Consumer belt-tightening takes toll on UK firms, report reveals
https://www.lbc.co.uk/article/fe7a0b2df78d45a196669633485abe97-5HjdFcf_2/
Posted by tylerthe-theatre
Consumer belt-tightening takes toll on UK firms, report reveals
https://www.lbc.co.uk/article/fe7a0b2df78d45a196669633485abe97-5HjdFcf_2/
Posted by tylerthe-theatre
22 Comments
When people spend almost all their salary on rent/mortgage, energy, water and food then there’s nothing left to spend on businesses that actually make the economy go round.
All the constant wealth extraction through privatising everything is coming home to roost.
No money left – tax us any more and it’ll be mend and make do rather than buy new winter clothes
So taking 90% of a person’s income away so they get to survive has a bad effect on their ability to spend, shocker!
“weak consumer confidence” – I don’t lack confidence, I lack money!
Tell you what, instead of announcing record profits every quarter, while saying you’ve got no choice but to raise the price of bread by 2p every other week, why don’t you be a bit less fucking greedy and stop milking people dry until they’ve got nothing left, while you’ve lined your pockets with the hard earned money of the working class, then complain that people aren’t spending money with you anymore.
If you spend years starving the roots, eventually the whole of the economic tree dies!
Was this the BOE strategy? Interest rates hikes are being felt more and more now as fixed terms came to an end. It’s no bloody surprise that people have less money. My friend is facing eviction from his sister’s second property, out of curiosity I looked at the rent prices in my area, it’s utterly appalling how high the rents are.
10 years ago my Brother started renting on a nice street in my town at £650 pcm, this was considered exclusive. Luckily the landlord is actually nice and has never raised the rent. Same street now, equivalent house is £1200…
Well who would’ve though that chronic wage stagnation and inflation busting rises on everything, year on year would have any consequences.
The only way to get growth in the economy is to get money back in workers pockets. Unfortunately, not a single politician, or political party, have a workable plan for achieving that. Not one!
It will only get worse next month when she delivers another growth killing budget
Small furniture company here.. sales are shiite at the moment
Lot of residency’s going round, constant threat of Ai. The cost of living going up. Not the time to be splashing the cash is it?
This, is how we’ll slowly asphyxiate. As more and more cash goes to share holder profits and propping up our crippling debt.
Not even remotely surprising or shocking
Same as the previous financial crash.
Uncertainty about jobs and rising costs means that people cut discretionary spending.
People don’t go to restaurants and bars as often, buy fewer clothes or switch to second hand, stop getting hair and beauty treatments, buy cheaper brands etc.
Nothing new, but has an impact on businesses and can cause further redundancies.
To the surprise of no one but corporate executives. There is a reason there has been talk of a cost of living crisis for so long and it is not because people have a ton of money to spare. Wages have not kept pace with inflation and the cost of goods has accelerated massively since COVID. People have spent years moaning that everything costs too much and that household budgets have been squeezed beyond belief. Companies should not be shocked that people are cutting back on everything non-essential and just accept that they have priced themselves out of the market.
Well maybe these “firms” need to pay more than 24k a year to staff who already have post grad degrees and experience. I was on that in 2014 and they still seem to offer that to entry level now.
Why the fuck do hiring managers seem to be the only people in the world that get to pretend inflation isn’t a thing?
Imagine if every single person who pays rent or has a mortgage had £200-£500 a month more to spend. Businesses would be booming, more innovation would occur, more people would start businesses that might become a worldwide success.
I was pretty sad today thinking about how the first thing that goes is fun.
The housing crisis has pushed rent up for a whole generation to unsustainable levels (Stewart Lee said he worked part time in a petrol station in the 80s in London to pay the rent for instance, try that now).
And people can’t not buy food / heat / rent / clothes etc, so the things they cut out their budget is fun, drinks, holidays, random purchases.
Probably 2 generations now have been robbed of so many important life experiences and that is just really sad.
But capitalists told me that when demand drops, prices drop
This is why interest rates shouldn’t have been cut, if more people are tightening their belt then higher interest lets the stock recover so it controls the cost of living.
But yeah…We like to think BoE is actually independent…
In other news, it has been discovered that *bears do indeed shit in woods*
At a local level we’ve seen orders from big retailers start to tail off for less essential items and in turn theres fewer staff on than there were 6 months ago. One of our bigger retail customers has sold out to VC investors because he’s decided he doesnt want to carry the risks in the UK market any longer and I’d not be surprised if there arent more to follow before Christmas.
Confidence in Reeves to keep the economy stable isn’t high.