Sara Clemence
Newspapers Facing Death By 15,000 Cuts. Who Else?
Erica Smith, a graphics designer for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, is a great example of someone who is applying creativity to bad circumstances.
A couple of years ago, Smith started compiling newspaper layoff reports into a mashup map that shows the toll across the country. “I can only update so many at a time without wanting to jump off the ninth floor of the building I live in,” she told the American Journalism Review.
Recession Concessions: HBO vs. The Cleaning Lady
Sara Clemence, 34
New York City
Editor, Recessionwire Co-founder
Keeping: My cleaning lady ($75 every two weeks)
Ditching: HBO ($15 a month)
Recession Lexicon: Propportunity
What you get when you look at a problem as a potential opportunity.
Be Nice to Rich People
Paul Krugman blogged about the “paradox of thrift” for the New York Times this morning. Basically, people are cutting spending, which negatively affects the economy, which results in more job losses, which causes people to pull back on spending, and so on…
Funnily enough, yesterday a friend who has a designer retail business was lamenting the trend of lambasting the rich for shopping.
Productive Loafing: Get on Board
Underemployed? Recessionwire offers weekly ideas for being productive with your newfound free time. First up, joining the board of a nonprofit organization.
Are We Bailing Out the Wrong Banks?
Earlier today, The Wall Street Journal reported that the Obama administration is considering putting pay restrictions on banks that get big bailout bucks. Top execs of the companies wouldn’t be able to get severance and would have their bonus pools cut 40 percent. (It’s not clear which companies this would be.)
Of course, not everyone likes this plan:
If the government imposes caps or other limits on compensation, some bankers worry that the most talented people will flee to firms that are less regulated.
It’s not a new argument. But according to this logic, capping pay would make smart people go to banks that didn’t need “exceptional aid” to stay alive—presumably, the stronger, smarter banks.
Recession Lexicon: Pre-Fired
We have plenty of synonyms for losing one’s job: laid off, fired, canned, made redundant, eliminated, dismissed, pink-slipped, discharged, and my personal favorite from a friend: “squirted out of the company.”
But new times demand new words, to describe concepts and situations we’ve never encountered before—like losing your job before you’ve even started it.
I’m Not Jobless, I’m…
…a banker/lawyer/retail executive/IT specialist/journalist/analyst who would rather not admit that I’ve been shit-canned. Some euphemisms that have been making the rounds at New York parties:
Nearly Free Art
Many of us are spending more time in our homes just as we have less to spend on our homes. Happily, there are creative ways to spiff up your walls without breaking out the college posters. Here, four works of art that practically cost pennies.
Recession Briefing 1.30
What you need to know today to survive and thrive in the recession.
Obama Calls Wall Street Bonuses ‘Shameful’ (NY Times)
“There will be time for them to make profits, and there will be time for them to get bonuses,” he said during an appearance in the Oval Office. “Now’s not that time.”
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