"The End Days"

This is an emergency blog posting.  I read in the paper this morning that Learjet is laying off 1,700 employees.  Their market is the one percenters and they are buying fewer Learjets.  This development is akin to the parakeet of the American Nation dropping dead.  Learjet is a bellwether of the health of our CEOs’ wealth.  The decision goes something like this:  “Well, do I need a third Learjet or can I get along with two?”  It is very similar to the decision my wife and I are faced with.  We each have a car.  One is a Chevrolet Malibu, the other a Ford Taurus.  Both are over a decade old and were purchased used.  There is no public transportation in our little town, but the question is, how much will we save by sharing a vehicle and can we get along with only one?

The lower income one percenter, is faced with the decision of if he or she can afford one Learjet.  The unacceptable alternative to the Private Learjet is traveling by first class on commercial airlines.  To the person of extreme wealth, this would be like a trip to Quartzite, Arizona in a Greyhound Bus.  Learjet’s marketing and engineering people have tried to make the purchase much more rational.  Their new product, the “35A”, gets just over 2 miles per gallon while cruising.  This is termed “low fuel burn” by Lear and the unit is only sucking 197 gallons of fuel per hour.  Don’t try to tell me that the wealthy are not concerned about the planet.

To make matters worse for Learjet, Humvee is offering an alternative to this market, for ground transportation.  The new offering is called the FED or “Alpha” and is claimed to be70% more fuel efficient than the unit it replaces.  It averages an astounding 6.8 mpg.  This is over three times the Learjet's mileage.  With competition like this, it is little wonder that Learjet is having a hard time in the conspicuous consumption market.  What the Humvee lacks in fuel mileage, it more than makes up for in lack of seating capacity and lack of storage area.  This vehicle is normally purchased by a macho, very wealthy person, with a very small penis.  It compensates nicely.  The question is, when you drive by in your Humvee, why are people on the sidewalk always laughing?

The issue here is why is a lowering of the Learjet market a bellwether for “End of Days?”  Obviously, if the richest one percent has to cut back, given the trickledown theory, you and yours are done for.  With 99% of the market gone, the remaining one percent is doomed as well.  Who will hang their clothes?

(I apologize to the 1,700 who are losing their jobs for my making light of it.  But you have to admit that you serve a strange market in a strange economy.  By the way, do any of you folks being laid off own a Learjet?)

Cheers, Old Buz

Cats & Rats

A friend sent me a video the other day featuring a cat and a small rat.  The rat approached the cat while the cat was at its water dish.  I watched the video a couple of times and saw that the cat caught a glimpse of the rat approaching, over his shoulder.  The cat took no immediate action and the rat jumped on the cat’s tail, and then proceeded to chase the cat from the room.   What was wrong with this video?  Lots of things.  Cats and rats don’t get along.  Cats don’t let rats sneak up on them.  Rats don’t chase cats.  I’m sure I could continue the list, but as it was shown later in the video, they were good friends and were having a great time playing together.

The question is, if small brained critters can learn to benefit from each other’s company, why can’t large brained critters like Israelis and Palestinians learn to do the same?  I don’t mean to point a finger at the Middle East here; you can ask the same question about cowboys and Indians.  The Crusades.   Your cave and my cave.  The Others.  Them and us.  So, what advantages do the cat and the rat have in remaining peaceful with each other and benefitting from each other’s company?  Damn!?

Well, for one thing, the cat and the rat know each other.  Our warriors know each other too, but don’t realize it.  The guy in both uniforms is fighting for God, Country, his family, his freedom.  When he aims his weapon, he is aiming at himself.  That should not be hard to learn and understand, especially with our methods of communication now available.

 

Another reason that the cat and the rat can get along is that neither is starving.  There are people starving on our planet, but with the present technology, that is not necessary.  If we turn “swords into plowshares” we can feed the planet.  Oh, hell yes we can.  So humans can be as peaceful as cats and rats, if they will get to know each other and enjoy reasonable creature comforts.  No more kill counts, we are talking about individual human beings, like yourself.

That seems too simple.  Problem is we have insane greed and psychopaths among our number.  There are folks who enjoy causing extreme pain and others willing to become wealthy at the cost of the lives of many or a nation.  There are soldiers sitting in missile silos ready to push a button that will kill millions of innocent civilians that they don’t know or have any interest in.  They have been sitting there for decades.  Just give them the order.  We just bombed Iraq back into the Stone Age and no one can give you a valid reason why.  We don’t even ask any longer.  So, how about we do some learning from the cat and the rat.

Cheers, Old Buz

We Are #1

We are number one.  Perhaps not in healthcare or education, a long way from it, but the United States is the #1 consumer nation in the world and it isn’t even close.  Japan is second, with less than a third of our consumption and Germany is third with less than a fifth.  We consume a little less than a third of what the entire world consumes and that is with less than a twentieth of the world’s population.  So take a little pride, consumers.  Consumption is power.  Perhaps more power to improve the world than our military has. 

 Right now our power of consumption is creating 1%ers and abused laborers all over our planet, particularly at home.  With a little thought and a little planning, we could accomplish the opposite.  A better world for all.  Even the wealthy would probably rather live in the foothills, above a middle income community, than above a slum.  I mean, one has to go to the market unless a servant does the shopping for you.

Our present creative consumer malice is best exemplified in the big box stores.  Volume flows to the lowest price.  This translates into the creation of slave-like working conditions and wages for the third world nations that strive to own the big box market.  The cheap labor in Mexico loses its jobs to the cheaper labor in India.  Only the CEOs and top managers in these sweat shops earn a living wage.  The American worker cannot compete, nor can our manufacturers.  Sounds like a free market driven world and it is.  We are describing a down spiral of world wages and living conditions.  Our middle class real earnings are falling.  We have an unfavorable balance of trade.  Can the down spiral be stopped?  Hell yes.  The world’s greatest consumer nation has the power.  We need to use it.

How about we power an up spiral instead of the down one we presently sponsor?  If a foreign manufacturer wishes to be certified to export goods to The United States, they must pay all of their employees, at least, our minimum wage.  That rule would apply to their suppliers as well.  Our workers would then exist on a more level playing field.  Our production facilities would be more competitive.  Better paid foreign workers would become a viable market for our manufactured goods.  Better paid workers, with lower unemployment are less likely to be snookered into a war.  Our brave young soldiers could be converted into brave young auditors, making sure that the certified exporters are, in fact, paying their employees a fair living wage.  They would be armed with lap tops, rather than assault rifles.  This would not be forced on the employers.  Certification would be a choice.

You are going to pay a little more for goods with this system in place.  But it will increase living standards the world over.  Retail price competition will not disappear, as well it shouldn’t.  This program will not harm the people of any nation.  “A rising tide lifts all boats.”

Cheers, Buz

A Fair Minimum Wage

It is unfortunate that we must legislate a minimum wage.  Some large corporations would rather pay their workers less.  In a better world an employer greets each employee at the door each morning, can look them in the eye and pays a wage that will provide adequate food, shelter, clothing and transportation for the employee and their family.  Anything below ten dollars per hour cannot possibly accomplish this.   For a fair wage, the employer has a right to expect an honest day’s work from the employee.  Smart employers hire good, intelligent, industrious employees, not cheap ones.  Good employees create good profits.  A major problem is that the employer is often a casino in New York named Wall Street and the players have no interest whatsoever in the employees or in the long term health of our economy.  All decisions in our present market driven economy are made for the short term maximization of profit.  But, a middle class that is doing well is very good for the top 10% of income earners.  They are called the major market and drive the economy.  Middle income earners have some discretional income to spend.  The low wage earner has little discretion over how they spend income and the top one percent earner’s spending is simply obscene.  Individual competition for higher income rather than greater results is not productive.  Our bank CEOs have recently proven that.

A more effective legislative action than a legal minimum wage would be a legal maximum wage.  According to a “trickle down” theory, this would free up billions of dollars to working Americans; and even an intelligent theory would agree.   A figure like five hundred thousand dollars per year, maximum, would supply a high income person with an excellent standard of living and a reasonable incentive to produce.  There is a misconception that the great commercial producers, athletes, artists, financiers and surgeons do what they do for the insane incomes that they receive.  Any super effective producer is primarily motivated by satisfaction earned from the fruits of their efforts and yes, those who benefit the society deserve to be well compensated.  The need to have the highest income in one’s sport or their field will never be satisfied.  You would probably opt to add great educators to the well paid.  We live in a strange values society that pays the president of a top notch university several times less than it pays the university’s football coach.  If the maximum legal wage were $500,000 a year, do you think that a LeBron James, a Brad Pitt or a Bill Gates would be willing to do what they love, for that figure?  You know they would, as long as no one earned more.  You wouldn’t miss a thing currently being created nor would the country suffer.  It would bloom.

A fair minimum wage, scaled to the local cost of living, along with a reasonable maximum wage designed to minimize conspicuous consumption and spread the wealth, would be thoughtful legislation.  Thoughtful legislation couldn’t hurt this country.  It might be a nice change.

Cheers, Blogger Buz

Fathers & Sons

I was in a restaurant having breakfast a week ago and two men in the booth next to me got up and left.  They appeared to be a father and son team.  The son wore an “Iraqi War Veteran” ball cap, the father a Marine Corps jacket that said “Vietnam War Veteran” on it.  Each used an aluminum cane that circled their right bicep and had a grip for the hand to grasp below.  Each had a right leg that didn’t support walking.  My view was of them walking out of the café, next to one another.  It was a very sad sight.  Father and son had traveled the same road.  I wondered if the younger man had a son that will soon be ready to go.  Is there a lesson to be taken from that scene? 

Upon viewing these men, a song started running through my head, which I haven’t been able to get rid of.  It is Peter, Paul & Mary singing a song written by Peter Yarrow, titled, “The Great Mandala (The Wheel of Life).”  Take a listen to it on your computer.  Here are some of the lyrics.

“Take your place on The Great Mandala

as it moves through your brief moment of time.

            Win or lose now, you must choose now

and if you lose you’re only losing your life.”

The song ends with, “And it’s been going on for ten thousand years!”  Probably ten thousand years is an understatement.  We don’t have much reliable history before that.  Our leaders will always lead us into wars that serve no purpose for the soldier or the population, but the simple majority, Patriots all, will continue to support these wars with great enthusiasm.

Cheers, Old Blogger Buz, The Pacifist