Economies: whilst Rome burns....

Would you borrow money from an underground lender? Many do, and a survey by the Thai Chamber of Commerce in Bangkok yesterday showed that 83% of Thai workers are increasingly in debe - many to more than a year's pay - and many taking loans from loan sharks.

Although the numbers were different, it's less than month since Singapore's government warned of the signs of increasing numbers of Singaporeans borrowing from ah longs, as they are called. All over Kuala Lumpur in Malaysia, lamp-posts are being splattered with adverts for lenders who operate from behind disposable mobile phones - despite all phones being subject to registration there are those who get around the system.

The UK Government issued a statement yesterday saying how tax deferment was saving many businesses from insolvency - but also admitting that the number of collapsed businesses in Q1 2009 is more than 43% up from the same quarter a year earlier.

Whilst governments are trying to pretend that the recession is over, or would be if people believed it to be so, the underlying facts are simple: things are still dire and will be for a lot longer than governments are trying to lead populations to believe.

The fundamentals remain extremely insecure. And encouraging people to go into debt to buy things they do not need is not going to provide anything but a postponement of the problems - problems that are going to be made even worse when the tax burden created by ill-advised attempts to shore up today's economy by hocking tomorrow's tax income comes to bite populations in the backside.

In most cases, that will happen after the current governments have left power and their successors will get the blame for prolonged misery.