We now live in an age of super sized everything, an age where we are reevaluating the worth of systems and institutions – from the drive through bank to the relevance of the monarchical government. The 21^st century has seen the rapid expansion of communications and telecommunications with mobile phones, the Internet and an overwhelming media focus on internationally popular culture. We have seen the rise of terrorism and the exponential growth of economic globalisation- that has taken us to the brink of a global recession. With UK markets in decline and the Confederation of British Industry predicting unemployment in the UK to hit three million by 2009,  what chance do I have of making it in the real world come May, when after twenty-one years, my climb up the education comes to an abrupt end?

It has been difficult to miss the almost hourly reportage on the latest economic crisis. In the simplest of terms, the credit crunch is a crisis caused by banks being too nervous to lend money to us or each other.  The phrase ‘Credit Crunch’ has been so widely used over the past year it has even been added to the latest edition of the Oxford English Dictionary.

Lets face it, U.S and British consumers are living beyond our means, borrowing money to fund our ever increasing spending habits. By late August 2007 it was clear that the US housing market was falling rapidly. The markets soon lost confidence and nobody was sure how large the losses would be. The banks stopped lending to each other then tried to repair their own finances by cutting back on lending to their customers. This made borrowing harder to arrange and increasingly expensive.

There are stories all over the media warning consumers to cut back, sell their car and watch their spending. I cannot help but feel that the national media is over stating the credit crunch and scaremongering. We all know the media loves bad news and let’s face it, bad news sells. The press considers these “cut back” headlines as a means to sell more newspapers, with the media looking to overcome the economic crisis, profit is in the forefront of their mind. Drastic headlines lead to an increase in readers, which inevitably leads to an increase in advertising revenue. 

But how far can we go in blaming the media?  We have been inundated with distressing headlines and dire warnings of an impending financial crisis. It is my view that the media has sacrificed responsible reporting in order to generate dramatic headlines with the aim of selling their papers or attracting viewers, often leading to conflicting reports. 

As much as the public would like to blame the media for its role in the current economic downturn, it is clear no one really knows who is to blame. We can sit here and point fingers, but like it or not we have all had our part to play in the current crisis. With all credit to the media they are playing on societies fears, reminding people of the great depression. This does not make it right but it enables them to sell papers, their ultimate goal if they themselves wish to survive the crunch. So where does this leave the rest of the industry? Is the film industry feeling the crunch? What about advertising and the rest of the creative industries?

It is clear that the credit crunch is having an effect on everyone. Be it the big city spenders or the thousands of small limited companies, the economic downturn and the effect on revenue is not going unnoticed. However, it is still unclear where the blame lies; the consumers are blaming the media and the banks, and the media are blaming the consumers.  It could be argued that advertising played its part by encouraging the ‘must have it now’ mentality of the consumer, whilst the banks obliged with easy credit which generated extortionate interest rates.  

Those consumers weighed down with debt face uncertain futures as unemployment and property repossessions rise; meanwhile governments bail out the banks with money earned by the consumer in the first place or by further borrowing. The High Street was already feeling the squeeze as more consumers made purchases online, now that the consumers are tightening their belts many retail outlets may become extinct.  The fall of Woolworths and MFI is just the beginning.

“Small opportunities are often the beginning of great enterprises” - Demosthenes (382BC – 322BC)