Discussion»Statements»Rosie's Corner» Many businesses are closed for good. With that so are many jobs lost forever. What kind of economy will there be in your country futurely?
We are open here. Our economy is bouncing back. I just had my biggest sales in Aug ever. I have not made up what we lost in the spring yet. But I am hoping.
Well you are not on fire m2c. So that helps. Thank you for your reply and Happy Wednesday to thee and thine. STAY SAFE. Though I don't know what state you live in because you are very tight lipped about that I bet you are a RED STATE and so the dipsh** doesn' target you for insults attacks. Which also helps.
I have said my state. I live in Missouri. (I do not give my town etc) No we are not on fire. And yes we have become a red state. Since 2000 we have gone red. What helps here is we are open. People are free to take care of themselves. We wear our masks etc. Our Governor never shutdown our businesses. Local Mayors did in some areas.
Looks like CA is starting to open some as well. You stay safe as well.
This post was edited by my2cents at September 16, 2020 5:56 AM MDT
Worst-hit in the UK are the catering and hospitality, performing-arts and high-street retail trades. Airlines and airports, and the travel industry generally, are suffering badly, too.
Other sectors appear to be doing well though, where they can adapt to work despite the pandemic.
Among those seem to be the building trade and small specialist companies like the on-line/ mail-order suppliers to craft hobbies. The Internet/mail-order trade has had a big boost by the pandemic.
A friend who is a self-employed plumber and heating-installer says has a full order-book. A company I rang today to ask about estimates for roof repairs told me they are too busy to take on new work at the moment.
I think most manufacturers are all working more or less normally, too.
A lot of the city-based financial and other office-only companies seem to have become used to home-working, but this has the unfortunate consequence of many small shops, restaurants, bars and taxi firms around the office-blocks losing much of their custom.
' This is now, of course. What the future, even just the next six months, will bring is very much open to question.
Thank you for a very thoughtful informative and comprehensive view of what you think it will be like AS OF NOW. Because you are absolutely right. We don't know what the next cataclysmic event will be to hit and how it will affect impact influence or destroy. Which means your guess is as good as mine...no it's a better guess because it's very well thought out in detail which I appreciate. Frankly Durdle I have no idea what's coming next. We have a loose cannon in charge which doesn't DIRECTLY affect your country but probably will have some influence (all bad) at a tertiary level. I mean we used to be best buddies..the U.K. and the USA but now I have no idea since the loose cannon cut all ties to allies and has cozied up with the monsters. Each new revelation is worse than the last so I don't have a lot of hope but ya never know! Anything is possible right? Happy Wednesday to thee and thine. STAY SAFE! :)
The USA and UK are still allies although recent actions by the UK around Huawei and the European Union have not helped matters.
You are right that the America's own politics do not directly affect Britain, though you would not think so as the BBC is so besotted with the USA that we hear almost more about America and Americans on the radio than of everyone else put together. Do your news services cover UK elections in fine detail? I can't really imagine your national broadcasters asking someone leading an ordinary life in some rural English village or industrial city, which party they will support in a forthcoming election, as if that is vital to analysing the other nation's home politics. I doubt too, they would prefer a British art-critic or academic to a home-grown American expert, for explaining your own country's work in those areas.
What does matter to Britain and other nations, are the international politics, as was highlighted the other day by France, Germany and Britain annoying the US Government by standing by the nuclear-control treaty with Iran.
Social matters have more effect here, with things like the "Black Lives Matters" campaign finding echoes in the UK and elsewhere, mercifully without anything like the violence and destruction some of your cities have suffered. The big Colston Hall concert-venue in Bristol has just been re-named the "Bristol Beacon" because Colston, the philanthropist who endowed it and much more in the city, made at least some of his money from the slave-trade.
The extreme-Right is growing in the USA, and I learnt recently some of them regard Timothy MacVeigh (the Oklahoma bomber) as a heroic "patriot" - and he had been turned radical by others already holding extreme views. However the USA is not alone there. Extremist ideas, individuals and groups are increasing in many European countries; mainly based on isolationist nationalism and racism but specific to their own countries.
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The pandemic's effect on the British economy are not easy to predict because some businesses are able to adapt and continue, some are thriving. Others have been hit very badly, the tighter restrictions now announced in the face of the epidemic rising again won't help them. Many people face a very bleak future as the wage-supporting "furlough" scheme will end next month, but they might not have any work to which to return.
The Government has warned these new controls may have to stay for the next six months, with reviewing. No-one can say what might happen after that. This will have repercussions far beyond, not only on businesses like "hospitality", travel and the arts and entertainments, but also on the huge number and variety of social, cultural and sports events here, that need planning well ahead. Almost all of those, even the ones that are purely voluntary, support various trades such as suppliers, caterers and insurers.
The British company J.D. Weatherspoon owns a chain of pubs/restaurants all over the country. The easing of the lock-down a few months ago allowed them, like all the other catering businesses, to re-open with appropriate controls; but it has just announced very poor performance due to far fewer customers; and is having to lay off a large number of staff. Like those other establishments in town-centres it probably rents many of its premises, in many cases from remote landlords in London or overseas; so a hazardous time for both sets of businesses. The remote property owners might survive. They are interested only in the buildings and the land, not the occupying business and its local customers and value to the town.
The BBC Radio services have been doing what they can to support musicians, comedians and other entertainers, and the presenters and panellists of various programmes like Gardeners' Question Time. It does so by organising home recordings, on-line conference-style presentations, and live concerts in large halls but with the players spaced widely apart, and no audiences. Most recently it managed to gain live audiences to radio shows by audio versions of Zoom meetings - each listener in his or her own home. Last week, the European Broadcasting Union (an international, live-event, broadcast-sharing scheme, nothing to do with the European Union) ran a "virtual festival" of music performed in empty halls and artistes' home.
Despite such help the future is bleak for many performances in all disciplines; and for the venues normally hosting them. Not only of national, professional level but also at local semi-pro and amateur level, as bands can no longer perform in pubs, amateur dramatics cannot present anything, exhibitions are either heavily restricted or out of the question, and so on. Even the loss of the amateur performances and events have commercial implications because the smaller, local venues depend on them as much as on the professional shows.
Theatres traditionally leave a small lamp, I think called the "ghost light" or something like that, on the stage even when the building is closed. There will be a lot of ghost-lights glowing all alone in dark halls for a long time yet.
One striking illustration of the loss of the cruising-holiday trade is the flotilla of cruise liners moored idle in Weymouth Bay (Southern England). The owners do not need to pay to anchor there, and the Bay is sheltered from the prevailing Westerly winds and worst of the waves, by the five-mile long peninsular of Chesil Beach and Portland.
There are generally about 7 of these big ships there, at one point there were 10, and during the Summer local charter-boat operators ran sight-seeing cruises giving tourists a closer view of them. They are not completely empty as the ship-handling officers and crew have to remain on board; watch-keeping, keeping the ships clean and maintained, and ready to take the ship elsewhere when necessary. I have heard there are perhaps 100 people on the larger ships but do not know if that is correct. Still, the cruise companies have to pay massive costs: capital repayment, insurance and depreciation, consumables including the fuel for the generators although the electrical demands are far below normal, the crew's food and wages ... and there is no prospect of cruising holidays resuming any time soon.
I saw one sailing away Westwards, down the English Channel towards the Atlantic, one evening a few weeks ago. She was glowing gold, thanks to the setting sun catching the white paint and acres of glass, and seemed to be moving at reduced speed (conserving fuel). I have never wanted to go on such a cruise, and I think the bigger modern cruise-liners are ostentatious and rather ugly; but that was rather a sad sight, in a strange way.
Perhaps that liner sailing away at half speed into the sunset, summed up the pandemic.
my2cents 