Tomorrow's my birthday. Almost forgot.
I've been reading a Sports Illustrated issue about athletes' lives after sports. And it occurred to me that, despite having careers of every sort, Americans don't really DO anything, make lots of money and get fat. Even people who help out aren't actually doing much of anything; they just make it look like it. People here work on their farms, break their backs for a couple of dollars doing whatever labor they can find. Where does that money come from? People who are richer, who own big things. How does someone get rich? They use their smarts to get a bigger chunk of the foreign money coming in to the country, which accounts for the majority of the economy. And who provides much of that? You got it. What do we import from Mozambique? Nothing. We just keep it poor.
What? That makes no sense, right? We give a country money and keep it poor. Well, we give a country money to do specific things, our priorities, and we ensure our own interests which are things like cheap oil, food and clothes. If Mozambique could afford to sell food to us or produce clothes we wanted, would they "need" so much of our money?
So here's the rub. If America stops spending money domestically, subsidizing local industry and promoting international competition, we lose jobs. But we reduce taxes because we're not subsidizing domestic industry and we can cut back on foreign spending because we would allow foreign economies to thrive. Which creates jobs. Specifically, more jobs where people DO something. The math is probably quite complicated and I clearly haven't taken everything into account. But my conclusion is that Americans like the sterilized office life because it is safe and you don't actually have to do anything - leave that to the handful of farmers, doctors and teachers who all suffer in often inadequate conditions.
I want to do something. I will. I am.
Peace
John
