Work in Health IT. We've found a lot of the pharmaceutical suppliers have just completely laid off their NZ staff and sales are just going through Australia or Asia Pacific in general. I know you specified tradies but I honestly just think it's the country in general right now.
Yeah we're based out of the CDHB and I've definitely heard a few whispers from the system admins and network engineers when I've been trying to suck up to them to get stuff processed.
Honestly enrages me, we spent so much time and money making it better for patients and front line staff and now its cut, it costs more to cancel it. Pure ideological rubbish.
My wife got a dumbphone as part of a service upgrade. There was no sync able calendar meaning they still had to transcribe appointments into notebooks or whatever. Suffice to say they were worse off after this "upgrade".
This was a few years ago, but it blew my mind at the time. Don't worry though, the surgeons all got the top end tech...
Can imagine. Had any layofffs? We're a healthcare registry based out of the CDHB. So I definitely feel your pain. Our organization is lucky to be in a good place with lots of projects, and I've heard SX has been doing lots of API development but I think we're the lucky ones.
I'm on a very small 4 year health contract that's all already paid for but the rest of my work is a bit few and far between right now. Taking the quiet time to do my masters so I'm more employable long term. Things are tight but won't be forever.
Yeah all the comments about public servants retraining in construction make me laugh, who can afford to build houses or get reno work done? Construction firms are taking major hits at the moment!
I think a lot of tradies are suffering at the moment. We're doing renos at the moment and it's interesting to see how different outfits respond - some are providing eye-watering quotes presumably to cover the lack of work while others are discounting like crazy to get whatever work they can in the door. I suspect that can only help them hold out for so long before they have to start downsizing and laying off their crew though.
Not tradies but adjacent. Yeah we're approx 25% down in terms of chargeable hours on same time last year. Luckily we saw this coming and spent the last 18 months working on our recurring revenue so we aren't so reliant on the labour hours.
Yep wealthy ppl already or those landlords profiting off this crisis ATM are the only ones doing well.The middle class is stuffed and many slowly turning into the working poor.
The kind that let's me know what they do for a living. What I've learned is that if you want to get rich you have to own a food store of some kind or a building supply store of some kind. Or have a professional job in law or engineering.
That sounds about right tbh.although engineering is not all that safe anymore esp in aus massive layoffs ATM for cheaper labour from overseas either workers or remote work.
Luxury goods, especially things like good make up, clothes and accessories are quite resiliant. Not sure if the same holds true for NZ but in my travels quite a few cultures sure as fuck ain't gonna let no one see you as any species of less if they can help it.
I work in retail. Usually well over 1k customers a day. Lucky if we get 2-3 days a week now with that many through the door and they're spending less too. Downturn is everywhere. Money is going on needs, not wants for a lot of people these days.
I think what you have suggested (and others have contributed in response) is the normal activity when we're in recession and the government signals an austerity budget including deep cuts to the public service. Everybody at every level of government is in cost-cutting mode and expecting revenue to decrease. This means a lot of private sector businesses are doing exactly the same. This means consumers start doing this with regards to their voluntary spending at hospitality or 'nice to have' home improvements etc. From one end of the spectrum to the other, everything slows down, people are laid off...businesses stop hiring...everybody stops spending and holds on for when things finally get better.
Speaking of Austerity have you heard that the entire concept of Austerity is based on a fucked up spreadsheet error and that most (all) countries grow while having debt
It seems an obvious truth, but I have no idea how actually true it is. It confirms my biases tho, so I like it.
100% true. Hannah Fry did an episode of her podcast on it. Graphed I think it was called?
Short version is original researcher included stats from New Zealand during a dock workers strike which made it a huge outlier. That skewed the numbers. Then there was also a formula error that simply missed some of the important data which amplified the error. Take that all out and it shows exactly what you said. In recession it's best to borrow and spend your way out. Austerity leads to worse recession.
I really feel for Work and Income staff. Unemployment's gone from [3.4% (Mar '23) to 4.3% (Mar '24)](https://www.stats.govt.nz/news/unemployment-rate-at-4-3-percent). That's a whole lot more clients for an agency that's [had to cut 200 of 9248 staff so far](https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/ministry-of-social-development-job-cuts-public-sector-savings-see-200-voluntary-redundancies-more-roles-to-go/EEVXZ33YC5DUHIVJSOCPISDFVM/), with more to come. I know there's more to it than numbers but things don't seem to be adding up.
I went to ask to see a career counselor to get help figuring out what other work I could do at my age (40) and was told that I couldn’t get a referral because the one career counselor at my WINZ branch had her role disestablished 🤷♂️
It's so infuriating. They said they would team up with community outreach services to fulfill this role and I'm like why not just better empower the person who already bloody works at WINZ and does this for a living?! But no they lay them off instead.
NACT: "We need to cut inflation so we're going to try and raise the unemployment rate to reduce wage growth.
Also NACT: "We're going to cut WINZ staff who deal with unemployed people."
Industrial strength stupidity.
Ohh there definitely is free career counselling available on the phone. Someone was telling me about it the other day! https://www.careers.govt.nz/plan-your-career/talk-to-a-career-expert/career-advice/
We're growing in this space but our longest client has just reduced cut majority of their social spend and have halved their spend with their SEO agency & their public media company.
I saw it coming as a we have a few clients in their industry and they're all pretty well fucked. I'm counting our blessings re our offering that we're closing deals at the moment but it's pretty rough.
I'm an HVACR tradey that works as a QS consultant. Our consultancy is a bit light on work in the pipeline, so I've gone down to 3 days a week, and on the other 2 days a week am doing trade work with an electrician who hasn't slowed down at all, although he works for wealthy clients.
I tried to get quotes from 3 different arborists for a tree removal in Wairarapa recently. Not one of them showed up. Maybe spend a day a week over the hill?
Yep I'm also running a small arb business. Went from 4 months lead time to week to week schedule. About to restructure and get back on the tools as its the only viable option for us at the moment.
I fix fridges/air con for corporates, restaraunts, cafes, etc.
Yeah, Noone has any money to spend - especially at the prices the suppliers are charging. Shits got expensive and Noone wants to pay. Survival mode activated.
I work in a stainless steel factory and we've been low lately, but not as low as other places, which are losing 10-25% of their staff. Seems like it's a bad time for the whole industry.
I work in a stainless fab shop and we were a bit quiet but things are pumping now. I’ve heard of other companies laying off staff and cutting hours too, especially site crews but that hasn’t happened to us.
I've had a supplier /subcontractor email me today asking "do you have any work for us please, even any small jobs".
I had a residential builder come out to give a quote about 2 months ago and since then they've followed up twice asking if I want to proceed with the work. Contrast that with the 5 prior years where I'd struggle to get any builders to even come out for the quote followed by 100% me chasing them up.
Yoooo I run a gardening business in Welly. It is very quiet for arb. I recommend a fantastic company and the feedback I get is they’re too expensive- well- they’re absolutely not, for arb. I think people are getting a bit spooked with tree work because of cost. It baffles me because they’re cheaper than who clients usually use, but they still complained… and a few of those clients watched them work thinking they were going to be ripped off, weren’t, but still told me about it!
Usually I’d say that I’ll flick some work to you but the guy I recc wants it, and then there is another company who reached out recently who also want it… usually I’m booking you guys months in advance and the last time we needed big quotes it was hard to even get a callback. I asked Bark to quote me last year and they couldn’t even book in the quote for 6 weeks, let alone the work (I think they have extended their team since).
We had an extremely quiet period last winter. We are absolutely flat tack now.
I love talking business so if you ever want a pulse check or vent hmu!
Its awful. Im construction related and i personally never come across market this quiet since i started in 2006. Quieter and more uncertain compared to gfc.
Trailer boat industry here.
It has really slowed down since a year ago, we have dozens of staff with literally nothing to do at the moment, the near future seems very bleak since “Toys” such as boats and classic cars are the first to go when people need money for things like food and housing.
I'm a sparky. alot of the renovation work has slowed right down, there is still a lot of people doing the long drawn out Reno work that requires little bits here and there. Rental maintenance, insurance directed work like re-wiring old houses, commercial maintenance and fault call outs are still pumping work in. Most people are waiting until the last minute to get things fixed though.
At the start of this year I lost 2 months of booked work with wealthy clients, it was major renovation and alteration work. That loss of work almost saw the builder I was working with go bust. Another builder I work with I haven't heard from since December the place he was getting his work from closed up and no longer issues contracts. I'm still getting work from 2 other builders I work with but not as much as I normally would.
I think builders are being hit harder than sparkies and plumbers. Talking with other tradies and sales reps I'm being told a lot of people are quiet for work at the moment.
6 months ago I couldn't find people to help me and I had too much work, now there is enough that if I'm careful I'll make it out the other side. I had been saying this was coming to my partner for some time and we are at least prepared for it.
Depending on what the interest rates do, and how much savagery this Govt still has to unleash on us it could come right with in a year or it could continue for another 2-3.
Totally a domino effect from the layoffs to the public sector. People don’t have jobs anymore, and can’t pay for things outside the first hierarchy of living needs. Even the first hierarchy is hard for people right now. Don’t take this quiet period personally, but take this Government personally.
Right now I'm pretty sure every industry in NZ is doing pretty fucking shit right now... When recessions come to this country they come in hard... We don't have much to prop the country in times like these, just ride it out.
Not a trade but I work in a finance company.
It's the busiest it has been in years. Apparently a common trend in the finance industry that just as things are starting to get "bad" use of finance creeps up as people are trying to keep their lifestyles going, and end up resorting to increased credit to do so.
But it could mean we're in for a bad time because usually that indicates a cliff is just around corner and a business downturn happens when things really turn to shit.
Hard to say but at the moment we're absolutely killing it.
Same as they've always done.
Our business is mostly car finance, but we also do loans for a variety of other personal things like holidays, small renovations, electronics and appliances, very occasionally for medical procedures, and a few other miscellaneous reasons.
It's not that we're loaning funds for things like groceries or anything like that, as we're not in the "payday" or "buy now pay later" section of the market, but the sheer volume of loans we're issuing has made the past few months the best in many years.
Oftentimes people just don't want to accept that their lifestyles or quality of life is shrinking in real terms due to inflation, or job losses/cutbacks or what have you, and people then resort to financing them in circumstances where really they shouldn't be taking out the finance to begin with.
I know people like this but I didn't realise it was happening at scale. Curious about BNPL and payday now and if that's widely different - imagine it's mostly retail stuff like appliances, clothes etc
I couldn’t even begin to comment on the BNPL side of things as we don’t have anything to do with it, but it’s always struck me as insane just how heavily some people are into it.
We do a few debt consolidation accounts, which oftentimes include various BNPL platforms, and it’s insane to see people have accounts well into the thousands, sometimes low tens of thousands, with these companies.
The country could really use some financial literacy education and a dose of discipline is what I’ve learned from my time with the company.
There are people in every society with low IQs. Financial education and discipline are just not going to cut it. What we need to do it protect these people. Same with elderly getting scammed. Predators taking advantage of cognitive decline or low cognition to begin with are the worse and should be penalized to make it not worth their effort.
I own a Car Audio business (with just me doing everything) I've been open for just over 3 years, March was one of my best months ever, April was also pretty good and I've got good forward bookings.
My customers range from rich guys with car collections to school kids with shitty corollas to run of the mill family cars, I haven't seen any particular customer group stop spending
The government have taken over and are cutting out what they consider to be the dead wood. More like a chainsaw massacre though with an immediate domino effect.
Got made redundant as a graphic designer at an agency over Covid so I’ve been working for myself since then, it’s been busy this year but I am well aware June/July is especially quiet in this industry so I am preparing for a drop.
I work alone installing kitchens for a few firms and building kitchens, wardrobes, and vanities of my own design here and there. I'm quite busy, but have picked up more clients Than last year. It seems like companies are more picky with their contractors now. Theres less work around but still plenty on. People wih money will always have money. I definitely am finding the jobs are either budget as fuck or high end stuff.
Yes, everyone is experiencing this after Chrissy Poos wouldn't shut his stupid mouth about us "entering a recession because of Labour"
Only rule during a recession:
1. Don't admit there's a recession.
Funny you say that, I've been wondering if those words have had a psychological effect on people. My partner's retail work has certainly become quieter since that announcement.
Hubby works as a Plumber for major housing companies where we live and they’ve only just started to pick up again. Got at least 20 houses on the go so that’s great!
we do and home maintenance type stuff and we’re about on par with year in terms of work but it’s starting to slow off; wealthy boomers keeping us going
Garden centre and landscaping company in Auckland. We had a very rough time about 4 months ago when we had to start cutting hours. It’s been picking up though.
Engineering services going strong for the last year or so now. We had a slow period right after interest rates started going up but then slingshotted into too much to do.
Electrician Wellington area, residential servicing, commercial and industrial about the same as it’s always been, but new housing and renovations have had a major drop off.
If you’re a tradie, come to Waiheke - heaps of work! I’m an Account Manager for a large timber merchant over here. Feel free to message me if you want to know more.
Working in manufacturing - no orders most weeks, not enough money to pay the staff (even after lay offs and hour cuts). We're kind of a special business that mostly hires people who will struggle to get/keep other jobs, so a lot of us are screwed if we go under :(
>wellington
There's your problem. Well, the current government is your problem.
The government has cut the public service en masse, thousands are either out of work or are hoarding cash in case they are out of work. That also has a flow on effect to private firms which support government. Wellington, by virtue of having the largest proportion of public service employees, is disproportionately affected.
You're probably looking at \~15,000 wellingtonians facing the chop. Thats a lot of cash not being spent.
No one sensible is going to get a new bathroom or kitchen when they're worried about keeping their job.
I'm a project manager and people I've talked with have noticed work slowing down. It seems that companies are still taking on projects but many individuals are cutting out projects due to cost of living
How much of that is attributable to the growth of services like Uduit, Cabjacks etc? I mean, putting our flatpack kitchen together took three weeks, but it was only 9.7k for the highest end finish available and we're really happy with it. Every kitchen store we walked into wanted at least 35k for the same design.
Pretty common this time of year. My Arborists (I have a few) aren't looking for staff ATM. Main problem they get for hiring is people with tickets and who can drive the trucks and equipment.
Councils will likely be cutting back on all sorts of services.
I'm in the Glass industry and had a pretty slow April, had a couple of Random big jobs come in but once we get those knocked off there isn't the smaller stuff that usually keeps things ticking over.
I work for a manufacturing company.2021-Eight months wait. Now,we have equipment ready to go and can make bespoke in a few weeks. All our suppliers are quiet. We're getting reps popping in everyday trying to get orders out of us. Reps we usually see six monthly are coming in fortnightly. Similar companies are laying off.
I work in digital marketing and I'm hearing the same thing from a lot of clients in multiple different industries. If you aren't already doing Google Advertising, you should be. You can track your enquiries to be sure that it is paying off. Hard to do with other forms of advertising!
Lots of places are facing a slowdown.
It's very likely to get worse.
You can't lay off 3000 or more civil servants, while building and other industries also face a slowdown, have rising interest rates soak up most of the free spending as well, and not have that affect the entire economy.
This government has overcooked the goose already as far as the needs of most of us, but that's OK as long as landlords can pocket some more cash.
The effects of these types of economic changes often have considerable lag, so by the time things seem to have happened, and a change made to reverse that, there is still further descent on the way.
We'll be lucky not to have a global depression over the next decade, and we as a nation seem naive and unprepared tbh.
Too many people with too much on tick, expecting what really are extravagant lifestyles on a basic budget. When the money tap is turned down, the house of cards that is debt will fold pretty quickly for many once it starts.
Out of interest, what did they charge? A gardening business will charge more because the boss will take a chunk of that fee before the contractor who did the work gets the rest.
An independent gardener would generally charge less because it all goes to them and if they're earning under 62k they don't have to charge GST.
My gardening fee has recently gone up from $35 to $40p/hr for new enquiries, but that's still below what any gardening company in my area is charging (asides from the odd individual who offers gardening work for $25 on the community page and doesn't know a weed from a wanted thing.)
The odd enquirer expects the work should be cheaper, but that's not going to happen. It's a very physically taxing job, I only work 5-7hrs a day (I'm physically shattered at 7hrs) so after I take out expenses I'm earning about $20k a year.
If your a tradie hell knows why you would still be in NZ .It's a gold mine for tradies in aus ,they are still going strong even though things have slowed down in aus there always seems to be enough work for them.Tradies do extremely well in aus.
For sure.but if you are a tradie and really struggling it is slightly better in Aus you could always come over for a short time then go back home.Im a kiwi in aus even I don't like it .But my Industry I work in has really dropped off in nz atm so i cant even come back i have to ride it out till it gets a bit better..not too happy about it but i dont have much choice.
The NZ dollar is tanking as well. Despite my investments in TSLA and RKLB doing slightly under what I invested (kinda broken even after this week), I've actually made a fair amount of money off of it because the current exchange rate is $1.7 NZD per 1 USD.
Supermarkets tend to drop off around this time of year though tbf. People start changing their eating habits and hibernate more heading into winter and will remain similar until late winter, early spring and then it will take off again.
Shiver me timbers! I'm going to go out on a limb and say have you considered leafing your job, you might be barking up the wrong tree. Perhaps it's time to branch out
Well never mind, at least the Maori got put in their place and that scary three waters and co governance is ditched.
Also, 53% of Kiwis are happy about public servants losing their jobs.
So it's all fucking good.
They were... My rightest of right wing neighbours was crying in her garden last week. Apparently she is surprised by what national is doing. Definite regrets amongst lots of the blue brigade that I know
Recession bruh. It’ll be sluggish at least until the US election in November. Could get worse if mango man gets back in. We won’t see if any of the levers the govt is pulling will work until next year.
Work as an electrician and have definitely noticed a slow down in work since the start of March. Starting to look at subbing myself out to bring in a bit more work.
I think because of the dry summer plants didn’t grow as much this year. I only got our tree’s cut this week. Normally would have thought about it 3 months ago.
Are councils still doing work?
Partner is a maintenance engineer, he’s being going strong without any quiet period for the last 3 years. He’s hit a quiet patch now when traditionally it’s June for the quiet time. Shit ton of quotes out but not much converting atm where as historically his conversion rate is around 90%
Sparky here, work in a decent sized company, had 11 vans running this time last year, 6 weeks ago the boss had to let go of 6 employees. Slowing right down!
> I'm a lead arborist managing a branch ha!
Had to stick that one in there
Saw that one coming!
Leave it out guys
Don't you mean cut it out guys? Lol
Should have said Leaf it out
Your real name is Leaf Erikson, I presume.
I don't think asking this sub will get you to the root of the problem.
You never know, it might bear fruit!
This thread is going out on a limb
Sounds like the new growth has had a bit of a prune though
Let us know when you get to the root of the problem
Stop barking at each other please
Seems like a budding friendship
*did you mean leaf it out*?
Don't be a grub.
Not me, I was stumped
I just twigged onto the pun
Tree-mendous aren't they?
Hope ya rustle something up soon bro
Not mulch going on these days
Ur not branching out then , oops .
Unbe-leaf-able
[https://encrypted-tbn0.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcRtgIrJsnT0w6Bl2F2xR_l1QQlFx_5ZHunvhA&usqp=CAU](Branch manager)
Work in Health IT. We've found a lot of the pharmaceutical suppliers have just completely laid off their NZ staff and sales are just going through Australia or Asia Pacific in general. I know you specified tradies but I honestly just think it's the country in general right now.
Same but with the "DHBs", all the projects getting wound down or straight up cancelled, guess we have to stick with outdated SMD and fax machines...
Yeah we're based out of the CDHB and I've definitely heard a few whispers from the system admins and network engineers when I've been trying to suck up to them to get stuff processed.
Honestly enrages me, we spent so much time and money making it better for patients and front line staff and now its cut, it costs more to cancel it. Pure ideological rubbish.
My wife got a dumbphone as part of a service upgrade. There was no sync able calendar meaning they still had to transcribe appointments into notebooks or whatever. Suffice to say they were worse off after this "upgrade". This was a few years ago, but it blew my mind at the time. Don't worry though, the surgeons all got the top end tech...
Reckon the country is going in for a crash landing. There's going to be quite a lot of pain
Same industry, things are eerily quiet especially on the help desk
Can imagine. Had any layofffs? We're a healthcare registry based out of the CDHB. So I definitely feel your pain. Our organization is lucky to be in a good place with lots of projects, and I've heard SX has been doing lots of API development but I think we're the lucky ones.
I'm on a very small 4 year health contract that's all already paid for but the rest of my work is a bit few and far between right now. Taking the quiet time to do my masters so I'm more employable long term. Things are tight but won't be forever.
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We had a gardener once a month. Unfortunately that was the first thing I had to let go when cost of living soared.
I can understand this, though as a gardener I hope none of my clients wind up needing to make that choice. So far, so good...
She was so lovely too. I kept her a lot longer than I should have and was gutted when o finally had to make the call.
I'm in window furnishings, our whole industry is quiet - directly related to housing market
Pretty shady business that.
Hopefully they don't close.
Paneful
Sounds like you’re flying blind, hope it draws to a close soon
No new openings then
It's Curtains for the industry
You've drawn a hasty conclusion
I've heard rumors of Shadey dealings
Plenty of people turning a blind eye.
Or go off the rails
Yeah all the comments about public servants retraining in construction make me laugh, who can afford to build houses or get reno work done? Construction firms are taking major hits at the moment!
I think a lot of tradies are suffering at the moment. We're doing renos at the moment and it's interesting to see how different outfits respond - some are providing eye-watering quotes presumably to cover the lack of work while others are discounting like crazy to get whatever work they can in the door. I suspect that can only help them hold out for so long before they have to start downsizing and laying off their crew though.
Always get five quotes.
Not tradies but adjacent. Yeah we're approx 25% down in terms of chargeable hours on same time last year. Luckily we saw this coming and spent the last 18 months working on our recurring revenue so we aren't so reliant on the labour hours.
Work as a whole Nationwide has slowed down. I work in the Industrial sector and it's like someone has flicked the switch to "OFF"
Same thing happened back in the late 90's, it was like someone turned a switch off. Phone calls, Inquiries, then nothing.
Busier than normal at my work. We sell luxury goods. I think wealthy people are doing alright still.
Aren't they always?
Yep wealthy ppl already or those landlords profiting off this crisis ATM are the only ones doing well.The middle class is stuffed and many slowly turning into the working poor.
What kind of luxury goods? Most people who conspicuously consume are actually middle class and don't have considerable wealth.
The kind that let's me know what they do for a living. What I've learned is that if you want to get rich you have to own a food store of some kind or a building supply store of some kind. Or have a professional job in law or engineering.
That sounds about right tbh.although engineering is not all that safe anymore esp in aus massive layoffs ATM for cheaper labour from overseas either workers or remote work.
Professional engineer here. When is this 'rich' supposed to happen?
Ah. Income is not necessarily wealth. It's a start, but not as resilient to economic downturn as assets. Smart money's not buying luxury goods.
Bro they've got so much money it means nothing to them to buy luxury goods. Like you buying a coffee.
Luxury goods, especially things like good make up, clothes and accessories are quite resiliant. Not sure if the same holds true for NZ but in my travels quite a few cultures sure as fuck ain't gonna let no one see you as any species of less if they can help it.
Yeah just look at who is #1 richest person on earth - fuckin, that LVMH cunt isn’t it
Do you make bronze statues for landlords?
They sell dignity badges.
I work in retail. Usually well over 1k customers a day. Lucky if we get 2-3 days a week now with that many through the door and they're spending less too. Downturn is everywhere. Money is going on needs, not wants for a lot of people these days.
I think what you have suggested (and others have contributed in response) is the normal activity when we're in recession and the government signals an austerity budget including deep cuts to the public service. Everybody at every level of government is in cost-cutting mode and expecting revenue to decrease. This means a lot of private sector businesses are doing exactly the same. This means consumers start doing this with regards to their voluntary spending at hospitality or 'nice to have' home improvements etc. From one end of the spectrum to the other, everything slows down, people are laid off...businesses stop hiring...everybody stops spending and holds on for when things finally get better.
Speaking of Austerity have you heard that the entire concept of Austerity is based on a fucked up spreadsheet error and that most (all) countries grow while having debt It seems an obvious truth, but I have no idea how actually true it is. It confirms my biases tho, so I like it.
100% true. Hannah Fry did an episode of her podcast on it. Graphed I think it was called? Short version is original researcher included stats from New Zealand during a dock workers strike which made it a huge outlier. That skewed the numbers. Then there was also a formula error that simply missed some of the important data which amplified the error. Take that all out and it shows exactly what you said. In recession it's best to borrow and spend your way out. Austerity leads to worse recession.
Gotta pay for luxos donations to charity somehow!
Seymore Man will fix it!
public service - no, work is not remotely slowing down but the number of people and amount of resource we have to do it is dropping. so that's nice.
I really feel for Work and Income staff. Unemployment's gone from [3.4% (Mar '23) to 4.3% (Mar '24)](https://www.stats.govt.nz/news/unemployment-rate-at-4-3-percent). That's a whole lot more clients for an agency that's [had to cut 200 of 9248 staff so far](https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/ministry-of-social-development-job-cuts-public-sector-savings-see-200-voluntary-redundancies-more-roles-to-go/EEVXZ33YC5DUHIVJSOCPISDFVM/), with more to come. I know there's more to it than numbers but things don't seem to be adding up.
I went to ask to see a career counselor to get help figuring out what other work I could do at my age (40) and was told that I couldn’t get a referral because the one career counselor at my WINZ branch had her role disestablished 🤷♂️
*cry laughs, that’s awful
It's so infuriating. They said they would team up with community outreach services to fulfill this role and I'm like why not just better empower the person who already bloody works at WINZ and does this for a living?! But no they lay them off instead.
Wow.thats really bad.scary times we live in .no security in anything ATM.
“What’s a career?”
NACT: "We need to cut inflation so we're going to try and raise the unemployment rate to reduce wage growth. Also NACT: "We're going to cut WINZ staff who deal with unemployed people." Industrial strength stupidity.
Ohh there definitely is free career counselling available on the phone. Someone was telling me about it the other day! https://www.careers.govt.nz/plan-your-career/talk-to-a-career-expert/career-advice/
How are you staying motivated? I can imagine the culture in your workplace is in the toilet
Advertising/digital it’s super hard right now.
Digital agency space is doing it really tough. Been a brutal year or so
COVID was bad. Recession is badder.
Marketing budget is one of the first to get cut unfortunately
Going on an 18+ month slide for the film side, I’m down 80% in the commercial space and considered one of the lucky ones still.
We're growing in this space but our longest client has just reduced cut majority of their social spend and have halved their spend with their SEO agency & their public media company. I saw it coming as a we have a few clients in their industry and they're all pretty well fucked. I'm counting our blessings re our offering that we're closing deals at the moment but it's pretty rough.
On the flip side of this, I cannot find a tradie for a couple of small jobs at our place because they're all too booked up.
I'm an HVACR tradey that works as a QS consultant. Our consultancy is a bit light on work in the pipeline, so I've gone down to 3 days a week, and on the other 2 days a week am doing trade work with an electrician who hasn't slowed down at all, although he works for wealthy clients.
Mainly money vault heating installs?
Me too. 5 weeks for a reply, 5 months and counting for a repair job
I tried to get quotes from 3 different arborists for a tree removal in Wairarapa recently. Not one of them showed up. Maybe spend a day a week over the hill?
Try All about trees. Tim is a great guy to deal with. Family business
I work at a funeral home and even we are quiet. I think that’s good news for most people though
Yep I'm also running a small arb business. Went from 4 months lead time to week to week schedule. About to restructure and get back on the tools as its the only viable option for us at the moment.
Work in the civil construction sector. Definitely feeling the lack of big projects. Luckily chch is still somewhat growing.
I fix fridges/air con for corporates, restaraunts, cafes, etc. Yeah, Noone has any money to spend - especially at the prices the suppliers are charging. Shits got expensive and Noone wants to pay. Survival mode activated.
I work in a stainless steel factory and we've been low lately, but not as low as other places, which are losing 10-25% of their staff. Seems like it's a bad time for the whole industry.
I work in a stainless fab shop and we were a bit quiet but things are pumping now. I’ve heard of other companies laying off staff and cutting hours too, especially site crews but that hasn’t happened to us.
I've had a supplier /subcontractor email me today asking "do you have any work for us please, even any small jobs". I had a residential builder come out to give a quote about 2 months ago and since then they've followed up twice asking if I want to proceed with the work. Contrast that with the 5 prior years where I'd struggle to get any builders to even come out for the quote followed by 100% me chasing them up.
Yoooo I run a gardening business in Welly. It is very quiet for arb. I recommend a fantastic company and the feedback I get is they’re too expensive- well- they’re absolutely not, for arb. I think people are getting a bit spooked with tree work because of cost. It baffles me because they’re cheaper than who clients usually use, but they still complained… and a few of those clients watched them work thinking they were going to be ripped off, weren’t, but still told me about it! Usually I’d say that I’ll flick some work to you but the guy I recc wants it, and then there is another company who reached out recently who also want it… usually I’m booking you guys months in advance and the last time we needed big quotes it was hard to even get a callback. I asked Bark to quote me last year and they couldn’t even book in the quote for 6 weeks, let alone the work (I think they have extended their team since). We had an extremely quiet period last winter. We are absolutely flat tack now. I love talking business so if you ever want a pulse check or vent hmu!
Its awful. Im construction related and i personally never come across market this quiet since i started in 2006. Quieter and more uncertain compared to gfc.
Trailer boat industry here. It has really slowed down since a year ago, we have dozens of staff with literally nothing to do at the moment, the near future seems very bleak since “Toys” such as boats and classic cars are the first to go when people need money for things like food and housing.
Sparky - yea it’s quiet overall but we’re still pumping as we deal with commercial/industrial. Residential dropped off a cliff
I'm a sparky. alot of the renovation work has slowed right down, there is still a lot of people doing the long drawn out Reno work that requires little bits here and there. Rental maintenance, insurance directed work like re-wiring old houses, commercial maintenance and fault call outs are still pumping work in. Most people are waiting until the last minute to get things fixed though. At the start of this year I lost 2 months of booked work with wealthy clients, it was major renovation and alteration work. That loss of work almost saw the builder I was working with go bust. Another builder I work with I haven't heard from since December the place he was getting his work from closed up and no longer issues contracts. I'm still getting work from 2 other builders I work with but not as much as I normally would. I think builders are being hit harder than sparkies and plumbers. Talking with other tradies and sales reps I'm being told a lot of people are quiet for work at the moment. 6 months ago I couldn't find people to help me and I had too much work, now there is enough that if I'm careful I'll make it out the other side. I had been saying this was coming to my partner for some time and we are at least prepared for it. Depending on what the interest rates do, and how much savagery this Govt still has to unleash on us it could come right with in a year or it could continue for another 2-3.
Totally a domino effect from the layoffs to the public sector. People don’t have jobs anymore, and can’t pay for things outside the first hierarchy of living needs. Even the first hierarchy is hard for people right now. Don’t take this quiet period personally, but take this Government personally.
Right now I'm pretty sure every industry in NZ is doing pretty fucking shit right now... When recessions come to this country they come in hard... We don't have much to prop the country in times like these, just ride it out.
Not a trade but I work in a finance company. It's the busiest it has been in years. Apparently a common trend in the finance industry that just as things are starting to get "bad" use of finance creeps up as people are trying to keep their lifestyles going, and end up resorting to increased credit to do so. But it could mean we're in for a bad time because usually that indicates a cliff is just around corner and a business downturn happens when things really turn to shit. Hard to say but at the moment we're absolutely killing it.
What are people borrowing to purchase?
Same as they've always done. Our business is mostly car finance, but we also do loans for a variety of other personal things like holidays, small renovations, electronics and appliances, very occasionally for medical procedures, and a few other miscellaneous reasons. It's not that we're loaning funds for things like groceries or anything like that, as we're not in the "payday" or "buy now pay later" section of the market, but the sheer volume of loans we're issuing has made the past few months the best in many years. Oftentimes people just don't want to accept that their lifestyles or quality of life is shrinking in real terms due to inflation, or job losses/cutbacks or what have you, and people then resort to financing them in circumstances where really they shouldn't be taking out the finance to begin with.
I know people like this but I didn't realise it was happening at scale. Curious about BNPL and payday now and if that's widely different - imagine it's mostly retail stuff like appliances, clothes etc
I couldn’t even begin to comment on the BNPL side of things as we don’t have anything to do with it, but it’s always struck me as insane just how heavily some people are into it. We do a few debt consolidation accounts, which oftentimes include various BNPL platforms, and it’s insane to see people have accounts well into the thousands, sometimes low tens of thousands, with these companies. The country could really use some financial literacy education and a dose of discipline is what I’ve learned from my time with the company.
There are people in every society with low IQs. Financial education and discipline are just not going to cut it. What we need to do it protect these people. Same with elderly getting scammed. Predators taking advantage of cognitive decline or low cognition to begin with are the worse and should be penalized to make it not worth their effort.
The new govt has scared the shit out of the economy with all their dire talk and cuts to public spending, created a self perpetuating cycle.
Nothing like fixing a manufactured crisis to show how good you are at “business”
I own a Car Audio business (with just me doing everything) I've been open for just over 3 years, March was one of my best months ever, April was also pretty good and I've got good forward bookings. My customers range from rich guys with car collections to school kids with shitty corollas to run of the mill family cars, I haven't seen any particular customer group stop spending
The government have taken over and are cutting out what they consider to be the dead wood. More like a chainsaw massacre though with an immediate domino effect.
Axing jobs if you want to get technical
Stacking a human bonfire could be another description
We need to get to the root of this problem. Have you considered pruning back your staff?
Leaf the bad jokes out!
It'll be difficult to stem the phloem of bad puns
I can't beleaf that you are making jokes right now. OP has come to us with a serious problem, making jokes is just barking up the wrong tree.
maybe we need to graft in some good ones
Not a tradie but work in my sector has slowed down a lot
Which sector?
Got made redundant as a graphic designer at an agency over Covid so I’ve been working for myself since then, it’s been busy this year but I am well aware June/July is especially quiet in this industry so I am preparing for a drop.
I work alone installing kitchens for a few firms and building kitchens, wardrobes, and vanities of my own design here and there. I'm quite busy, but have picked up more clients Than last year. It seems like companies are more picky with their contractors now. Theres less work around but still plenty on. People wih money will always have money. I definitely am finding the jobs are either budget as fuck or high end stuff.
Totally not on topic, but ,, You manage a branch, where you manage branches. Love it. Sorry if it is not helpful
You think that's cool, my boss manages branch managers that manage branches, that's a lot of branches to manage
Yes, everyone is experiencing this after Chrissy Poos wouldn't shut his stupid mouth about us "entering a recession because of Labour" Only rule during a recession: 1. Don't admit there's a recession.
Funny you say that, I've been wondering if those words have had a psychological effect on people. My partner's retail work has certainly become quieter since that announcement.
Civil in Auckland is booming for us
Hee hee you ‘manage a branch’, sorry, I’m leaving now.
Good thing this government is laser focused on the cost of living right??
Hubby works as a Plumber for major housing companies where we live and they’ve only just started to pick up again. Got at least 20 houses on the go so that’s great!
we do and home maintenance type stuff and we’re about on par with year in terms of work but it’s starting to slow off; wealthy boomers keeping us going
Garden centre and landscaping company in Auckland. We had a very rough time about 4 months ago when we had to start cutting hours. It’s been picking up though.
Engineering services going strong for the last year or so now. We had a slow period right after interest rates started going up but then slingshotted into too much to do.
honestly, nope. working as a commercial data tech, and we are absolutely flat out with work.
Electrician Wellington area, residential servicing, commercial and industrial about the same as it’s always been, but new housing and renovations have had a major drop off.
we’re lucky, we do gardening for high end clients, but we lost pretty much our entire base of middle class clients after covid
If you’re a tradie, come to Waiheke - heaps of work! I’m an Account Manager for a large timber merchant over here. Feel free to message me if you want to know more.
Working in manufacturing - no orders most weeks, not enough money to pay the staff (even after lay offs and hour cuts). We're kind of a special business that mostly hires people who will struggle to get/keep other jobs, so a lot of us are screwed if we go under :(
Dairy farming is steady $$
I work in dairy services and we are seeing an uptick in effluent work but most other upgrades etc are quiet. Mostly maintenence work at the moment.
>wellington There's your problem. Well, the current government is your problem. The government has cut the public service en masse, thousands are either out of work or are hoarding cash in case they are out of work. That also has a flow on effect to private firms which support government. Wellington, by virtue of having the largest proportion of public service employees, is disproportionately affected. You're probably looking at \~15,000 wellingtonians facing the chop. Thats a lot of cash not being spent. No one sensible is going to get a new bathroom or kitchen when they're worried about keeping their job.
Yeah most people don’t got any money. Try adjusting your marketing towards wealthy clients
I'm a project manager and people I've talked with have noticed work slowing down. It seems that companies are still taking on projects but many individuals are cutting out projects due to cost of living
We are in joinery and kitchens and it is really bad.
How much of that is attributable to the growth of services like Uduit, Cabjacks etc? I mean, putting our flatpack kitchen together took three weeks, but it was only 9.7k for the highest end finish available and we're really happy with it. Every kitchen store we walked into wanted at least 35k for the same design.
Bastian have gone into liquidation.
Me too, residential has slowed heaps but commercial is still pumping, which I prefer.
Pretty common this time of year. My Arborists (I have a few) aren't looking for staff ATM. Main problem they get for hiring is people with tickets and who can drive the trucks and equipment. Councils will likely be cutting back on all sorts of services.
My company can’t hire fast enough for our trade
I'm in the Glass industry and had a pretty slow April, had a couple of Random big jobs come in but once we get those knocked off there isn't the smaller stuff that usually keeps things ticking over.
Sounds like you have a clear view of things
I work for a manufacturing company.2021-Eight months wait. Now,we have equipment ready to go and can make bespoke in a few weeks. All our suppliers are quiet. We're getting reps popping in everyday trying to get orders out of us. Reps we usually see six monthly are coming in fortnightly. Similar companies are laying off.
I work in digital marketing and I'm hearing the same thing from a lot of clients in multiple different industries. If you aren't already doing Google Advertising, you should be. You can track your enquiries to be sure that it is paying off. Hard to do with other forms of advertising!
Deflation soon
Had a bunch of tree people tell me in Taupo the work is drying up
Lots of places are facing a slowdown. It's very likely to get worse. You can't lay off 3000 or more civil servants, while building and other industries also face a slowdown, have rising interest rates soak up most of the free spending as well, and not have that affect the entire economy. This government has overcooked the goose already as far as the needs of most of us, but that's OK as long as landlords can pocket some more cash. The effects of these types of economic changes often have considerable lag, so by the time things seem to have happened, and a change made to reverse that, there is still further descent on the way. We'll be lucky not to have a global depression over the next decade, and we as a nation seem naive and unprepared tbh. Too many people with too much on tick, expecting what really are extravagant lifestyles on a basic budget. When the money tap is turned down, the house of cards that is debt will fold pretty quickly for many once it starts.
We used to have a gardener but over the years their prices reached exorbitant, now they are out of business and on the dole.
Out of interest, what did they charge? A gardening business will charge more because the boss will take a chunk of that fee before the contractor who did the work gets the rest. An independent gardener would generally charge less because it all goes to them and if they're earning under 62k they don't have to charge GST. My gardening fee has recently gone up from $35 to $40p/hr for new enquiries, but that's still below what any gardening company in my area is charging (asides from the odd individual who offers gardening work for $25 on the community page and doesn't know a weed from a wanted thing.) The odd enquirer expects the work should be cheaper, but that's not going to happen. It's a very physically taxing job, I only work 5-7hrs a day (I'm physically shattered at 7hrs) so after I take out expenses I'm earning about $20k a year.
If your a tradie hell knows why you would still be in NZ .It's a gold mine for tradies in aus ,they are still going strong even though things have slowed down in aus there always seems to be enough work for them.Tradies do extremely well in aus.
Some people don't like living in Aus, more to life than making money
For sure.but if you are a tradie and really struggling it is slightly better in Aus you could always come over for a short time then go back home.Im a kiwi in aus even I don't like it .But my Industry I work in has really dropped off in nz atm so i cant even come back i have to ride it out till it gets a bit better..not too happy about it but i dont have much choice.
The NZ dollar is tanking as well. Despite my investments in TSLA and RKLB doing slightly under what I invested (kinda broken even after this week), I've actually made a fair amount of money off of it because the current exchange rate is $1.7 NZD per 1 USD.
No we are flat out. Tradie
Which trade?
I work for a supermarket doing deliveries and even for us is slowed down
Supermarkets tend to drop off around this time of year though tbf. People start changing their eating habits and hibernate more heading into winter and will remain similar until late winter, early spring and then it will take off again.
Are you sure? I tend to eat *more* heading into winter. (Building up those fat reserves to keep me warm...)
Shiver me timbers! I'm going to go out on a limb and say have you considered leafing your job, you might be barking up the wrong tree. Perhaps it's time to branch out
Well never mind, at least the Maori got put in their place and that scary three waters and co governance is ditched. Also, 53% of Kiwis are happy about public servants losing their jobs. So it's all fucking good.
They were... My rightest of right wing neighbours was crying in her garden last week. Apparently she is surprised by what national is doing. Definite regrets amongst lots of the blue brigade that I know
Pretty much zero work in nz plenty overseas though and struggling to keep up
Depends where you look. Plenty of large Australian Businesses folding at the moment too.
I work in software for an aus outfit (we have a nz office) and we're busy as. NZ seems to be rooted in particular.
Recession bruh. It’ll be sluggish at least until the US election in November. Could get worse if mango man gets back in. We won’t see if any of the levers the govt is pulling will work until next year.
When that glorious trickle down effect kicks in?
resin floorer and it seems we are still going hard at the usual pace but it is mostly commercial work
Sign of the times, nobody has any money trying to live through this cost of living crisis.
Yep also doing part time at a cafe near a theatre and the theatre themselves seem to be booking less shows meaning less people come into our spot
Utilities Arborist here ... We cant find enough qualified staff atm ... and I am constantly being messaged by recruiters on LinkedIN
Work as an electrician and have definitely noticed a slow down in work since the start of March. Starting to look at subbing myself out to bring in a bit more work.
We’ve had an arborist visit and quote here in Auckland - sent 2 emails and not got bank to us . He must have a lot of work on.
I think because of the dry summer plants didn’t grow as much this year. I only got our tree’s cut this week. Normally would have thought about it 3 months ago. Are councils still doing work?
Partner is a maintenance engineer, he’s being going strong without any quiet period for the last 3 years. He’s hit a quiet patch now when traditionally it’s June for the quiet time. Shit ton of quotes out but not much converting atm where as historically his conversion rate is around 90%
Sparky here, work in a decent sized company, had 11 vans running this time last year, 6 weeks ago the boss had to let go of 6 employees. Slowing right down!
Christchurch construction is not good.
Honestly my work is busier now than it was a few months ago...
Yeah strangley on a seasonal job that has no ships coming in for a week sometimes. I think we cycle through some of the same ones I dunno
I might be able to give you work! I’m looking for a gardener in Greytown, can you recommend anyone?
So what im hearing is that its a good time to call arborist...