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How is the economy affecting you.

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daywane:
work 2 or 3 weeks then plant shut down for 8 to 10 working days.
At first we were allowed to use vacation days for the shut down but not now.
It makes it harder to pay bills on time.
I am paid weekly
Unemployment pays Bi Weekly
and first week back no paycheck.
I worked all last week, all this week and next week then off 10 working days.
So this time around is a good one.
3 pay checks to stock up before the dry spell.
My gas bill for the car is Way down
Food not a real problem. I am a hunter and froze 3 deer this year
also heat with wood so I guess we are OK just big life style changes
I saw this coming and prepaired.
I work in the Auto Industry.
I kept tabs on all the lay offs in auto, also uper-managment was dropping like flies and not replaced.
That's when I put in the baby bear wood stove, and really started watching the deer trails. Big massive garden this spring
Maybe as big a 1 acre.

knave:

--- Quote from: JMB on March 11, 2009, 04:36:22 pm ---On the plus side with my 401k tanking and my home value dropping I will have to give my cheating wh@re wife less in the divorce.  Got to love living in a no fault state.  :angry:

--- End quote ---

I know what you mean bro.   :-\

pinballwizard79:
I formerly worked in lending up until apx 2 years ago.

Now I work in the Fire, Burglary, CCTV &  card access industry. Quite a contrast yes but I calculated my move for a reason. This industry is not immune but more more "rescission resilient" than others. When times are good we focus on new construction residential & commercial locations. When times are bad we slow down but the market shifts to existing residential/commercial locations. The worse the economy gets the more stores/houses get robbed & as insurance continues to rise so does the ROI on fire protection.

The GF is a buyer & forecaster analyst. Needless to say she isn't forecasting much these days & we do worry for her job but her role is important as it would suck if they let her go & bought a billion dollars of copper & spent 7 million dollars a year to warehouse it.

Honestly I think the worst is far from being over for the wealthy. The common folk will return to normal far sooner as again we "shift" models. Rather than working in a slate tile factory we will work in linoleum factories. Instead of working as a union employee @ GMC we will see TATA Motors open factories here & etc.

You do know the American auto companies are using our bailout money to open foreign factories right?

Many US cars are made in Canada & Mexico now, soon to be Brazil........tell the US auto companies to shut down the Mexican/Canadian factories & halt building efforts on new foreign factories & focus on employing US citizens, maybe that will work.

Level42:

--- Quote from: pinballwizard79 on March 11, 2009, 07:09:32 pm ---Many US cars are made in Canada & Mexico now, soon to be Brazil........tell the US auto companies to shut down the Mexican/Canadian factories & halt building efforts on new foreign factories & focus on employing US citizens, maybe that will work.

--- End quote ---
Protectionism never works.

I'm in the same business, fire alarms. Boss told us at x-mas time 2008 that seeing the orders they had at that moment for 2009, it would _already_ be a better year than 2008....

We are dragging along. Construction plans that are now finishing up (we're usually in the last phase of a project) were planned at least 2/3 years ago. So I expect that we get the dip much later.

Talked with my boss on the phone last week and he told me he was going nuts because his desk was full of requests for prices on projects.... :dunno

I think the reason might be that we, as a rather small company, are usually cheaper than the big one's. So, for the projects that are going on, price is more than ever an important factor.
We do have to see if the big one's will start a price war...let's hope not.

Even if we had no new projects at all, we can still keep afloat on the amount of work in periodic inspection and maintenance. We gathered so many new customers over the last 4 years even when some will go bust we still have a pretty large base.

Then again, I've been through a couple of bad times. I've worked for a company that went bankrupt and at I was a victim of the "internet bubble burst" when I worked in the IT business. I always managed to get a new job very soon and I'm not overly worried.

I do expect a salary increase. I got a diploma so I am now officially allowed to design fire alarms and we made agreed on a rise when I would succeed in getting the diploma.

We are actually still looking for new employees.

RayB:
I'm Canadian. None of our banks have failed. We're still affected of course, but it's more of an indirect and delayed after-effect from what the US is experiencing. Exports and tourism are down. Home values have reversed in some of the more inflated areas (Vancouver) but nothing drastic. Elsewhere home values have plateaued. Some are predicting 20% decrease over next year or two. Jobs are being shed, but again, not as bad as in the US.

As for auto companies, quit your whining. There aren't that many plants here, and the auto makers are asking our government for bailout cash too. *We're* worried they'll just take it and close down the plants anyways, so the Americans can have the jobs!

I've lost about $2k from my RRSP (a retirement investment fund), but interest rate cuts have seen me pay about $200 less each month on my mortgage. Yay!

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