Written by Schon Condon in April, 2010

As 2010 begins to further unfold the country continues to bask in the burgeoning prosperity of a growing and blossoming economy.

It’s funny but around this time last year at a presentation I was doing I had suggested that the then current crisis would be over by June next year.  As some may know I’m sometimes known for my frank understanding of the downsides of commercial life but in this instance it was quite surprising that a great number of people in the audience became quite vocal about my optimism, and it was not cries of support and pride but rather that I had not really come to the appreciation of the severity of the situation.

Recently I received a collection of classic photos relating to significant moments in history, one of the photos was of a woman and her family taken during the great depression, her name was Florence Owens Thompson, a 32 year old mother of 7.  She had just sold the family tent to provide food for her children.  The other statistics (which I suspect are American) contained with the photo are also enlightening:-

• Stocks fell by 40%
• 9,000 banks went out of business
• 9,000,000 savings accounts were wiped out wages decreased by 60%
• 15,000,000 were made jobless, and
• It effectively lasted from 1929 to 1939.

The jobless figure then was 12.3 percent of the WHOLE US population, with the current GFC the US is currently at 10.4 percent of their EMPLOYABLE population.  Figures and stories such as this do a lot to help us put things into a real perspective between then and now.  Mind you conversations that I have had with many from overseas, particularly parts of the US and Europe confirm that we do not really appreciate the state of affairs in these countries.

By virtue of the lesser impact that this country has had from the GFC we must well appreciate that we in this country are well removed from things overseas.

So given the above, was it really a crisis?  It will be interesting to see how we march forward; again interest rates are mooted to be increased again, with discussions in certain quarters seeking overall increases of potentially 2 percent.  If this is the case we may well yet be approaching our real crisis and let’s hope people have or are planning for these potential occurrences.

Also this month we get some interesting feed back from one our young staff who has recently returned from an overseas deployment with the Australian Army Reserve, the experience of three months in Malaysia, but I shall let Nathan tell his own story.

In closing I would also like to welcome Nathan Adams to the team who joins us to assist with the further development of our existing services and enhancing our Business Development team.

Enjoy the read!