Are you feeling the recession (yet)?

[Leo]

yup. i'm self-employed, actually gained an additional client last year and did better than ever before, but this year's monthly take is down about 40% compared to 2009. luckily, the misses is working again (took 18 months off to work on her phd, which is still in progress), so it's balancing out.

 

[nomos]

I can't really believe I haven't asked this yet, but: what are you pursuing a PhD in?

It's an interdisc arts program and my work straddles music and sound studies

 

[Sick Boy]

It's an interdisc arts program and my work straddles music and sound studies

How very appropriate.
I hope that you let us all know when the work is done.

 

[Mr. Tea]

I think if I had to choose one image as a symbol of the recession in this country, it'd be a boarded-up pub. A handful have shut over the last year or two within a short walk of my house. If the govt are going to bring in this measure to stop sales of super-cheap off-licence booze, it's only fair there should be some kind of tax break for on-licence sales.

Apart from that, it's the usual tale of mates who are out of work, or stuck in jobs they're woefully overqualified for - and the better-part-of-a-year in which I was un(der)employed before I got a full-time job last year.

 

[cobretti]

If the govt are going to bring in this measure to stop sales of super-cheap off-licence booze, it's only fair there should be some kind of tax break for on-licence sales.

The last thing they're going to do is give pubs any reason to make booze cheaper, as (IMO) the picture they paint of the binge drinking culture/problem is that of people spilling out of pubs at closing time and causing mayhem on the streets, something quite apart from the ASBO crew drinking down a lane or whatever (which really should be solvable with smart community policing). It'd be nice to think that tax breaks would mean pubs keeping the same prices but taking home more money, but it'd inevitably lead to further price cuts being such a competitive business.

-------

As the manager of a small business (one of two shops when I took on the job three years ago aged 19, we're now two and a half shops, if that makes any sense), the recession has made life very difficult. Two shop moves in a year due to both the recession and changes in shopping habits in Glasgow, being paid late for many months, having problems with suppliers due to cash flow problems (particularly Nike and Adidas, who despite their marketing are only in the skateboard footwear business for the money, surprise surprise), it's been very very hard as we're right at the bottom of the trickle down effect the credit crunch and subsequent recession has had on people's income. The fact of the matter is that the recession has affected pretty much everyone, and even if people are still on the same salary/wage, taking home the same pay packet at the end of the month, the constant fearmongering in the media has made people a lot more careful with their money. Unfortunately that affects shops such as ourselves more than anyone on the high street, because we can't offset one store's losses with the profits of 10 others. If both shops have a shit month, it gets very stressful very quickly.

That said, we are through the worst of it and I'm glad to have been a part of pulling us through. I've worked hard over the last 3 years to bring the Glasgow shop from a real shit position to being the main earner for the company, and it has been a valuable learning experience that'll prove useful in whatever I go on to do after I'm finished with this job. Hopefully with the launch of a new website later this year, that'll help to keep money coming in even when the shops are having a shit time of it, and make life a bit easier for everyone in the company.

 

[Mr. Tea]

The last thing they're going to do is give pubs any reason to make booze cheaper, as (IMO) the picture they paint of the binge drinking culture/problem is that of people spilling out of pubs at closing time and causing mayhem on the streets, something quite apart from the ASBO crew drinking down a lane or whatever (which really should be solvable with smart community policing). It'd be nice to think that tax breaks would mean pubs keeping the same prices but taking home more money, but it'd inevitably lead to further price cuts being such a competitive business.

I hear you - when I said it would be "only fair", I didn't mean I thought it was particularly likely. What I'd be perfectly happy with is an end to stupid drinks promotions and Happy Hour bollocks - which I think is the main driver behind crowds of rowdy pissheads flooding the streets at 11.30 every weekend, and all the aggro and puke that goes with it - and a modest but across-the-board drop in the price of a pint or glass of wine. I think this would help save proper pubs from closing down while reducing the most severe binge drinking.

Good to hear your business is riding out the recession! Best of luck and all that, I've got massive respect for anyone who can take on something like that and make a go of it, I'm sure I wouldn't have a clue.

 

[Sectionfive]

Wait a minute ! Ye actually have pubs that lower prices ?

 

[Mr. Tea]

Wait a minute ! Ye actually have pubs that lower prices ?

I'm saying such a thing could happen, if there were a drop in the tax on on-licence sales. Note the 'could' and 'if'.

But you're in Ireland, and I've heard stories about pub prices there that have chilled me to the marrow.

 

[Sick Boy]

Have drink prices changed in England then? Last I was there it was pretty much a standard 3 quid a pint, if I remember correctly. At what I was getting paid during that time (9 pound an hour) versus comparable wages in Toronto that actually worked out to being cheaper. Pints here are about $7 plus tip.

 

[Mr. Tea]

Well naturally it varies according to location and type of bar, but yeah, £3 is pretty much standard not just in London but across the entire South. Significantly cheaper in the rest of the country. It creeps up a few pence with every budget because of course it's acceptable to tax alcohol massively on the back of 'binge-drinking Britain' rhetoric (not that a lot of people in this country don't drink far too much far too often).

My main beef with the ever-increasing level of booze duty is that it's a blunt instrument. When people are causing fights and killing their livers en masse, chances are they aren't doing it with regular-price pints and glasses of wine because these are already prohibitively expensive for many people to actually get proper drunk on; it's people necking a few cans of cheap supermarket beer and then hitting the bars that have cheap shots, pitchers and bottles on promotion. Meanwhile ordinary locals are shutting down because they can't compete on price. If limitations on cheap drink promotions were brought in, along with a small reduction in the overall duty, you'd see less hardcore problem drinking while helping pubs stay in business. (I reckon.)

 

[Sick Boy]

My main beef with the ever-increasing level of booze duty is that it's a blunt instrument. When people are causing fights and killing their livers en masse, chances are they aren't doing it with regular-price pints and glasses of wine because these are already prohibitively expensive for many people to actually get proper drunk on; it's people necking a few cans of cheap supermarket beer and then hitting the bars that have cheap shots, pitchers and bottles on promotion. Meanwhile ordinary locals are shutting down because they can't compete on price. If limitations on cheap drink promotions were brought in, along with a small reduction in the overall duty, you'd see less hardcore problem drinking while helping pubs stay in business. (I reckon.)

Completely agree with this. This definitely happens in North America too: the legal sale of alcohol is such a political quandry that all policies surrounding it seem to be informed by a paradoxical notion that selling booze equals good, but drinking it equals bad. Which is why all the laws and by-laws surrounding last calls, bartender etiquette, legal volumes, open containers, and on- and off-licence categorizations seem like such an arbitrary and incongruous mess.

That and "BINGE DRINKING BRITAIN" makes a much better headline.

 

[Sick Boy]

Take this for example. The Ontario Liquor Board just recently decided to stop selling Dan Akroyd's vodka in their liquor stores, caving into public pressure that it should be removed because its skull-shaped bottle was encouraging teenage binge-drinking and glamourizing alcoholism.

This, of course, not taking into consideration that teenagers aren't actually legally supposed to be buying anything from liquor stores in the first place, and that if liquor stores really wanted to prevent binge-drinking they would ban 3L bottles of Smirnoff* instead of an $80 bottle of top shelf vodka with a "cool" bottle design.

*These 3L bottles are referred to in Canada as "Texas Mickeys", a riff on the 375ml "mickeys" which contain an amount of alcohol reasonable for an evening's personal use. So the term itself is a tongue-in-cheek joke about binge-drinking. Poor Dan Akroyd.

 

[Slothrop]

Take this for example. The Ontario Liquor Board just recently decided to stop selling Dan Akroyd's vodka in their liquor stores, caving into public pressure that it should be removed because its skull-shaped bottle was encouraging teenage binge-drinking and glamourizing alcoholism.

This, of course, not taking into consideration that teenagers aren't actually legally supposed to be buying anything from liquor stores in the first place, and that if liquor stores really wanted to prevent binge-drinking they would ban 3L bottles of Smirnoff* instead of an $80 bottle of top shelf vodka with a "cool" bottle design.

Yeah, look up Brewdog's ongoing skirmishes with the Portman Group for almost exactly the same story.

 

[mistersloane]

(I'm sure there was a thread that discussed this but can't find it)

I heard from a bloke down my local that the reason the pubs are shutting is that breweries are putting up prices to sell beer to landlords prohibitely prohibitivly urgh making it expensive and forcing the landlords out, in order to sell the property off to developers. This guy was a landlord himself, he was also really pissed and on alot of coke but I thought it was interesting.

I'd like to think that stopping happy hours etc would stop people getting hideously drunk, but in my heart of hearts I don't think it will, I think we just have to face up to the fact that the UK in general just totally love getting utterly, completely incapably cunted and always have and always will. I'd love to see a book on that.

 

[Sectionfive]

Its an funny system ye have over there with the breweries. Id tend to believe what that landlord was saying, especially over the last few years .

Re happy hour, It doesn't make a blind bit of difference. Its been banned here forever and the rest of that paragraph still applies here too, maybe even more so. Has the 24 license affect peoples habits at all ? I take it, ye didn't turn into the continent over night but have people started going out later, taking their time or pacing themselves over the night.

Its the biggest problem here. Only a few hours to go out every weekend, people down everything as fast as they can. Then everyone gets chucked out on the street at the same time with only so many taxis/chippers to go around = chaos.
And like Sickboy said " binge-drinking " looks alot better then " Many avoid town centre and go home minding there own business "

 

[john eden]

A few more layoffs at work. More people joining the union.

Better half has had to scrape around for more work but it does seem to be coming in.

A bit more skint than usual after xmas.

How is everyone else doing?

 

[matt b]

Sixth forms are still waiting for details.

Rumour has it we will face 4% per cent per year cuts in funding per student for the next 3 years.

TES ran a piece last week that enrichment funding (tutorials, non-academic activities) is going to be slashed from about 130 hours/student/year to 30. Not only will that impact on lots of institutions that derive extra funding from enrichment, but will mean that students from the state sector will struggle even more to get onto highly competitive university courses as enrichment activities are stopped.

There is a complete shitstorm brewing nationally in education. The government have no idea what they are doing, they just want to make cuts.

 

[sufi]

we're up for 50-60% cuts according to 'our' minister - i.e. the one who sets our budget for our modest corner of the voluntary sector - there's no connection between this figure and any reality of the work we do at all... just lust for cuts to pay for the tory junketing

our entire budget is way less than the compensation paid out by his same dept to some of our client group mistreated at the hands of sub-contracted private sector gorillas
union raising merry hell, to little avail

 

[droid]

Pretty much fucked. 28% cut in wages in my household due to bullshit government levies. Also Mrs. Droid had to go on a 3 day week.

Come the end of the month we'll be about €200 worse off on top of that due to increased taxes and cuts in child allowance etc...

With interest rates on the way up, incoming water, property and oxygen taxes and possibly more paycuts its going to get progressively worse over the next 5 years.

Id be long gone if we didnt have a mortgage. As it stands I'm just selling stuff, paying off debts and trying to earn any extra cash I can. We basically have no disposable income after food, debts, bills, utilities etc... are paid each month. And Id count us as amongst the lucky.

Meanwhile our scumbag politicians are resigning en masse so they can avail of better pension deals (already worth anywhere from 80k up a year) before conditions change at the next election.

 

[john eden]

well that all sounds pretty shit! Hope we all weather the storm ok.