Recession Lexicon: New Words for a New Era

The world has turned truly upside down. The Dow used to be way up, now it’s down (climbing back, but still down). Your house used to be a source of pride — and value. Now it’s underwater. Job security? Forget about it. And all that shopping and spending — now, saving’s the name of the day.

As we navigate this new, sometimes foreign turf, we’re learning to speak a new language. Here are a few of the terms you’ll need to know:

Pre-Fired
n. Being dismissed from a new position before you even start. Usually because the company folds between the offer and your start date.

Bleakonomics
n. The dire forecasts, depressing warnings, and otherwise gloomy chatter that’s still brewing beneath the recent round of cheerier economic predictions…

You Say “Recession,” I Say “Spad”

In American English, we have a handful of words for the recession: downturn, slump, bust, economic collapse, financial crisis. We talk about “hard times” and “tough times.” Here at Recessionwire, we’ve used all those synonyms to death. So we decided to look beyond our borders at how our friends around the world refer to the recession. (And not so we can look smart at cocktail parties.) (Okay, maybe a little bit.) We think they sound best thrown randomly into the middle of an English sentence, using a thick, “authentic” accent…

Recession Lexicon: Recession Hacking

Finding and using smart strategies and ideas for dealing with the downturn—whether it’s saving money on your cell phone bill to dining for less. We don’t know where this one started, but there are already a few websites using it, including Recession Hacking and Recession Hacks. Without realizing it, you’re probably looking for recession hacks every day.