Now for some positive news
While I agree the above scenarios are all quite possible the fact that the Governments have acted quickly to this current crisis is a very positive sign. (it's just a shame they didn't act quickly to prevent this crisis many years ago
).
Lessons have been learned from the credit crunch in Japan which followed impressive but unsustainable economic growth, similar to the situation we are facing now and although we may be making our own mistakes we are in better shape to make the right descisions and avoid complete melt down.
The view is that the $700bn isn't going to be sufficient and it will cost US tax payers much more but so what, it's the majority of these tax payers that regardless of their opposition to disgustingly high fat cat sallaries, fully supported capitalism and benefited from from the boom years.
We are undoubtably going to be faced with 'a world of pain' but the world wont come to an end. It appears to be universally agreed that 2009 is going to be really sh
it and personally I don't think 2010 is going to be any better but there are signs that the stock market is approaching the bottom and Anthony Bolton (Englands answer to Warren Buffet, the worlds most sucsessful investor) is starting to buy shares for the first time in a couple of years. I doubt very much if they were going to fall much further or stagnate for many years that he'd be risking his hard earned cash.
It's still barking mad to even consider doing an intergrated course right now but personally I'd take some comfort in this news....
British Airways was a heavy faller after the airline reported a drop in traffic in September as tight economic conditions curbed air travel and said the outlook remains challenging. BA carried about 2.8m passengers during the month compared with about 2.96m in the same month last year, a drop of 5.6%.
However, it may be a sign of the times that budget airline Ryanair flew more than 5m passengers last month, 20% more than the same time last year, although it didn’t fill its planes quite as efficiently. Passenger numbers jumped to 5.23m in September, up from 4.35m in 2007, taking the total number of passengers flown during the 12 months to 56m.
In itself I don't think the fact that Ryanairs pax numbers are up is good news, it just means that more people are turning to low cost carriers. Over all numbers of people traveling will still continue to fall and probably a few more airlines will cease to exist but it bodes well that it's a carrier that historically employs low hour pilots that is likely to come through this recession relatively unscathed. IMO though it'll be a foolish person who racks up huge debts in the hope of a large salary once they get their first job because given the current situation that first airline job could be a long way away and if MOL doesn't find a way to reduce the overall take home pay of newbie pilots when they do start recruiting again, i'll eat my hat. Never the less if you genuinely want to fly for a living and it's not just the nice fat salary that attracts you then there will be oppotunities reasonably early on in the recovery.