Where Do People Work

[spen666]

This is not intended to be a political thread, and it would be good if we can avoid the usual political tribalism
Yesterday, I ventured into my nearest town centre. I rarely venture there for lots of reasons, (including crime, lack of shops that interest me etc), The main street, shopping centre etc were rather depressing and consisted of circa 50% empty units. Even Greggs, Starbucks etc and some pound type shops had closed.

Today out on my bike, I went through the centre of another nearby town and saw the same situation.

Retail is struggling in most places
We no longer have that many large employers - eg mins have closed, heavy industry has gone, manufacturing etc is in decline. (I'm not blaming any political party for this and its not a political post)

However, within the same area, there are numerous housing developments, in this area usually blocks of flats rather than houses. We are told there is a shortage of housing in this area.

My question is where are those who are moving into these new properties working?
Whilst unemployment has risen slightly in recent years, it is not the case that it has risen so much that the occupants of these new properties are all on benefits etc, so that is not an explanation
So where are people working these days to replace the lost retail, manufacturing and heavy industry jobs?

 

[Pblakeney]

Retired. Doubt that helps.
To answer your question, service industries. Once some of them can be replaced by AI, well...

 

[spen666]

Retired. Doubt that helps.
To answer your question, service industries. Once some of them can be replaced by AI, well...

I wondered re service industries - clearly a lot work for delivery outfits eg Amazon , DPD etc, but seems a lot of people to fill all the new housing ( which is on top of existing housing)

 

[icowden]

My question is where are those who are moving into these new properties working?

At home if they work in IT.
At home if they work in customer service.
At home if they work in management.

Manufacturing never happened in city centers.
Retail has been suffering due to the rise of online deliveries, inflation and the soaring cost of living.

There are plenty of service jobs. Working in a shop is now a fairly small sector.

 

[BoldonLad]

Retired now, but, in the latter years of my work life, I worked mostly from home as freelance in IT.

I observe, in the street where I live, very few of those of working age, actually .”go to work”, they all seem to work from home, no idea what they actually do.

Among my offspring, three “go to work” (nurse, teacher, support worker), two work from home, and one has managed to avoid work for all of his 51 years.

 

[Ian H]

Return I was working they worked for me (some of them). Now? I have no idea.