Recently in Economy Category

'Everywhere you look you'll see a guide to defeating the recession'

Even HSBC: The world's local bank (6,000 miles away in a communist country) has had its profits plummet.

It was reported yesterday that along with the car industry, some of the worst affected areas are the television companies and hair dressers. This may be the reason why repeats of Cash in the Attic seem to be dominating the television schedules and why more and more people are walking around with hair like a baby gorilla.

With the recession hitting the television companies it seems the quality of the programming is going to decrease even more.

Future Radio Times entries should look something like this:

8.00pm - The Bill
Tonight's action-packed episode centres on a food fight in a school canteen and a man is arrested for dropping an apple on the floor in broad daylight.

9.00pm - Who Wants To Win £3.87?
Presented by new host Ingrid Tarrant. Contestants answer questions for a chance to win £3.87.

10.00pm - I'm A Celebrity. . . Get Me Out Of Here!
Anneka Rice, Mr. Blobby and the Short One from Casualty compete to be king or queen of the jungle. Live from the urban allotments in Stoke-On Trent. Presented by Ant.

10.30pm - Britain's Best Dish - Celebrity Special
One of the Nolan Sisters microwaves a Pot Noodle. See pick of the day.

11.00pm -Midsomer Murders
DCI Barnaby retires when he realises he's the only one left alive in Midsomer. He discovers that the rest have either been murdered or have moved to Eastern Europe in search of work. Last in the series.

01.00am - CSI: Digbeth
Remake of the American crime drama. The team discover an aluminium can has been placed in a paper-recycling box and pursue the culprit.

It's even been suggested that the recession isn't necessarily affecting the low-income families.

Those who have spent their life ensuring they only eat sweets that come lightly-dusted in a round tin, that have conditioned themselves to refer to a game of croquet as being 'absolutely marvellous', and have experimented with off-white emulsions, are said to be the ones who will suffer due the worthlessness of their savings.

Everywhere you look you'll see a guide to defeating the recession.

Going out and collecting wild berries, making a doormat out of wooden clothes pegs, and knitting a microwave and fan-assisted oven.

Last week, £150billion of extra money was printed.

Quantitative easing, they call it, as if it's something new - forgetting it's what Mugabe has been doing for years.

When the British government are taking financial advice from an authoritarian tyrant, you know there's a problem.

When this financial situation first started, some people said it's just what the country needs - something to unite everyone and make people concentrate on the things that matter.

At best, it's united everyone against people. It's the bankers' faults. It's the MPs' faults. It's America's fault. And if you read the Daily Mail, it's Global Warming's fault.

And a common question has been about the salary of MP's.

An MP gets £63,291 per year, excluding expenses.

But this will actually improve the economy because the money they spend on alcohol, prostitutes, and nude women gyrating to Britney Spears' Womanizer, will mean the money soon filters back into the community.

But for all the blaming, job hunting, and eating leftovers, we'll still end up having to walk 30 miles to collect wood, before walking 30 miles to get back and burn it to power the television so we can watch the final of Dancing on Thin Ice - in which tonight's episode Rick Wallar battles it out with Gillian McKeith for the title of 2009 champion. Repeated tomorrow. And the day after.

'The latest figures suggest that flights abroad are becoming less popular'

Supposedly, this is the week, (half-term week) when many people are going to be booking their summer holidays. That's if they're not already on holiday - having put their last two, credit-crunched pennies towards the extortionate half-term prices.

It may only be a third of the price next week, but the fine from the school for parents taking their children away from detention and learning about John Milton's infused new significance into the concept of history in poetry, will make up for that.

Despite having no money, no job, and no Woolworths, people are still going on holiday.
They may not be going for a fortnight stay in the Maldives, relaxing in a 5-star hotel, or even waking up to the sound of tropical birds in a far-away land, but they're still going on holiday.

There is set to be an increase in people taking the cheaper options this year with the number of holidaymakers deciding to go camping or caravanning set to increase even more than last year.

Some camping parks, this year, are already fully booked and some people are having to join waiting lists for a camping reservation.

When you have to wait a year to go out of your warm house for the opportunity to sleep on the floor next to a tree, you know something is wrong.

Camping is nature's way of promoting the hotel industry.

It always rains on tents. Rainstorms will travel thousands of miles, against prevailing winds, over mountains, and high pressures, for the opportunity to rain on a tent.

For your whole life, you've made numerous successful attempts to open zips on coats, bags and trousers - but, you can bet that when you're soaking wet; trying to open a tent with frostbitten, icy-blue fingers that have been rendered useless, the zip to the tent will never open.

Camping is a holiday where you have to do your business in a hole (or even in a public washroom), go and eat in a restaurant that serves food that tastes and smells like donkey feet - where people look like extras from Dawn of the Dead from lack of sleep - before returning to your tent so you can lie on the floor in the freezing cold, and count how many fingers you have left.

But there have also been an increase in adventurous holiday packages over the last year. There's even a chance for people to learn to fly their own plane to their holiday destinations.

But then these are for people who have enough time and money on their hands that they are willing to learn to fly a plane. And it's not very convenient to have to learn to fly a plane just to have a weekend in Italy.

Learning to fly is not like a driving test when you just show the man in beige trousers you can reverse around a corner.

The latest figures suggest that flights abroad are becoming less popular. Although it does seem that there have been a few too many plane crashes lately.

Earlier this month there were complaints from passengers onboard an Aeroflot flight about to depart from Moscow to New York. They were waiting to take off - the excitement of getting an in-flight meal keeping them on the edge of their seats - when they started to question the mental state of their pilot - who turned out to be drunk.

'Ladies and Gentlemen, this ishhh your captain slurrrrrring. I reeeeally love you. No, I'm not just saying that. I reeeeally, reeeeally love all my passengers - because you're reeeeally, reeeeally lovely.'

It makes you wonder about the priorities of the airlines.

You're not allowed on the plane unless you've arrived 7 days in advance, the staff have ruined your laptop, revealed your underwear to all the other passengers while rummaging through your luggage, had a dozen spaniels sniffing around your shoes, and been shot at for trying to carry a bottle of water on the plane.

And the pilot just walks straight by like John Travolta at the start of Saturday Night Fever with a bottle of tequila in his hand, while you're queuing to be x-rayed in case you've got nail clippers in your pocket that you may use to hijack the plain by clipping everyone to death.

'The biggest hurdle seems to be the cost'

The government released hundreds of millions of pounds of contingency funds last week to keep work on the London Olympic 2012 venues on track amid a worsening credit crunch.

Some people have welcomed the Olympics with open arms and some have said that Britain and London has enough to deal with without the burden of hosting the games in 2012.

But, even though it's already going ahead anyway, some people are still dubious as to whether it was the right decision to make.

And while we think that, if China can organise a fortnight of running and jumping - we can too, no one really likes the idea of Lord Sir Pope Archbishop Earl Duke King His-Royal-Highness Seb Coe as chairman of the Olympic Games Committee.

Some people really like the Olympics; they like the idea of training, dedication and the glory of winning medals - a way of getting people involved in something national, and it supposedly gets young people off the street where they put holes in each other, and into an event where they can burn off a little steam and have a purpose at the same time.

All very good.

While I'm not really a fan of sport (or movement, for that matter) and while running is useful if you're late for the train, or fun if you're aged 7, I may find it difficult to be enthusiastic about the Olympics.

But whether you like it or not, it's there.

And the biggest hurdle seems to be the cost.

With a budget running up to nearly £10billion, it could easily be argued that quite a few baby incubators could have been bought, with enough left over to set up a whale sanctuary, and shove a new hip into every pensioner in the land.

It has been suggested that the National Lottery start to fund even more towards the Games, instead of funding schemes like Age Concern's £40,000, for a project called Meals on Wheels for Gluten-Free Birds.

And another problem is that, for some reason, the notion of sport has somehow become the business of government.

The moment when a sports competition got into the hands of those who built the Millennium Dome, attempt to run the NHS, allow our transport system to look like it's been designed by a toddler with a crayon, set up the ever-so successful Child Support Agency, took 21st Century Britain into war and couldn't balance the books at a primary school tombola, seemed to pass everyone's notice.

The new stadiums and set designs are said to symbolise modern Britain. Even the public, street viewing of the torch handover in East London was cancelled in London because a teenager got stabbed.

So if we jump forward to the summer of 2012, to the opening ceremony of the London Games, what are we likely to find? A perfect, ethnic blend of school children prancing about in the half-finished stadium wearing hard hats and protective goggles just in case they get exposed, in some way, to the Olympic flame.

And there will be no swimming events just in case someone drowns or slips on wet tiles. And no javelin events because you could have someone's eye out with one of those things.

We may have to see who can get a gold in crocheting or cross-stitching - making sure everyone wears metal gloves so they don't prick themselves on the needles.

And don't be surprised if, in four years' time, the Olympic torch is carried into that half-finished stadium in East London by Kerry Katona, following a 50-gun salute from the Wembley Crazee Killaz drive-by shooting posse, and a concert by Boy George.

The best idea would be to have a really cheap Olympic Games that's all crammed into one stadium in one day.

Then we can spend nearly the full £10billion on the most important part of the Games.

The fireworks.

'It seems the only ones who will be benefiting are ITV with increased viewing figures for Jeremy Kyle'

WE'VE HAD Christmas, New Year and the January sales. The time when people push each other over to buy things they don't need with money they haven't got is over, and, a few weeks into January, the year is officially in full swing.

And we're already hearing the 'crisis' stories. No money. Global warming. Recycling. Credit Crunch. Broken Britain. The end of the Earth.

David Cameron said, last month, that we should all think a little less about money and more about our standard of living.

Of course, this is nice for parents who have time to play scrabble with their children, stay at home trimming the hedge, and spend their time scattering grain for the chickens. And for their children who come out of school, across the village green, with rosy cheeks; throwing their grammar school hats in the air and heading off to catch newts in the local stream.

Unfortunately, many people can't do that. There's food to buy, mouths to feed, and Dancing On Ice voting to be done.

Hundreds of jobs are disappearing every week, and with the unemployment level estimated to be reaching 3million this year it seems the only ones who will be benefiting are ITV with increased viewing figures for Jeremy Kyle.

A story last week suggested that some long-distance commuters are giving up their jobs because the fuel prices and taxes meant the jobs aren't worth getting to. And the only reason the government doesn't ban driving altogether is because it needs the income from fuel and motoring taxes to bail out Jaguar, Land Rover and the last few cogs of the British motor trade.

Owned by India.

And the motor industry is failing because no one is buying cars - perhaps because they can't afford the extortionate taxes. A vicious cycle.

But don't worry. Mr Brooooon is going to be creating 100,000 more jobs this year. Only 2,900,000 left to create.

But it's not his fault there are no jobs; that's America's fault as well.

And as people can't sell their houses, Eastern European's will build you an extension. They charge good money, turn up on time, work hard, don't shout remarks and whistle at women, and don't urinate in your sink. You couldn't ask for any more.

And like a lot of telephone switchboard-manning jobs, many train operators have moved their telephone enquiries abroad.

Third World wages for Britain's Third World transport system.

By doing that, they're hoping to save up to £12 million - currently the going-rate for an open return ticket from Birmingham to London.

And, unlike in Britain, when you call the rail enquiries hotline abroad, you won't get an answer phone recording with the message: "We're sorry to inform you that all trains are currently buggered. We apologise for any inconvenience caused."

So, with jobs disappearing faster than something really fast, everyone will have to get retained in something politically correct and preferably offered by the council or HM Revenue and Customs.

Perhaps a job in which the government will be on your side, give you a six figure salary, and 300 days a year holiday. Many people will have to train as a global warming press officer, ladder-climbing trainer, or a bereavement counsellor for the One-Legged Lesbian Alliance

'You'll probably start receiving your pension when you reach the age of 114'

ONCE upon a time, at the age of 65; you retired with a gold watch, a carriage clock, or a signature plate to remind you of all those years you paid into the state's pocket. You spent your pension on cruises or potting plants or model ships and when you weren't doing that you went looking around Marks and Spencer's for 'sensible shoes'.

Then, sometime later, you ascended on your Stannah stair lift to Heaven; your money going to your family - if they came to visit you - or the local sanctuary for cats with one eye and three legs if they didn't.

But now, things are different. Firstly, you'd be lucky if you can live on a state pension. You've reached the age of 65 and you were hoping to sit down with a cup of Ovaltine and catch up with This Morning, which you've missed for the last 20 years.

You may have been deciding to collect a few tea towels and book a few holidays to places you've always dreamed of going.

But, by the time you realise how much money you're going to get (just 17% of your average lifetime earnings) you find you have to go back to work or sit at home with cold toes because you can't afford to turn the central heating on and you play with a lose thread on your jumper because you can't afford the electricity bill to watch This Morning anyway.

Britain has the worst pension system in Europe. Across the EU, the average pension is a return of 57% of your lifetime's savings. In Britain, just 17% of your average life's savings is what you can expect to get back. Frieda and John Pierre across Europe are on the high seas with their yacht, gold medallions and £1million healthcare insurance while Ethel and Walter in the UK make-do with their £10 Christmas bonus and are praying the NHS can keep their limbs attached.

And it will probably get worse.

The chances are, with pensioners living forever and the retired population continuing to rise, further changes are probably going to be made.

In the future, after spending your whole life paying taxes to ensure our politicians can enjoy the view of a post-Woolworths apocalyptic landscape from the comfort of their £40,000 cars, you'll probably start receiving your pension when you reach the age of 114. And you'll only get it if you were born on the 3rd Wednesday of a month. In the summer. Of a leap year. Under a full moon.

But, being old and retired is not all that bad. Many pensioners out there are not going to let a rubbish pension ruin their retirement.

It's not all about death and boredom.

When you reach the age when you can live without sex but not without your glasses and people call you at 8pm and say "Did I wake you?", there are those who will like to spend their money on wholesale teabags and copious amounts of menthol products.

But there are just as many who give two fingers to the pension system and the state, and spend their hours surfing the internet, kickboxing and break dancing.

And there are still many positives to being old.

Your joints are more accurate at gauging the weather than the Met Office, all your secrets are safe with your friends because they can't remember them, it's now socially acceptable to sing along to music in shopping centres, you think comparing operation scars is entertainment, you can go to eat dinner at 3pm without people thinking you're strange, you can start to wear those clothes you think have come back in, but never actually were, in fashion, you can have a party without the neighbours even realising, and you'll always be the first released from a hostage situation.