A Few Get It -- Only a Few Dozen Generations to Go and Change will Arrive

I saw another article over on the "ESOP News" gadget I set up to the right of this blog: "Hire smart people, get out of their hair." It's an encouraging article, give it a read.

I actually have seen two articles in the LA Times regarding this same TV business (The other article is, "The Power of Being Local and Employee-Owned." That, to me, is encouraging. A for-profit newspaper has allowed a reporter to highlight an alternative capitalistic model. It is encouraging that the business has been prospering; it is encouraging that the reporter, and her editor, felt the story was worthy of publication; and it is encouraging that their owners allowed the story to be published.

[Actually, I notice that it is "FROM HOWARD'S 65TH ANNIVERSARY, A SPECIAL ADVERTISING FEATURE" and is not a product of a reporter, or editor, or even a publisher's tolerance of alternative models of capitalism. I guess I should have stuck with my snakiness about humanity.]

That is what it is going to take to achieve change, intelligent people spreading the word about how to construct a sustainable capitalistic economy. Repeated stories over a lengthy period of time until others recognize the validity of the alternative capitalistic models and begin to follow suit. It is also encouraging that the writer didn't not grow snarky as I normally do.

The business highlighted in the article has been around for years, and has been employee-owned since 1976. Publix has been around a similar amount of time, and the Bank of North Dakota has been around for over a hundred years. Those are the dismaying points, to me. That the model of sustainable capitalism, which is a style of socialism, has been around for so long yet Americans have ignored it.

But, as I highlighted a few posts ago on November 7, Gars Alperovitz points out that the number of worker-owned corporations has increased. So, change is coming, it is just going to be very slow. Evolution is frustratingly slow, I guess. But at least there is some hope of a more just economy for our great-great-granchildren.

Change the Economy, Change Politics

I somewhat criticized Gar Alperovitz in my last post when I wrote, "I would have hoped that Mr. Alperovitz would have explained the evolutionary aspects of this shift in ownership." Given my critique I think I should explicitly lay out my thoughts.

Basically, my thoughts are that everything is interconnected. That may seem like a, "Well, duh, tell me something I don't know," type of statement, but, apparently, it does need to be stated. But everything is connected, in more ways than I can even express. Without rambling on about everything, I will just stick to the big three that I would like to highlight today: culture, economics, and politics.

Given a type of culture, certain types of economies would logically, and realistically, follow. Given certain economies, certain types of politics would logically, and realistically, follow.

In the United States our society, as a whole, suffers from a style of cognitive dissonance. Americans will say they value independence, yet the vast majority are almost completely dependent on the government or a corporation. Think about it, Americans puff up their chests and say they are so independent, yet they go to work everyday when told to and then go home when allowed to.

Or, Americans worship of the military, or a football team -- a worship of a role where the individuals do as they are told … And even which football team they are loyal to, i.e. the team that is nearest and that everybody else around them cheers for, basically, Americans have no independent preferences, no independent wills, they are apparently the people most susceptible to peer pressure on earth, they are completely servile.

OK, enough on the American culture of servility. But given a certain culture, a certain style of economics would follow. In this case, we have a somewhat capitalistic system, meaning a small sliver of the nation owns the factories and the offices and the vast majority then file into those factories and offices everyday and create continuous profits for the sliver of the nation that are the owners of those factories and those offices.

This suits the servile Americans quite well; though they may occasionally grumble about that reality, there is little reason to think they actually want it otherwise.

So, a small sliver of the nation owns the factories and the offices and that small sliver thus reaps the profits from the workers who staff those factories and offices. Then, given the style of politics in America, where the politicians have been allowed to craft the laws which regulate themselves, they have crafted the laws to funnel money to themselves through 'political donations' from the wealthy. They then use those political donations to saturate the media with messages to the servile populace to then vote for them again.

And this system also seems to be working out fairly well. Again, there are small groups that grumble, but the entire system is plain for all to see and the vast majority seem to be satisfied with this system.

So, I should title this piece, "Change the Culture, Change the Economy, Change Politics," but that is lengthy and clumsy and isn't as catchy as the current title. ;-) So that is why I leave it as it is.

So that is my too long explanation of why I am so fixated on worker ownership. Independence! Freedom! Those are my goals, that is the path that I try to steer Americans towards.

While a co-operative, or a worker owned factory, may resemble dreaded socialism to many Americans, holding the reins to steer your own destiny appears much closer to freedom, to me, than filing in to an office everyday, when told to, to create a profit for an owner you don't even know, and who may not even live in this nation…

My final point being, money controls politics, and money accrues to the owners of the businesses, therefor, continuing to work for a business in which a person has no ownership interest abdicates political power.

Successful Activist Amplifies My Cause

Though I have been jotting down my thoughts about worker ownership here in obscurity, another writer with a far greater reach has touched on some of my them. "Capitalism fading in the evolutionary revolution" is a very good article by Gar Alperovitz, a professor and published author. I sugest anybody who is now reading this to go check it out.

The short snippets that I support are:

Over the last three decades, for instance, more workers have become owners of their own companies than are members of unions in the private sector; indeed, 5 million more.

and

14 states are considering the creation of state banks following the long-established North Dakota model, a trend that is also likely to grow.

Given the title of the piece I would have hoped that Mr. Alperovitz would have explained the evolutionary aspects of this shift in ownership. That he doesn't leaves me with some hope that I may yet have a role to play.

"Crowdfunding" on the Horizon

I saw another article that I wanted to comment on and I thought I should go ahead and write post before I lose the article. The article is "When 'Friending' Becomes a Source of Start-Up Funds". The article is about legislation [PDF] "To amend the securities laws to provide for registration exemptions for certain crowdfunded securities, and for other purposes."

The article summarizes: "Critics say the idea is dangerous for investors, and even dicey for the entrepreneurs. Yet, it is gaining traction with small-business owners from the Bay Area to New York, who say they eagerly await an opportunity to sell stakes in their businesses through social networking—a process known as crowd funding."

The House Financial Services committee last week backed legislation that would make it possible for small businesses to use crowd funding to raise money from investors in exchange for equity stakes.

Under the proposal, investors would be able to buy stakes of up to $10,000 a year, or 10% of their annual income, whichever is less. Companies would be able to sell up to $2 million in equity—but must provide audited financial statements if the total exceeds $1 million.

I agree with the critics, somewhat, it could be dicey. But it could open up capitalism to the people, which you know, is one of my main interests, and it intersects with my other interests. I am going to be watching this Bill closely and acting upon it if it passes. I think it is a great opportunity, for myself and all Americans.

I'll add more thoughts later, I just wanted to get this "out there" for now. There's another article on the same topic, "A Split in the Crowd-Funding Crowd", and I will post more after I have read the Bill carefully and have done a little more research.

A Joke, But I'm Not Laughing: The SBA is Off Target

I noticed a little article with a fairly partisan and incendiary headline, "How did Solyndra get $500 million when I can’t get $5,000?", and, to amuse myself and waste a little time, I gave it a read. Now, it is clear the article is meant to be a right-wing indictment of the president of the United States by another right-wing media outline that is more concerned with destroying an American President, and America, than it is with helping America progress, but I basically agree with the meat of the article (I just find the blatant partisanship distasteful.)

First, the actual meat of the article. The article is written by Lisa Qualls, "the CEO and managing partner of Fresh ID, an agency dedicated to improving and socializing the brand experience across all forms of media." (A BS description of a consulting firm trying to make money from actual companies by just telling them what they should be doing if I ever heard one.) She 'serves' on boards for the Salvation Army and the Christian Foundation for Children, and she lives in Kansas City, so it is obvious she is a hard-core "Christian soldier" that concentrates her time on bolstering the prison industrial complex by getting heathens thrown in jail.

So, I am sure that if I met her in person I would retch. Which is a shame, because she has an ounce or two of intelligence, and alludes to valid criticisms of the Small Business Administration (SBA), though she never really discusses them. She mentions her desire for the SBA to "make these loans fair and accessible to those who truly need [them]." That sentence was near the end of the article, and is presented like a great revelation. It should have been in the first paragraph and should have lead to a serious discussion of the history of the SBA. Ms. Qualis notes, briefly, that the SBA requires a business to prove a "minimum three years of top line revenue and profit growth of 20 to 30 percent." Well, those are pretty demanding requirements, and makes it clear that the SBA doesn't want to get involved with helping a small business grow, but only wants to ride along after a small business has already been growing at a healthy rate for many years.

The SBA doesn't want to help small business grow, but wants to tag along after the SBA perceives there is no stopping this business. The SBA doesn't really make loans to what you and I would think of as small businesses. I drive around town and see small businesses all over. The small, family owned auto shop that I visit, or the one the son opened up across town; local restaurants and bars; specialty grocery marts like fish or health food stores; small book stores and craft shops; and on and on. These are small businesses in my mind. None of these would qualify for a "small business" loan. (And if you go by the SBA website they constantly put "small" in quotation marks, signifying that the manner in which they are using the word is not the actual meaning of the word.)

Basically, the SBA is looking for semi-large corporations that are already growing at a healthy clip and they want to loan them hundreds of millions of dollars so they can make the leap to huge, multinational mega-corporations. Their basic criteria is that the are not the leader in their industry. Growing, but not yet the leader. So, a huge chain like "Panera Bread" might manage to qualify, or maybe something like "Target" department stores. These obviously aren't small businesses. They know this. The data says that most new jobs are created in companies with less than twenty employees. Those are small-businesses. But most of those won't qualify for an SBA loan.

My second point, besides what a joke the SBA is, would be what a joke these massive media outlets are. The Washington Post has carefully found an individual who will parrot their own partisan ideals. The SBAhas been a joke for many decades. Yet Ms. Qualis has managed to seize on a high-profile disaster and imply that it is a recent development that needs to be changed. Ms. Qualis is attempting to lay all of the blame at President Obama's feet. Now, I'm not fond of President Obama, and he probably deserves plenty of criticism. But the SBA catering to only large businesses is not a recent development, and probably has more to do with the long history of our right-wing influences than today's African-American President.

So instead of the Washington Post running lame little articles they should be taking a serious look at the history of the SBA and advocating that it actually help small businesses that are in danger of failing. Just betting on the New England Patriots doesn't really help anybody. Helping a great little family run auto shop to expand, like Aaron's Auto Center, here in Jacksonville, would help the economy.

But the SBA only bet's on big companies, and the Washington Post only takes partisan pot shots at the president. Niether are helpful to the United States of America or its economy.