10m now unemployed or on furlough

Interesting reading this thread and seeing how willing the people of this country are to accept that this is how it is and they’re either going to sacrifice their job or the elderly. No question of why we’re making these choices.
I wonder if these conversations are being had in countries that acted proactively and got this under control. Makes it clear that nobody will be held account at the end of all this and we will shrug our shoulders and say this was the only way it could have been.

 

If restaurants can only serve half the people they will need half the staff. If shops can only let a handful of people in they will need less staff. This will then have a knock on through the supply chain.
If a business is struggling they will look to reduce expenditure. That nearly always leads to some reduction in staff. We are already seen this with airlines and hospitality. As the financial impact becomes more evident this will spread to other sectors. Many on furlough now will be heading for redundancy. High unemployment and a smaller jobs market is a frightening mix.

 

I’m not kidding myself - there’ll definitely be a recession.

but the circumstances here are unique, recessions normally happen because money is in short supply, drives lack of demand, drives further shortage of money.

here we’ve removed labour and demand. A lot is being made of the number of ‘unemployed’, but many of the people who have recently claimed benefit still have jobs, are self employed or work on the gig economy which could pick up much stronger than we’d expect out of a recession. None of us know.

The other ‘recession’ factor is how we’re doing vs our competitors, and here all economies are hit similarly.

all of this is unprecedented. The nearest economical impact I can think of is a war, and plenty of economies grew at a staggering rate coming out of the last one. But it took some brave investment to do so . That might be an ask too far for this Tory government.

 

"Possible"? There would have been hundreds of thousands dead had there been no lockdown. Excess deaths due to Covid currently estimated between 55k and 61k, likely to be higher.

 

I think the issue is that the economy wasn't in good shape before this happened. We narrowly avoided an official recession at the start of the year by very narrow margins. Then we have Brexit to add into the mix, which every report said would give some economic downturn at least for a couple of years. Then Covid happened, which leaves us in a bit of a pickle. Look at local councils... already busted from 10 years of austerity, now facing more debt due to revenue and tax losses.

Ironic that its Tory MPs in old Labour heartlands that have been dealt this card.

Time to start hunting down tax avoiding billionaires. Anyone supporting taxing the masses needs their head checking.

 

Or those with any spark of common decency!

 

I think it probably has. And also the lack of testing is the biggest **** up. Apparently in Uganda they've tracked and traced and are managing the situation well for the time being. If Africa can manage to do it then we should have done.

 

Same here mate. Over half of our team (PMs / SEs, config and consultants) have been furloughed. The irony is that we still have as much work as before furlough, we told them that it would affect revenue if they ignored us and hey presto we have now been able to bring four people back. A small victory but a victory nonetheless.

I actually asked not to be furloughed, I didn't want to be furloughed and I wasn't but I found out afterwards that I was never on the list in the first place.

I've just had one day off, from my annual leave entitlement. But as others have said I would rather be in my position than one of those who has been furloughed.

 

Ive been questioning the choices of the Government since the very start. When I did you called me a ‘cultist.’

You’re right, it’s not a trade off between the two. I’ll say this slowly and with simple words; the elderly and vulnerable should not be treated the same as the young and healthy. That way we don’t have to have either consequence as severely.

 

FT is currently tracking excess deaths at a Conservative estimate of 61k

 

It’s achievable and has happened in other countries.

 

For my builder clients the supply chain for materials dried up. A significant number of my clients have furloughed staff. Most who can are now going back to work.

 

So far unemployment is just revealing the true figures that the current Govts massages. It’s around 3-4 million but they pretend someone who works for 1 hour per week is employed.

 

I'll ask you the same questions I asked SuperTyke, since he was unable to give me an answer.

How do you guarantee the vulnerable get the care and supplies they need if the rest of the country is back to normal?
How do you guarantee the hospitals are not overrun when the 'young and healthy' all go out and catch COVID like good citizens?
How do you guarantee there are no long term effects for those that are being told to do an ostrich impression and pretend COVID doesn't exist?
How do you protect those with undiagnosed health conditions?

By the way, we are already treating the vulnerable differently. They are shielded.

 

It’s a great headline for ‘anti government propaganda.

but do you know anyone who works 1 hr per week?

 

My wife does 2.

 

You can't guarantee anything. That's life.

 

But you work?

is she claiming benefit for being ‘unemployed’?

 

Ok, replace guarantee with ‘try to ensure’ or even ‘make an attempt to’ and I still haven’t seen an answer.