Do Small Businesses Require More Help?

In this time of economic problems many small businesses appear to be suffering badly and some have as a result failed, leaving the owners financially bankrupt. I experienced this a couple of years ago and it has taken until now for me to recover and to start considering where to go from here.

One of the issues was that I did not have the expertise to identify the problems that I was facing nor have the skills or ability to deal with them. When times are hard, those who are not as business savvy as perhaps they should be, are almost certainly the first to suffer as a consequence.

It is often quite easy when looking back on the events to identify what the reasons were that caused things to go wrong; however at the time they remained hidden. Many small businesses in this situation often find themselves up against a financial wall, where they need cash to resolve their problems but are unable to get it and suffer as a result.

Over the years the government and other bodies have formed local business support groups which are intended to help out those that face difficulties and need the advice that is available. Many of these organisations however, focus on the larger small business, those employing ten people or more and ignore or do not have time to assist the many one man outfits that are normally the first to be hit hardest.

I tried Business Link, the Chamber of Commerce and some other organisations but got little in the way of help without spending cash I did not have. Now over two years later I realise that my problems were caused because I allowed my business to deteriorate slowly in the year or so before the failure occurred. I failed to ensure that my business was strong and robust and could weather bad conditions if and when they occurred.

Today operating a small business is very hard especially when economic pressures are being applied. I identified some years ago a concept called Mentor Power, which called upon groups of local small business people to create formal relationships together to assist each other in strengthening their businesses and enabling them to grow in size, turnover and profit. The obvious advantage was that the knowledge, skills and experiences of say ten business owners working together would provide a much stronger management input for all the businesses involved.

When we consider this, we realise that it is far too easy to remain detached from what others are doing and to isolate ourselves to such an extent that eventually we find that we are facing problems that are almost impossible to resolve or live through.

As a result of my experiences I am now looking at Mentor Power again to see if it is a viable business model and if it will provide the support and encouragement that small business owners need in the current and future economic environment. As part of this process I have been looking at other organisations that provide help to small businesses and although generally disappointed I am encouraged by the appearance of a new organisation called The National Alliance of Business Owners which started earlier this year and has grown substantially since. One of the great things about it is that they provide a monthly printed newsletter called Business Success which is mailed to every member. This magazine is full of great ideas and is extremely well presented and worth reading. In addition every member gets to attend a free seminar called ‘How to explode Your Business Profits’ which is held in various locations around the country.

Perhaps the greatest advantage is that membership is currently free to anyone who wishes to join.

Finally it only remains for me to sum up what I’ve already said in a single sentence:-

“If you are a small business then do whatever it takes to grow it so that in the event of economic downturn you survive!”

Regards

Jim

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Disabled, To Be or Not to Be!

A few days ago we had need to go to our local supermarket so that my wife could pick up some essential supplies for our evening meal. It had been a long hot day and I was tired and not really in the mood for fighting my way through the hordes of shoppers so I elected to remain in the car while my wife did the shopping.

By chance I had parked facing the bay full of disabled parking spaces. I would have to wait for about twenty minutes or so for my wife to return. After a minute or so a car pulled into one of the disabled bays and a young woman jumped out and ran into the store. She did not appear to be disabled in anyway but to be fair she did have a disabled sticker in her car window.

This woman started me thinking about the whole issue of disability and the fact that it seems that today, normal white people are probably discriminated against more than any other group. Now I’m not having a go at disabled or coloured people in any way, I know people in both groups and have the greatest respect for them.

After about five minutes the young woman re-appeared, still running, carrying a packet of cigarettes. She jumped into her car, put in reverse and drove away. Not very disabled I thought! Of course it is not my job to judge other is it?

Then to my surprise, another car pulled into the same bay. After a few moments another more elderly woman got out, locked the car and walked briskly into the supermarket. This made me focus more on what was happening in the disabled parking bay.

I got out of my car and walked over to a bench beside the bay where I could watch what was going on more closely. All the vehicles seemed to be displaying disability badges. Within a few minutes a gentleman, about 50’ish, pushed his trolley up to the back of a large BMW 4x4, and proceeded to load his shopping into the back. He left the trolled beside his car, got in and drove away.

“Well” I though, “he could have put the trolley back.” He did not seem to be disabled in any way either!

The time was moving on and I was expecting my wife to reappear. Another woman returned to her car, loaded it and got in and drove away. She did not look disabled either. I could not believe what I was seeing. The only movements in the disabled parking bay appeared to have perfectly healthy drivers.

After nearly thirty minutes had passed a rather old van appeared and drove slowly into one of the empty spaces. It was sporting a disabled badge just like the others. An old man struggled to get out of the driving seat and was having trouble standing up. I could not help myself - I quickly jumped up and walked the few feet to assist him. At last, someone who was genuinely disabled I thought.

He thanked me, but then added that it was not him who was disabled, but his wife in the wheelchair in the back of the van. He would not allow me to help him extract her via a hydraulic lift to the ground saying “When I can’t unload her, I’ll have to stop driving”. He then added “If it was just me I’d have parked in a normal space!” and chuckled.

We all laughed!

My wife then returned and as we drove away I wondered how many non disabled people who had disability badges for other members of their family always parked in a disabled bay when no disabled person was aboard! It is just not right!

“Jim!” my wife said, bringing me back to the moment, “You are naughty … fancy parking in a families only bay, next you’ll be parking in the disabled bay!”

Hmmm … Who am I to talk?

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Should Everyone Be Entitled to Benefits?

In the UK we are faced with a huge deficit which mounts to thousands of pounds for every man, woman and child in the country. Irrespective of how we got to this situation and irrespective of who might be to blame, we are all obligated to do our bit to help reduce that sum.

Now some people can afford to contribute more than others, while others really cannot afford to contribute anything. The new government says that we must get rid of waste and cut back on all services which are not essential. Whatever the arguments are and whoever puts them forward, many will not want to contribute and will continue to do the opposite and milk the system.

Why should people who have family income exceeding say £40,000 per annum receive Child Benefit or Family Tax credits, while there are many pensioners who live on less than £150 per week and get nothing!

I don’t wish to go into the rights and wrongs of this but instead I want to pick up on a point that the Chancellor made during his recent emergency budget speech.

He spoke about the issue of Child Benefit and whether it was right that all should receive it irrespective of their financial position. He said that restricting who received child benefit would result in a huge cost to setup and administer and therefore was not viable. Interestingly we still pay the huge operational costs of the administration of over 100 other benefits. Thousands of people get benefits that they are not really entitled to and thousands do not receive benefits they should get.

Is it not about time that we changed all this?

How about this for an idea?

Create a completely new benefit system to replace the existing worn out system. It would be simplified and centralised and would control and distributes all benefits to all people. Each person who wishes to participate would go online (or be assisted by a local benefit office) and complete a detailed benefit registration. Any medical report would be provided by the doctor, again online and a complete record built up of the applicant’s situation. Housing benefit would be paid depending upon how many children you have and where you live and subjected to a maximum amount per week. All other benefits could be taken into consideration.

Once this had been done, the applicant would be informed about the level of benefit they are entitled to, if any. The amount due would credited to their bank account each week or month. More importantly each claimant would receive a plastic card with their photo and basic details on. This card would have a star rating of 1 to 3 stars and depending upon the rating would indicate what additional benefits they could get. For example if they have three stars they get free travel on public transport at any time and they might get prescription charges paid in full. If they have a two star card, then they get these things at 50% discount, or a one star at 25% discount.

The advantage of such a scheme is that there is better control; individuals get what they are entitled to without having to make dozens of different claims and fill out dozens of different forms, many with the same information. Tax and earnings information should be reported weekly or monthly instead of annually and the details kept against the person records.

Yes you might think this is complex, but look at the current DVLC vehicle licensing system, you can do it all online and they already know if you have a valid driving license, motor insurance and MOT certificate if required.

I always thought that the ID card system was a great idea, after all - anyone who does not have anything to hide should have no objection to such a system. We live in a complex world and whether we like it or not there has to be some controls. People who argue that it is not right that our personal details be recorded are actually living in cloud cuckoo land.

Our information is recorded everywhere!

Why not have a system where the information is kept centrally and the relevant information is made available only to those who are licensed to see it. Even things like our fingerprints, DNA and photographs should be recorded for every person in the country. It would help reduce crime dramatically!

Yes I know that people would abuse the system, avoid being on the database and try and forge information, but this already happens in a huge way with all the various database and systems currently being used.

What do you think?

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Should We Freely Pay Benefits?

The new coalition government is concerned about all those people who receive benefits of various kinds every week when perhaps they are not really entitled to them.

We all know that sometimes things happen in our lives which results in our needing help to manage financially. Perhaps that is because we have lost our job and can no longer afford to support our family. Perhaps it is because we have become ill and unable to work until we are better. Maybe we are disabled and unable to work at all. There are lots of reasons and most of them are legitimate and the vast majority of claimants satisfy the rules to obtain the help they need.

However, there is apparently a group of people who have not worked for years and do nothing to find employment and as a result are a financial drain on society. I don’t wish to make judgements against anyone but I wonder if it is time that we become a little firmer on those who abuse the system and do not really try to find employment.

We have well over a million people legitimately receiving job seekers allowance. To receive that benefit each one has to be making an effort to find employment, and each fortnight they are required to show some evidence of their efforts if they wish to receive their jobseekers allowance.

I have to stress here that I am well aware of the issues about how difficult it is to get a job at the moment so I am not criticising anyone who is getting benefits.

Is it not about time that everyone who is unemployed, for whatever reason, should be required to contribute back in some small way.

For example, where I live there are miles of back alleys, strewn with rubbish, over grown with brambles and weeds and as a result a hazard to people who use them. Having spoken to the local council about this problem they told me that it was not their responsibility but that of the home owners on the estate. It appears that although these alleys are public rights of way, they are not the responsibility of the council to keep them safe and clear of rubbish.

A further issue is that on many of our estates and residential areas the level of graffiti seems to be on the increase again. This is an eyesore, devaluing the properties in the area, destroying community pride and needs addressing. Again local authorities do their best but because of limited funding there is only so much they can do.

Councils try and keep roads swept and grass areas cut but the quality of the finished work is never very good. My road is swept probably twice a year, I try and pick up litter off of the grassed areas but it soon reappears. The council would need an army of people to maintain these areas properly.

Pot holes are another issue! Condition of pavements yet another, and I could go on and on. There are probably hundreds of other areas and issues which do not get any real attention because funding is not available that could benefit from some help.

The point I am getting too is this.

Why not introduce regulations which requires all people claiming benefit, and who are able, to carry out (say) six hours of voluntary work for the local council on some of the issues described above. I’m sure that those who genuinely are unemployed would welcome the chance to contribute something back to society, to feel part of the community and enjoy the opportunity to work. Doing these tasks would improve our environment as they are not being done at the moment, and without anyone’s job being put at risk.

This may be extended to doing some voluntary work for local charities, play groups, schools or even commercial enterprises - as long as it does not take jobs away from others. A bonus might be that individuals are spotted as being good at what they are doing and might be a useful addition to the permanent workforce.

What do you think?
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The War in Afghanistan – Is it Right?

Another four British soldiers have died as a result of our presence in Afghanistan, a total of 18 this month so far making a total since 2001 of 307. Once again this begs the question about the validity of us being involved in this so called terrorist war.

The argument proffered that we need to be there to eradicate the terrorists who are responsible for attacks against our people here in the UK is not as strong as it sounds.

The major reason why these groups of people are a threat to us - is that we are a threat to them!

Do they attack us because we threaten them?

If we pulled out and avoided any further conflict with these people - instead offering to meet and discuss with them what their grievances really are, perhaps the threat to us would be removed and we can help them resolve their issues with the rest of the world and their own people.

I know that everyone says that we cannot be pushed around by these people, we cannot and will not tolerate terrorism but perhaps we need to stop and think and way up the real costs of our actions.

When I was a child, I was always having my school cap taken and spent half my play time chasing after those who had taken it. This went on for months and became quite stressful. Eventually one of my teachers took me aside and said to me ‘Let them have it. Stop chasing them ... they will soon get fed up and go and irritate someone else!’

How true those words were. My cap was duly returned by one of the culprits and they quickly understood that I (and no one else) would pay them any attention to what they were doing. They eventually gave up.

Like all things in life there is a cost. So far there has been a huge financial cost to us being in Afghanistan, the loss of 307 lives, over 3,000 injured plus the huge amount of stress to both our soldiers and their families and friends. What is the maximum price we as a country are prepared to pay!

It would be easy to say that what we do is what we have to do. But there are hundreds of countries across the world that do not get involved and as a result are not really affected by these events. Of course it could be argued that if every country in the world put in say 1,000 troops then the problem could have been resolved years ago and the loss of life would be spread and long past.

But I suppose at the end of the day we are not called Great Britain for nothing! We have to get involved even if it is at a cost which we really cannot afford. I’m not against us trying to resolve the whole issue of terrorism and subjecting our people to threats, I just question the way we are going about it!

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Retiring at 66, 67 or even 70 plus?

Over the last few days we have been hearing a lot about the proposed changes to the retirement age. For men that is likely to start going up from 2016 to 66 and then progressively until the age of 70 or even later.

The issue I have is that the idea is fine, as it does save the taxpayer a huge amount of money, but only if there is sufficient jobs available.

Currently the National Office of Statistics reports that 28.86 million people are in work. If we assume that the average person works from the age of 20 to 65, a total of 45 years, then one extra year represents a lengthening of the average working life by 2.22%.

Not much you might say, but that represents over 600,000 extra jobs required each year for each year the pensionable age is increased.

We already have 2.47 million people unemployed with 1.48 million on unemployment benefit looking for work. The number of people unemployed for more than twelve months increased by 85,000 over the last quarter to reach 772,000, the highest figure since the three months to April 1997.

It is reported that during the three months up until May 2010 there was a total of 492,000 vacancies. That is 5.2 unemployed people per vacancy.

If we introduce a further 600,000 jobs required by raising the retirement age, what will that achieve short of increasing the number on unemployment benefit by a huge amount. Of course the current benefit paid to the unemployed (£64.30) is a lot less than that paid as pension (£95.25) ... so the tax payer will save money (£30.95), which is around £1 billion per year.

My other concern is that if people retire at 66, 67 or later then there will be a number of years when very few people will retire and vacate their jobs. These vacated jobs make way for others to be promoted, effectively shuffling everyone one up the employment ladder, perhaps allowing them to earn a little more money, and save a little more for their non state (and state) pension.

This shuffling effect goes right down through the ranks and ages, making space at the bottom for new people. Those new people are our young people finishing school and university.

If this happens the number of unemployed at the younger end of the market will rise dramatically. These are the people who really need to get work and earn themselves a good living, as they have their whole lives ahead of them.

The issue appears to simply be that if we create additional working years (approx 600,000 for each year the pension age is raised) we need to create additional jobs to absorb those years. We are already around 2.5 million jobs short so this is just making the problem worse.

Pumping money into the state system to cover unemployment is short sighted. Surely what we need to do is create more jobs, probably between 3 and 5 million over the next five to ten years.

How?

So much of our manufacturing and services have gone overseas because labour is much cheaper and everyone is interested in reducing costs to a minimum.

Increasing taxes on a sliding scale on the profits of businesses who import goods that we could make ourselves would help.
Introduce import taxes on all imported goods that could be made in the UK. That’s not on materials, services or products that we cannot make, but on those than we can.

Reduce the cost of production in the UK by cutting bureaucracy, cutting manufacturing costs, business rates and encouraging manufacturing all in areas again.

Using some of that money saved to encourage manufacturing in the UK. After all we are a leading nation when it comes to science and technology, once we were the worlds’ leading industrialised nation until we threw it all away in favour of the service industries such as banking! Sorry!
Surely it can’t be that hard to reduce the difference in cost between manufacturing here in the UK and that of some cheaper nation considering transportation and environmental costs, possible tax advantages and incentives to UK manufacturers.

The new government is full of ideas, but is it really looking at the long term affect of what it plans to do.

Based upon material from Office for National Statistics - Published on 16 June 2010 at 9:30 am

No! Not another Twitter, FaceBook or Google!

Who could have possible imagined that Twitter or FaceBook would ever end up as huge multi million pound businesses. But they did - along with worlds number one search engine Google.

But what is interesting about Twitter is that most people join it, and use it, but they don’t really understand what the advantages are or how to obtain them.

Do You?

These strange business models are hugely successful - earning massive incomes from advertising and sponsorship. Income level that most companies just dream about and high profit margins to boot!

When I think about Twitter or FaceBook (Yes, I am a member of both), I really don’t understand why so many people think being a member is a good idea. After all who really takes much notice of Tweets, or indeed what is being posted on FaceBook. Of course when you are an active member of either, you may act differently and get lots of value.

If we go back before Twitter and imagine the scene as the founders Evan Williams and Biz Stone sat around their kitchen table discussing what they were planning to do. They planned to allow people to collect connections with other people and then send those people short messages telling them what the sender was doing!

Now - really who is going to be interested in that? Well, over 50 million tweets are sent each day! So someone is interested. It will die out quickly …

Well four years have passed and it is still growing daily.

These sites are launched by their founders to provide a service to its members. But of course the real reason is the financial gain that the business makes as it grows. This is based upon billions of advertising images, each shown and paid for, either when displayed or when clicked upon. Those billions of images all add up and return huge revenues to the business.

Of course advertisers that use these facilities expect them to produce results in the form of sales of their products or services. If this is not forthcoming then they will stop using the service and eventually the platform will lose it profitability and cause a real headache to its owners. Advertisers only want people who are potential customers to see and click on their ads.

What will be next?

Well if we ask the question as to why people click on these ads and follow the links to purchase products we will find that some of it is purely impulsive, but the majority is because the ad relates closely to the content.

Advertising in conventional magazine has always worked really well. But a business that manufactures valves for oil leaks would be foolish to advertise in a teenage magazine! Likewise if you have an interest in diving and read a diving magazine each week, you are likely to find that there are a huge number of advertisements that are about diving!

How long will it be before someone comes up with a new online concept that allows individuals to only see advertisements on subjects or interests that they have elected? No spam! No emails! No wasted time?

Guess what … they have already!
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Are We Killing Our Young Peoples Futures?

We have heard so much about the ‘ring-fencing’ of education during the recent election campaign here in the UK that I started to ask myself the question - Why? After all, all our children are getting an education at the moment and by ‘ring-fencing’ education surely all we are doing is allowing any waste to continue.

Questions really do need to be asked about how the education system works and if it could be done in a better way or indeed if it needs to be changed as a matter of urgency.

I’d like to look at a number of areas, but today I want to focus on just one. That is the issue of how many of our young people should go to university.

Before I start, I want to assure you that I have no desire to stop anyone from doing anything they want to do or stand in their way when planning their futures. Indeed freedom of choice is actually one of my arguments.
Our education system is designed to encourage as many young people to go to university as is possible (Government target of 50%). Yet we find graduates working in the local supermarket unable to find work and taking jobs that those who did not go to university should perhaps be filling.
Why can they not get a job doing what they have trained to do? Well perhaps the answer is simply that there are not enough of these specialist jobs, and those who obtain the best results get the best jobs. Those who perhaps should not have gone to university or obtained a degree at a lower level or in a more general subject area are likely to find it harder to find employment.

You may not agree with me, but let us suppose that all young people could go to university and obtain a first class honour degree … after all if we can improve our education system as many say we can, then that might be possible. If everyone has a degree, then what value is having a degree going to be? We could of course simply introduce a ‘super-degree’ so that those with the very best results stand out.

Although this concept is only fictional the truth is it is also impractical and would be fatal for our economy. The dreams that the last government created when they instigated plans for every child to have access to university with 50% achieving that dream seems fine on paper. The real problem is that it has set a precedent for the future. Today’s new parents now expect their children to go to university as a matter of course. Anything else is not acceptable. The focus is on achieving that dream of everyone having a degree, which then might be worthless.
Sadly, young people who do not do well at school often feel that they are second class citizens and that no one really cares about them! This is wrong, everyone is part of our society.

So what is wrong you may ask?

Who is going to build our homes, check our central heating system or repair our cars? These skilled jobs and many others are absolutely vital and need young people to be trained, perhaps using old fashioned apprenticeships, moving to work in these critical areas. Sadly young people see these types of skilled jobs as ‘second-class’ and strive to go to university. It is time to change that image and make apprenticeships as important as university education.

Whether we like it or not, we need highly skilled people, educated to the highest levels. We also need technically skilled people to do all those tasks that individuals cannot do. Finally we also need those semi-skilled and unskilled people who carry out the millions of low paid jobs in our retail, hotel and caring industries.

No! I’m not getting into a discussion about how much these essential workers get paid! Personally I think it is disgusting that carers and checkout operators get paid so badly.

Not everyone is bright enough to be a doctor or engineer – and we don’t need millions. Not everyone is clever enough to be a plumber or a motor mechanic – and we don’t need that many anyway. Not everyone is cut out to be a supermarket checkout operator or a home carer. But all these jobs are essential and important, and every human being should feel worthy of what they do.

I’ve worked as a company director, as a software developer, as a baker and even a fishmonger in a supermarket. I’m sure there are other things that I will do as well. Whatever the job I do – it does not make me a different person. I might earn £100 per hour in one job, and only £5.85 in another … but I am still the same person.

Crucially whatever job we do, someone has to do it, because it is essential. We, as a nation need to take the stigma out of education and recognise that we need people of all skills and abilities.

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Getting Work at 60 Plus – Depressing or What?

My current job as a Data Manager (Maternity Cover) at the well known independent King Edward VI School in Southampton finishes at the end of this term in early July. In preparation for that event I have been searching for a new position.

Now I know that times are tough and that jobs are difficult to get whatever your age, but that is not really my concern. I want to work and even the government is trying to encourage people to work past 65 so that the huge cost of providing state pensions is reduced. I for one have no problem with that idea, after all … if I can continue working at something that I enjoy and at the same time continue to bring an income into the home, then why not?

Of course, if I had a nice fat private pension then I could stop working and enjoy myself even more. Sadly that is not so in my case and many others are also discovering that their pensions are not quite as ‘fat’ as they had hoped!

Yes, I will have a small pension plus the state pension at 65, but that amounts to barely enough to exist on. What is worse … I will have much more time on my hands with a lot less money to spend on filling those hours.

Now please do not shout at me, I’m not blaming anyone other than myself. My point is that I really do want to keep on working … but there is just nothing available and where there is, there are plenty of younger and more paper qualified people than me. Many advertised jobs I could do easily - but they demand a degree or some other qualification, a number of years experience, are only part time or pay unfair low wages.

Experience seems not to count for much anymore.
I have a wealth of business experience, business development, IT and people skills. I’ve even run my own businesses, some with a good level of success and others … well not so good perhaps!

Once upon a time I was top of my profession as a software developer. Today that technology has long gone and the new technologies are very complex and almost exclusively done by the younger generation who received quality teaching and guidance in their chosen areas. I learnt my skills by reading the software manufacture’s manuals … there were no training courses as software development was so very new back then.

The point is this - as my life moved forward my work became more generalised. I moved from being a software developer to being a manager, then to being a company director. The roles became much wider and less specialised, the earnings rose exponentially as the responsibilities increased. This is a quite normal pattern of things for people who have been working during the last 30 to 40 years or so.

Of course if you do these things within some large corporate business then you are likely to end up nearer the top with a great income and an amazing pension plan. But, if like so many of us you do this yourself, running a small business, struggling from one month to the next then it is often very different. Yes we have our freedom; we have the right to make our own decisions but often we operate within our own limited knowledge and make the wrong decisions as a result.

Today’s young people are much more likely to be professionally trained and keep working with the skill sets they were trained in and continued to develop over the years. Companies are bigger, structures much stronger and individual careers planned and developed to a much higher degree.
I’m not scared of taking any job that I can do, even if it only pays the minimum wage, but what does that do to my self esteem. What happened to all those dreams of success … those desires that we all secretly have, to own that special car and country home, or having our own business and financial independence.

As we get older we also have the issues of declining health, the added restrictions that age brings, the powerlessness to carry out heavy work, failing eye sight and hearing and the general decline of our bodies.
These frustrations are not made any easier when we are also hounded by the inability to find work that we are able to do; we would enjoy doing and that pays a reasonable wage.

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Cutting that Deficit

Yesterday we heard the new coalition government talking about the huge monumental debt problems that the country is experiencing and likely to do so for the next decade or so.

Cut! Cut! Cut!

This seems to be what is being said. For whatever reason, it appears that we have, as a country, overspent and over provided during the last decade to such an extent that we now have to pay the price of that action. A price that is going to hurt!

It reminds me of what so many of us have experienced over the years, that horrible credit card debt that most of us have incurred at some stage. Yes, we can be foolish and go on a shopping spree and load our cards with ever increasing debt attracting huge interest rates each month. But I’m not really talking about those purchases but about those that we have HAD to make because of circumstance beyond our control.

• Losing our job and having a family to feed.
• The washing machine breaks down and those clothes need to be washes.
• A relative dies and a funeral needs to be paid for.
• You, your wife and children really do need that holiday!

Yes we all have relied on our credit card when things have got tough. It is easier to take out the card rather than hand over the cash – and anyway we can pay it off over a period of time, can’t we?

But I wonder how many of us watch that balance getting bigger and bigger. Then we have to pay off the minimum amount each month which is getting bigger as well, leaving us with even less cash to play with. I’m sure most of us understand this cycle.

The problem is that the situation tends to get worse and worse, and we ignore it for as long as we can. Eventually we are faced with the problem of how to resolve the debt crisis and get back to some more normal footing. We set up a plan to pay back a larger amount each month. The interest keeps on getting added! The amount of free cash keeps getting lower!

Whether we like it or not, eventually we have to cut back everywhere until the debt becomes more manageable. No holidays. No new car. No shopping sprees. No night’s out. No expensive Christmas gifts. Everything we spend, even the weekly shopping has to be trimmed and reduced.

Yes it hurts, but once it is done and the debt has gone, we suddenly find that it was all worth it, and that we have much more freedom to do as we please. We are not paying interest anymore so we have more money to spend on ourselves. We have also learnt a big lesson!

The national debt the UK has is exactly the same. We got here by irrational spending for whatever reason. Politicians make promised to get elected then have to keep them if they want to get elected next time. Whatever the reason, it has happened!

The system is such that no one appears to be controlling what is spent. That is a different issue which hopefully will be dealt with by the current government.

So, like the credit card problems we have faced, the country needs to do the same. It is all very well to say that education and the NHS should be ‘ring-fenced’ but why? We have over spent in all these areas as well. Yes I know that education could perhaps do with more money … I could do with a new car! I can’t afford it, nor can the country.

Our national debt of over £800,000,000,000 (800 billion) attracts interest at something over £65,000,000,000 (65 billion) every year and that is going to rise year upon year if we do not do something about it. We can run our education system for that!

No! If we need to cut government spending by 10% (say) to bring the situation under control then every area, irrespective of where, should have its budget cut by 10%. Yes this is going to be hard, and there are probably some valid cases where this cannot be sustained. More people will become unemployed, benefits costs will rise and the current benefits for the unemployed are simply not high enough to live on.

A compromise will be required. Just like our credit card debt, something will have to go and others remain essential. Currently all children of school age have a place and receive a reasonable education … why spend more? We introduced targets and league tables in our schools. What is the matter with them? They cost a fortune in time and money to record and report, when the money should be spent on educating our young people.

Currently the NHS carried out thousands of operations that are not deemed essential … why can’t the patient contribute or better still wait? Again the target driven strategy of today and the paperwork in creates is just beyond belief. We need to cut it out, and focus on providing real health service just as most doctors and nurses want to do!

We live in a society that is ring fenced with things such as ‘Health & Safety’. Now I am not suggesting that we should do away with it, but it has got out of control. We as individuals need to start taking responsibility for what we do. If you think things are bad here … just spend a few days in Mumbai.

Perhaps higher taxes are the answer. I don’t support the argument that anyone who earns less than £10,000 should not pay any tax. We all live here, we should all contribute something, however little we earn. I think it is better to do that so we all understand the needs of the country. If necessary give those lower paid more financial support, but they should all contribute.

I could go on and on but I’m running out of passion and desire to change it!

Let’s get out of this situation, however hard it may be and vow never to go back here again. We are all responsible for our country and we should all take that responsibility seriously.

+

Employing 18 to 25 year olds - Is it fair?

The previous Government decided that there were to many young people unemployed and as a result they would introduce a scheme to effectively guarantee 18 to 25 year olds who had been out of work for 12 months a job.

The scheme provides upto £6,500 per person given a job. That is equivalent of just over £3 per hour for a full time worker. If you owned a supermarket paying £6 per hour, would you be tempted to take on some of these young people and save £3 per hour in employment cost? With wages being one of the highest costs to a supermarket, will we see profits double for £3 billion to £6 billion? :)

My concern is that if any government scheme or indeed any other initiative that is introduced that subsidises the cost of employing someone (whatever their age) results in employers taking on people from that age group.

Great you might say, that is the objective!

Sadly the fact is simply this … there is a limited amount of work to be done, and therefore a limited number of people are required to carry out that work. If an employer can get someone to meet some of their employment costs they will do so … replacing someone else who they cannot get help with, with someone who they can.

If there is say, 25 million jobs and 30 million people wanting to work, then however you look at it, 5 million won’t be working. What worries me is if 170,000 jobs are going to go to younger people, does that mean that 170,000 older people will lose theirs?

New initiatives should focus on CREATING NEW jobs. Perhaps one approach would be to restrict the amount of goods that are imported, and get back into manufacturing again. Long term being a provider of essentially ’service’ jobs just will not work.

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Should we Treat Women as Equals to Men?

Over the last few years we are constantly being reminded that men and women should be treated as equals. We are supposed to pay women at the same rate as men, offer the same employment benefits etc.

The retirement age for women in the UK is slowly rising to 65 to match that of men, and then onward and upward until it hits the new ceiling proposed for everyone to retire at.

If not treating women as equal to men is wrong, then not treating men as not equal to women should equally be wrong!

Women, who are 60 this year, retire and get a state pension, but if you’re a man you have to wait another five years!

So much for being equal!

Affiliate Marketing Secrets

One of the easiest and fastest way to make money online in through affiliate marketing. This is when you send visitors to someone else's product sales page, they make the sale and deliver the product, and you get a percentage of the sale price as you commission (usually 50% or more for digital products).

The benefits of this are

1. You can get started almost immediately because you don't have to create a product, write the sales page, design the website, develop marketing materials, or set up the ordering, billing & delivery system.
2. You have almost no investment of time because you don't have to do the customer support or deal with billing or technical issues.
3. You have nearly zero risk because you already know the product sells. So if you send visitors you will get paid.

Looking at these benefits, it's clear that affiliate marketing is the way to go!

The downside is...

After all your hard work of generating traffic to the sales page, you will never see any of those visitors again. Most of them will not buy on their first visit, which means you're losing over 90% of the traffic right off the top. And of the 10% or less that do buy, the product owner will be able to sell to them again, but you will not.

What's the solution?

Simply put, you need to capture the name and email of your visitors *before* sending them to the product sales page. This way you can follow up with them and keep sending them back to the sales page to increase your chances of making the sale. And if you're really on top of your game, you'll then send to a pre-sales page in between.
Here's what these affiliate marketing strategies will do for you:

1. You'll be building your own list of potential customers that you can market to again and again.
2. You'll be pre-selling them by providing valuable information and then casually linking to the product sales page in the context of this information.

In order to set a system like this up, you will need the following affiliate marketing tools:

1. A Video Squeeze Page (with video)
2. One or more content-rich Pre-Selling Pages
3. At least a 5-Part Email Followup Series

The video squeeze page is where you'll direct your traffic instead of directly to the product sales page. It captures the name and email of your visitors and puts them into your autoresponder, which then begins sending out the 5-part email series. Then it redirects them to your pre-selling pages after they subscribe to your email series.

All of this together increases your chances of making the sale by up to 500% so it's well worth the effort of setting it up. And once it's set up, it runs automatically - you just keep sending visitors to the squeeze page.

If you don't have the time or expertise to set it all up yourself, you can use something like Affiliate Silver Bullet. Services like this design the enter system (the video, the video squeeze page, the email series, the content pages, etc). The benefit is that it's much less expensive then you could do it yourself, and it's instantly set up. The downside is that other people will be using the same affiliate tools as you. But the internet is pretty big, so this isn't much of a concern.

The other route you can take is to hire people on Elance to create and implement the various aspects for you. Either way, it's an important step that you need to take if you're going to be serious about your business.

A Christmas Gift

With November well over now and our thoughts are now on Christmas - and the New Year.
I just wanted to recommend the following to you as a sort of Christmas gift. I'm a member and there is so much stuff on this Membership site that I am still ploughing through it and learning lots of new things. If you are interested in making money via the Internet then this is very likely one of the best places to belong to.

So Jeremy Gislason has devised a sizzling, take-it-to-the-bank package, just for you, to make sure 2010 can be your best year yet.
If you're in a hurry, this the fast link to success:

Privileged Memberships

You'll have a ball.

It really is a complete no-brainer, because he's giving you a lifetime's top level access to his top ten, five-start membership sites. What's more...

If you hit this link: Privileged Memberships right away, you'll be able to take a full 30 days to test drive it all. And, here's the advantage it gives you...

Because you're getting a boatload of Master Reseller and other licenses on red hot products, such as books, courses, videos and software (and other items too hot to mention in an open blog), which you can use to pour cash straight into your PayPal account.

That way, when the 30 days trial is up, you'll not only have enough to cover the pitifully tiny payment for all this PLUS enough left over for the best ever New Year's party.

But I must WARN YOU: this is such a lucrative giveaway, he's naturally having to severely limit who gets on board. So, don't waste another minute before you go to:
 
Privileged Memberships
 
Regards
 
Jim

Is It Really Our Right?

In light of the issues facing the world with Climate Change and the predicted growth of the world’s population to over 20 billion within 100 years, is it not time to start thinking about some possible solutions.

As a consequence of my previous blog 'Is Climate Control Really the Issue?' I received a number of messages from people who thought that perhaps I was suggesting that there should be some controls on who is allowed to have children and who is not. This idea had not actually crossed my mind but now that it has been presented - perhaps it is one way of solving some of the problems.

We automatically assume that it is our right to have children and no one should be able to take that right away from us even if it means that indirectly it might result in the over population of the earth and perhaps the demise of millions of people.

In the same way we tend to believe that we have the right to speak our mind. In practise we don’t! Well we can - but might have to face the consequences of what we say! 

Is it a correct belief that we should assume that we have the absolute right to have as many children as we wish or the right to say what we want when we want? Has anyone really challenged these unwritten laws?

When I think about it, I’m not sure that any of us have the right to put the world at risk just because we want to have one or more children. Currently the world average population growth rate is 1.12% per year. That means that in 100 years time the population will have grown to 20.8 billion. That’s quite a lot of people!

If we take this into our own hands and decide it is our right to have as many children as we want – let’s say that the annual population increase doubles to just 2.24%. That would see a world population in 2109 of just over 64 billion people, a three fold increase on what is anticipated and ten times more than reside here at the moment.

But here is the real worry. If that increase doubled again to 4.48% annum, we would have a staggering 584 billion people within 100 years, an 87 times increase over the current levels. I won’t go any further but it does show that even small changes can make a huge difference.

If every person restricted the number of children they produce to just one (two per couple) the growth would be much reduced. We have to remember there are millions of younger people who have yet to add to the population statistics over the next 25 to 30 years. Once that has happened the increase rate would be reduced substantially.

It is very easy for people to say that if they want six children they will have six children – it is their right, but is it?

If we take a look at the animal kingdom, Mother Nature seems to have control. If a lioness produces too many young when food is short, they ultimately go hungry and die. If an area of jungle gets over populated, the animals fight each other until the balance is restored.

We human beings will do everything possible to lengthen our lives. We have successful reduced or eradicated many illnesses and diseases that naturally helped reduce the population. We used to fight each other a lot more, thus losing more people.

Medical advances can keep people alive even when they are very elderly and sick. Ultimately can we expect people to live to be 100 or 120 or even longer? This would definitely exasperate the situation even more.

But are there any other options?

If we look forward to the future, to when the population has grown to say 100 or 200 billion, and the sheer number of people is just more than the earth can sustain.

What then?

Do we send the undesirables to the Moon?

Do we allow the rich to go to Mars?

Well these are a few possibilities we can develop if the necessary technology to get to these places, especially in light of the shrinking fuel reserves, are built. Of course only a few will be able to go leaving the vast majority here on earth starving and dying.

Ah!

Perhaps that is the solution … dying!

..

Is Climate Control Really the Issue?

Today it is estimated that there will be 6,842,771,203 (6.8 billion) people living on earth by the end of this month, December 2009. This estimate is based upon the latest figures and the lowest suggested growth estimate available - an annual net population increase of just 1.12% across the world year upon year.

If we apply this 1.12% per annum increase to the current population and compound it up, in just 100 years, that is the end of December 2109, the world will be home to 20,841,938,636 (20.8 billion) people, a real increase of just over 211% on today’s estimated figure. That is a massive three times as many people as today, living, breathing, eating and needing to be housed.

If the level of CO2 being produced by the existing 6.8 billion people is already more than the world’s environment can cope with, what real reductions would we have to achieve to ensure that the total emissions in 2109 are less than they are today? Allowing for the tripling of the population, then we will have to reduce our overall production of CO2 gases by over 70% per person. Could you manage using 70% less petrol, or 70% less electricity? That is just the cap of the iceberg!

This is an important question, but perhaps even more important is the question asking just how we will feed and house all these people, let alone doing it and decreasing the total amount of emissions given off as well?

When we consider that the estimated oil and natural gas reserves are likely to have been exhausted well before 2109, and the estimated 150 years supply of coal (at today’s consumption rates) will probably be nearly at its end as demand grows to replace oil and gas, this will make the situation even worse. Even if these figures are wrong, no one is going to deny that this isn’t going to happen at some stage in the future.

Naturally new improved forms of renewable energy, advance nuclear power etc will be discovered and brought into production. A huge proportion of this new power will be in the form of generated electricity and we need to find new ways to use it. We are very reliant on fossil fuels for oil, lubricants, chemicals, medicine, road surfaces and many other items.

There are five main types of renewable energy, namely solar power, wind power, hydropower, biomass energy and geothermal power. All these have their issues and they all result in production of electricity. Biomass involves the burning of bio material to produce heat, steam and electricity and geothermal, the extraction of heat from inner earth.

We also have Bio Fuels, which basically means that oils can be extracted from plants or other organic material such as algae, or fermented to produce alcohol type products. The issue here is that we would need vast tracts of land (or sea) handed over to producing the required crops and with the anticipated huge increase in demand for food production this is likely to result in a massive clash between food and fuel production and demand.

Because of the nature of machinery with its moving parts, there will always be a demand for lubricants to keep them working, and the output of the bio fuel industry is likely to be totally consumed by this market.

As the world population grows, the demands on these declining fuel resources will grow as well, reducing the length of time we can expect to have them available. The use of oil, natural gas and particularly coal contributes in a big way to greenhouse gases and just make the situation even more difficult to control.

The estimated population growth in the UK is around 0.6% per annum, about half of the worldwide average, but this still means that by 2109 the population in the UK will have risen from the current 61,708,895 to 113,590,446 an increase of nearly 85% on today’s figures.

In the UK we already have a problem producing all the food we require, importing large amounts from other countries by sea and air. If we are to reduce pollution then that level of importing will have to be reduced dramatically, and we as a country will have to produce a great deal more.

Allowing that we will always have to import food that can only be grown in other climate areas, perhaps we need to investigate and research ways of producing some these items ourselves. For example, with the increasing temperature over the 100 years, perhaps we could grow our own coffee thus saving the need to import it.

Sadly, our education, political and business environments do not appear to be taking much notice of what is happening and especially what is going to happen over the next 100 years. Are they interested in investing in the production of some of the imported food types, new energy friendly machinery, improved vehicles and generally recognising the need to start taking action now?

And what about us the normal people on the street?

Can you imagine what it would be like if there were twice as many vehicles on the roads. Twice as many trains - requiring more railway lines and stations, stations with car parks twice their current size. What about planes, twice as many planes. More runways, more noise … ah … thankfully no, there will be no fuel for their engines!

Twice as many people in the supermarket on Saturday, twice as many houses, twice as many jobs, twice as many children, twice as many pensioners (perhaps even more as medicine and health levels improve) … the list goes on and on.

Do we as individuals have a responsibly to do something now?

Of course none of us will be around to see the outcome and therefore will not be involved or affected by what is going to happen. Indeed by the time we get to 2109 things might have change dramatically for the better, and the predicted outcome might not be anywhere near as bad … but just maybe it will be even worse – especially as we all love talking about these things and not quite so keen in getting involved and doing something.

Politics : Learn from Mother Nature?

Whose fault is it that the UK is in such a terrible financial and economic mess? Is it the bankers, the politicians, businesses, world affairs or some other force we do not understand?


Who should we blame for this mess? After all unless we can blame someone - we won’t feel any better about it! It can’t be our fault, because we have no say and no control over what happens – can it?

Perhaps we should just ignore what is happening and then it will go away! After all we elect politicians to solve all these sorts of problems.

Sadly today, many of these individuals are professional politicians, i.e. they have been educated to work and live inside politics and have never had any real experience at running a successful business. Indeed, it now appears that many of the top people in business (the bankers come to mind) are also experiencing the same sort of problems having being educated to do the jobs they aspire to but not necessarily any good at doing.

But the truth is that times are always changing, things are not the same as they were in the seventies, eighties or nineties! The country’s (and the world’s) problems have changed; things are different now from back then. Is that not true?

The difference between a country (as a business) and a genuine business is that every business has one or more owners who expect the business to perform against a predetermined set of rules. That may be achieving some financial targets, profits, growth or market share etc. All businesses are run by people who are appointed because they are accessed by qualified people who understand what is required of them and what skills are needed to achieve them. These professionals remain in their positions until such a time as they either leave or fail to achieve the agreed targets.

Government is different. We, the people, who do not own the country (business), elect essentially unknown people to run that business. In most cases we do not understand what qualities are required and if the candidates have any of them. We have little or no influence at all on what the government of the day does. Worse still, are system here in the UK encourages us not to vote for a person, but for a political party. As a result, in most cases, we only ever see our MP or their representative, on the doorstep when they are canvassing for the job. Is this not a recipe for disaster – especially as we can’t even sack them for doing a bad job?

These MP’s are essentially directed by the agenda of the party they belong to. If their leaders tell them to vote yes, they vote yes. Of course MP’s often get to vote freely on the less important matters, making it look as if they do have freedom to vote as they feel, or perhaps even in line with the feelings of their constituents (who elected them) – well perhaps not, as no MP has ever asked me for my opinion! What about you?

Of course, running a country, with its infinite areas of operation, and their complexity is not easy. Indeed it is harder than any other job. The variables are numerous, the outcomes are unpredictable, and the affect of any action can cause a huge re-action in many other areas. To make it even worse, we are subjected by the action of other countries - which we have no control over whatsoever.

So how do we run a country under these conditions?

Well perhaps we should take a lesson from nature. It is made up of billions of independent plants, animals, elements, events, conditions - all affected by time, weather and a host of other variables. Yet nature survives and has done for millions of years. Whatever is thrown at it, it appears to deal with. Yes it might lose a few species, flood some deserts or turn a beauty spot into a wasteland or wilderness – but it deals with it! And it does it slowly and automatically without the rest knowing much about it.

It achieves this by allowing every element to look after itself, to manage their own interests, and if any fail, then they fail, but at just that level. It may influence other elements of nature, it may be disastrous for some, but it may help others to thrive. The point is that Mother Nature allows everything to happen at the smallest or lowest level. She did not interfere when the mighty Elm Tree succumbed to Dutch Elm Tree disease, the weak ones just died and the stronger trees survived – a common outcome in nature.

So perhaps the leaders of the UK should take a lesson from Mother Nature and step back and allow the people to resolve the problems that we face, at the lowest level. Decisions about our futures have been taken out of our hands and passed up to some autocratic body who have little or no understanding of the situation - or worse still, no desire to even understand and do what is best to resolve it.

As a result of us relinquishing our responsibilities we no longer are prepared to take responsibility for anything outside of our own lives.

Who cares about water fluoridisation, as long as it not in our area?

Of course we should have wind farms, but according to the nimby’s, not in my back yard! How quickly would we change our attitude and start taking action if our electricity was turned off for good and we had to come up with a plan to generate it locally?

I don’t think this is because people want to be difficult, I believe it is because they have not been allowed to become really involved with what goes on in their lives. We have become conditioned to having everything done for us, and the record of politicians in recent years seems to back this argument up.

We have local councillors, both at village, town, city, district, county and regional levels, all adding to the tiers of bureaucracy. The problem is the higher you go, the more power they have! What good is a local village councillor if he or she has no power to do anything? The time is coming to strip out all this bureaucracy and change the system so that it puts responsibility for change and the necessary action back into the hands of the people which the current system tries to control.

Power to the People!

Sadly, making a large change of this nature has to come from the top as we are powerless down here at the bottom. After all we are just the tiny elements that make up this once great nation.

How much longer will we focus on just ourselves, ignoring the huge issues that the whole country faces, content to just be a member of the largest political party in the UK, the Nimby’s, but having no power and little say!

Are the UK politicians mad or something?

I just can't believe that the politicians in the UK can be so stupid in some of the things that they do or say. Without being specific, which would need a huge volume of books, it seems to me that they do and say things without realising that most of us 'ordinary' people can see right through what they are saying. Do they really believe we are so naive about life that we will just accept what they say as being right or even sensible?

Alan Duncan, a senior conservative recently made comments about MP's having to 'live on rations' and being 'treated like shit' whilst being filmed secretly. He later apologies and said he was only joking. I watched the secret film and believe me, he was not joking, whatever he might have said later. OK so he has apologised and we have all moved on, but I'd like to wager that those words he spoke, and actually exactly what he felt and meant! I was horrified when David Cameron rushed to his support.

I was beginning to believe that the conservatives might be about ready to govern this country, but it now appears that they are little better than the current labour party. I for one do not believe anything I hear any more.

What about you?

It is time to be POSITIVE about the future

So much has been written and spoken in the press, radio and TV about the current situation with the banks and stock markets. Even the talk in the offices I visit is all about this gloomy subject. I for one am sick and tired of hearing about what is happening to our world and our lives.

Of course all these things do impinge on on us, and no doubt we will be feeling that backlash for weeks, months and years to come. It does seem that the talk just makes the situation worse. It appears that the more the crisis is discussed the more gloom there is … all just making the situation even worse.

Now some of us will predict that this is just a blip and all will be well again soon – after all this sort of thing has happened before (hasn’t it?) and some of us will believe that the situation will get just worse and worse and the world will come tumbling down around our ears, never to be the same again!

The fact is that we can do very little about the situation. It is here, it is happening and it is mostly out of our control. Yes, some people will be poorer for what has happened, some will find that their pensions are dramatically reduced, other that their homes have dropped in value, many are likely to loose their jobs … all these things are unfortunate … but they are beyond our control.

The truth is that the outcome is not really known. Yes, governments have taken action, but is it the right action? We, in our own way have stopped buying shares and property, we have put off getting that new car, we are thinking twice about how much to spend on our next holiday. All this has an ongoing affect on most of us who work in these or similar industries. Sadly thousands of small businesses around the world will disappear as a result.

Perhaps what we need to do is get on with our lives. Have confidence that by doing so, the markets will recover, recession will be pushed back and that we, each and every one of us, can get on with our new lives. There are many lessons to be learned from the events of the past month – let them be learnt but in the meanwhile let us all be positive and upbeat and make the very best of all that we are fortunate to have.