Coventry Economy 1976 to 2026

[rebbonk]

An incredibly interesting document... (page 26 is very enlightening!)

http://www.coventry.gov.uk/ccm/cms-service/stream/asset/?asset_id=20415015

Would be nice to hear any comments.

[dutchman]

There's an awful lot to digest in there Rebbonk. One thing which stands out is the city's increasing reliance on the education sector for its employment (and also in the period before the one dealt with in the report). That's fine in a culture where an ever-expanding education sector is automatically seen as a "good thing". What happens to those jobs when that attitude changes and (mainly) central government decides to (or is forced to by circumstances) pull the plug on education spending?

[dutchman]

It's a bit worrying that it's now reliant on public sector organisers as its mass employers, but if you look around you can find a fair amount of smaller businesses operating in a diverse range of sectors, ranging from software to hi-tech electronics.

Speaking as the owner of one of them Flapdoodle I can tell you I encountered nothing but hostility from various council departments and was forced to move my main business from a retail outlet in the city centre to mail order. It is the reason Coventry lost out on the boom in DVD sales despite being a pioneer of the then-new format.

[dutchman]

What business was that, may I ask...

I don't like to advertise but I was in the laserdisc distribution business even before DVD became available.

[dutchman]

I was just wondering if you had your retail unit back when I was a student or when I moved back here in 1997.

It was the years in-between so you wouldn't remember it although I supplied a number of other retailers in the immediate area for some years after that.