Oh, What a feeling!

Oh, What a feeling! ...a famous Toyota tag line in the 1980s Toyota commercials.

Toyota reported today that it expects a net loss of 350 billion yen ($3.85 billion) for the fiscal year through March -- a stunning reversal from the record 1.72 trillion yen profit it posted the previous year. (AP)

Sharp, one of Japan’s largest electronics companies, said it will make its first operating loss as a listed company in the year to March.The company cut its forecast from an operating profit of Y130bn to an operating loss of Y30bn, and also expects a net loss of Y100bn.The forecast figures highlight the depth of the downturn that has hit Japan’s electronics companies. Sony, Panasonic, Toshiba, NEC and Hitachi have all said that they will lose hundreds of billions of yen this fiscal year.

Key sectors of the Indian economy shed half a million jobs in the final three months of last year as the global slowdown took its toll on one of the world’s fastest growing big economies.A survey of employment across seven sectors by the Ministry of Labour showed job losses in mining, textiles, carmaking, transport, metals, gems and jewellery and back office process outsourcing. Employment of contract workers in the motor industry alone fell 12.5 per cent during the period as demand slowed and the liquidity crisis shortcircuited demand in the global economy. But the report showed that the gems and jewellery sector, a usually strong export performer, was the hardest hit with a total fall of 9 per cent.Many additional jobs among contract and temporary staff, particularly in textiles, are likely to have gone unrecorded. Workers in many industries are being encouraged to take pay cuts and work longer hours to save their jobs.

More than 20m rural migrant workers in China have lost their jobs and returned to their home villages or towns as a result of the global economic crisis, government figures revealed on Monday.By the start of the Chinese new year festival on January 25, 15.3 per cent of China’s 130m migrant workers had lost their jobs and left coastal manufacturing centres to return home, said officials quoting a survey from the agriculture ministry.The job losses were a direct result of the global economic crisis and its impact on export-oriented manufacturers, said Chen Xiwen, director of the Office of Central Rural Work Leading Group. He warned that the flood of unemployed migrants would pose challenges to social stability in the countryside.The figure of 20m unemployed migrants does not include those who have stayed in cities to look for work after being made redundant and is substantially higher than the figure of 12m that Wen Jiabao, premier, gave to the Financial Times in an interview on Sunday. Speaking on a visit to the UK on Monday, Mr Wen said there had been signs at the end of last year the Chinese economy might be starting to recover.

Moral of the story: When irresponsible behavior spreads like a contagion, and the sane people do not protest, everyone suffers.