Latest news with #pessimism
Yahoo
17 hours ago
- Business
- Yahoo
Private sector to shrink at fastest pace since pandemic
British business activity is expected to shrink at its fastest pace since the depths of the pandemic in 2020 amid growing pessimism since Labour took power. Economists warned the 'negative sentiment' had no end in sight, with activity across 'all parts' of the British economy expected to keep shrinking over the next three months, according to the Confederation of British Industry (CBI). Its latest barometer of private sector output showed businesses were still reeling from the impact of Rachel Reeves's autumn tax raid, with consumer-facing sectors hit hardest by the £25bn increase in employers' National Insurance. The response to the CBI's business barometer was the most negative since October 2020, when Boris Johnson, the former prime minister announced the second national lockdown during the pandemic. Bosses were also wary about the impact of global trade policy, even though the UK has escaped with one of the lowest additional tariffs from Donald Trump among major advanced economies. 'The outlook remains negative across the board,' the CBI said, as it warned of a toxic mix of slower growth and higher prices. 'Our surveys also suggest that headcount will be cut further in the three months to October, marking almost a year of weak hiring intentions,' it said. The decline in July means more businesses have reported a slump in output than an expansion since Labour won the general election in July last year. Expectations about future output have also dragged into negative territory since Ms Reeves's tax raid. Alpesh Paleja, the CBI's deputy chief economist, said: 'Firms continue to face testing conditions, with expectations pointing to another quarter of falling activity across the economy. 'While not worsening, the persistently negative outlook underlines the fragility of demand conditions. 'Against this backdrop, businesses continue to cite headwinds from adjusting to higher employment costs, energy prices and continued uncertainty from a volatile global environment. With few signs of recovery on the horizon, firms are focused on managing costs and streamlining processes in what looks set to be a subdued second half of the year.' It came as separate figures showed British households squirrelled away £8.8bn into banks, building societies and National Savings and Investment accounts amid signs that consumers remain cautious. The Bank of England said households' total liquid assets increased by £8.8bn in June, which was almost double the increase recorded in May and the £4.5bn average month-to-month increase in the two years before the pandemic. 'This suggests households are in the mood to save rather than spend,' said Ashley Webb at Capital Economics, adding that this 'casts a bit more doubt over [stronger] consumer spending growth' to support the economy. Erreur lors de la récupération des données Connectez-vous pour accéder à votre portefeuille Erreur lors de la récupération des données Erreur lors de la récupération des données Erreur lors de la récupération des données Erreur lors de la récupération des données
Times
5 days ago
- Health
- Times
How to stop being a pessimist — by the happiness expert who knows
D o you wish you were a sunnier sort, but find yourself regularly fearing disaster in graphic, convincing detail? A new study from scientists at Kobe University in Japan has found that most optimists think alike, whereas pessimists are far more unique in their gloomy predictions. In scans, when optimists were asked to imagine future scenarios, the same areas of their brains lit up. Pessimists displayed a far more diverse range of brain activity, suggesting that they could more vividly imagine a wider sweep of worst-case scenarios. There's a strong case for wanting to work on one's optimism. 'People who are more optimistic tend to have better physical and mental health,' says Kate Oliver, a chartered psychologist and the co-author of Rise and Shine: How to Transform Your Life, Morning by Morning. Even though there's a degree of mutual causation (good health will likely make you more optimistic, for example), she says: 'Optimists tend to live longer than pessimists, have lower rates of depression and better cardiovascular health because their stress levels are lower.'
Yahoo
22-07-2025
- Science
- Yahoo
Optimists Are Alike, but Pessimists Are Unique, Brain Scan Study Suggests
Optimists have similar patterns of brain activation when they think about the future—but pessimists are all different from one another, a brain scan study suggests 'All happy families are alike; each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way.' This is the first line of Leo Tolstoy's novel Anna Karenina, and it may hold a kernel of truth that goes beyond family dynamics. In a recent study of optimism, neuroscientists found an equivalent principle at play: optimists shared similar patterns of activity in a key brain region when they imagined future events, but each pessimist's brain patterns was unique. The results help neuroscientists understand what distinguishes optimism from pessimism in the brain. This is an important question because optimism is associated with better physical, mental and social health. The results were published on Monday in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA. 'We tend to think of imagining the future as a deeply personal, subjective act,' says Kuniaki Yanagisawa, the study's lead author and a psychologist at Kobe University in Japan. 'Our study, however, shows that—especially for optimists—the way our brains do this can be similar' and suggests that such shared cognitive frameworks for imagining the future might explain why we 'click' with some people, he says. Prior studies have shown that optimists have larger social networks and higher acceptance by their peers. Yanagisawa wanted to understand 'whether this social success is just about personality,' he says, 'or if optimists might share a fundamental brain mechanism that makes it easier for them to form social connections.' [Sign up for Today in Science, a free daily newsletter] The researchers scanned participants in a functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) machine while they imagined specific future events happening to either them or their spouse. Some of the events were positive; others were neutral or negative. Afterward the team had the participants take a questionnaire to determine their level of optimism or pessimism. The researchers conducted the study twice, once in a group of 37 participants and again in a group of 50. To analyze the brain scans, the researchers zoomed in on one region that's particularly active while imagining future events: the medial prefrontal cortex, located in the middle of the very front of the brain. They compared patterns of brain activation in each possible pair of participants and used statistical tests to determine how similar the activations were to each other in these pairs. The team found that only pairs consisting of two optimistic participants had similar brain activation; pairs where one or both participants were more pessimistic were dissimilar to each other. The researchers also found that optimistic people showed bigger differences between brain patterns for emotionally positive and negative events than pessimists did. A few prior studies of 'positive' social traits have shown similar results. A 2022 brain scan study showed that people who held a central position in their social network have similar activation patterns to one another—but that less central people had a lot of individual differences, or idiosyncrasies. The same pattern held true in another study of people with low versus high levels of loneliness. Elisa Baek, a social neuroscientist now at the University of Southern California and lead author of those two studies, refers to these results as examples of the 'Anna Karenina principle,' the idea that successful endeavors have similar characteristics but that unsuccessful ones are each different in their own way. 'One intriguing interpretation [of the optimism study], consistent with the Anna Karenina principle, is that there may be many different ways for a person to be pessimistic, while optimistic people tend to converge on a few shared mental models of a hopeful future,' Baek says. Together, these studies 'may point to a more general principle—that being 'on the same page' as others is a foundational mechanism that underlies the experience of social connection.' If there is an Anna Karenina principle at work for positive social traits, what would be causing it? After all, the traits we deem 'positive' vary greatly among different societies, so there's a risk of cultural bias. Yanagisawa thinks that these cultural values could actually be driving the effect—they orient people toward a specific goal that is valued in a society, such as being optimistic or having a lot of social connections, perhaps leading those individuals to behave and think similarly over time. It's also possible that optimism, as measured in this study, is picking up on related traits such as people's level of loneliness or position in a social network. 'These convergent findings raise an important question about the overlap between constructs such as optimism, loneliness and network centrality,' Baek says. 'Because the new study didn't control for loneliness or social network position, and my prior work didn't control for optimism, it is unclear how much these dimensions are overlapping or distinct.' Optimism and pessimism aren't unchanging traits; they tend to shift with age, although the trajectories vary from culture to culture. Nor is optimism an unquestioned good. 'Extreme optimism might not always be a good thing because we might not plan for the future as well as we should,' says Aleea Devitt, a psychologist at the University of Waikato in New Zealand, who studies future thinking. And 'pessimism may be a useful 'positive' trait in some situations; there's evidence that some people can be defensive pessimists, which can actually help them better prepare for the future.' Solve the daily Crossword
Times
12-07-2025
- Business
- Times
Small business sentiment at record low, poll reveals
More small businesses expect to downsize or shut up shop than grow over the next 12 months, according to a survey by one of the UK's most influential trade bodies. Of those surveyed, 27 per cent of owners expect their businesses to either close, shrink or be sold in the coming year, according to the Federation of Small Businesses (FSB). Only 25 per cent believed their businesses would expand. The sentiment is the worst since the closely watched annual survey began in 2008. After suffering from tax rises since Labour swept to power, Tina McKenzie, the FSB policy chair, said small businesses were 'facing a very dangerous situation'. 'Confidence being so low, and not showing any improvement since the start of the year, is bad enough. Stagnation and pessimism among small businesses spells huge risk for the overall economy,' she said. For years political leaders have lauded small business as the 'backbone of the economy'. Rachel Reeves, the chancellor, has insisted that the government is doing all it can to shield small firms from the fallout caused by her commitment to balance public finances. She said in December: 'I know it's tough and there are a lot of costs but we are trying to help.' The FSB polling comes days after it emerged that the UK economy had unexpectedly contracted. Reeves admitted she was 'disappointed' by a 0.1 per cent contraction in May, announced by the Office for National Statistics (ONS) on Friday. Small business owners said the state of the domestic economy was their biggest worry, followed by the tax burden and rising labour costs. The results come just a week after it emerged that the hospitality industry had suffered the worst job losses since the Covid-19 pandemic, with 69,000 roles cut since October. There were warnings that 200,000 further jobs would be lost if Reeves's increase to the minimum wage and national insurance contributions are not reversed. McKenzie said: 'The government has made all the right noises about supporting the small business community.' But she added that members' growth was being affected by late payments by larger businesses and the blanket imposition of personal guarantees on loans. On Friday, the FSB issued a super-complaint to the Financial Conduct Authority to highlight the 'harsh lending practices' of banks that demand personal guarantees for business loans. It said personal guarantees could be a 'straitjacket' on business growth, forcing entrepreneurs to put their homes or other assets on the line when taking out finance — even for small loans. Many business owners are now more likely to abandon their business or growth plans or be pushed into being over-cautious, the FSB said. A second survey last week found that more than half the leaders of small and medium-sized companies in the UK believe the economic climate is more volatile than during the pandemic. The poll — by Dext, which makes bookkeeping automation tools — showed that more than a quarter of businesses had cut staff or frozen hiring and that early half had faced cashflow issues or turned to emergency funding. More than half have also said planning was 'virtually impossible' in the current climate. Among those forced to make redundancies is Tom Haward, who runs Richard Haward's Oysters, an eighth-generation family business. He let go one staff member and cut the hours of the remaining 18 employees. He said it was one of the hardest decisions he has had to make since succeeding his father, but had no choice because customer spend has declined 10 per cent in the past 12 months. 'It's so hard but I can't put prices up because then people spend even less so I have no choice but to cut costs where I can,' said Haward, 43. Likewise, Dana Denis-Smith, the founder of Obelisk Support, which offers part-time lawyers to companies including Barclays Bank and BT, chose not to offer permanent contracts to the three staff whose 12-month contracts ended earlier this year. She said she knows a 'huge' number of people who have recently chosen to shut down their businesses due to the volatile economic climate. 'They'll say, 'I'm so stressed – what's the point?' The increased taxation burdens adds to a sense that entrepreneurs aren't welcome, said Denis-Smith, 49. 'There's no drive or energy in the economy.' Mandira Sarkar, the founder of Mandira's Kitchen, a caterer and maker of upmarket Indian ready meals, is among those carefully considering her options. She is fearful of the impact of further potential tax rises in the autumn budget. 'For an economy to thrive, you've got to create conditions for businesses to function, not to stifle them. It's an absolute bloodbath out there and my family are looking at me saying, 'Why are you doing this? Let's just shut it.' Sarkar, 54, admits that, for the first time, it's tempting to close the business and try something new. 'It can't carry on like this,' she said. A spokesman for the business department said: 'The last few years have been incredibly difficult for business. That's why this pro-business government is determined to improve the total business environment including for small businesses.' Of the challenges faced by small companies seeking access to the capital needed to help them grow, he said the government is 'focused on working with banks to create opportunities for businesses to access the finance they need to scale, export and break into new markets.'
Wall Street Journal
08-07-2025
- Business
- Wall Street Journal
U.S. Small-Business Sentiment Darkens Slightly
Businesses on Main Street became a little more pessimistic last month as heightened uncertainty continued to weigh. The National Federation of Independent Business said Tuesday that its optimism index, a gauge of sentiment among small firms, edged down 0.2 points to 98.6 in June, slightly above its long-term reading of 98. A consensus of economists polled by The Wall Street Journal expected 98.7.
