International Trade Blog

I am sure that I am not the only one who has received various ‘’excellent’’ offers via email or generally the internet. Lately I have started to wonder what is the point ofd all this. I really do not believe that you can curb your enterprise using such tactics, but maybe I am wrong.

First of all lets start with and excellent example. Apparently at least a half of world population needs some sort of a dildo. I won’t elaborate on what this is if you are interested then use google.com and find out. But really has anyone bought this item due to the fact that it was advertised in an email. Lately I do not even bother to read these so called spam mails. Of course they are not all attempts of fraud there might be some real bargains, but simply I get to angry to react properly to them and basically delete them on sight. But someone actually made them, used their time and perhaps invested some money into them. So is it worth? Yes a simple homepage might look too boring so to add some color why not use cheerful and interesting banners. It livens up the place and maybe perhaps someone even buys something. For someone it may work, but I really not sure that it is worth all the money and time invested.

Maybe its is me, but I will probably never believe online advertisement. I accept it, but in most cases do not agree with it. In my opinion a good product does not need an extensive advertising campaign. Quality should speak for itself. But everyone must choose what is right for them.

The global economic crisis has had a major effect on the economic activity worldwide. Various markets have collapsed and a huge number of people have lost their jobs. So what actually is there to do during a crisis?

When the crisis hit everyone was ready to predict that shops would empty and go out of business due to the lack of customers with any money to spend. Some part of this came true, but only a part. Yes a huge amount of people lost their jobs and thus their income. This had a dramatic effect on the overall economic activity as there simply was no money to spend, but this is true to a certain degree because only some specific type of shops went out of business. We must remember one thing that does not change no matter what – people must eat. So to fulfill that need they must spend the money they still have on seemingly basic stuff like food. This is why only high end retailers experienced difficulties. Of course the number of newly bought cars decreased, but food and basic clothing numbers stayed the same. Actually the crisis did one positive thing it decreased the rather high basic commodity prices that were pushed to unrealistic heights due to the previous inflated economy.

Although currently everyone is speaking about the imminent recovery the economy is still in very bad shape. It may have won the fight with death, but still will need a lot of good doctors to fully recover if that is possible at all. What do we do for the time being? Everything that can be done to scrape by and pray for the glorious return of a healthy economic activity!

Despite all positive predictions and statements that the crisis is over we somehow still experience and probably will experience for some time the ‘’magnificent effects of the global crisis. If not the crisis itself then we will sure feel the full wrath of its aftershock.

Global market has been crushed to pieces and many trade dependent countries are experiencing harsh times. Numerous jobs have been lost. Real estate market is non existent right now. Construction sphere experiences major difficulties. Basically the overall happiness levels have plummeted. What should we do in such times? Well the government should take care of us right? It should, but only in a perfect world. Sadly this is a cruel one. Its like a deathmatch – everyone fights for themselves. Even the government officials in the highest places have forgotten for whom they actually work and who pays their salary. The basic credo of today is ‘’hang to anything you can’’. Those of us who still have a job and a steady income should really feel lucky. Of course not everyone is affected by the crisis negatively. Some actually use the crisis to make profits not always in morally correct ways. Still they have found a way to make a living and on some level I admire and even understand them. What the future holds no one knows. Yes the crisis may end and it most definitely will end, but people tend to forget that the effects of the crisis won’t magically go away in one day. Countless lives may have already been inadvisably ruined.

What to do right now? I do not have an answer. Duck, cover and hope for the best could be my only advice. I really do hope that everything will turn out okay, but if it does not I won’t be very surprised.

While some countries do not experience the full power of the global economic crisis some are hit the hardest. The biggest losers as always are the simple people. If a cut in salary can be considered lucky, many people have lost their jobs and only source of income.

What will you do if you do not have any money? While a small percentage may choose such drastic measures as suicide, most people will do anything to feed themselves and their family. They may accept illegal or dangerous jobs and some, normally honest people, might even turn to criminals. While I do not approve I on some level understand them. For the past six months fraudulence and scam cases have multiplied. People are stealing everything that is not tied to something. Everyday there is a story in the news about a robbery and what is the most frightening fact is that people have become more violent. There have been stories in news about robberies which ended in homicide and not that the robbers stole millions. Today the violence levels are so high that people are willing to hurt others for mere scraps. And all this happened during the summer months. I do not know what will happen during winter.

The same situation applies to scams. Currently the most popular scam in my country is to offer people jobs in foreign countries. When the person has paid the necessary money bought the ticket and traveled to their destination they find out that there is no job for them and the company who offered them the job has mysteriously vanished. Many people have been cheated this way. The funny part is that no matter the numerous stories in news about such scams people still get scammed.

The situation is very serious. If last year people joked about people who work for minimal wage then today most of them would kill for such an opportunity.

While most of the people tremble before the global economic crisis for some it is nothing special. And why should it be? They have experienced this crisis all their life and have survived it.

I am of course speaking about people it the third world countries. Maybe not only the third world as most post soviet countries are in the same position. Let’s look at the post soviet era countries. While most of them have valuable natural resources the quality of life has not changed very much since the soviet times. During the soviet times the salaries were quite small and even if you were a lucky one with a bigger government official’s salary there was still the utter lack of goods. It did not matter how much money you had as there was simply nothing to do with it. Shops were empty, private business was more or less illegal and real estate market did not exist as such. So it was basically a crisis. None the less people survived I would even say more; they were happy. Yes they did not have very much, but nobody had and it was ok. Ok yes there was one thing different from today. There was virtually no unemployment. The government spends a humongous amount of money, but everyone who was willing had a job and was played for it. Of course from the economical side point it was a total catastrophe as the economy could not sustain itself and eventually collapsed.

After the independence was gained not that much changed. Yes a handful of people became very rich even obscenely rich, but most people still had low salaries and were forced to struggle. Of course now the difference was that the shops were full of good. If only there was the necessary money to actually benefit from this fact. But no matter what people survived and still were quite happy.

The general idea behind this entire rumble is that no matter what we will survive. Sooner or latter the crisis will fade and the quality of life begin to rise, but of course not for everyone. That’s just the way of life.

As the global economic crisis is still roaming the world one might think that now would be the time to come together, forget private ambitions and work towards a common goal. Yeah one might think…

If this would be an ideal world with an ideal society then maybe it would be possible, but sadly this is not the fact. While these truly are hard times, these are also times of various possibilities. Of course in an ideal society everyone would do their outmost to combat the crisis in every possible way. Today more often then not everybody fights for themselves. While this might be ok for private entrepreneurs and larger companies, at least it would be justifiable, it is totally wrong when government officials start to use this crisis for their own benefit. While some politicians use the crisis as propaganda to increase their party ratings others simply gain financial benefits. Is it morally correct to proclaim that now everybody must tighten their belts and accept huge cuts in salary for the benefit of overall economy while at the same time the salary levels of government official remain ridiculously high. How can you order a family to survive with minimal income while you yourself have never experienced that? I, as a private person, might understand that it is necessary to decrease costs and thus decrease wages, but only if I see that the official who have ordered it do the same. While this may not be text book corruption I still perceive this as corruption if an official uses his post to gain unfair financial benefits in the time of crisis. If the overall situation is normal I have nothing against higher salaries for government officials, after all they represent our country and must be rewarded. Sadly in most cases government officials have now forgotten who they represent and only thinking about their personal ambitions.

I really do hope that the situation will change, but I fear that this will not happen in my lifetime. On some level I even understand these people. It is very hard to let go if you have gained something valuable, even if it is for the good of us all. This is the nature of humans.

The current main objective is to defeat the global economic crisis and many governments have come up with various plans on how to do that. Sometimes the actions might seem cruel, but if there is a long term benefit then it is understandable.

All is all this thesis does not sound so bad, but unfortunately some governments have decided that the only way to defeat the crisis is to raise taxes. Sometimes it really feels like the government official who make these decisions do not really understand how the economy works in real life. Of course it looks great on paper; raising taxes will provide increased income. Sadly in real life it does not work like that. Companies are struggling and unemployment levels are rising so higher tax rates will only force people to adapt shadow economy, meaning envelope salaries, evasion of taxes and other thing that will actually harm the economy. Sadly some government officials still seem not to understand the situation. In fact the government should think about lowering of taxes to promote more economic activity. As I read various news items I see that some governments have realized this fact and are actually doing the right thing.

This is the time when politicians should forget about party ratings and cease all political game to come and work together. They must understand that raising taxes means raising the dissent level of the population. A high dissent level may turn into hostility between government officials and general public. That would only decrease the stability which is a vital part of a possible recovery. I do really hope that at least someone will realize this and finally does something real instead just talking about what should be done.

We tend to accuse governments and large corporations for causing the global economic crisis and on some level it is true, but we must be able to admit that we also helped to create this economic recession. But more often than not, it is easier to point the finger to others rather than ourselves.

What did really happen? What were the main causes of the global economic crisis? We were actually living quite good and then suddenly almost like out of nothing the crisis hit us. And boy did it hit us hard! Of course at some degree governments are responsible, but I do not view them as the sole origin of the crisis. They only partially created this humongous problem. I cannot speak for the whole world, but in the context of my own native country I must admit that we, the everyday consumers, caused the crisis on some level. The inflated prices in construction and real estate sectors were significant factors. The salaries and costs were pushed to unseen heights and people believing that it can only get better started to spend and live above the real situation. Huge leasing loans became an ordinary thing. People loaned large amounts of money to invest in the booming real estate sector. When the crisis hit they were left with enormous debts without real possibility to sell the accumulated real estate as the sector was the first to crush. Banks and other financial institutions demanded the return of the assets, but that was an impossible undertaking as there simply was no more money to return. This lack of money directly influenced the construction sector and caused its collapse. A lot of people lost their jobs and income meaning even less money to spend. This only allowed the crisis to gain strength.

Now the government is forced to decrease the overall costs and raise taxes to increase income. A foolish act if you ask me as it probably will have quite the opposite effect. The main idea behind all this is that we must admit that the global economic crisis was not caused just by one country, government or person. We all are partially responsible and this should not the time of finger pointing.

China is on its way to become a superpower in global market. Even the global economic crisis that is currently wreaking havoc in the rest of the world has not been able to crush the prospering economy of China.

China is gaining power continuously for the pas 20 years. While twenty or fifteen years ago we sneered at the quality of Chinese goods, today we gladly purchase a lot of Chinese items. Yes the quality of Chinese products was really bad a few decades ago. China had a lot of cheap labor which in theory should be a good base of great industrial capacity, but China lacked education and technology. So the government of China, a communist government might I add, opened up the country to foreign investors. A bold move if you ask me, considering the ideology. None the less it worked. Western and USA enterprises allocated their factories to China due to the cheap labor costs thus decreasing the manufacturing costs and the overall price of the produced items. That meant good news for the everyday consumer. They brought advanced technology to China and the people who worked at the factories became more skilled thus increasing the quality not only of Chinese products, but also the quality of life.

Now China exports a lot of stuff all over the world and it means a lot of money. People are not any more afraid to buy Chinese goods as the have acknowledged the increased quality. I myself have purchased some Chinese goods and at least until now I have not been disappointed. If China stays on it course I believe it can achieve global market dominance. Where else can you find a rather cheap labor force numbering in more than a billion?

The global economic crisis has had a terrible impact on world economy and basically our everyday life. But which is the most damaging weapon of the crisis? We all can somehow deal with salary cuts, expensive goods and inept governments, but uncertainty is something far more terrible.

What do we basically want to achieve in our lives? I am not talking about riches and fame because those can be only secondary goals in life. We strive for stability. Stability provides us with a feeling of certainty. We can make long term plans concerning our lives and professional careers. The global crisis has taken certainty out of this equation because nothing is safe anymore. Well you might have a job and even accepted a salary cut, but who is to say that two months from now your employer will come up to you and inform that there is no more work for you and that you should look for a new job. Actually in some cases this is the best scenario as it still provides some options. A more evil employer will use the global crisis to his own advantage. He can make you to take ridiculous cuts in salary; work overtime and maybe even orders you to do illegal or dangerous work. In most cases the employee has no options as to accept the demands because the salary is needed to support a family, no matter how small the salary is.

Another thing that provides unneeded uncertainty is the possible actions of governments. No one can actually tell which steps the government will take to battle the economic crisis. In some cases this could mean increase of taxes or maybe the decrease of minimal wage. Granted the government actions have a larger impact on companies and business people, but we must not forget who actually pays our salaries. Its the same companies and business people who if hindered by the government will on the other hand take it out on their employees.

We need stability. This should be the main goal for the moment. Only stability can pull us out of the global crisis. As soon as it will return the people will start to spend more money thus heating the economy. It is simple as that. But for now uncertainty rules the world.