So I believe we are now officially and statistically in recession. Robert Peston's blog seems to always find something else downbeat to publish, so I am trying not to think about it. Obviously I am now in a position of relative protection from the effects of the downturn - I don't think a Clergyperson has ever been made redundant, and my annual bonus should remain the same as last year's, although there would be signs that there is scary news around the corner when the Clergy Pension Fund is revalued and more money is needed to bolster the outlay. Obviously the fact that we are paid a pittance helps, but that's another story.
I have been keeping my eyes and ears open around the place as I meet and chat. According to the data from the 2001 Census this area has a much higher than national average self-employed/working from home types and of this category that I know most are in some form of service and support work which, I guess, might the first expenditure that a shrinking company might consider not outsourcing.
However I am suspicious about the degree of bravado when people are talking in public, although I hope I am wrong. Lots seem to have full order books, or a big project that will carry them through the next quarter or two, although nothing like that would help if many more of my local contacts have significant customers going bust before paying. One or two quiet conversations paint a different picture. Employers deeply anxious about their businesses, but primarily expressed in terms of the responsibility they feel for their staff.
I got the sense on our post-Christmas shopping expedition that there was almost a frenzy - people HAD to buy something in the sales as a sign of them tightening their belts without going without, as if that option was anathema. I listened to the radio the other morning and talks of a second "bail out" for the banks and renewed efforts to bolster the car-making industry. It seems that those who have been most profligate are getting support. Perhaps the idea of reaping what you sow doesn't apply to them, only to the rest of us who invested so much of our identities and security into their care.
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