Comment on Google confirms it just laid off around a thousand employees

• qyron@sopuli.xyz ⁨10⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  Good morning.

  Let’s call that example the canary in the mine but I’m seeing many similar situations where I live.

  Being in a less than urban area, there is still a bit of industry around and some factories are cutting staff and a few have already shut down operations, especially in sectors more closely related with end user products (clothing, footwear, yarn, etc). Industries with ties to industrial use (metal working, construction materials, wood and derivates) are keeping afloat but only replacing workers that go into retirement or that for some reason or another just quit, and these industries, in my understanding, are keeping afloat because of the hard push into more sustainable and efficient houses, which is forcing a good deal of public investment into large renovation projects and funds.

  Parallel to this, bakeries, coffee shops, small businesses that rely on consumption, are shutting down. For me, this implies there is less money floating around.

  Paired with the hike in housing…

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  • coffeetest@beehaw.org ⁨10⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    Thanks for your observations and I won’t argue them. The problem with a word like recession is that we’re in what I see as, the poor get poorer, the rich get richer. The middle class, what’s left of it, is mainly moving toward being poor. That said, the “smart” economy people will say “we are not in a recession and in fact the economy is good.” And it is good, very good in fact - for the privileged. Wealth inequality is the issue, at least in my view.

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    • KevonLooney@lemm.ee ⁨10⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

      Exactly. This person is noticing a local recession and believes the entire world is like their small town. It isn’t.

      Recessions have causes and “housing expensive” is not a cause. In a recession everyone loses, not just “some factory workers” or “people who rent”. This person is describing the effects of situational unemployment, which can hurt small towns reliant on only one industry.

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      • maynarkh@feddit.nl ⁨10⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

        Anecdotally, I know some people working in a paper mill who make essential materials for the world’s sticker tags, you know, the things that get put on absolutely anything and everything that gets shipped or sold everywhere globally. This factory is one of a very few globally in this ultra-niche industry.

        They said that the KYC they are doing now shows their clients globally overstating their manufacturing since the pandemic by a lot. Somehow, everyone has lost 20-40% of their turnover while producing the same financial results. I know this is multiple layers of trust me bro stuff, but still.

        There is a lot of pressure and lies in the global economy right now, more than usual. I don’t think we ever recovered from the “pandemic downturn”, which actually was much more than just the pandemic, it was war, it was idiocy, it was much more things at the same time.

        I guess what I’m saying is that the economy is not well, it has never been well, and people keep lying. The US was never in a recession if you listen to the White House, only if you listen to your eyes looking at the actual numbers.

        And I’m saying this as someone who is not interested in more chaos, quite the opposite.

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