Back in Dobra, Eddie and I would do something we never do at home - watch television. In our room there was a small set that we'd switch on to catch the local news and Małopolska weather forecasts on TVP Info. While waiting for these, we'd be subjected to an hour of commercials (on the state broadcaster that also lives off licence fees). Over half the ads aired were for 'leki' clearly aimed at the Polish hypochondriac- over-the-counter (OTC) remedies that claimed to cure a wide range of ailments from mucholiopsypsypoza* to chesty coughs.
Eddie and I were in stitches at the banal, calculated, unsophisticated way the ads were made. "Serduszko puka/w rytmie cza-cza" was our favourite; a middle-aged man hears a series of knocks on the door somberly announcing various cardiologic conditions, then a smiling middle-aged woman comes dancing into his flat with a bottle of something that's meant to restore his dodgy ticker to perfect functioning without having to submit to open heart surgery.
Or the ad for Amol - a firemans' brass band na wsi; the rehersal's not going well. A woman enters the room. The mustachioed, helmeted conductor complains to her that he can't conduct properly because of the numerous illnesses plaguing individual members of the band. Each and every one of the musicians' maladies can, of course, be cured by Amol, which the lady conveniently carries in her basket. Cut to band marching along in spritely fashion to De Souza's Liberty Bell (the Monty Python theme). Apt, because the ad is an absurd comedy.
Other ads would show middle-aged women sitting around eating tons of cake and then complaining about the build-up of gas pressure within their intestines. Cut to picture of an inflated balloon, bearing with it the implication that if they let out some of this gas, their figures would shrink from Size 18 to Size 10 within seconds. This could happen if they were to take this pill or drink that syrop.
And we learnt by heart the text that the regulator insists is to be rattled off at high speed during every TV ad for an OTC remedy: Przed spożyciem zapoznaj się z treścią ulotki dołączonej do opakowania bądż skonsultuj się z lekarzem lub farmaceutą, bo każdy lek nie właściwie stosowany może zagrażać twojemu życiu lub zdrowiu (Before consumption, acquaint yourself with the contents of the leaflet appended to the packaging or consult a doctor or pharmacist, because every medicine inappropriately applied may threaten your life or health). We would hear this text recited as fast as is humanly possible** by Mr Voice-over Man at least four times in every commercial break.
I remember when the warning at the end of ads for OTC medicines was simply Przed użciem przeczytaj ulotkę (Read leaflet before taking). What was wrong with that? The regulator, in his eagerness to regulate, will take things to the level of the absurd.
* "Over three-quarters of women over 45 are unaware of the risks of mucholiopsypsypoza!"
** My thanks to Piotrek for sending me this link to a Romanian OTC ad; it appears it can be done even faster!
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13 comments:
Michael,
check out the Romanian version of Mr Voice-over Man in this one:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BWvbNo_l2FA
Piotrek
when watching those ads one can infer doctors are totally superfluous, they don't have to prescribe any medicines, if over-the-counter ones can serve as catch-all remedies for all ailments.
Regulators - don't you know that they want to protect you from yourself. As long as they protect you from other people it is acceptable.
Yesterday I also decided to check if my box is still working, turned over to TVP Info and now I'm afraid to open my refrigerator :)
Seriously, it's easy to say, why we didn't witness a bubble on Polish real estate market - because it did not burst...
Piotrek - an excellent find! Is Romania's Mr Voice-over Man blessed with a natural ability to patter at such speed, or was it speeded up in the dubbing studio?
Bartek -
My exposure in Dobra aside, I can honestly say I spend more time in front of a TV camera than in front of a TV set.
Why no bubble? Polish banks can offer 110% or more, but before they offer your the money they make damned sure you can pay them back. The form-filling, the checks, the neurotic suspicion of lenders - all these signs of 'backwardness' helped save Poland's banking sector last year.
When you start seeing ads for mortgage loans in Super Express and on daytime TV, then start worrying!
before they offer your the money they make damned sure you can pay them back. The form-filling, the checks, the neurotic suspicion of lenders - all these signs of 'backwardness' helped save Poland's banking sector last year.
That's positively un-American, and something Poles can be grateful for.
wait, wait, I don't get what your point is.
We both agreed there was no bubble on Polish real estate market. Banks' credit policy didn't inflate and now, as banks are still x-ray any potential borrower, subprime loans are unlikely to hit Poland, as they weren't in the past.
Now an academic point of view: some economists argue bubble can be spotted only wit hindsight, so after it bursts, if it doesn't burst, it's not a bubble.
What we had in Poland in 2006 and 2007 was what other economists say is an observable phase of inflating bubble. According to their theories a bubble can be recognised whenever prices rise in unsustainable pace and assets are evidently overvalued.
In Poland the current market equilibrium is caused by insufficient supply and excessive demand on real estates. The rally in prices was caused by cuts in interest rates in mid 2000s and loosened mortgage creditworthiness criteria.
The worst thing is that if bank gave loans to anyone the prices would shoot up. A dreadful prospect given that I want to buy a flat in a few years and I'm saving.
Super Express, daytime TV? What more? M jak miłość, Fakt? Don't make me change my habits that much...
There's an inordinate difference between applying for a mortgage loan in Poland and in the UK. There, the banks (at least used to) go our of their way to make things easy for you. Here, you are sent from pillar to post with this document or that piece of paper (notarially witnessed, of course); the process is based on the premise that every mortgage applicant is a crook, hell-bent on defrauding the bank.
As to the bubble. My parents bought their house 40 years ago for £10,000. Adjusting for inflation, in today's money, that's £115,000. What's it worth today? £650,000 - £700,000. OK, not the £850,000 that these houses were selling for when the bubble burst in Q3 2008, but still six times more than what they paid for it. I bought my house in London for £28,500 in 1982 (within a year of starting my first job - best thing I ever did!). Today's money: £74,000. Market value today: £280,000. Asking price of houses like this on same street at top of market: £350,000.
Take a long term view. Booms and busts, bubbles and bursts, but in the long term (in London at least), housing is an excellent investment.
In Poland there was always a lot of legwork with getting a mortgage, but in 2007 creditworthiness was assessed liberally, now criteria changed, bureaucracy is intact. When my parents were applying for a mortgage it was an ordeal and they had 3/4 of the sum necessary to buy our unfinished house and needed a bridging loan to finish, decorate and furnish it. Collateral was quite good and in spite of that bank wasn't that eager to lend money.
But lower availability of mortgages translated into affordable prices. Compare how many square metres of a flat in Warsaw you could buy for an average salary in 2004 and 2005 and today. To afford to buy a flat you need to take a mortgage and whatever happens pay it month by months for many years (of course many loans are paid off earlier).
Before 2005 house prices were rather stable, they shoot up in construction boom. But please don't tell me that if the value of your property rises by 30 per cent a year it's normal and beneficial for society.
Gone are the days when you could buy a furnished house on the suburbs of Warsaw for 500,000 zlotys.
Long-term investment? Figures confirm your views but I would choose something different and more liquid for an investment. Dwelling is one of the basic needs of a human being, house should be used for living in it, not as an investment.
My parents taught me that renting a house is akin to burning your cash. To look at the real return on capital long-term, you need to compare the cost of buying with the cost of renting.
When we moved to Poland, we rented for four and half years. Over that period (three and half years of which was waiting for our house to be built), we spent $108,000 on rent.
Within my first year of buying a house, more than half of my income (then £6,400 a year) went on mortgate repayments. But the price of houses such as mine in that time went up from £28,500 to £35,000. Had I waited just another year, I'd have been squeezed out of the market. All about timing, Bartek!
Anyway, back to the drug ads. Couldn't agree more, Michael. I suppose one of the aims of making the regulatory text longer is to try and cut down the swarm of such adverts but it only seems to make it worse. A cynic might think a longer message also increases revenue and therefore taxes.
What I'm equally worried about though is the total length of commercial breaks. Has anyone measured this? It seems at time to go on without end, a good ten minutes or more of adverts. So long in fact that I just can't watch any programme that includes such ridiculous breaks.
Ian
What your parents taught you is true - it's wasted money, like the ones from municipal budget spent on snow clearing.
I feel sorry for my fellow students who rent flats in Warsaw. Within five years they might spend even 100,000 zł for renting, move out of the flat and still will own nothing.
Timing, didn't I write about timing many times? Stock market, real estate market, or sale in a shopping mall - timing always matters!
Scatts, good points, I don't watch that much to know, but I've heard sometimes there are breaks between commercials and they broadcast news programmes, soap operas, quiz shows, films and other stupid stuff
Indeed, the ad breaks are often so long now that that have an intermission in the middle where the TV company advertises their programmes so it is - adverts - TV company adverts - adverts. Fantastic!
Buying a house in London was an "excellent investment" for those with the money a decade or two ago. But isn't it reckoned now that half or more of young people will never be able to buy a house during their lifetimes? That isn't far off the medieval situation where the landless serfs were ground down providing work and rent to the wealthy. Are we moving into the new feudalism?
Be grateful for the difficulty in obtaining loans. I remember the situation in Romania a few years ago where every second TV ad was for consumer credit. One could obtain a loan to the value of a year's average salary just by showing an identity card at the bank and filling in a form. The result - senseless lending where people took a ten year loan to buy stuff that would last five years if they were lucky. (But try to obtain a business loan - that was like sucking blood from a stone.) My take was that the banks thought that they could convince so many people to take out loans that they'd capture several percent of GDP as a long-term income stream. And what if someone couldn't pay - well the former communist thugs has a new role as private sector debt collectors.
But then I'd expect more sense from a western-looking country such as Poland, which wasn't a corrupt Ottoman vasal for several centuries.
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