When, how, and if the recession will end is not an academic question for those of us with businesses to run.

We have to make daily decisions based on our best guesses as to whether things will start to improve this year or next or beyond the foreseeable future.

There is no shortage of opinions. There is a spectrum that runs from self-satisfied doom-mongers at one extreme to those who seem to be in denial about there being a crisis at the other.

This blog is firm and constant in its position – somewhere in the middle.

However, it is interesting that, in general, those who are actually running businesses tend to be among the more upbeat. Obviously we have a vested interest in talking up the economy in general and our own businesses in particular.

Yet we may also be influenced by the fact that we are practical problem-solvers. We see clearly how things could easily be put right if only everyone kept their heads.

Alas, we are not the ones making the big decisions.

So the best advice remains, “Hope for the best but prepare for the worst”.