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The British economy is to slip into a deep recession in the first half of this year as the government continues with its fiscal squeeze on public spending, warns an influential think tank.
A report published by the National Institute for Economic and Social Research (NISER) has lowered its forecast for the UK's financial situation, expecting the economy to shrink 0.1% in 2012.
"We forecast a return to technical recession in the first half of this year, as households continue to retrench, credit conditions remain tight, and businesses are reluctant to invest given uncertainty about both domestic and foreign demand," said the think hank.
NISER has also predicted an increase to 9.1% in the UK unemployment rate in late 2012, from 8.4% in the three months to November, and has urged the coalition government to boost near-term spending to prevent long-term damage caused by rising unemployment.
"Unemployment at this elevated level for such a long period is likely to do permanent damage to the supply side of the economy, with large long-run economic costs," the report added.
Calling for the Tory-led government to relax its austerity measures in order to boost the economy by creating jobs, the NIESR's director Jonathan Portes, warned that "accepting a significant degree of long-term economic and social damage," is the inevitable result of not wavering from the government's path to "deliberately" damage the country's economy.
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