The economic impact of Covid-19

[KentVillan]

6 minutes ago, chrisp65 said:

Trouble with the 4 guys from the local deli model, far less share holders, far less London based corporate HQ, far less kick backs for ministers.

Get back to the office you plebs! My property portfolio is taking a kicking.

This is the biggest problem isn't it. Britain is fairly corrupt when it comes to urban planning (among other things, but especially urban planning). And a lot of the problems kicked up by Covid relate to that.

Independent businesses get **** all support from authorities most of the time, but some national plc that runs crap Christmas markets and the like will always be able to get planning permission, because they can afford to fund events at party conference and get in with the right people.

[tonyh29]

9 minutes ago, chrisp65 said:

Remember when Mabel used to come around the office at 10:30am with strong tea from an urn and a cheese n pickle sandwich wrapped in a kilo of cling film? 

OT , I used to do work at the MOD in Whitehall in the mid  90’s and they did still have a tea lady come around ... until that point I thought it was just something that only happened to shoe horn in jokes on British sitcoms 

[bickster]

53 minutes ago, chrisp65 said:

My property portfolio is taking a kicking.

I've said it from the off, this is exactly what it's about

Trouble is. really its business vs buisness and business does what it does. Bottom line is key

Those middle ranking buisnesses with big offices who now know their staff can be trusted to work from home. These are the businesses that generally "do something", they'll do whatever they have to to cut costs for the benefit of the shareholders. Smaller offices required, smaller offices it is.

On the other side you have the businesses that "generally do jack shit", the landlords, the owners of buildings. The types of business that do so little they even employ 2 estate agents to fill their floor space

Well there's sod all the second group can do. The first group can get by with smaller office space, the second group have to suck it up or get out. Result, office space reduces in price an extra win for thopse business in the first group that "do something".

Eventually the rents in the shops outside (or inside) the office complexes comes down, some of the office blocks get converted to accomodation (work for builders) and places to live for more people. More get demolished, more building for houses, more work for builders, more places for people to live

The smaller and medium buinesses might actually make more money in the long run. The landlords.... not so much

All that has a knock on in the housing market too in time

I hope it pans out that way. The property market needs it for the sake of the people

[Davkaus]

Less of a commute is good for commuter's mental health, good for commuters' wallets, and good for the environment. **** Pret and Starbucks. People will spend that money elsewhere and more jobs will be created.

[Xela]

4 minutes ago, Davkaus said:

Less of a commute is good for commuter's mental health, good for commuters' wallets, and good for the environment.

I'm definitely sleeping better and fee more content, most of the time. 

My waistline is expanding though! Least the office meant I actually was forced to walk a fair bit. Need to get myself out at lunchtime more and get my legs moving. 

[blandy]

21 minutes ago, bickster said:

Those middle ranking buisnesses with big offices who now know their staff can be trusted to work from home. These are the businesses that generally "do something", they'll do whatever they have to to cut costs for the benefit of the shareholders. Smaller offices required, smaller offices it is.

I think that's maybe a harder take than is necessarily the case.

I mean you say they'll do whatever to cut costs for the shareholders - yet at the same time, they're enabling the workforce to work from home. So you could strongly argue that in supporting their workforce, by adapting to the new situation, a side effect is no need for so much office space, and thus as a consequence the shareholders may benefit. or in short, both workforce and shareholders benefit. That's a good thing.

Generally, shareholders have been walloped by this virus as the stocks market plummeted and hasn't recovered. Unemployment will also rocket, I'd imagine, for those businesses that can't or won't adapt, which will again also depress the markets.

And then there's Brexit.

Fustercluck.

[bickster]

4 minutes ago, blandy said:

I think that's maybe a harder take than is necessarily the case.

I mean you say they'll do whatever to cut costs for the shareholders - yet at the same time, they're enabling the workforce to work from home. So you could strongly argue that in supporting their workforce, by adapting to the new situation, a side effect is no need for so much office space, and thus as a consequence the shareholders may benefit. or in short, both workforce and shareholders benefit. That's a good thing.

Generally, shareholders have been walloped by this virus as the stocks market plummeted and hasn't recovered. Unemployment will also rocket, I'd imagine, for those businesses that can't or won't adapt, which will again also depress the markets.

And then there's Brexit.

Fustercluck.

yes I agree to a degree, its a bit from column a and a bit from column b, both those things are going to drive the desire for smaller office space. Whichever way those businesses come to the decision, its the same decision and it benefits both staff and shareholders alike

[Demitri_C]

1 hour ago, Xela said:

I'm definitely sleeping better and fee more content, most of the time. 

My waistline is expanding though! Least the office meant I actually was forced to walk a fair bit. Need to get myself out at lunchtime more and get my legs moving. 

Yeah same with me.

Starting making more effort to get myself out at after 2pm when i finish work and do some exercise whether its gym or going for a run in the field or long walks.

[OutByEaster?]

I don't want to work from home. 

It's my home.

I like to work at work.

 

[bickster]

50 minutes ago, OutByEaster? said:

I don't want to work from home. 

It's my home.

I like to work at work.

 

Tory 

[chrisp65]

56 minutes ago, OutByEaster? said:

I don't want to work from home. 

It's my home.

I like to work at work.

 

I had to drive a 300 mile drive today because some dinosaur wasn’t comfortable with a TEAMS meeting.

Tomorrow, I’m staying home and joining a zoom meeting with people that have gone in to the office.

We need a flexible system. 

One size doesn’t fit all, it poorly fits the majority.

[Genie]

1 hour ago, OutByEaster? said:

I don't want to work from home. 

It's my home.

I like to work at work.

 

I’m fortunate to have a spare room that is now the office, I’m happy to leave work in there and keep the rest of my home as home. If I lived closer to work I’d probably get less benefit but I’m saving myself about 400miles a week (plus all the other financial and time improvements that go with that).

[mikeyp102]

59 minutes ago, Genie said:

I’m fortunate to have a spare room that is now the office, I’m happy to leave work in there and keep the rest of my home as home. If I lived closer to work I’d probably get less benefit but I’m saving myself about 400miles a week (plus all the other financial and time improvements that go with that).

Pretty much the same situation as me

[KenjiOgiwara]

10 hours ago, bickster said:

I've said it from the off, this is exactly what it's about

Trouble is. really its business vs buisness and business does what it does. Bottom line is key

Those middle ranking buisnesses with big offices who now know their staff can be trusted to work from home. These are the businesses that generally "do something", they'll do whatever they have to to cut costs for the benefit of the shareholders. Smaller offices required, smaller offices it is.

On the other side you have the businesses that "generally do jack shit", the landlords, the owners of buildings. The types of business that do so little they even employ 2 estate agents to fill their floor space

Well there's sod all the second group can do. The first group can get by with smaller office space, the second group have to suck it up or get out. Result, office space reduces in price an extra win for thopse business in the first group that "do something".

Eventually the rents in the shops outside (or inside) the office complexes comes down, some of the office blocks get converted to accomodation (work for builders) and places to live for more people. More get demolished, more building for houses, more work for builders, more places for people to live

The smaller and medium buinesses might actually make more money in the long run. The landlords.... not so much

All that has a knock on in the housing market too in time

I hope it pans out that way. The property market needs it for the sake of the people

I think I am struggling to understand your position here, but from a general point of view. If one is hoping a crash in the housing market, what happens to the millions of working people who have their entire life savings, pensions, all equites, locked in their housing investment. Loads of people are heavily leveraged. Hoping a crash in the housing market from idiologic reasons, will have absolutely massive consequences for everyone. Lives will be ruined, banks will go under etc. Hoping the housing market takes a fall for the sake of the people, is to me exactly what it's not. 

Maybe I completely misunderstood you, but I just think this is incredibly delicate. I can mostly speak of what I see here, as I don't know too much about what's going on in England, but what's needed here is;

1) stricter regulations in terms of how stuff is built. There are rules here about for instance how many 4 bed rooms apartments you should have relative to 2 bedroom apartments. Even if 2 bedroom apartments have a far higher pressure on them. There's some absurd rules about how much park areas should be around redevelopment projects, and now builders have gotten approvals that "play areas" can include the roofs of buildings. This kinda of madness is part of the problem to me. 

2) there's smart solutions where you can tax secondary apartments differently. Or you can require higher cash to loan ratios for those investing in secondary housing. Or lower for first time owners. 

3) You can promote governmental ownership with loan to buy solutions for people worse off. 

There's loads of stuff that can be done IMO rather than some drastic housing market reset button. Cause I can guarantee that is not the smart way to go about it.

Ofc the office/business market is different than housing, but I guess for obvious reasons, like area development, they tend to go hand in hand. 

[chrisp65]

There are two ways it can happen.

The people with the power, the money, the property can decide the system isn’t really that fair and we shouldn’t be making basic shelter such a rare and expensive commodity and we shouldn’t have people in a life of debt to live somewhere halfway decent. So they decide to give up their leverage over us all. They give something up.

In the crazy world where that somehow doesn’t happen, even though we know the money people are genuinely caring for us all, well then some sort of system shock is the next option.

All those people living in negative equity? It’s fake. Drawing down that pension to pay off the last of the mortgage? Fake. Happy to work an extra seven years so the mortgage can be an extra seven years long? Waiting for mum to die so the money in that property can help you pay for your property?

We are turning in to debt slaves for somewhere to live.

There are over one million planning approvals for new housing in the UK where the developer hasn’t then built those houses. Already, today, Imagine what a million extra homes would do to the price of property... It’s all a construct to keep people in debt and keep them well behaved.

[OutByEaster?]

3 hours ago, chrisp65 said:

The people with the power, the money, the property can decide the system isn’t really that fair and we shouldn’t be making basic shelter such a rare and expensive commodity and we shouldn’t have people in a life of debt to live somewhere halfway decent. So they decide to give up their leverage over us all. They give something up.

At the top of the tree, in terms of the fund managers and pension managers that are the worlds biggest homeowners, sadly the exact opposite is true - there are legal stipulations on fund managers that insist that they find the best value for the funds under their control regardless of its social effect. A pension fund manager who decides to "give something up" faces removal from the profession at best and the potential of criminal action at worst - the requirement under law is to get the best return on investment for the investor, even if it messes up the world in which the investor lives, and even if the investor isn't even aware that this is what their pension does. There's a real argument for the idea that your pension is the most evil thing you will ever do.

Quote

It’s all a construct to keep people in debt and keep them well behaved.

I think that's right, but it's also something else as well - it's somewhere for money to live - the value of the market economy so far outstrips the value of the physical economy now that on occasion the market has to build things in order to bring a justification of reality to the investment funds. It's not good building a million new homes if they're all owned by Blackstone and their only real purpose is to give a grounding to a funds balance sheet in order to give it leverage for percieved growth - there are an awful lot of properties in the UK where the people that live in them are almost incidental, it's the money that lives in them that's important.

 

 

[StefanAVFC]

12 hours ago, chrisp65 said:

I had to drive a 300 mile drive today because some dinosaur wasn’t comfortable with a TEAMS meeting.

Tomorrow, I’m staying home and joining a zoom meeting with people that have gone in to the office.

We need a flexible system. 

One size doesn’t fit all, it poorly fits the majority.

Bingo. We'll have a very flexible hybrid model moving forward. Those who want to be in the office can be, those who don't, occasionally. 

[bannedfromHandV]

14 hours ago, OutByEaster? said:

I don't want to work from home. 

It's my home.

I like to work at work.

 

Bang on, and it goes way beyond simply having distinction between home and the office.

I can say for sure my relationship with my girlfriend is being tested at the moment because we’re spending too much time around each other, being out of the house for 8 hours a day was our break from each other.

I get that for some people this new advent of home working is great because they’ve been asking for it for years but I think the affects on social relationships will be massive and will begin to become evident over the coming months.

Two of my friends have had relationships break down already this year.

We are a social species, locking ourselves in at home and seeing the same face(s) day after day will be a recipe for disaster in general.

[Seat68]

I have been in with my wife a long time. Usually after a 2 week holiday we are ready to kill each other. Not sure why but this period we have been pretty good. No fights, no falling out. Good. 

Now office/home. Negatively and Positively I am still working very long hours. I need to at the moment but if I was in the office I would only be able to work 7.30 till 5.30. Which on the dealing with exhaustion thing, thats great, but delivering a project, I would miss deadlines. Or I would drive back from Solihull, turn on my laptop and continue. Here I start early and finish at an OKish hour. 

[Follyfoot]

42 minutes ago, Seat68 said:

I have been in with my wife a long time. Usually after a 2 week holiday we are ready to kill each other. Not sure why but this period we have been pretty good. No fights, no falling out. Good. 

Now office/home. Negatively and Positively I am still working very long hours. I need to at the moment but if I was in the office I would only be able to work 7.30 till 5.30. Which on the dealing with exhaustion thing, thats great, but delivering a project, I would miss deadlines. Or I would drive back from Solihull, turn on my laptop and continue. Here I start early and finish at an OKish hour. 

Myself and grotbags have been 22 years virtually 24/7 with each other at work and home and the relationship has never been stronger