Pax Plena

Tag: Economics

  • A Visit from a Friend

    A Mourning Dove. I call him Dave.

    I’m in Indiana this week. My time of being a nomad is well underway. It’s cloudy and muggy out. The heat grasps at the moisture in the air. It’s oppressive. Not quite as dreadful as DC in the summer. But pretty close. Even the squirrels and chipmunks have stilled their play to allow the afternoon heat to drag on.

    Soon, I imagine, they will resume their scurrying and gathering, or whatever it is that my friends do during the heat of the summer. My ex-wife’s backyard is filled with animals. I usually spend my days at the dining room table with an unobstructed view of the backyard. When animals make their way onto the deck (which happens fairly often) I call them my friends.

    So, with my friends scampering about, I suppose that the only idle one around here is me. My son has resumed school. His family here has resumed their work routines. My girlfriend in CO remains busy doing attorney things while maintaining her home for her kids. My family in OK are all, well, doing okay! Work, School, and Church seem to run the days there.

    The Sentinel.

    As I thought about the constant motion, it occurred to me that I felt a bit like the tree in the backyard. I call him The Sentinel. A fine specimen of a sugar maple, he stands athwart the chaos of days and looks calmly on. His stately branches reach out and provide shade and shelter as the world passes by. It could be said that he stands idle. But, at risk of being overly animistic, I don’t think he does. I think there’s a wisdom to watching and learning before acting. At least that’s what I think he does, and what I hope I’m doing.

    At any rate, what made today especially interesting was that a mourning dove joined me on the deck this afternoon. He was a handsome fella. He seemed rather content to join me and sit on the deck while we awaited the afternoon thunderstorm. As the humidity rose, I began to wonder where he would go should it truly start to rain.

    It prompted me to learn a bit more about mourning doves. I read that female mourning doves sit on their nests from late afternoon throughout the night. So, I figured that this mourning dove, who was decidedly nowhere near a nest, was a male. For all I know, he had just finished the morning shift of nest sitting and was cooling his heels until the storm arrived or passed. I’d say, he was here at least 20 minutes.

    In considering his stay, my mind began to wander, and I grew concerned for him. I hoped that he wasn’t injured.

    But isn’t that rich! He was doing what I was doing. Together, between me, the bird, and the tree, we were all idling and whiling away the afternoon. There was nothing wrong with me. The tree seemed fine. Yet, I immediately wondered whether there was something wrong with the bird.

    It wasn’t a flash of insight, but it struck me that maybe a guy just needs a damn break from time to time. And while it’s not popular in our culture and economy to take breaks (Gasp! Resume gaps!), maybe taking a break is okay.

    Because, come 6AM tomorrow, I reckon we’ll both be up, taking care of the kids, and doing all the things, all over again.

    I learned a lot today. I’m glad my friend stopped by.

  • Capitalism in New Zealand

    IMG 1134

    This afternoon I ambled about town and visited The Base – a large indoor/outdoor shopping centre rumored to be New Zealand’s largest. I’m not sure about the rumors, but I was pleased to happen across something that reminded me of home. 

    Whilst on the hunt for a new backpack I spotted one of America’s finest exports, a Dunkin Donuts smack in the middle of the mall. I quickly shared my excitement with the manager, much to her surprise. Apparently, most people don’t get quite as excited as I do while happening upon a local D&D.

    As I bit into my strawberry frosted doughnut, I swear that I tasted the sweet taste of freedom itself. Somewhere in America, a bald eagle soared a little higher.

    And when I sipped my hazelnut coffee, made with one cream and two sugars just like God intended, well, it was enough to bring a tear to the eye. I promptly said a silent prayer of thanks and thought twice about singing The Star-Spangled Banner to the crowd.

    Instead, I did the next best thing. I read some of Ayn Rand’s reflections on capitalism before happily proceeding to apply the lessons I had learned.

    On the way home, I thought about the invisible hand of the market, and about the aspiration of free trade. And I smiled contentedly for the first time in many days.

    Yes, friends. Capitalism is alive and well here in New Zealand and American exports are still making their way into the global market.

    Three cheers for globalisation! And God bless America.

    – Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

  • My Trip to Costco

    Alexas Loves Costco.

    I took my first trip to Costco earlier this afternoon to purchase a membership. On the advice of a couple of friends, my wife was persuaded that the amount of groceries we purchase would easily make up for the price of joining over time. I’m not sure that it ever will, but that probably won’t keep us from trying to milk every bit of savings that we can out of our membership. In addition to an obscenely large bottle of Scotch, we also bought a doggy bed for Alexas that is certifiably many times larger than she is, selling for roughly half the cost on Amazon.

    Walking around the massive warehouse, I had several mixed reactions.

    My initial thought was “this is exactly why Al Qaeda hates us,” and while the conclusion is dramatic, it’s also quite true. If Costco isn’t the poster child for American opulence, then I’m really not sure what is. By every objective measure, that store is huge. Huge. It’s shelves, which span the entire height and length of the building, are stocked full of every conceivable product one could ever want or need. (Although, there was a notable absence of products from Apple). From discounted computer software to relatively inexpensive and presumably, relatively fresh salmon, the store was a treasure trove of American consumerism. Given economic disparities between countries like America and, say, countries like Afghanistan, it’s easy to see how the seeds of envy, jealousy, and hate could grow. Any ‘reasonable militant’ could simply look at places like Costco (or Sam’s Club, BJ’s, Walmart, Target, etc.), realize that such stores will never exist in her home country, and blame every economic woe on the ‘greedy Americans’ hogging all the goods.

    On the other hand, I realize that I’ve used a loaded term, consumerism. In fact, somewhat frightening, and almost certainly annoying protests were held this weekend warning of the coming ‘class war,’ demanding to know ‘which side are you on.’ I fancy myself as more of a Switzerland whenever the class wars are waged, but as an unabashed proponent of the free-market, the libertarian in me responds to the sentimentalist above by noting, “That’s just how markets work. Someone had the idea to form a company based on the concept of selling bulk products to consumers rather than selling to retailers only, and I’ll be damned if the idea wasn’t a smashing success. I will drink my ridiculously inexpensive alcohol tonight, and, accordingly, sleep like a baby – albeit a very drunk one.” The simple point being that if local supermarkets can’t compete, then shouldn’t they go out of business? Why should the market reward inefficiencies?

    But again the sentimentalist in me considers that the ground isn’t exactly level at the foot of the economic cross. Companies like Costco can leverage billions of dollars in annual revenue to sell products at deeply discounted prices thanks to their incredibly low product mark-ups. Mom and Pop supermarkets could never compete because they lack billions of dollars to leverage and offer competitive pricing.

    And on, and on the conversation goes. I don’t claim to have a solution. If I did have a solution, you could (and should) contact the folks at the Nobel Headquarters, and tell them this year’s Nobel Prizes for peace and economics have all but been picked up. I’d certainly be a more worthy recipient than our hapless President who somehow won the Nobel Peace Prize while orchestrating three wars around the world. Of course, he was only a warmonger twice-over at the time.

    Still, the interesting thing about shopping at Costco was the simple fact that no one seemed to be having the internal dialogue above in their heads – except for me. That’s when I realized that I am weird. So, rather than revel in my eccentricity, I happily walked up to the checkout to pay for the doggy bed and scotch, knowing that I would drink the scotch, and knowing that Alexas would still sleep in our bed rather than the doggy bed I had just purchased. In fact, after posing for the photo above, Alexas promptly got up, and lay down on our king-sized bed. And maybe that’s the lesson of consumerism.

    The point of consumerism isn’t really to be satisfied. That would make the world markets tank for sure. The point of consumerism is to feel you need something, pretend you enjoy it, and then lumber back to the bed you’re used to sleeping on.