Australia in Recession and massive job losses

[Guest proud2beaussie]

Even so, isn't it better to re-train you own rather than import people already trained from some other country? The lack of retraining opportunities in Australia, which seem to be somewhat more scarce than they were in the last main recession in 1990-1992, doesn't say much about the Australian Government's commitment to people who are already in Australia.

 

 

Hi Treesea,

You make some good points and I can see where you are coming from regarding retraining,however having said that i perhaps should point out that the previous government failed to learn the lessons from the 90-92 recession and for a decade from 1996-2006 did virtually nothing about building the infrastructure that is necessary to retrain thousands of workers who have been displaced from sectors such as manufacturing where Australia is no longer able to compete due to cheap imports from places like China,and as a result we are now having to 'Top Up" our skills base with migrant labor,fundamentally I have no problem with this,in fact I welcome it,but it does seem rather ridiculous to be "importing" nurses and doctors when if the governments of the past,Labor and Liberal had done the right thing and invested money in building universities etc in the late 70's and 80's then we would not need to be trying to entice workers to come here,but rather focus on encouraging self funded retirees to come here,(and yes,bring their money !).

I realise that all I have said is very over simplified and an economy is much more complex than that,but it seems that the current generation is paying for the inaction of past governments.

BTW ,In saying the above please don't think I am in any way denigrating the commitment shown to Australia by migrants-far from it.migrants bring their skills to Australia hoping for a new life,but sadly sometimes things don't go quite as planned.

[Guest bowbrum03]

You really are a right bundle of laughs!

 

You really need too get you head out of the sand ,and anywhere else you may have it :nah:

[Guest bowbrum03]

So why does Australia continue to import so many new migrants when employment is so high?

 

NigelinOz, I take your point - just because a million people are unemployed, it doesn't follow that any of them are trained to do the work that needs to be done. Even so, isn't it better to re-train you own rather than import people already trained from some other country? The lack of retraining opportunities in Australia, which seem to be somewhat more scarce than they were in the last main recession in 1990-1992, doesn't say much about the Australian Government's commitment to people who are already in Australia.

 

From what I can see, Australia isn't going to reduce the numbers of visas it gives out any time soon, even with the recession. The exhorbitant fees would-be migrants have to shell out for their visas, not to mention the costs for the skills assessment hoops they are made to jump through, probably support Australia's embassies worldwide. Sure they want carpenters and bricklayers. What a surprise it must be for them, with 20 years experience, to find, along with plumbers and electricians, that they need to get a licence before they can work, AND that getting the licence, if they have to take a course or two, could cost them an arm and a leg.

 

Having got the migrant into Australia, there's really only an upside from Australia's point of view. The migrant ends up spending a mint in Australia, irrespective of whether they are successful in obtaining work. If they are on a working visa but don't find any work, their visas can be revoked. It really doesn't matter, from the receiving country's point of view, whether the migrant is successful in finding work or not - either way they pay, and that helps to support the people who are already in Australia.

 

They also help to keep housing prices artifically high. This has quite a few positive implications:

- the stamp duty take is higher than it would be without high levels of new migrants;

- the slowdown for the construction industry isn't as sharp as it would have been without the migrants;

- landlords get to charge high enough rentals to cover their costs;

- demand for household related items like fridges, washing machines and the like, is propped up by migration.

 

And the poor old migrant themselves, sucked in with the promise of a better life in Australia, only to find it's quite a struggle and can be hard to make ends meet? I doubt if the Australian Government gives a toss about this group, because at the end of the day, someone's got to pay, and it's the migrant, not the Australian taxpayer. Well, at least until they have survived for 2 years AND got their PR. I suppose the wisdom is, if people make it that far, then they must be standing on their own two feet.

 

My advice to anyone planning to emigrate from the UK to Australia echoes that of some of the people posting on this thread - don't leave behind good jobs here in the UK unless you have a firm offer of employment, in writing, prefearbly with a guarantee of a job for the first couple of years.

 

As to the recession in Australia not going to be as bad as in England, kernow43, I would agree with that. However, if you have a family with, say, two children and you lose your job, and have less than £16,000 in savings (which is probably the vast majority of Brits), the U.K. government will give you £400 or so a week ( income support, child tax credits, child benefit, housing benefit (or payment of mortgage interest up to mortgages of £200,000 after 13 weeks) and council tax benefit) until you get back into work. No matter how many people lose their jobs here, we are all still going to have our roofs over our heads and can still afford to eat and heat our houses.

 

Totally agree, Points I have been saying for months, however I have been led too believe that Australia, in particular Perth and Brisbane are worse than UK.

[Petals]

I so agree with you Nigel. Nothing was done about training under supposed super treasurer. They just got on the coat tails of the world economy and did nothing. Now we have to pick up the pieces. They got rid of everything we had and as people said at the time you can only sell it once.

 

The western world gave everything up for the god house and based it on housing and we know that from the plethora of programmes around about selling, auctioning, doing houses up for profit. Unfortunately its a sand economy not a rock one and its crashing.

 

Nothing was spent of infrastructure in the Howard years, nothing was spent on education, health, except the stupid tax on the poor to help out the rich with health insurance. Nothing was spent on the things we are good at our scientists have all disappeared over to countries who will finance their research.

 

Forward thinking not in Aus, its all about me and getting elected.

 

No statesmen, we need statesmen who make hard decisions for the good of all.

[Guest lovediving]

Bowbrum, what City are you in ?

[Guest bowbrum03]

Bowbrum, what City are you in ?

 

 

 

I’m in Perth.

More lay offs today.

Project manger, who was on a sponsored visa.

Site manager and supervisors.

Also A gang of ground workers went to start a job only to be told the job has been put on hold.

Very Dark times ahead

[Guest lovediving]

Not good it is very worrying times for everyone.

 

I have been to Northbridge in Perth for a flying visit, quite an eye opener and went to some salsa club I dont even remember the name but that was quite good had a laugh there.

 

I’m in Perth.

 

More lay offs today.

 

Project manger, who was on a sponsored visa.

 

Site manager and supervisors.

 

Also A gang of ground workers went to start a job only to be told the job has been put on hold.

 

Very Dark times ahead

 

[Guest TheArmChairDetective]

if the shops and pubs are anything to go people are not worried as they are very busy.

 

 

It is reported on local TV that 114 pubs have shut in the South West area since the start of the New Year, the remaining pub landlords are VERY VERY worried.

 

As for shops, there is a discussion every day on Bristol GWRFM radio as to which shop will close next in the new shopping centre called Cabot's Circus.

[Guest Andy]

You really need too get you head out of the sand ,and anywhere else you may have it :nah:

Why do you assume I have my head in the sand?

[cazmayo]

Those of us thinking of or in the process of emmigrating want HONEST feedback on how things are in the various industries, so do not apoligise if the feedback is negative! Say it as it is!!!

 

We are going regardless, but it helps in trying to time the move. People might delay the move for 12 months or so and hope for improvement if they have a job at home. We are only starting the process so who knows what the outlook is like when we get our visa, and we can always validate if things dont look good.

 

I was at a exhibition a few weeks ago, and there was a representative of WA government and she said their outlook was that the recession is a short term problem but their search for skilled migrants is them looking at the long term.

 

Lots of pain in this house, have lost a business, and now the job is proving unreliable with 2 pay cuts in 5 weeks, still its a job.

 

Businesses are closing down every day here in Ireland with 35,000 jobs in the month of Jan alone. Im no expert, but I think it will take along time to replace those jobs. Lots of companies on 3 days a week.

 

Lets hope the US start to move again.

Thanks for your HONEST posts guys.

 

Cheers

Caz

[Guest treesea]

Hi Treesea,

You make some good points and I can see where you are coming from regarding retraining,however having said that i perhaps should point out that the previous government failed to learn the lessons from the 90-92 recession and for a decade from 1996-2006 did virtually nothing about building the infrastructure that is necessary to retrain thousands of workers who have been displaced from sectors such as manufacturing where Australia is no longer able to compete due to cheap imports from places like China,and as a result we are now having to 'Top Up" our skills base with migrant labor,fundamentally I have no problem with this,in fact I welcome it,but it does seem rather ridiculous to be "importing" nurses and doctors when if the governments of the past,Labor and Liberal had done the right thing and invested money in building universities etc in the late 70's and 80's then we would not need to be trying to entice workers to come here,but rather focus on encouraging self funded retirees to come here,(and yes,bring their money !).

I realise that all I have said is very over simplified and an economy is much more complex than that,but it seems that the current generation is paying for the inaction of past governments.

BTW ,In saying the above please don't think I am in any way denigrating the commitment shown to Australia by migrants-far from it.migrants bring their skills to Australia hoping for a new life,but sadly sometimes things don't go quite as planned.

 

Hi, NigelinOz,

What I noticed about the retraining that did go on post the 1990-92 recession in Australia is that rather than up-skilling the people, it was more about dumbing them down, so still retraining but into lower skilled, lower paid jobs. Things like telling English teachers that yes, there was no work in their field, due to all the cheap new graduates entering the workforce and forcing them out (government teachers are relatively well protected but private school teachers are not and can be laid off at the drop of a hat) but they couldn't stay on the dole while waiting for something in their field to come up and would have to retrain....to be a security guard. Needless to say, a fair few skilled people were less than overjoyed with this approach.

 

My OH was an automotive engineer, and couldn't get work in the 90-92 recession. He would have been happy to retrain as a mechanic, - he regarded it as different but still related to cars and thought in the longer term it would be really useful. But oh no, that was going to take too long - up to a year at least at a Tafe and then the governemnt would have to subsidise him through an apprenticeship. You couldn't choose what you wanted to retrain into. You were meant to be grateful that you got any training at all. So he ended up going on a 13 week course and retraining as a chef. It's great! He cooks heaps better than me now :[) but it was quite a waste of an education.

 

I suppose in the end, the decision over whether to train your own or import cheap migrant labour comes down to money. I can see the Australian government's point - why go to the expense of training and then subsidising an electrician through his/her apprenticeship if there are any number of electricians overseas who are not only keen to come to Australia but are willing to pay through the nose for the privilege? Even the UK is getting to be more and more like that now its got a cheap EU workforce, many of whom are self employed so can legally work for peanuts, - well, the minimum wage at least, - on its doorstep.

[Guest treesea]

Totally agree, Points I have been saying for months, however I have been led too believe that Australia, in particular Perth and Brisbane are worse than UK.

 

And that always seems to be the case, that Perth and Brisbane seem to crumble in a recession when it comes to jobs quicker than either Sydney or Melbourne and also to recover more slowly. Anyone have any thoughts as to why that is?

 

WA has 10% of the population and is the fastest growing of all the states, and Queensland, with 20% of the population is the 2nd fastest growing state population wise. They're both pretty nice looking and well put together cities. Well, I'm not into Brisbane's weather, but it is still a beautiful place. And yet they don't seem to hold up in a recession very well. I suppose, with their on mineral wealth, they go really well in boom times, but go bust that much harder. But even then, only 50,000 people are directly employed in mining activities in Queensland, out of a total population of over 4 million.

 

Even the residential housing market in these states, as in new builds, seems to have dozed off, yet both states are growing, and faster than everywhere else in Australia, so I would have thought would be a constant need for new or extended housing to house all these new arrivals, be they immigrants or new births.

[Petals]

I think you have to look who the majority of migrants to QLD are, lots of retired people from other States. I know some. Lots of New Zealanders who also look to retire or buy holiday apartments there. Japanese again holiday apartments etc. Then there are the surfie types who just move to QLD to do anything and laze about on the beach. These people swell the numbers put strain on resources but not much added. The retirees for example, self funded are pulling in their belts as although the home owners are loving the low interest self funded retirees do not get any return on their money wherever it is at the moment. So they are not spending any money and lets face it we are the people who usually spend money. I know that we are not spending now and cancelling trips etc as we do not want to reduce our capital.

 

Western Australia its mining that the people go for mainly and if China has a cold then these jobs disappear.

 

Victoria is used to being the rust bucket state and got used to having it tough and I think it will do ok in the long run because we do not rely on anything here. Certainly tourists come here and lots of them but its not really a retirement destination.

 

I could never see how we could continue to rely on housing as a commodity. Yes we need to live somewhere but we also need to be able to afford it. It became stupid and way too expensive for most young peoople. There is life after house. Once the house becomes your life then you are on the slippery slope to unhappiness in some instances divorce all that negative stuff because us humans need interaction and fun.

[Guest TheArmChairDetective]

I was at a exhibition a few weeks ago, and there was a representative of WA government and she said their outlook was that the recession is a short term problem but their search for skilled migrants is them looking at the long term.

 

Lots of pain in this house, have lost a business, and now the job is proving unreliable with 2 pay cuts in 5 weeks, still its a job.

 

Businesses are closing down every day here in Ireland with 35,000 jobs in the month of Jan alone. Im no expert, but I think it will take along time to replace those jobs. Lots of companies on 3 days a week.

 

Cheers

Caz

A friend of mine who is in the auto industry in Adelaide told me, and others, at a BBQ recently that he believes that Australia will start climbing out of recession around August 2009.

As for UK businesses. On tonight's Panorama Prog on BBC1 Theo Pathetis(spelling) hosts a show about why the banks are forcing 120 small businesses a day to go bust and what needs to be done to reverse things.

[Guest lovediving]

I hope so, I really do for everybody's sake.

 

A friend of mine who is in the auto industry in Adelaide told me, and others, at a BBQ recently that he believes that Australia will start climbing out of recession around August 2009.

As for UK businesses. On tonight's Panorama Prog on BBC1 Theo Pathetis(spelling) hosts a show about why the banks are forcing 120 small businesses a day to go bust and what needs to be done to reverse things.

[Guest treesea]

A friend of mine who is in the auto industry in Adelaide told me, and others, at a BBQ recently that he believes that Australia will start climbing out of recession around August 2009.

As for UK businesses. On tonight's Panorama Prog on BBC1 Theo Pathetis(spelling) hosts a show about why the banks are forcing 120 small businesses a day to go bust and what needs to be done to reverse things.

 

I would be really surprised if Australia has climbed out of recession by August 2009. The last bad recession in Australia went from some time in 1990 to the end of 1992. We came back to Australia at the tail end of that recession, and it still took us over 6 months to find work. This latest recession looks just as bad as the 1990-1992 recession, if not worse.

 

The auto industry did well in Australia when most companies bought company cars and gave them to their employees on operating leases. In those days, you could run up as many miles as you wanted and get a brand new car every three years.

 

Nowadays, the norm is for novated leases on company cars. They're terrible - if you go over the alloted mileage, then you, and not the company, has to pay. They are usually for four years, rather than three. It makes more sense to keep running your own car than it does to make the salary sacrifice and taking a company car these days.

 

With GE and GMAC withdrawing finance from the Australian market, I would think a lot of car dealerships will go to the wall, even with Rudd's $2 billion bailout.

 

Yes, the banks are taking a lot of stick over here for not supporting companies and letting them go to the wall, but a lot of those companies are technically insolvent, surviving only with the support of their banks. What is the point of banks throwing good money after bad at them? Two such companies have recently been in the news, one of which was an IT company who has hardly any sales but wanted a £75K loan just so he could stay afloat, and another one which was a translation service and wanted bank finance to buy a shop, no equity down mind you, so she could have a shop front for her business. Why does she need a shop front for that kind of business? It's hardly the "passing trade" sort of business, is it?

[Guest lovediving]

Thousands of workers at Holden are waiting for news regarding job losses and are at home today.

[Guest TheArmChairDetective]

I would be really surprised if Australia has climbed out of recession by August 2009.

As my friend actually runs a business in Australia and has done for several years I hope he has his fingers on the button.

 

 

 

Nowadays, the norm is for novated leases on company cars. They're terrible - if you go over the alloted mileage, then you, and not the company, has to pay. They are usually for four years, rather than three. It makes more sense to keep running your own car than it does to make the salary sacrifice and taking a company car these days.

 

My brother has leased cars in Australia for as long as I can remember, expensive cars, the only thing he pays for is the fuel., everything else is within the bundle.

He doesn't have allotted mileage in his lease. He changes his cars every two to three years.

He wouldn't even think of buying his own car but neither would he have a company car.

[Mongrel]

4500 mine jobs losses in Wa this month , ther domino effect is gainin momentum ,booo

[Guest peterb]

I would be really surprised if Australia has climbed out of recession by August 2009.

 

While the global economic crisis is just that - global, and is effecting all countries, it is important to remember that Australia is NOT in recession yet. Australian Business / Wall Street Journal report

Parts of the article are also supported by the Real Estate Institute of Victoria, which this week predicted that houses prices are set to stage a 13% recovery this year.

[Mongrel]

While the global economic crisis is just that - global, and is effecting all countries, it is important to remember that Australia is NOT in recession yet. Australian Business / Wall Street Journal report

Parts of the article are also supported by the Real Estate Institute of Victoria, which this week predicted that houses prices are set to stage a 13% recovery this year.

 

The difference mate is that each state puts out its own statistics ,the uk would paint a different picture if it was divided up and the statistics made. Parts of the uk would be doing better than others .

[Guest TheArmChairDetective]

"Australia in recession: IMF

Michael Stutchbury, Economics editor | January 31, 2009

Article from: The Australian

Australia's forecast -0.2pc growth this year is not as dire as the US (-1.6pc), Europe (-2pc), the UK (-2.8 pc) and Japan (-2.6pc)."

 

From January.

 

The one fact that remains consistent is that as long as we have a world wide media that insist on focusing on the negative, everyone else is going to drown in doom and gloom.

[Guest peterb]

It's by no means certain that Australia will enter a technical recession, growth is slowing, and may even stop, but it may avoid recession.

 

Herald Sun Feb 07th 2009

 

"AUSTRALIA may stave off a recession, the Reserve Bank has predicted, but the good news is likely to cost homeowners an interest rate cut next month...

 

The bank is now predicting the economy to grind to a near-halt, falling to 0.25 per cent growth in the June quarter, and 0.5 per cent for the year"

 

The Australian Feb 23rd 2009

 

CommSec chief economist Craig James says Australia could enjoy its eighteenth consecutive year of growth as big interest rate cuts and Federal Government stimulus programs support the economy.

 

"While the global downturn is far bigger than the 2001 slowdown, it is not out of the question that Australia could avoid recession yet again," Mr James said.

 

"No other country has received the same economic boost from all three factors - Government spending, lower interest rates and a cheaper Aussie dollar.

[Mongrel]

It's by no means certain that Australia will enter a technical recession, growth is slowing, and may even stop, but it may avoid recession.

 

Herald Sun Feb 07th 2009

 

"AUSTRALIA may stave off a recession, the Reserve Bank has predicted, but the good news is likely to cost homeowners an interest rate cut next month...

 

The bank is now predicting the economy to grind to a near-halt, falling to 0.25 per cent growth in the June quarter, and 0.5 per cent for the year"

 

The Australian Feb 23rd 2009

 

CommSec chief economist Craig James says Australia could enjoy its eighteenth consecutive year of growth as big interest rate cuts and Federal Government stimulus programs support the economy.

 

"While the global downturn is far bigger than the 2001 slowdown, it is not out of the question that Australia could avoid recession yet again," Mr James said.

 

"No other country has received the same economic boost from all three factors - Government spending, lower interest rates and a cheaper Aussie dollar.

 

Err the Wa govt are chuckin $14k to $21 k at home buyers to stimulate growth and nobodys bitin part from me i think :cry:

 

mALLY

[Guest peterb]

Err the Wa govt are chuckin $14k to $21 k at home buyers to stimulate growth and nobodys bitin part from me i think :cry:

 

mALLY

 

I guess each state is reacting differently to the problems. While like you said, WA doesn't seem to be recovering, I've read 2 separate articles this week in the Herald Sun (online) both stating how Melbourne's property market is reviving (I think the home owner grants in VIC are the same as WA)