Best Insurance

Will your city be the first to come out of recession?(24-Jan-2011)

The age old adage location – location – location holds true for employment opportunities as well. Over the last 2 years, almost every city and every sector has been hit by unemployment. While lots of redundancies are expected in the public sector, there is hope that private sector can bridge some of the gap. As per the latest report - "Cities Outlook 2011" published by Centre for Cities, which is an independent, non partisan research and policy institute committed to improving the economic performance of UK cities, job prospects vary quite a lot from one city to another.Many cities are bouncing back from the recession, including some of those hardest hit by job losses, however, economic recovery is likely to be unevenly spread across the country in the years ahead. 

The performance of 11 largest cities that contribute to almost 37% of Britain’s private sector jobs, say 1 in every 3 jobs is crucial. These cities are London, Birmingham, Bristol, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Leeds, Liverpool Manchester, Newcastle, Nottingham, and Sheffield.

The five cities that are better placed i.e. insulated from economic impact of the spending squeeze and have the potential to create private sector jobs are Milton Keynes, Reading, Aberdeen, Leeds and Bristol.  They also have relatively lower vulnerability to public sector job losses and spending cuts.

The five vulnerable cities which may not feel the full benefits of national economic recovery for some time are Sunderland, Liverpool, Birkenhead, Swansea and Newport. These places are predicted to be highest hit as a result of Government spending cuts. Traditionally these are also the cities with people having low skill levels, more people employed in the public sector, and more people claiming unemployment benefits.  Undoubtedly, these cities will need additional financial support from central government, and a highly effective implementation plan.

Kesh Thukaram, Director Best Insurance commented that while optimistic views about economic recovery albeit more in some cities than others is helpful, the real impact of the unprecedented public sector cuts and rising inflation cannot be under estimated. Banks are not showing any signs of increasing lending to small and medium sector businesses and rising inflation can yet be another blow. Unless there is more lending, any recovery can be slow and painful. It is not time for individuals or businesses to be complacent. He added that the number of people buying payment protection and income protection policies have been on the rise this year.

Best Insurance is a specialist provider of protection products. Their range of redundancy insurance and accident, sickness and unemployment covers are very comprehensive.