Periscopes at The New York Times and Business Week offer worth-reading insights into economic climate of 2009.
Following on my comments yesterday, it’s good to see Lou Uchitelle’s round up of economists views in The Times.
He makes reference to a psychological factor, quoting Yale economist Robert J Shiller saying, “‘If we have mass “If we have massive infrastructure spending and people feel that it is working, it could create a sense that we are O.K. and people will go back to normal,’ he said. ‘The real problem is that we are on hold. Everyone is’.”
Uchitelle later brings in thoughts from Martin Regalia, chief economist at the United States Chamber of Commerce.
Regalia talks about the resilient American consumer — I can remember President Eisenhower talking about this country’s consumer as the power behind the post-war activity that did not dip into protracted recession. Regalia presents the consumers as wanting to work, to earn and to spend. ” ‘They lick their wounds and with some help from government, they start back again and we come out of this quickly’,” he says in the Times.
Business Week — after forecasting that the Times itself will be rescued and transformed into a not-for-profit organization — forecasts that restless, unemployed “will turn creative about job opportunities. Look for freelancing and small business applications to explode as laid off workers attempt to strike out on their own.
I take today’s stories as another validation that we can expects passive consumers to take a much more active role in their future, unleashing all kinds of entrepreneurial energy. I personally think they will be very savvy about marketing communications, employing it and technology to help their businesses, and in some cases they themselves will be outsourced communications resources for others to use.
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Photo by Marco Gomes http://www.flickr.com/people/marcogomes/
