A few days ago I wrote about a new project I’m working on which is going to be Gluten free guides for your city. I got to thinking though, and although I’m pretty quick at developing web sites, it still does take a little time to do. So, in the meantime, I’ve come up with a stop-gap solution and created a series of “Gluten Free in [x]” Facebook pages. I built three of them already for (San Diego, CA, Seattle, WA, and Boston, MA.

Those pages are done, and have Discussion forums on them which include Restaurants, Grocery Stores, and Recipes for each city. Please feel free to add your favorite places in your city. I’ll be using that information when we add the cities to Gluten Free Guides once it’s up and running.

The other cities I have pages for already, but there’s not much content in there yet. But, if you want to… feel free to go to one and start us off in the right direction. I’ll be there soon to put up the same format there. Here’s the list of cities…

• Boston
• Chicago
• Colorado Springs
• Dallas
• Denver
• Duluth
• Eugene
• Houston
• Los Angeles
• Minneapolis – St. Paul
• New York
• Philadelphia
• Phoenix
• Portland
• San Antonio
• San Diego
• San Francisco
• Seattle
• Reston
• Richardson

And please share and tweet these page urls out to your friends who are gluten intolerant or celiacs. We could use the support and we’d love to see their feedback on what is useful.

Thanks.

Making it fifty years married is pretty amazing. Most people haven’t even lived that long. So, what do you get the couple who’s probably lived together for more years than we’ve been alive? Here’s a few relatively unique ideas for you.

Love the 50th time around

• Family coat of arms plaque, engraved photo album, or family tree chart
• Twisted candlesticks
• Family tree photo frame
• A last minute cruise
• Turn their wedding photo into a big wrapped canvas photo art
• Restaurant gift certificates, since they might not cook for themselves much or would enjoy a night out
• A poem written by one of the children and recited for the anniversary party

Many couples don’t even want gifts at all. Give a gift of your time and help. Make up “Gift of Time” or “Labor of Love” coupons to take them out to their favorite restaurant, make them a home-cooked meal, chauffeur them on a shopping trip, run errands for them, take them to a show or movie, have a local landscaping company take care of their property, have their home repainted. Find out what will make a difference in the quality of their life.

Your love and attention will be the most appreciated 50th wedding anniversary gift you can give your parents or a couple. Make the time for those you love!

Whew… even writing this article was difficult. There’s obviously a lack of creative gifts for 50th anniversaries. I hope this list helps just a little more. Good luck! And congratulate the amazing couple for their long-lasting love for each other! :)

If you have any more ideas, please feel free to add them in the comments.

This kind of thing didn’t surprise me, coming from Ted. He’s one of the most vigilant awesomeness advocates I know. But, one thing I realized during that conversation…. if he could get the stack of front-end engineers together with the purpose of producing awesome stuff, there would be almost nothing stopping them except for one thing. The same kryptonite which stops all great developers – marketing.

Competition, Collaboration, Complaining

Marketing is the bane of a developer’s existence. It’s the thing we ignore, but we need.

Marketing is similar to tourism. The locals hate tourists, yet they depend on them for their survival in the modern age. It’s a love/hate relationship. Development is no different. We need marketing, but we hate it too. It’s so fake. So contrived. So finicky. Why can’t the quality stuff just get to the top of the list and get popular simply because it’s awesome? It’s sad really.

But, it’s needed. And, there are plenty of people out there who love to market. They just don’t like developers.

Why do developers have to be so agitating, so controlling, so vigilant and annoying to work with? If marketers could just have an idea and get someone to build it without complaining, the world would be a much better place, right? I mean, marketers know the market. It’s what they do. They know what people want, so the developers should just listen to them.

Ah, conflict. Gotta love it.

So, here’s the point… I live in both worlds. I see both points. I understand both pains because I’ve been both. So here’s what I’m going to do. I’m going to shine the spotlight on little projects that developers are creating which are awesome. On the other side, I’m going to highlight some marketers who are pushing some great stuff.

In doing so, I hope to make some connections, smooth out the rough edges, and bring two communities together. There’s nothing we can’t accomplish if we actually get along. My vision is to see developers with great ideas and great talent build awesome stuff, and have a great local marketer pick that up and make it huge. On the other side, I want to see marketers with amazing ideas get their stuff built by some crazy awesome developers. Everyone would benefit from this.

It should be noted that I skipped one major aspect of the community, and that is designers. I didn’t do that on purpose in this article, and I do recognize how different each skill is. I do think design is a major aspect of adoption, usability, etc. Thus designers play a critical role in the awesomeness quotient of a project as well. We’ll add designers to the batter when we get the first two ingredients playing nicely and that’s when the world will explode and finally realize that San Diego has some major powerhouses in all three specializations.

However, there are a few people I’ve been lucky enough to be introduced to and happy to call friends who I’ve estimated are about 5 years ahead of their time.  These people affect my decisions. They affect my opinions. They affect my beliefs of where things are headed.

So, you want to know who these people are?  Here’s one of them.  Chris Messina (aka Factory Joe).  I’m including his most recent talk on identity below.  If you believe I’m even partially smart, and you want to be smarter than me, you need to be listening to what this guy says.  Listen. Absorb. Think. Create.

Identity is the Platform from Chris Messina on Vimeo.

Photo credit: Eneas on Flickr

“Honestly,” she says to me, “there is absolutely no market for stated income loans anymore.”

These were the words I was afraid of, was warned about, and didn’t believe. I wasn’t easily turned away.

“Why? What’s the difference between a stated income loan and a full doc loan… is that right? Is it called ‘full doc’?” I asked.

The woman on the other end of the phone didn’t realize that while I was talking to her I was looking up the big, unusual words I hadn’t had defined to my satisfaction via Google. See, I’m a self-employed Web Chef which gives me the distinct honor of being able to spend my time when and where I want. That sounds great right? Hold that thought because right now – on this phone call – my time was best spent looking up definitions to real estate and lending terminology so that I could continue this word battle.

The woman continues. “Yes, you’re right. ‘Full doc’ means that you have documentation like W-2′s, bank statements, and 1040 tax records that prove that you make what you are telling us, the lender.”

“I see,” I said. “So, this is what’s interesting to me. The government gives us – the self employed and the small business – incentives to start and run these businesses, effectively hiring over 80% of the workforce of America. One of the biggest incentives we get is the ability to claim deductions, which effectively lowers our taxable income. But what you’re telling me is that because my taxable income is essentially in the poverty bracket (and yet, I might add that we rent in one of the more expensive areas of one of the more expensive downtown cities in the nation), that we can’t get a loan?”

Without hesitation, as if she’s heard this hundreds of times before, she answers “Yes, that’s correct.”

Much to my dismay, I’m losing the battle, so I try a more direct approach. I tell her how much we rent for and ask her if we could get a loan where the mortgage would work out exactly the same as our rent. I explain, as if she’s never rented before, that we’ve been paying this amount monthly for a year already, so there’s no way we are unable to afford the amount. At that price, we should surely be able to afford the the nice condo we were looking at. In the most simple terms I then say “Look, we will either be paying this amount in rent, or we can buy a condo and give you the money each month.”

Her response was more than informative. “The unfortunate thing is that because Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac are now government entities, essentially, their new policies are simply not to accept stated income loans. Now, normally, we’d give you the loan and then to free up the cash that we’ve just lent out we’d sell that loan to Fannie or Freddie. That gives us some money back to be able to keep lending. Now, the secondary market for loans is gone. The problem is … ”

… Let me just stop here. This is where I believe she went schizo on me and missed where the blame should have squarely been placed. Ok, let’s continue….

“The problem is,” she says, “so many people lied on their stated income mortgages and then all these people fell into defaulting on their loans, that Fannie and Freddie are effectively not buying these types of loans anymore.”

Ok, I have to interject again. If you haven’t seen this video on how all this economic situation really came about, I highly recommend watching it. If you’ve seen it or you don’t believe a word she just said, then feel free to continue right along. For those of you who need some fiscal education, watch this:

The Crisis of Credit Visualized from Jonathan Jarvis on Vimeo.

Now, I was sunk.

Of course I couldn’t argue with her about who started this whole mess (ahem *cough cough* the lenders *achoo*), because that surely won’t help me get the loan I wanted. But, if that’s the way she wants to spin it, fine. Whatever, let’s move on.

Recap

Many people love to blame the current economic situation (consumerism being down, people losing their jobs, housing and lending industries creeping, etc) on the housing bubble. Now, I’m all for reading fine print – I know, call me a geek, I’m used to it – but most of the people out there aren’t like that. They do what people tell them to do, especially ones who seem to know more than they do about a particular domain. Thus, perhaps a ton of people did lie on their stated income returns even though they had W-2′s, 1040′s and bank statements to prove that they didn’t make enough to pay for a house, a car, their alimony and child support and that 61 inch TV they just bought from Best Buy. I mean hey, perhaps they did have income coming in some other way right Mr. or Mrs. Lender? Let’s just believe them and sign that loan document so you can collect a big fat commission check. Great.

So what’s the problem with all of this? Let’s do a quick summary:

• The loan officer: walks away with a big fat commission check because they got a loan signed. Who cares if they could actually afford it?
• The bank: Well, they got stuck with the bill when Fannie and Freddie stopped buying loans that had a massive risk attached to them, so they got screwed at the end of it. But, while the loans were being signed and sold, they were happy-go-lucky. It’s only because they got caught holding the red hot potato that they’re failing now.
• The W-2 employee who bought a house: Well, it sucks for them because now they have to walk away from a house that’s worth half (or less) of what they originally (stupidly) signed a loan for. Even if they did it because the loan officer convinced them, they’re back where they were before – renting with no intention to buy in the near future. If they did want to get a house now though, they could just break out their W-2 and 1040, show they still have a job and cut back on their crazy spending habits and debt, and go buy a house (again) without blinking (this time, the right way).
• The self-employed person who didn’t buy when the market was hot but is now ready to get in when it’s reasonably priced: Oh these guys? They get completely screwed. Yea, screwed. We’ve been running a legal, profitable business for 15 years on tax benefits that stimulate the economy. We hire employees and contractors and spend money only when we have it because that’s called cash flow and business people know this term inside out. We’re the ones who get screwed.

Now this is the part of the story I call “Getting Frustrated”

Now that I’ve pointed more fingers than I possess, I’d like to offer some possible solutions. Solutions which I have absolutely no faith will be adopted in my lifetime. But, I hate coming to the table and just complaining. So here they are:

Option 1: Only allow people to do stated income loans who are not W-2 employees of any companies and yet do meet certain minimum revenue minimums for at least a year. This way, you’re keeping out the people who simply misstate their income (the so-called “liars” the lender mentioned), as well as those who obviously don’t make the amount of money they should to qualify for a loan.

Option 2: Allow, nay, certify via a CPA, the backing out of certain deductions that the IRS allows small businesses to take such as home office space, utilities, office equipment, and food and entertainment budgets. These are absolutely used for business, but they are also used in a personal context (ie a room in the home dedicated to business, eating, drinking, traveling, and more). Being able to certifiably back those expenses out would have easily given us the ability to quality for a loan – as a documented fact.

Option 3: This is the easiest. If someone is able to afford, let’s say $1500 per month in rent for a year, and nothing has changed in the last 2 months, there is absolutely no reason why that person shouldn’t be able to afford a $1500 mortgage (including PMI and taxes). That easily qualifies them for $230k+ house even with almost no money down. Proving your rent should be just as much considered full documentation as a 1040. Not accepting a 3rd party’s certification (and even their tax records if necessary), is simply asinine.

… Now, I hate leaving an article with the word “asinine.” So, go ahead, tell me your thoughts on the matter. Whatcha got?

Please, add your awesome Father’s Day gift ideas in the comments and I’ll probably add them to this post if I think the’re cool and/or unique enough.

The great list of Gift Ideas for your Pops on Father’s Day

Happy Father's Day! (image credit davef3138)

1. A family photo put on canvas for wall art *
2. A steak dinner, delivered to his door *
3. A gift card to a wine club for the wine drinker
4. Sightseeing tour for the adventure-seeking dad
5. Eco-friendly, recycled golf balls
6. Tailgating swing-out grill
7. A new cell phone (for free)
8. Wall art for your dad’s office
9. A mini tennis court for the driveway
10. Personalized golf balls from Schwetty Balls (not even kidding)
11. T-shirts and other stuff from Old Guys Rule
12. Other funny t-shirts
13. Laptop or travel bag for the father on the move
14. Old fashioned shaving stuff for the dad who likes it done the old fashioned way.
15. For the geeky dad, geek gadgets and gifts (Use coupon code: DEALNEWS and this link for free FedEx shipping)
16. Poker supplies for your dad’s weekly poker games
17. Make your own father’s day card, calendar, poster, or book for him (free 5×5 photo book via this link)

Honestly, I wish I had a child so I could get a few of these as presents on a day that’s 6 months away from my birthday. That would be sweet. Some of the gifts are pretty typical, but others would be an awesome gift to give your dad. Remember, it’s not too far away… might want to start looking just a little early this year, otherwise you’ll end up getting him that same ‘ol generic tie.

What other great Father’s Day gifts can you think of? What are you going to do for your dad on Father’s day?

So, I’m actually being a little proactive here and shelling out both traditional and unique gift ideas. Of course, every mother is different, and each relationship is different, so you can’t expect all of these gift ideas to be pertinent to your mom. This is just a beginners list, so please add your ideas in the comments if you have some good ideas too.

To mom.. Happy Mother's Day! (image credit: wadefromoklahoma on flickr)

The list of Gift Ideas for your Mother’s Day

1. Perfume
2. A body lotion gift set
3. Unique candle gift set
4. Bath and body sprays and creams
5. Roses
6. Other types of flowers
7. Citrus spa gift basket
8. Luxury spa gift basket
9. Fresh baked goodness
10. Calming candles
11. Taste of Tuscany gift basket
12. Tea gift basket
13. Basket o’ chocolate
14. An exotic plant
15. A gourmet meal, delivered to her door *
16. A photo of your family put to canvas*
17. A gift card to a wine club *
18. A wine club subscription *
19. Bus, wine or adventure travel tour
20. Mother’s Day cruises (breakfast, lunch, and/or dinner) *

Personally, I like quite a few of these on this list. I added some Mother’s day gifts that are pretty typical, but then there’s some really unique ones for your unique mothers on there too.

What other great Mother’s Day gifts can you think of? What are you going to do for your mom on Mother’s day?

Micro-finance and micro-lending are changing the world as we know it. It’s not just a new way to help the poor. It’s a new way to invest. It’s more stable than the market. It’s almost as lucrative. And it’s not just a good way to live, it’s a smart way too. I’m going “all in.”

The personal problem (for both you and me) with money and time

So, everyone who knows me knows I’m one of those “idea guys.” If you know another “idea guy” you know what this term really translates into. We start projects and never finish them. I really hate that about myself, as most of us do. So, I’ve been on a mission these past few years to hone in on the ways I can be most productive, efficient, and get the most out of my time. Most of us “idea guys” are terribly lousy at managing our time where it counts the most. We have a distorted view of what’s important, especially in the minutia of day to day tasks.

There are a few ideas and passions I’ve held on to over the years, though. One of those is microfinance, specifically starting my own micro-lending company. However, creating what essentially constitutes the equivalent of a bank is pretty difficult to do these days without prior finance and monetary policy knowledge. I knew that even when I interviewed Chris Larsen from Prosper.com back in 2006. I may have ideas, but I’m also a realist.

So, what’s the next best thing? If I can’t do something today, what can I do today that gets me closer to that goal? Well, of course participating in microfinance is definitely an option. With Kiva.org I can (and have for years) lend my money to the organization and in turn the entrepreneurs. In return I get that nice warm fuzzy feeling and maybe a little whuffie. But, I’m also an entrepreneur, so that can’t be all I can do…. can it?

Other options are lending to others where it’s not really microfinance, but more peer to peer lending in the US and the UK. There’s places like Prosper.com (US) and Zopa (UK). I could also simply give money to people anonymously if I’d rather not lend. And I do. I have done each of these at one time or another, and continue to do so.

Why now?

Now, before I share my new plan, I want to mention why I’ve decided this today. Why now?

There’s a few sources of inspiration, but much of it comes from reading The Snowball, a book about Warren Buffett – his life and his business(es). From that book, I’ve been spurred on to think more about the power of compounding interest and what and where to invest. The end of the book also brings to attention the need for doing more than just making money (albeit, this is coming from a guy who has more than he’d ever care to spend). Tangentially, I’ve been considering heavily the Rule of 70 (or 72 if you prefer).

Now, to get past all the financial mumbo jumbo, I’ll get to the point. I’ve tried everything I can think of that’s still honorable (and sometimes even in the gray areas) to make money without going into debt. I’ve not wanted to get into debt because I (personally) usually have a hard time getting out of it. But, that’s usually because I choose risky operations for the money which I borrow. I wouldn’t worry about it so much if I invested my money and time in more stable income-producing operations. But, now I’ve gotten off track again. So, the point is… exponential gain and affiliate marketing.

*poof* and now you’re gone, I’m sure.

For those of you who are still here… here’s the plan.

The plan

First, let me just say that affiliate marketing has some huge advantages to it. You can start small, risk a little, and when you find a winner of a campaign, scale to where you’re making $1000 per day (profit). Yes, it’s possible. No, I’m not going to sell you a product or anything else. But, just trust me, it can be done both ethically and without much risk.

It also has some very big disadvantages too. There are millionaires who play this game and it’s not for the weak minded or emotional. You will get beat and lose your shirt if that’s you. Don’t go into that game without a lot of study (not buying e-books), consultation, and very small tests at first with money you are perfectly happy to lose. For newbies, you’re speculators. You’re gamblers. Realize that fact until you find the patterns and you’ll not be in the poor house. And last, this kind of work is not the most powerful use of your money. It is not able to be used directly in compounding anything exponentially. So, we need a two-part system.

Now, what I’m going to do is actually take all the proceeds of my affiliate income (since we don’t live on this source of income) and funnel every penny of profit (after taxes) into micro-finance.

But why would you do that if the micro-finance organizations aren’t giving you a return on your investment? (you might ask)

Ah hah! But wait… there is ONE micro-finance organization that actually does pay you interest (right now, and I’m sure there will be more in the future). That one place is MicroPlace.com.

MicroPlace.com was started by the same guy who founded eBay – Pierre Omidyar. The man is not only wealthy and innovative, he’s got a heart the size of … well, it’s really big. The organization is funded primarily by the Omidyar Network and has the right idea.

I’ve just invested in 3 people like Jessica Maria Corea Gutierrez who is a Candy Maker with only $745.00. With this investment, I’ll make %6 annual return (as long they stick to the repayment plan) and help them on their way to becoming self-sufficient.

Jessica Maria Corea Gutierrez

Jessica Maria Corea Gutierrez is a candy maker in the small community of San Martin located a few miles outside of Tipitapa. She is a member of a “solidarity group” comprised of two other women. Together they have recently taken out their first loan with NICA Fund partner agency FODEM. Jessica explains that before she took out a loan her situation was “critical”. She lacked the income to be able to afford to pay for all of her children’s shoes and school supplies, which ultimately forced one of her children to have to drop out of school.

Jessica says that with her loan she has been able to purchase larger quantities of the ingredients needed to make her candy such as milk, cinnamon, and vanilla. With increased output she has been able to multiply her candy sales. Now her son is able to return to his studies.

Many members of the community of San Martin have few other work options than to travel to Managua and work in the free trade zones. Jessica is thankful that her microcredit loan has provided her the opportunity to remain working in her community and has dreams that her children will one day be able to pursue their educations beyond secondary school.

Here’s how I envision it:

• The non-exponential work (optionally, just saving some money and skipping to #2)
  1. I pay Google (or whoever) for traffic
  2. Google delivers the consumer to my website
  3. I deliver the consumer to the producer
  4. Consumer delivers money to producer
  5. Producer delivers product to consumer
  6. Producer delivers commission money to me
• The exponential work
  1. I invest profits into microplace (or other micro-lending organizations)
  2. Entrepreneur gets funds and creates or enhances their own business and profit
  3. Entrepreneur pays back interest and principal on the loan to the organization
  4. Organization takes their share of the interest for operating costs and expansion
  5. Organization gives the rest (interest and principal) back to me
  6. I reinvest once again in the organization and more entrepreneurs

Ok, so that was a bit more in depth than you probably needed to see, but it maps out my plan nicely. First, with affiliate marketing, I have the ability to expand a good business rapidly and capitalize on trends in marketplaces where people have money to spend. Next, I reinvest that money into areas that have less money to spend but earning an interest.

There are two criterion which I am simply hoping exist that make this a good transaction for everyone. The first I can control. The second I cannot.

1. The products or services which I get paid a commission on, and the companies I promote should be honorable and ethical. Without this criteria, I’m just helping move the poverty from one person to another. That’s not helpful.
2. The entrepreneur should be profitable, over and above the cost of the loan. If they aren’t the purpose of the loan was not fulfilled (to help them get self-sufficient).

A word on making money vs doing good

There seems to be this notion, or itch, that if we were truly doing right in the world to these entrepreneurs, we’d just give them the money or loan it to them with no interest due. Although that seems wonderful and idealistic, there are problems with that notion.

First, it’s very well known that giving money to people, on average, creates social and economic problems – especially if it’s given to people who don’t have a plan already in place on how they will be managing it. There’s the entitlement theory that creeps in and a relaxed (if any) sense of ownership and pride. If you’ve been in a startup before you know how that hunger for success needs to be there. Without it, you’re dead. With it, you’ll grow fast, innovate, own your ideas, and squeeze every bit of value from every penny you have in the bank. Then when you succeed, you feel huge. But the pressure to perform is so much less when we’re just given a million bucks with no necessity to repay. We feel like it’s ours. We can do whatever we want with it, including squander it.

Second, the idea that we shouldn’t make money while we do good things has no foundation. It seems to itch us the wrong way for some reason. However, most of the reasons I’ve heard so far usually have to do with the problem of incentive and motivation. The problem with this thought process is this; If I were only focused on the money, I wouldn’t put it into the micro-finance world. There are much better places to put your money than into micro-lending in terms of ROI. So, if it’s sacrifice you want, consider that those who choose to receive a gain from their assets have other options. Usually they (we) have chosen this route because it’s helpful. The ROI is equal to sustainability and growth.

The crux of the matter always seems to come down to this one question. If I could help one person with $10, wouldn’t it be better to help 99 more people with $1000? If the answer is yes, but you don’t have $1000, how do you get there?

Thus, the plan. Make money you can invest. Invest it letting compound interest work it’s magic.

Now, because of micro-lenders paying back interest, I think we have a better plan. Or perhaps just a different meaning, for “compound interest.”

Discuss.

The folks at CashTactics.net are offering you free AM advice. The only catch is that you sign up with Convert2Media (a great affiliate network) under them. By doing that, you’ll effectively not be losing a dime. But, for every sale or lead you make using Convert2Media you’ll be thanking CashTactics because they’ll get a small referral fee for bringing you into Convert2Media.

Honestly, that’s a pretty sweet deal both for you and for them.

For You:

You should get great advice from Cash Tactics. They’ve been around the AM block for a while and know what they’re doing. So, the advice you get should be solid. And, you’re not losing anything by taking their advice. Of course, you could lose money if (1) you can’t follow their directions or (2) their directions suck for some reason. But, just work slowly and test everything yourself and you should be perfectly fine… perhaps more than fine.

For Them:

They’re setting themselves up and leveraging their knowledge to a great degree by training up affiliates like you. If you do well, they do well. Done deal. If you are a terrible marketer, they haven’t lost anything except for time (which in their case can be very valuable, but there’s no monetary loss at least… just opportunity cost loss).

Anyway, you can read more about their offer on their site. I personally just wanted to say that it’s a great deal for everyone.

Panhandler vs Business man (via Ectofranz on Flickr)

Hey, if you don’t like it, vote with your money.

When people stop paying for the things a company offers they’ll stop offering it.

The Almighty Dollar

These are just a few cliches we hear when times are good. We tell our friends that the collective “we” have the power to decide whether a company should be producing certain things or not. But that’s not the complete truth is it?

In the midst of governments bailing out industries and financial institutions we, the people, have lost our power. We no longer get to decide with our dollars. The government gets to decide with our dollars.

Now, before you run off and tell your mommy that Nate’s getting political and throwing around an anarchist agenda, let me explain. We still have the power, but most people don’t understand where to flex their muscles.

If the government is going to bail out companies that fail (and I mean “fail” by our self-defined, capitalist standards), and many citizens are going to support these financial policies, then we have to understand why. What are the biggest reasons for this support?

One word: jobs.

The auto industry says they employ one out of ten Americans. And some economic teachers and thinkers believe that if those employers go away then our economy tanks. While that may be true, look at where the power lies. Let’s follow the trail.

The power trail

• Trend: The world is getting more and more conscious about saving energy, like gas.
• Fact: Currently, the large majority of manufactured cars for the U.S. depend on gas to be a functional product.

Here’s how it’s supposed to work:

1. An American gets a job at an auto plant.
2. People buy the cars that auto plant produces.
3. The worker gets paid.
4. Hopefully, when the worker retires, the company has saved some money to pay their pensions.

Here’s how it actually works:

1. An American gets a job at an auto plant.
2. The auto company produces cars.
3. Other Americans don’t buy said cars.
4. Auto maker complains to government, citing employees paychecks (and trickling down, the economy) as the country’s problem.
5. The government agrees with the economic problem and pushes said American’s tax money into the auto company’s hands to pay for the employees.
6. Employees keep producing cars that said Americans don’t want.

Of course you might have already thought that through and agree that a bailout is pretty ridiculous. You might agree with me that it’s crazy to be in business if you can’t make a profit, which includes the costs of paying your employees and selling a product the market wants. Failing is ok. Succeeding is more fun, sure. But, all of that is capitalism.

But, even if you don’t agree with me on the end result, look at where the power lies in both areas. Jobs. And I don’t mean jobs that the companies offer. I mean jobs that people apply for and work at. Now, here it comes – the kicker.

Wait for it….

By working for failing companies these employees have chosen the path of the welfare check. Maybe not the literal one, but definitely the figurative one. They’re being supported by tax payers (FTF).

Detour

Let’s even break it down to the tiny towns across middle America that work for these companies with no other industry to support them. What do you do then? Answer: move away from them.

If a small town in middle America was supported by one company, a start-up tech company for example. And that start-up produced typewriters. Would you work for them? Do you really feel that you have no other choices presented to you? Is your only option failure (either having a job from a company that will fail, or not having a job at all)? Absolutely not.

If that’s what we’ve come to, a nation of people who can’t see beyond their front yard and can’t be creative problem solvers, then we have a bigger issue than our current financial crisis. We have a major problem with our citizen mentality which needs to be bailed out.

Back on track

So, what’s my point? My point is that each person has an incredible amount of power by deciding who they work for.

If you work for someone else, you might not have realized this yet, but you have just as much power as your employer. You and your employer enter into a contract together. She will give you some money in exchange for your labor. She doesn’t give it to you because you’re nice. She gives it to you because she wants something that you can provide. Stop. Let me say it again. She’s paying you for something that you can provide.

You, the employee, have just as much power as the employer.

“But wait,” you exclaim. “They could just fire me if I do something they don’t like.”

Yes, that’s true. But guess what? You have the same power. If your employer does something you don’t like, you can quit. And employee training costs money. It hurts. It also sends them a message (if done properly) just as much as an employer firing an employee sends a message.

Wrapping up

This is just a small portion of my full argument, but the end result is that when we, the people, understand that where we spend our time (in exchange for money) is where the biggest power lies, we’ll be able to say we’re capitalists again.

Until then, we’ll just be paying to support failing industries, governments that pay themselves too much for the work they do, and for useless wooden arrows to be produced.