Billboards of Hope

Article from The New Zealand Herald:

RHODE ISLAND: Some Americans put out of work by the latest recession are driving past billboards with messages like: "Interesting fact about recessions ... they end."

Another reads: "Self worth is greater than net worth." A third says: "This will end long before those who caused it are paroled."

Drivers across America are seeing those and similar messages as part of a billboard campaign dubbed "Recession 101" funded by an anonymous East Coast donor who was depressed about how the country was reacting to the economy's tailspin.

The campaign began last month and is now appearing on more than 1000 billboards, including a spot in New York's Times Square.

Designer Charles Robb said his client wanted people to realise America had suffered recessions before and made it through.

"One of the lines is, 'Stop obsessing about economy, you're scaring the children.' That's the overriding concept of the thing," said Robb, founder of Charchin Creative in Florida.

Members of the Outdoor Advertising Agency of America had donated the space, printing materials and labour needed for the campaign, said agency spokesman Jeff Golimowski.

Some in hard-hit Rhode Island say it is hard to put a lighthearted spin on the downturn when people are worried about losing their jobs and homes, while others share the billboards' sentiments.

"History has proven that we get into recessions and we get out of them," said 41-year-old Paul Sullivan. "Whether it's perception or reality, we have to think this too shall pass."

Leonard Lardaro, an economist with the University of Rhode Island, said people should not lose hope in a crisis and should instead look for opportunity, preparing themselves for other jobs or the economy's eventual turnaround.

"For people who are very capable and talented who lost their jobs, it wears away at you. It takes away your sense of worth, which it shouldn't do," Lardaro said.

"Don't think in a recession that nothing good can or does happen."

Lardaro said he liked the posters but they were not enough to fix people's spirits by themselves.

"This person might need to have those signs posted in Rhode Island a lot longer than other states," he said.

The state's 12.1 per cent unemployment rate in May tied with South Carolina for third-highest in the country behind only Michigan and Oregon - all of which are also getting the billboards.

Gail Robnett, 53, from Exeter, said she did not know anyone unaffected by the recession and wondered about the campaign's effectiveness.

"You're not paying attention to stuff like that when you're trying to put groceries on the table."

Robb - who also designed the "God Speaks" billboards from 1999 that featured such insights as "Keep using my name in vain and I'll make rush hour longer" - said he understood that perspective.

"If you just lost your job and your house, this campaign is not going to do a thing for you. That's a whole different set of parameters," he said.

"If you're like most of America, you've still got a job and you're making your mortgage payment.

"You may not be spending what you normally spend because you're afraid of what's going on."

Mostly, Robb said, the messages were to remind people of the country's resiliency and optimism. For example, the billboard that 24-year-old Ryan Korsak saw said, "Bill Gates started Microsoft in a recession."

"I appreciate the sentiment," said Korsak, who works for a Providence software company. "But I'm kind of not Bill Gates."