Should we simply prepare for a prolonged downturn?

Totally_Baffled · Post by **Totally_Baffled** » 16 Apr 2009, 21:38

Hard to figure out, though, what it is we actually make.

machine tools, electric power equipment, automation equipment, railroad equipment, shipbuilding, aircraft, motor vehicles and parts, electronics and communications equipment, metals, chemicals, coal, petroleum, paper and paper products, food processing, textiles, clothing, other consumer goods

Ooops I forgot, lots and lots of weapons!(second largest arms exporter in the world!)

eatyourveg · Post by **eatyourveg** » 16 Apr 2009, 23:07

Totally_Baffled wrote:
Hard to figure out, though, what it is we actually make.
machine tools, electric power equipment, automation equipment, railroad equipment, shipbuilding, aircraft, motor vehicles and parts, electronics and communications equipment, metals, chemicals, coal, petroleum, paper and paper products, food processing, textiles, clothing, other consumer goods

Ooops I forgot, lots and lots of weapons!(second largest arms exporter in the world!)

Don't forget we have an enviable reputation for making cannon fodder for Uncle Sam.

DominicJ · Post by **DominicJ** » 17 Apr 2009, 09:05

What do we make?

I drive past a factory, Peak Precision Engineering, apparently they make jet engine transport cases, one use only, sell for about 100k a pop.
Its a small one site factory, employs about 80 people.
There are thousands of such sites.
They arent as sexy as BMW or Renault, but they're a damn site more profitable.

Do you know the mighty Japanese public transport system you all bang on about?
The brakes for almost all of it are made in another factory near me.

Re: Arms
I'm not sure if you were being a hippie or not, but tough.
The UK doesnt supply Arms, we supply high defence equipment.
Radars, Jets, Surface to Air Missiles, Air to Air Missiles and warships.
We dont export small arms, or ammunition for small arms.

Oh, we're also 9th, not 2nd
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arms_expor ... _exporters
So, whats worse, us selling the Saudis 150 AsF/SF and the bombs and missiles to arm them at a cost of some £20b, or Russia selling Zimbabwe £5b of small arms...

PS_RalphW · Post by **PS_RalphW** » 17 Apr 2009, 09:15

I don't see aircraft or performance cars as a growth industry.

The arms trade is, unfortunately, booming.

/ducks for cover from exploding puns/

RenewableCandy · Post by **RenewableCandy** » 17 Apr 2009, 18:29

DominicJ wrote:What do we make?

I drive past a factory, Peak Precision Engineering, apparently they make jet engine transport cases, one use only, sell for about 100k a pop.

I wonder what they do with them afterwards? Do you think they'd convert into a novel type of house

?

Totally_Baffled · Post by **Totally_Baffled** » 17 Apr 2009, 20:06

Re: Arms
I'm not sure if you were being a hippie or not, but tough.
The UK doesnt supply Arms, we supply high defence equipment.
Radars, Jets, Surface to Air Missiles, Air to Air Missiles and warships.
We dont export small arms, or ammunition for small arms.

No I wasn't being a hippy

I dont have a problem with it.

I did realise we didnt export small arms and ammuntion, but I must admit I didnt realise we had fallen down to 9th!

My stat was out of date on this occasion

RevdTess · Post by **RevdTess** » 17 Apr 2009, 21:23

DominicJ wrote: So, whats worse, us selling the Saudis 150 AsF/SF and the bombs and missiles to arm them at a cost of some £20b, or Russia selling Zimbabwe £5b of small arms...

How about, they're both evil? It's not either/or you know.

Totally_Baffled · Post by **Totally_Baffled** » 17 Apr 2009, 22:17

Tess wrote:
DominicJ wrote: So, whats worse, us selling the Saudis 150 AsF/SF and the bombs and missiles to arm them at a cost of some £20b, or Russia selling Zimbabwe £5b of small arms...
How about, they're both evil? It's not either/or you know.

Nah it aint, if I was surrounded by Saudis neighbours I would arm myself to the teeth!!

if we can have them, why cant they? (which is the usual argument against the west when we say certain countries cannot have nuclear power stations or nuclear weapons.....)

snow hope · Post by **snow hope** » 17 Apr 2009, 23:10

Totally_Baffled wrote:
Hard to figure out, though, what it is we actually make.
machine tools, electric power equipment, automation equipment, railroad equipment, shipbuilding, aircraft, motor vehicles and parts, electronics and communications equipment, metals, chemicals, coal, petroleum, paper and paper products, food processing, textiles, clothing, other consumer goods

Ooops I forgot, lots and lots of weapons!(second largest arms exporter in the world!)

Hmmm, heard all that before and am less convinced than ever.....

Retail industry going downhill, Financial industry on its knees, Tourism dropping due to world recession and aviation industry problems. Service industry going downhill as spending reduces on non-essentials. NS oil and gas declining rapidly. Property - both commercial and residential going south dramatically. Manufacturing continuing its unrelenting multi-decadel down swing.

Govt. income requirements going through the roof as debt mountains created for money thrown away to the *ankers. Employment going through the roof and worse to come - more outgoings to be funded by people still working! Pensions pretty much fecked for just about everybody who hasn't already retiured.

Sterling dropping against all other major currencies.

Nah, unconvinced we have any fecking chance at all..... still waiting to be persuaded......

Totally_Baffled · Post by **Totally_Baffled** » 17 Apr 2009, 23:31

still waiting to be persuaded

With respect snow - I dont think you can be pursuaded.

Your pessimism is a psychological trick.

You expect the very worst -so when (if) it doenst happen - you win!!

I can understand that position!

All the best mate - dont get too depressed!

I put it to you again, if we are such a 'basket case' why do very clever traders, countries, pension funds (foreign and domestic) etc keep buying our debt?

Surely they would be throwing their money away??? (why dont they buy the debt of all those countries that are such havens of manufacturing!?)

Its all relative - we are in trouble - but so are other countries.

snow hope · Post by **snow hope** » 17 Apr 2009, 23:42

Hi TB.

I don't get too depressed. (Only a bit.

)

I don't think traders, markets, pension funds, etc. are very clever. They are fickle as the rest of the general financial markets and in this day and age as volatile as ever. From what I can see they follow short-term trends and are very herd-like. They are buying dollars and pounds because that is what they do... and have done....they don't have a lot else to do. They play within certain parameters and can't cope at all with paradigm change.

Most pensions have dropped by 40-50% over the last 1-2 years. Mine has dropped by about 9% and I am disappointed with that result. Why? Well I took action that I beieved would cope with the paradigm change I saw coming. So please don't tell me they are clever, as history does not prove that statement. No offense meant TB.

I do agree its all relative. But I am coming to realise that rather than doing okay relative to other countries I am now thinking that the UK will actually do quite a bit worse than many other countries. Another disappointment I suppose......

What about my justification of why I hold these views in my last post - you seem to have ignored that bit - what are you thoughts?

As for your psychological analysis - you could well be right about that wee bit - I will think about that.

Totally_Baffled · Post by **Totally_Baffled** » 18 Apr 2009, 00:15

What about my justification of why I hold these views in my last post - you seem to have ignored that bit - what are you thoughts?

Hi Snow

I presume you meant:

Retail industry going downhill, Financial industry on its knees, Tourism dropping due to world recession and aviation industry problems. Service industry going downhill as spending reduces on non-essentials. NS oil and gas declining rapidly. Property - both commercial and residential going south dramatically. Manufacturing continuing its unrelenting multi-decadel down swing.

I will have a go! but please put in keep in context as all countries are suffering at the moment.

Firstly - manufacturing.

Look at the stats on manufacturing since the 1970's, yes it has shrunk SUBSTANTIALLY as a proportion of the economy. 100% accept that.

But if you look at it in £ terms - it has still grown massively (even allowing for inflation), its just that it a) Its not grown anywhere near as fast as services and b) Employment has fallen because of automation (which is the same in all developed countries)

Also, look at the proportion of other OECD countries that consist of manufacturing. They are not far off the UK. We actually have a bigger % industrial sector than the US and France.

NS oil and gas, yes in decline. But at least we have some, no other western European country has anywhere the reserves of the UK (except Norway). Ditto Coal.

Retail industry is going down substantially- but by no more than any other country! There is a global recession on you know!

Ditto Tourism and aviation (but at least with the latter we have a generation of world class engineers etc)

Property - is going down , but so what? Asset prices are all relative. My mum and dad bought there house for 18K in 1982, brilliant! But then interest rates were 15%!!

More recently in the early nineties, again you could buy a house cheap but interest rates also hit 15%!!

Besides - there are sign property could turn around shorty. As no one can get a return on their money in a bank so it has to go somewhere..
.
Financial industry on its knee's - yes it is. No doubt it will have to take a smaller role in the UK economy, but that is a good thing. Maybe we will redirect the resources of this sector into something more useful (rather than glorified gamblers)

As for debt, google Japanese national debt or French national debt, or US debt or Ireland, Iceland or perhaps Spansh Public debt, or Italian debt etc etc etc , its all relative. The UK's isn't particularly bad.

When quoting consumer debt, look at consumer savings. There are more savers than debters in the UK. UK savers have nearly as much on deposit as debt. If you add in pension funds, UK savings > consumer debt.

Most pensions have dropped by 40-50% over the last 1-2 years. Mine has dropped by about 9% and I am disappointed with that result. Why? Well I took action that I beieved would cope with the paradigm change I saw coming. So please don't tell me they are clever, as history does not prove that statement. No offense meant TB.

Firstly, I would never take offence from you snow, because you one of lifes good guys. A top bloke.

Secondly, well ok - next time someone quotes one of the financial top knobs, warning of 'the UK is doomed' eg Jim Rodgers, I shall say' what the F--k do they know they were outperformed by Snow!' , besides Jim if you are so fecking clever why do your piers keep buying sterling if they are screwed???? Why should we take any notice of your predictions Jim

snow hope · Post by **snow hope** » 18 Apr 2009, 00:39

Totally_Baffled wrote: Firstly, I would never take offence from you snow, because you one of lifes good guys. A top bloke.

Aha, you have sussed me TB.

Flattery will get you everywhere!

A valient attempt to persuade me about UK PLC having a future. You did this before once - nearly persuaded me that things weren't going to be too bad........ but then we had to nationalise the banks.

Now if nothing big goes down for the rest of the year, you might have turned me, but the chances of no major economic wheels coming off before the end of the year are probably similar to the benefit of using an ashtray on a motorbike.

As for property prices "turning around shortly" - hehehe, who are you trying to convince? Yourself?

I will predict they will continue to drop throughout the current year. Time will tell my friend.

As for beating the pundits, well I don't consider myself especially clever - there are lots cleverer than me on this board (one of the reasons I enjoy it so much), rather, that they (pundits) are not as clever as they think they are. Of course being aware of PO and resource constraints gives me a major advantage against the economists, the gamblers and the *ankers!!!

Totally_Baffled · Post by **Totally_Baffled** » 18 Apr 2009, 00:52

snow hope wrote:
Totally_Baffled wrote: Firstly, I would never take offence from you snow, because you one of lifes good guys. A top bloke.
Aha, you have sussed me TB. Flattery will get you everywhere!

A valient attempt to persuade me about UK PLC having a future. You did this before once - nearly persuaded me that things weren't going to be too bad........ but then we had to nationalise the banks.

Now if nothing big goes down for the rest of the year, you might have turned me, but the chances of no major economic wheels coming off before the end of the year are probably similar to the benefit of using an ashtray on a motorbike.

As for property prices "turning around shortly" - hehehe, who are you trying to convince? Yourself? I will predict they will continue to drop throughout the current year. Time will tell my friend.

As for beating the pundits, well I don't consider myself especially clever - there are lots cleverer than me on this board (one of the reasons I enjoy it so much), rather, that they (pundits) are not as clever as they think they are. Of course being aware of PO and resource constraints gives me a major advantage against the economists, the gamblers and the *ankers!!!

Hehehe, lets leave it there Snow!

have a great weekend. Im going to bed because Im pisse.d....

Post by **kenneal - lagger** » 18 Apr 2009, 02:23

Something is on the up because something else is on the down. On the news tonight, tourism, from the eurozone, at least, is booming because of the weakness of the pound against the euro.

Grasping Gordon can sleep easy tonight for a change.