I have heard many things about the state of Great Britain's economy. What do you Brits have to say about it?

You should place Nick Griffin in charge, and things will take care of themselves.

Well in London the economy is not quite out of the woods just yet, and the recent declaration that the UK is no longer in recession has yet to compute in real tangible examples...one only has to look at the job vacancies in London to see that Companies of all sizes are still not expanding their numbers of staff. Certainly the sector i work in (TV broadcasting/Media) is still tightening its collective belt.

One week they say we are recession free. Then there will be an article in the Daily Mail about how investement bankers are now making a lot of money and getting big bonuses and blowing it on lavish dinners (which I thought would be good since they are pumping money back into the system, how kind of them).
But then the following week we will be even deeper in the recession.

I am not an economist and have been a bit slack on the news lately so I am a bit behind on what is going on.

everythings fixed, just waiting for people to start spending again.

Perhaps we should let MP expenses go unchecked. They seemed quite keen to spend money.

Recession is still in full swing pretty much, there is growth in some sectors (IE in London) but across the country we are still pretty much in the pan.

^This
"out of reccession" just means that the rich who became less rich in the recessi9on are richer again. Meanwhile the working class are seeing very little of this recovery.
To be fair to the government, it is only in small pockets where we've felt the full force of the depression that was predicted however these areas tended to be ones that relied on one large employer in the community that has gone as a result of the recession or were poor areas anyway.

Mebbe you should let some members of parliament get real jobs? That ought to do something for the economy, at the very least you could return those salaries to the treasury for use of propping up your shambles of a health care system.

Giving MPs jobs outside of parliament is the equivalent of spitting at a bonfire in order to put it out.

Oh and stop watching Fox for information about the NHS.

Still a recession from what i read. GNP is still dropping.

Edit: I am not a brit

Despite what you might read, this recession hasn't been anywhere near as bad as the 70's or the 80's.

Yes I have heard THAT was very bad. Interesting responses. I have heard a lot about how terrible the rest of the world is doing and how if America goes under we will drag everyone with us. Hopefully not.

So you guys have much the same problem with them bankers eh? lavishing money on private jets etc. Well, I guess evil is the same all over. It just comes in different accents

The government/media were all predicting that the recession would be over by now, so figures last week showing that were still in recession -- making it the longest recession since the 50s -- came as a bit of a shock. But even if the UK does come out of the recession it will be extremely fragile, and many economists are suggesting that we could have a 'double dip' recession, or collapse into Japanese style stagnation -- though they don't get much of a public airing for fear of creating a self-fulfilling prophecy; even though the chief BBC economist (if I recall) predicts the former.

Of course, this is all on paper; when it comes to people's lives, even if things improve, we are yet to see the worst of it. Unemployment may rise as high as 4 million (significantly higher than in the 80s) and social budgets will be slashed across the board (both to reduce the deficit and on ideological grounds once the Tories get in). Already the working classes are beginning to strike (more notably postmen and binmen) and the middle classes are beginning to complain about their benefits being cut (formerly universal benefits will become means tested, which in turn will weaken their support and make it easier for the Tories to dismantle them altogether).

So even if the economy recovers as the government predicts (and has been predicting every month for a year) those of us who got screwed by the economy as opposed to screwing it up are unlikely to have many good times as a result. The rich get richer, the poor get poorer.

In theory, everything was in place to take us out of recession by the start of this year. But it hasn't happened yet.


Also, none of the main parties are willing introduce any meaningful regulation for the banks either, which is idiotic considering an unregulated banking sector is what got us into this mess in the first place. It is as if the window frame was put in without the glass.

Effective bank regulation needs to be across national boundaries, and quite frankly the G20 seems to be dragging its feet on good bank regulation. But I get most of my information on that from Baseline Scenario, which tends to be bit pessimistic.

Not in Great Britain, but I know a little bit about where things are there. They're in essentially the same jobless recovery most other western nations are in at the moment. They've likely stabilized in terms of quarterly GDP, but don't expect that to help the average working folks.

The new government is looking to cut down on government spending after some rather serious threats from S&P and others regarding their fiscal future. That will probably kill off chances at any further economic stimulus coming from London. The real problem looking forward for Britain is the fact that the IMF is basically saying that the NHS will need some big changes to keep from runaway debts in the future. That could take the form of pay-for-service, increased taxation, raising the retirement age, cutting benefits, or some combination.

Yeah that sounds spot on to me , particularly the reduction of spending in the public sector especially once the Tories come to power (If they come into power, alot can happen between now and the general election). But if London with its concentration of wealth and resources is suffering from a lack of job opportunities i can but only imagine how bad the situation is in other areas of the UK.