The recession is the elephant in every room and a tired and grey elephant it is at that.
Here in New Zealand we started our slide, to feel the effects of economic decline well before the likes of Lehmann Brothers and the spectacular collapse of the subprime mortgage sector in the US became front page news.
Our recession began with a whimper some 18 months ago. Quietly many businesses re-organised, changed structure and readied themselves for the economic winter ahead before the Northern hemisphere noticed.
New Zealand had come off a long period of sustained growth. We all enjoyed record high employment where a shortage of skilled workers was one of the biggest hurdles to business development.
While the world went credit-crazy the deep conservatism shown by much of the banking sector here (on a comparative basis with the US and Britain) has saved many a Kiwis’ bacon.
We are often criticised for our love affair with bricks, mortar and land but the housing market has showed surprisingly resilience, not plummeted anywhere near to the levels in the UK and US.
Now we are into the dull-phase of the recession, the hard yards where gloomy global messages are being recycled over and over again. Tried dodging the talk of the downturn at a dinner party? Businesses going to the wall-stories pile up like a body count.
But where is the perspective? World news is not our news. Many key elements of our economy are in robust health and unemployment rates are still relatively low. Today’s business confidence survey points to sparks of optimism returning as a net 5.5% of firms expect business conditions to improve in the next year.
As a nation we struggle with self-belief, and this applies here. What we really need to do is ‘knock the bastard off’ and we can do that with confidence, grit and self belief.
Spread the word.
