Hi,
As we all know financial economics go in cycles, the "upzy and downzy" cycles, and in so doing present some interesting history. There's a new book out on the Atlantic and Pacific Tea Company's start and it has some facts that are analogous to the PRESENT TECHNOLOGY REVOLUTION or "revulsion" if it's impacted your lifelihood.
"The Great A&P..." by Marc Levinson is certainly not a book favorable to the company but does make some interesting points.
The A&P that many of us knew as kids was a TREND SETTER and GROUND BREAKER and was hated for it. In the 1860s, it was the innovator of chain business, supermarkets, and sensationally oriented public relations fiction. AND FOR IT'S PROGRESSIVE OUTLOOK, IT WAS HATED BY EVERY MOM AND POP BUSINESS IN AMERICA and there were a slew of them.
There were evidently even in a handicapped communication system, so much unrest and anger that FDR IN THE 1940s (note 60 years later) used his influence in Anti-trust law to try to bring the company down. It took all told over 100 years plus union pressure to finish the job hatred started but it's interesting that BIG BUSINESS was UNDER ATTACK even in the early days. Unfortunately ALTHOUGH GEORGE HARTFORD had a knack with advertising, he did not have BILL GATES' "rock and roll" knack for moving unfavorable publicity to the the GOOD LANE.
Of course, Bill Gates experienced a similar phenomenom with his INNOVATIVE and world changing company, MICROSOFT. Instead of thanking him, the public turned against him and villified his BIG BUSINESS.
LUCKILY HE HAD SOME FRIENDS LIKE WARREN BUFFET, A GENIUS IN HIS OWN RIGHT, TO TURN THE PUBLIC TIRADE TO PUBLIC PRAISE FOR GATES' CHARITY DONATIONS.
Why are these men held up as DESTROYERS OF SOCIETY rather than BRILLIANT AND OUTSTANDING MEN SHOWING THE ROAD TO SUCCESS IN A CHANGING SOCIETY????????? SCAPEGOATS????????? We need somebody to blame for the unfairness of life.
Well, in the 1860's most of the country's (AND THE WORLD's-although we weren't as involved)commerce was in the form of very small businesses, called Mom and Pop's, because that's the way food and goods had to be distributed since we were still in the horse and buggy stage.
Interstate commerce FOR PERISHABLE GOODS was a thing of the future and when A&P, that dastardly INNOVATOR, took to expanding into MULTIPLE areas, adding foods, other than tea and coffee plus CUTTING PRICE TO THE BONE, the screams of pain from small retailers were loud and clear. In spite of or because of the clamor, A&P ULTIMATELY BECAME THE LARGEST LONG LASTING FOOD RETAILER. NEVER MIND THE GREATER CONVENIENCE, BETTER PRICE, AND FRESHER GOODS and buying public support !!!!!!!!! THIS WAS CHANGE OF THE RANKEST PROPORTIONS!!!!!!!!
Or so it was said. Now it's the FUTURE of WALMART Stores!!!!!!!
SO NOW LOOK BACK AT 1960, a fermenting, fomenting, loud and brassy struggle on the streets of the world by young people. WHY???????? CHANGE WAS AGAIN IN THE WIND. Computers had made their debut but only a few could make them work because they ran on manual systems in a language unknown to the common man. The economy was struggling even as space research was heading toward its peak. BUT MOST PEOPLE unlike the young were pretty satisfied with what Atlantic and Pacific's world had delivered.
LO AND BEHOLD, suddenly the populace LEARNED OF a system to work those FOREIGN LANGUAGE computers. Something called a SOFTWARE AND NAMED MICROSOFT by a company of the same name. Articles begain to appear about this GENIUS, Bill GATES, who DROVE THE MICROSOFT TRUCK.
IN THE BEGINNING THE PRAISE WAS LOUD AND LONG and the word NERD was banished from conversation. UNTIL......UNTIL ONE DAY THE WORLD BEGAN TO CHANGE visibly and folks got uncomfortable AS THE IDEA OF A TECHNOLOGICAL REVOLUTION BEGAN TO TAKE HOLD.
Suddenly, just as A&P began the changes that made the United States more accessible and familiar; Microsoft made the World more
accessible and familiar. BUSINESS AS WE KNEW IT CHANGED TO A PATTERN UNFAMILIAR AND SMALL BUSINESSES WERE DESTROYED BY AN ECONOMY THAT NOW RELIED ON SPEED AND FOREIGN TRADE. ALL these were ACCESSIBLE IN GREATER DEGREE BY THE CHANGES WROUGHT BY THE COMPUTER.
UH OH!!!!!!!!!!! Who's the culprit we can blame for our new discomfort and A WORLD GONE MAD?????????? WHO ELSE BUT GOOD OLD GENIUS BILL GATES????????? AND BIG BUSINESS WHICH IS WHAT MICROSOFT BECAME. Except BILL didn't stand still and let the public BEAT HIM WITH HIS GENIUS. THANK GOODNESS!!!!!!
The downturn in the economy caused by TERRIBLE FINANCIAL DECISIONS by BOTH LENDER AND BORROWER could not have happened without the computer to CREATE A SET OF PERAMETERS THAT SEEMED TO WORK BUT DIDN'T. BUT WAS THAT THE ONLY FACTOR IN THE RECENT DOWNTURN???????????
IT WAS NOT!!!!!!!!! When a country or a world is in the midst of another ECONOMIC CHANGE, like the shift in the late 1800s from farm to INDUSTRY, it happens in a uneven and uncomfortable pattern. MEN AND WOMEN who WERE TRAINED for farm work NOT ASSEMBLY LINES. Many did NOT or could not ADJUST, WERE OUT OF WORK, AND BECAME THE VICTIMS OF A NEW POVERTY and the VILLAIN???????? GOOD OLE A&P, WHO SHOWED THE WAY TO CHANGE!!!!!!!!!
THE SHIFT IN THE LATE 1960S TOWARD TECHNOLOGY BECAME ANOTHER UNCOMFORTABLE time and unfortunately those who still do not recognise the power and future of TECHNOLOGY as the LEADING EMPLOYER AND BECOME RETRAINED will suffer the same agonies that the farm workers suffered.
YES, THERE WILL ALWAYS BE AN INDEPENDENT WORKING MINORITY, thank goodness, for various fields that simply can't be PROGRAMMED, OR TECHNOLOGICALLY HANDLED AND IF YOU ARE FORWARD LOOKING THERE'S A NEW JOB OUT THERE FOR YOU.
But if you were to ask this blogger today to name those fields, she would be hard pressed to do so. There seem to be some obvious ones like HEALTH, CONSTRUCTION, TRANSPORT OF GOODS, SUPERMARKETS AND SO FORTH.........BUT...........would you have thought that OUR CARS, SO LONG BELOVED AND PART OF THE ASSEMBLY LINE ECONOMY, would become a victim of technology. BUT THEY MOST CERTAINLY HAVE DONE SO AS WE DISCUSS THE ELECTRIC and/or FOSSIL FUELS OF THE FUTURE.
OKAY, SO THE ROUGH ECONOMIC TIMES ARE NOT SO SIMPLY BASED on one factor AS we WOULD LOVE TO BELIEVE!!!!!!!!!!! And they won't be resolved either quickly or easily. THE BEST HOPE IS TO STAY SOLVENT, PULL IN YOUR HORNS, KEEP SHELTERED, AND HOPE THE STORM PASSES INTO THE SECOND PHASE MORE QUICKLY THAN IN THE 1800S BECAUSE TECHNOLOGY moves more quickly.
TECHNOLOGY ITSELF IS TRYING TO MAKE CHANGE MORE PAINLESS than it was in 1860 by making technological education available free. BUT YOU HAVE TO GO FOR IT!!!!!!!!!!! YOU HAVE TO ENROLL AND DO THE WORK!!!!!!
FOR THE UNLUCKY FOLKS UNABLE TO STAY SOLVENT, DO THE NEXT, BEST, POSITIVE THING. GET RETRAINED FOR SOMETHING TECHNOLOGICAL. You can take free courses on the net. I don't expect to need it but I'm studying computer language such as how strings of information are put into PYTHON, a computer language.
I ENROLLED in a college called Udacity.com on the web AND THERE ARE MANY OTHER good FREE OUTLETS FOR TECHNOLOGY TRAINING BOTH OUTSIDE AND INSIDE COLLEGE CURRICULUMS on the Internet!!!! Explore them and take a shot at becoming COMPUTER LITERATE!!!!!!! I frankly despair of ever learning the new language but I shall prevail. THERE ARE COMPUTERS IN ALL THE LIBRARIES THAT CAN BE USED IF YOU DON'T HAVE ONE. Libraries in recent years have been sitting on the leading edge of change toward a time when storage of books will be an anachronism.
OTHER OPTIONS include THE CHOICE OF LEADERS who CONCENTRATE on the changes that are happening NOW and don't try to stuff a SQUARE PEG IN A ROUND HOLE!!!!!!! An old system like Socialism/communism is NOT THE RIGHT SYSTEM FOR THE CHANGES FACING AMERICA IN THE FUTURE.
SOCIALISM IS A SQUARE PEG AND FORCING IT INTO THE ROUND HOLE OF TECHNOLOGY IS A DOOM'S DAY CHOICE!!!!!!!!!! We need leaders, who understand the TECHNOLOGICAL FUTURE AND OFFER SOLUTIONS TO THE IMMEDIATE PROBLEMS FACING US IN TECHNOLOGY. Just creating STOP GAP METHODS that PLUG HOLES like HEALTH CARE INSTEAD OF SOLVING PROBLEMS is not enough. RETRAINING SHOULD BE NUMBER ONE ON ANY NEW LEADER'S LIST!!!!!!!! WE NEED WISDOM MORE THAN CHEERLEADING!!!!!!!! AND CAREFUL SPENDING IN PLACE OF SPENDTHRIFTS WHO WASTE WHAT LITTLE IS LEFT.
THINK ABOUT THIS WHEN YOU VOTE. WISDOM. THRIFT. RETRAINING. THE FUTURE DEPENDS ON IT!!!!!!!!!!!!
CHEERS, CONNIE
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