I reckon:

– lot less poncy coffee shops
– a big backlash against pension-guaranteed Public Sector employees
– a much more risk averse population
– British Bike brands looking cheap
– Less Benedorm, more Camping
– hopefully something more balanced where there is some level of job security: I reckon the whole reason for this mess is the get rich quick mentality driven by a feeling that you better make some money before you get laid off and end up stacking shelves at Tesco’s
– we’ll all work until we are vitually dead ‘cos (except those above) we’ll have no pensions, and will be bankrupted paying back what GB is borrowing at the moment and the pensions above

what else?

i recon environmental technology will catch on, given that a lot of stuff will need builing/rebuilding/investment after the slump legislation may as well take the oppertunityforce it to be better than it was before.

Ditto cars, recon people will downsize form 4×4’s etc and possibly by the time they can go back they will be prohibitively expensiven and/or all but outlawed by emmission regulation.

just a thought…………..

can anyone see a downside to caping engine size at say 2000cc?

you can build a 2000cc sports car, or a 2000cc 4×4, but it would kill off the big sports 4×4’s and other nonsence?

a big backlash against pension-guaranteed Public Sector employees

Aren’t public sector pensions noww much more inline with the private sector?

can anyone see a downside to caping engine size at say 2000cc?

Not me. It will not happen as HGV will need much bigger engines.
To be honest I cant really understand why manufacturers still produce cars that can go up to 200 MPH or go from 0 to 60 in 2 second, just complete non sense to me.

I think after a few years it’ll all go back to the way it was before. We’ve had recessions before and this is looking like the worst ever. I predict increased greed and people willing to take more risk.

‘Less Benedorm, more Camping’ – eh camping in the UK isn’t cheap. It’s as cheap to go abroad.

“Not me. It will not happen as HGV will need much bigger engines.
To be honest I cant really understand why manufacturers still produce cars that can go up to 200 MPH or go from 0 to 60 in 2 second, just complete non sense to me.”

Beacause they can.
Why make a supersonic airliner? Because they can.
Why make carbon fibre bikes with 6″ of suspension travel? Because they can.
Why sail across oceans to uncharted lands? Because they can.
Why master fire? Because they can.
Why leave the cave? Because they can.

’tis what humans do. We like, dare I say we need as a civilisation bigger/faster/further/higher/lighter/stronger/better, else we’d never “evolve” in the modern, technological sense and we’d all revert to the Dark Ages.
Unfortunately people also seemed hell-bent on “richer” and nothing else, hence why we’re in this mess.

i meant for cars, sorry, obviously 2l isn’t going to go very far in anything bigger than a transit.

Would bring back turbo lag though, imagine the big manufacturers making 2L V8’s with silly turbo’s and power, but still economical if driven at sensible speeds 🙂

Gary M is right IMO, greed caused this and most of the other recessions and unless we find a way to eradicate greed from human nature the cycle will begin again.

The only question is when will we reach the bottom and how bad will it get before then….

Yep – I agree with Gary, it will go back to the way it was. Evidence? Well given it was all based on borrowing before, and the plan seems to be to borrow our way out…

Oh, apart from the fact that some employers will use it as an excuse to get rid of some perks and benefits (I can see ours making the pension scheme worse again).

camping in the UK isn’t cheap. It’s as cheap to go abroad.

Where are you camping?

£15 – £20 a night to pitch a tent in a campsite. How is that more expensive than going abroad?

We’ve had recessions before and this is looking like the worst ever.

Worse than the Great Depression?

it won’t change as long as people can only see £ signs

depends if you’re going abroad ‘off season’ or not though bob. I should have said ‘can be as cheap’. We normally go camping in the UK for summer holiday, not this year though. The last 2 years have been terrible weather wise.

Camping is FREE at the Big Bike Bash in August*

Well, it is included in the ticket price

camping is free*

*if you’r cheeky and dont like camping in a field full of screeming kids, screeming teenagers, and screeming adults screeming at the screeming kids who were woken up by the screeming teenagers.

thisisnotaspoon – Do you scream a lot or have you just had bad camping experiences?

depends if you’re going abroad ‘off season’ or not though bob. I should have said ‘can be as cheap’. We normally go camping in the UK for summer holiday, not this year though. The last 2 years have been terrible weather wise.

Hmmm.

7 nights camping = £140 (And that’s per pitch, not per person)

7 nights self catering in Spain circa £300-400 per person

had some great camping, just not on official campsites, and not in the UK!

Good places to camp:
-halfway up a mountain, in the alps, in a 30 year old tent, on a steep grassy slope (no time to find a better place, and at least it wasnt going to turn into a stream) during a torrential thunderstorm.
-german forrest next door to army barraks

bad places to camp
-“family friendly” UK campsites.

sorry, wasnt refering to the bikefest, was talking about camping on campsites in general.

BoardinBob I really think you’re getting a bit too hung up on the camping thing. It was a throwaway comment and it’s not really the point of the discussion. You’re right, I’m wrong – can you leave it now.

Is this really the only input you can give to this thread – the cost of camping v. holidays abroad. There is a bigger issue being discussed.

can anyone see a downside to caping engine size at say 2000cc?

The vast majority of cars on the road have smaller engines, certainly me and most of the other high-mileage reps out there are running sub 2000cc diesels with low CO2 figure (’cause of company car tax…)

Somebody doing 30k a year in a 2000cc car will do more damage than somebody doing 5k a year in a Ferrari.

Also consider the environmental impact of making a car – far higher than its exhaust emmissions over its entire life. Ferraris and they’re like are generally much more likely to still be in use in 25 years time than a rep-mobile.

You may have guessed, I like cars.

It would be good if the credit cruch thingy stopped people flying so much!

Ouch, i just typed ‘they’re’ instead of ‘their’ – sorry!

When the dust settles all that will be left will be, Supermarkets and Mail order…. no change in my shopping habits then!

can anyone see a downside to caping engine size at say 2000cc?

it is utterly pointless. heres some 10-15 year old ferraris
http://www.pistonheads.co.uk/sales/list.asp?s=192
notice they have around 30k miles on the clock??

heres some old Volvos of a similar age
http://www.pistonheads.co.uk/sales/list.asp?s=457
notice they have around 100-200k miles on the clock

whats doing more damage to the environment over its lifetime?

If cars were used solely for leisure there probably wouldn’t be all the problems with congestion and pollution. Its routine commuting, popping down the shops etc.. that needs to be stopped.

Oh yes I can see that making small engined cars is pointless and obviously everyone drives a maximum of 5 miles.
How many times do you see on here people complaining about driving 200 miles a day to work and back?
With luck there’ll be a shake up in employment patterns and people will stop doing this and companies will stop expecting their employees to travel so far as a matter of course.

There will be cut backs for a while then slowly everyone will forget, house prices will go through the roof again and then there will be a crash.

Not sure some politician will be calling the end of boom and bust for a while though.

– a big backlash against pension-guaranteed Public Sector employees

This really does p*** me off. Why turn against public sector employees when our current economic problems have been triggered by the money-grabbing selfish capitalists in the financial sector? Rapid economic growth = massive increases in salaries and bonuses for city executives–but the last time I checked those benefits didn’t get anywhere near the public sector. Public sector employees work very hard knowing that they will never get the same rewards as–in my case–a lot of those who left university at the same time. The flip side is that when things go belly up they are (hopefully) insulated from some of the immediate effects of recession. No one in the public sector made a fortune out of economic growth; the credit crunch started elsewhere. If you’re going to lashback against anyone, at least pick the right target.

You know how it goes though – they spit on you when times are good because you’re not out there having a good time, then when times are bad and they’re having a rubbish time they hate you because life has just continued on the same where you are 🙂

I agree with those two… ^^^^^^^^^^

And where is the public funding that would have gone to the nhs, education, transport, research etc going? That’s right, you guessed it, prats like the author of this thread who borrowed too much, saved too little, took the big pay and bonuses of the private sector, and then cried to uncle Gordon when it all went pete tongue because of their greed….

Perhaps after all this, we’ll get a few less of them….

When you compare like for like salaries using the mean average, public sector workers get paid less.
If you use the median average, public sectors get paid more.

The mean is distorted by the few people at the top in private industry making millions.

Would bring back turbo lag though

There is barely no turbo lag in modern cars – my 2.0l turbo has torque and power straight from tick-over speeds.

Not sure some politician will be calling the end of boom and bust for a while though.

At least not until they all forget the lessons of history again

I think the small local shops (like butchers, etc) will probably suffer the most – and quietly too. People are more likely to bulk buy at the supermarket (especially now fuel prices are dropping again) and so local shops will have an even more disproportionate customer base of elderly folk, who will be watching their pennies even more. That paired with the banks withdrawing bank loans and overdrafts (very necessary for most small businesses to function), and energy bills and business rates increasing will result in many small local shops being squeezed out of the market. Pretty sad. Even sadder is that it is happening to pubs too! Especially the more rural ones, same price increases and squeezing from banks paired with less people going out for a pub meal or pint. To put it in context, in the west Midlands, three pubs are closing a week due to the economic climate…

It’s not all about stocks and cars…

There’s nothing wrong with my 2.2 Verso.

It’s pretty good as far as CO2 emissions go.

I reckon everyone will come round to my house and we’ll go biking. Then I’ll make a cake and we’ll eat it with a nice cup of tea. Then beer, obviously.

But seriously, most of what everyone else said, and I’m sorry but the public sector people I know are paid more, never seem to suffer any rounds of redundancies (and some of them are *dire*) and still won’t stop whinging!

I reckon we’ll be bust pensions-wise and the govt of the day (whoever, they’re all as bad as each other) will be forced to do something. Most probably up everyone else’s taxes to cover it!

Nobody will say things like “my property is my pension” or “you can’t go wrong with bricks and mortar”

Houses will be for living in…not for investment.

I think a lot of discount retailers (like empire direct) working on small margins will fold (like empire direct). In a year or two there will be less competiton on the high street and those left will milk us for some nice big profit margins as soon as there is any upturn.

Will there still be some decent Claret on the market? I think so. Problems over.

We’ll forget about all this environment crap. That’s about it.

I REALLY WOULD LIKE TO SEE THE END OF ‘ RIP OFF BRITAIN’