am an independent contractor, and expect a rate which respects this......things will have to change or we'll become third world..rant rant thats it!!

[MrMark]

Are we in a downturn?

Silly question it may seem, but if exports have risen this year (and exports are the key to generating real wealth) then can we really say we're in a downturn?

I'm given to believe that both Spain and Germany have seen good percentage increases in exports this year, and they're both in the Eurozone. Is this the same with the UK who allegedly have the benefit of not being tied to the Euro (I really don't know the answer to this one - Google gives conflicting sites)?

Export or die.

[AtW]

I thought Japan pioneered QE...and much good it has done them ...

No, Mr Printing Press (AKA Bernanke) studied Japanese experience in detail only to come to conclusion that they were wrong to use tight monetary policy (ie not print money to get out of debt).

"Recognizing that this bubble was unsustainable, the Finance Ministry sharply raised interest rates in late 1989. This abruptly terminated the bubble, leading to a massive crash in the stock market. It also led to a debt crisis; a large proportion of the debts that had been run up turned bad, which in turn led to a crisis in the banking sector, with many banks being bailed out by the government."

Source: Lost Decade (Japan) - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

[Green Mango]

Are we in a downturn?

Silly question it may seem, but if exports have risen this year (and exports are the key to generating real wealth) then can we really say we're in a downturn?

I'm given to believe that both Spain and Germany have seen good percentage increases in exports this year, and they're both in the Eurozone. Is this the same with the UK who allegedly have the benefit of not being tied to the Euro (I really don't know the answer to this one - Google gives conflicting sites)?

Export or die.

Well the manufacturing and engineering did very badly under Labour when there was a heavy jobs loss in these sectors.
Jobs being created under labour in the finance and public sectors.

However, I believe jobs are steadily coming back to manufacturing and engineering and we are seeing exports rising although not as quickly as some would like.

[Green Mango]

No, Mr Printing Press (AKA Bernanke) studied Japanese experience in detail only to come to conclusion that they were wrong to use tight monetary policy (ie not print money to get out of debt).

"Recognizing that this bubble was unsustainable, the Finance Ministry sharply raised interest rates in late 1989. This abruptly terminated the bubble, leading to a massive crash in the stock market. It also led to a debt crisis; a large proportion of the debts that had been run up turned bad, which in turn led to a crisis in the banking sector, with many banks being bailed out by the government."

Source: Lost Decade (Japan) - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

According to Wikipedia :-

Quantitative easing (QE) is a monetary policy used by some central banks to increase the supply of money by increasing the excess reserves of the banking system, generally through buying of the central government's own bonds to stabilize or raise their prices and thereby lower long-term interest rates. This policy is usually invoked when the normal methods to control the money supply have failed, i.e the bank interest rate, discount rate and/or interbank interest rate are either at, or close to, zero.

The central bank then purchases financial assets, including government bonds, agency debt, mortgage-backed securities and corporate bonds, from banks and other financial institutions in a process referred to as open market operations. The purchases, by way of account deposits, give banks the excess reserves required for them to create new money, and thus hopefully induce a stimulation of the economy, by the process of deposit multiplication from increased lending in the fractional reserve banking system.

Risks include the policy being more effective than intended or the risk of not being effective enough, if banks opt simply to sit on the additional cash in order to increase their capital reserves in a climate of increasing defaults in their present loan portfolio.[1]

"Quantitative" refers to the fact that a specific quantity of money is being created; "easing" refers to reducing the pressure on banks.[2] However, another explanation is that the name comes from the Japanese-language expression for "stimulatory monetary policy", which uses the term "easing".[3] Quantitative easing is sometimes colloquially described as "printing money" although in reality the money is simply shifted to member bank dollar deposits from financial instruments.[4] Examples of economies where this policy has been used include Japan during the early 2000s, and the United States, the United Kingdom and the Eurozone during the global financial crisis of 2007–the present, since the programme is suitable for economies where the bank interest rate, discount rate and/or interbank interest rate are either at, or close to, zero."

So it started in Japan in the early 2000s and appears to have done them no good....

[AtW]

So it started in Japan in the early 2000s and appears to have done them no good....

Japan's massive crash also known as "lost decade" was earlier - look at dates.

In early 2000 they indeed tried moderate (compared to the Feds/BoE/EB) money printing but that did not have much effect, which is good as it did not make things massively worse.

The real issue for Japan (IMHO) is that they outsource their technology to next door neighbours thus undermining themselves - less work available in aging population that needs support.