Would you believe, I'm the one with the gadgets and spending habit (nowhere near some of the geeks in the office - but the Mrs won't believe me).

My wife only owns about 2 or 3 pairs of shoes the last 7 years. She only ever buys dance/sports gear to exercise in, and like me, just wears good clothes that don't need replacing much. It helps that her sisters are shoppers and send her all the stuff they are bored with. She has a $4000 watch that her sister lent to her 7 years ago and never asked for back...wtf.

My wife is the same, only 2 or 3 pairs of shoes per month... oh wait a minute... you mean 2 or 3 pairs of shoes IN TOTAL in the last 7 years

She has a slightly wide foot, if pretty, from dancing which means that she would not get in to the average suburban shop shoe.

Believe me when I say this, her main shoe she wears with jeans she has had for 10+ years which makes her laugh. They're sort of sports/hiking (with a goretex liner) boots which are aged enough that they don't draw the eye.

She also has a pair of RM paddock boots, then a softer pair. And a pair of runners.

Employed immediately in a recession. Most people who have bills to pay want to get work, as does everyone else who's fighting for the same jobs.

Temp work. Most companies are paying award rates for temp staff which is pitiful. Not forgetting temp work doesn't pay holiday or sick pay and for people not so young holidays are required to charge up the batteries

Savings - in a recession with the standard of living so costly, what are savings. For most people they're living hand to mouth

MPI

Bad luck can and does happen. Being made redundant however you want to dress it up is bad luck and nothing but bad luck. No individual can help it or asks for it.

Maybe you want to try it mate and see how you feel in terms of "companies bad times" rather than bad luck on your part

I have twice!

In a recession

I totally disagree. To put it in perspective, my grandparents were some of the wealthiest people in pre war Holland. They fled with their lives and very little else when the Nazi's invaded and were LUCKY to do so. Most didn't.

How could they have changed this?? This is not people sitting on their asses letting opportunity slip through their fingers. They came to the UK and then worked their asses off to just stay on the breadline and died young. They did however educate their children and they got good jobs and worked hard, etc, etc. Their grandchildren ended up as middle class professionals. Sometimes 'bad luck' is so bad that it takes generations to overcome.

Death, illness, recession, we have very little control over these things - no matter how hard we work. I agree, you dust yourself off and work hard to overcome whatever happens but to say that every person who doesn't do well is the architect of their own downfall is ridiculous. May this sort of 'bad luck' never happen to you.

What do you do? Can I have your profession? I'm working two jobs just in case one of them falls by the wayside, which is fairly common when you depend on funding from grants from organisations that don't always recognise the benefit of the work you do, even though it could potentially save lives in the future.

I'm confused...............I am talking about using the word "luck".....what happened with the Nazi's for example was not "luck" it was human actions.

I am not saying people's bad "luck" is their fault same was as good "luck" is not theirs.

People control how they handle things not what happens to them.

I am totally lost

I'd disagree with you there. Companies in a recession tend to cut out the chaff and keep the wheat, if you know what I mean.

So if a person is just working there, treading water and not making a difference, is it 'bad luck' that they get sacked during a recession?

Unless a company goes completely bankrupt (yes, that would be bad luck) then if an employee is selected to be made redundant, they should ask themselves why (hint: it wasn't down to luck).

The one and only time I got sacked it was because I had a real personality clash with the director of the department, we just didn't get along. When he sacked me I didn't think it was 'bad luck'. I knew exactly why I was sacked, and I was grateful to get away from the arsehole.

But generally, if you do your job well, and make yourself a key part of the company, you won't get made redundant, even in a recession. Luck doesn't come in to it. So individuals can help themselves, we're not just passively working and relying on 'good' or 'bad' luck to keep our jobs.

JTL

Have to admit, I've been made redundant twice once in the UK, once in Australia. I asked for it both times.

But sometimes companies get rid of whole teams, and whole swaves of people, some of them better than others who stay: I've seen no real rhyme or reason in selection, too. Could be cost centre, and team, not ability.

I reckon alot of us in IT have had it good for quite awhile and take alot for granted.

Wrong. Not in all cases. I have had to make this kind of decision in the past based on monetary value i.e how much it will save the company to let X go and how much it will cost the company to do so. This has sometimes meant the best person has been made redundant.

Some people are let go due to not adding value but the sad fact is most people are let go based on cost savings and the business does what it needs to do based on that basis, and makes the process *fit* around this. It's a means to an end. Bad luck if your job happens to fit into that catagory

Which is what I was saying. If you can make yourself too valuable to let go, i.e. it would not be a cost saving to let you go, then you are safe.

I'm not talking about me. But I've worked with guys supporting 30 year old COBOL IBM systems who have a job for life as it would cost too much to replace the system and the guy supporting it can't be replaced. Recession or no recession, these guys are laughing and can ask for any pay they feel like.

JTL

The majorty of people made redundant don't fall into this category. They don't fall into the "bad luck" catagory as, like you say, they're not likely to be made redundant. Not sure why you raised them then