The Economy

When it comes to the recession, people like to think that we might be through the worst of it. I beg to differ.

Part of the reason that I say this is that everything right now is about discounting. Businesses are seem to be so desperate to generate any kind of revenue they can (which makes sense as revenue is like oxygen) that they are willing to discount their wares all over the place.

To see this, look no further than your television set. Watch any U.S. based channel and I find it so noticeable, you couldn't miss it if you tried. You can even mute your TV and notice it.

Go to the newspaper and see what kinds of flyers or coupons you're getting . Today I saw some crazy coupons for Denny's (not even sure where there is one near me in Ottawa) that promised a free entree with purchase of two. Ten dollars off a bill over $30... and many more which seem to knock the price of a Denny's outing for a few people by about 30 percent.

The problem is that people are tapped. Those people who are working, are probably taking pay cuts, work reductions and unpaid leave.

Those who aren't working, and there are many people out there, aren't going to be getting jobs too quickly. I read some recent figures that show while employment will increase in the next few months, companies will be adding headcount slowly.

I think the big concern is that we are not going to have a big fourth quarter... which is when most companies make all of their money or profit for any given year. The holiday shopping season will be flat or significantly lower than last year's and this, I believe, is going to cause a massive dip in economic output from Q1 through Q3 next year.

I'd like to believe we have seen the worse yet but I'm just finding it hard given the hard economic numbers I'm seeing and the sheer volume of discounting on behalf of marketing managers everywhere...

Buckle up.