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eichy815 · 6 years

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Land of Missed Opportunity

For the past three years, I’ve penned an annual Independence Day piece discussion on what it means to be American – where we get things right, and where we need to improve. Last year’s edition, entitled “Amber Waves of Pain,” served as an “Open Letter to the Entire World” from my quaint little lips. In it, I acknowledge the many shortcomings of the United States...while simultaneously calling out other countries (along with any of their own nationalistic citizens) and challenging them to do better, for their own part.

One year earlier, I’d written a piece entitled “Star-Spangled Manners” that explored numerous reasons *WHY* so much anti-Americanism exists in our world. The year before that, I wrote one about how blind patriotism amongst Americans is dangerous while simultaneously weighing the nuances of the pros and cons inherent within American culture itself.

Any of these op-ed articles of mine are relevant to what we are currently enduring, within the context of U.S. politics. The next three years will comprise a major turning-point in American history...what happens during the 2018 and 2020 national election cycles could make-or-break us, collectively.

So today, I’m going to summarize six major areas in which our “beloved” U.S. government has failed our citizenry. These failures have occurred due to a variety of factors: individual greed, bad messaging, incomplete (i.e. badly-written) policy details, institutional corruption, “oppression-ranking,” mass media complacency, and lack of personal empathy.

None of these topical areas, in and of themselves, would magically fix all of our problems. However, if we gave each of these areas more focused attention...we could indeed undergo a truly transformative revolution.

AGRICULTURAL SUSTAINABILITY

In February, I launched The REGIS Initiative – an acronym that stands for Raising / Eating / Growing / Inventing / Sustaining. It’s designed to be a multifaceted drive to confront aspects of food production, farmers’ rights, drought alleviation, environmental stewardship, and pollinator protection – in terms of legislation, education, public awareness, and the localized nonprofit sectors alike.

My main gripe is that the issue of sustainable agriculture has failed to become a significant part of our national discourse. Whether this is by design or due to incompetence (or a combination of both) is, quite frankly, irrelevant; the point is that we need to get this issue “on the map.”

All of us should strive to become “Agri-Warriors” – conscious, proactive citizens who demand to our lawmakers that they design legislation, youth curriculums, and philanthropic incentives to achieve the outcome of affordable, plentiful groceries and healthy growing conditions. This needs to be prioritized, at every turn, to avoid mass-inflation or food shortages.

It isn’t “socialism”...it’s about our survival!

ELECTORAL REFORM – NO, FOR REAL!

Whenever politicians invoke “electoral reform,” they are usually referring to the common solutions of term limits, campaign-finance reform, and overturning Citizens United.

The latter is a tall order (as is any U.S. Constitutional Amendment) that will take many years – perhaps decades – to achieve. Campaign-finance reform sounds good, in theory; but will it become a backhanded way of preserving sectarian privilege on behalf of Democrats and Republicans? Term limits are another nice theoretical concept, but implementing them won’t make one lick of difference (and, in fact, may only exacerbate current problems) without simultaneously enacting large-scale reforms to D.C.’s lobbying sectors.

What we should be focusing on, with much greater fervency, are alternative forms of voting. Instant Runoff Voting (IRV), Approval Voting (AV), or Range Voting (RV) would be the most logical alternatives. We should be looking to examples such as the entire state of Maine (along with select U.S. cities) that have offered up such new systems to voters. The recent June 13 broadcast of The View initially featured this issue (via a joint campaign commercial from gubernatorial candidates Betsy Sweet and Mark Eves) as part of its daily “Hot Topics” segments; but then, before the cohosts could discuss it amongst themselves with any substance, ABC cut in with “breaking news” about the Mueller investigation (which, ultimately, was a “non-story” about how Trump attorney Michael Cohen had agreed that he would cooperate with federal investigators).

I’m not a conspiracy theorist, but there’s no doubt in my mind that someone at ABC News intentionally disrupted/preempted The View’s potential discussion of Instant-Runoff Voting because, if other states begin to follow Maine’s example, it will probably disrupt and upend the two-party system (thus limiting the mainstream media’s ability to control the narrative).

MULTICULTURALISM...*ACTUAL* MULTICULTURALISM

In March 2017, I wrote a somewhat-controversial op-ed entitled “What No One Wants to Say About Racism.” Many conservatives hated it because they don’t want to acknowledge the existence of systemic racism against people of color. Many liberals hated it because they don’t want to acknowledge that some cultural and social forms of racism can additionally target white people.

I still contend that distinguishing between institutional (systemic), social (individual), and cultural (group-based) forms of racism will be the only way our society ever reaches any semblance of mutual understanding and cooperation. Instead, too many people want to control the entire discourse on racial or cultural identities based on, narrowly, their own personal experiences and/or the personal experiences of those who they believe are getting a raw deal. Or cherrypicked statistics that happen to “prove” their point.

Sometimes this manifests itself when folks insist that we all should be “colorblind” or how “the only race is the human race.” At other times, people employ a “turnabout is fair play” philosophy alleging how it’s time for white people (or white-passing individuals) to be explicitly and pointedly targeted for discrimination, themselves. Michael Eric Dyson – the classic example of a performance artist trying to pass himself off as “an academic” – epitomizes this toxic archetype.

Not everyone should be expected to speak “on behalf of their race.” And no one should be allowed to speak “on behalf of their race.” Both systemic and personal experiences with racism need to be brought out into the open, keeping context in mind when looking at each occurrence. No apologism for any of it. No accusations that the narrator is making things up or “being too sensitive.” No reducing those occurrences to “hurt feelings, ”political correctness,” or “cultural relativism” (and, thereby, writing them off). Not every person from a specific marginalized group necessarily has the exact same worldview.

As I discussed in my recent blog article, “Bigots Without Borders,” racism is a much more complex topic than either the Left or the Right would have all of us believe.

CRIMINAL JUSTICE REFORM

After we take that first step of maintaining productive conversations on race and nationality, we all need to become razor-focused on actual solutions. Otherwise, platitudes without results only keep these vicious cycles repeating themselves.

The most life-threatening forms of systemic racism – police brutality targeted specifically at people of color – need to be stopped through meaningful criminal justice reform. The platform of “Campaign Zero” – originally constructed by founders and organizers of the #BlackLivesMatter movement – has offered up the clearest path for enacting those changes.

Yet, instead of embracing “Campaign Zero” and trumpeting its proposed solutions, many guilt-ridden Caucasian liberals/progressives seem to think that caustic virtue-signalling (as described in my editorial piece from this past April entitled “White Knights of the Oblong-Table”) against other white people is somehow the wisest approach in lieu of direct policy changes. Such cluelessness and tone-deafness from these so-called “anti-racists” will only exacerbate racial tensions.

#SorryNotSorry, but that’s a reality.

ECONOMIC STABILITY: A “PIT STOP” TO PROSPERITY

Much has been said about raising the minimum wage, cracking down on corporations, or even guaranteeing employment and a basic income to all Americans. The two peskiest questions that seem to come up, amid this particular conversation: how do we administer it, and how do we pay for it?

My friend and fellow Morpheus magazine columnist, Pasquale Neri, wrote about this scenario in an op-ed piece from this past May. He proposes guaranteeing a universal income to every qualifying American by replacing it with an opt-in guarantee of $52,500 annually in lieu of one’s Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid benefits. Unfortunately, his plan doesn’t address trickier confounding factors such as illegal terminations, geographic disparities, or limitations for citizens with disabilities.

Former Amazing Race contestant Justin Kanew – who is running for Marsha Blackburn’s open seat (Tennessee’s 7th Congressional District) in the U.S. House of Representatives – has floated a more workable idea that I myself have endorsed for many years now. Rather than giving corporations lower tax rates right off the bat...why not offer corporate tax breaks as a REWARD for individual corporations that keep jobs stateside and add to the American workforce?

A lot of desire exists to raise the national minimum wage. But not all industries are created equal. Tell me with a straight face that an entry-level fast food worker and an entry-level computer programmer are equally deserving of $15 per hour. Furthermore, American lawmakers have done virtually nothing to address the arbitrary taxation that hinders 1099 employees across-the-board.

Universal basic income, paid family leave, and The-Fight-for-$15 all sound lovely, in theory. But, if implemented, what prevents these costs from being passed on to the consumers while driving up inflation?

IMMIGRATION REFORM

Two conflicting schools-of-thought, here: “We are a nation of immigrants” versus “We must secure our borders by keeping out dangerous people.”

Nearly every politician claims to be in favor of “immigration reform.” But what that reform itself literally involves – that’s dependent on the politician’s individual ideology. I say – let’s pass a comprehensive immigration reform package that: A.) mandates that people in the U.S. on work visas get paid wages identical to their American-born counterparts; B.) institutes a permanent renewal of DACA with clear and consistent guidelines; C.) incorporates a detailed and narrowly-defined version of The DREAM Act; and D.) establishes humane conditions for those seeking asylum from other countries.

When Democrats talk about “dismantling ICE,” they are usually referring to a broader goal of disempowering U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement from its current power abuses of indiscriminately detaining people. We must also end the “Show Me Your Papers”-style exploitation of laws such as Arizona’s SB 1070. In turn, the trend of “chain migration” needs to be ended by making it stricter and tougher for Americans to capriciously sponsor an extended relative for immigration status (without that potential immigrant having proven his or her skill set).

I’m also tired of hearing people on the Left blather: “Everyone in this country who comes from a nonindigenous background is technically an ‘immigrant.’” Um, no...everyone who is born in America (or who has at least one American-born parent) is automatically an American. Isn’t that the principle used to deconstruct those unhinged claims from “birthers” that President Obama was somehow here illegally? So you can’t have it both ways. Even the earliest members of America’s Tribal Nations migrated to the North American continent from other parts of the world. Plus, many indigenous tribes fought and enslaved EACH OTHER. No one’s hands are clean, here.

We should be welcoming low-risk, qualified immigrants from every country (not just Norway, Donald!). At the same time, people who claim to be “progressive” or “feminist” or “anti-racist” need to quit exploiting “white guilt”...meanwhile, right-wing fundamentalists and obnoxious neocons need to quit embracing white supremacy.

BROADER GOALS

Finally, if Justice Anthony Kennedy’s successor proves to be a conservative hard-liner who shifts the U.S. Supreme Court away from reasonable progress, Democrats need to campaign in 2020 on the promise that – under a Democratic president and Democratic majorities in both the House and Senate – they will increase the size of the Supreme Court from 9 to 11 justices. This would be done in the name of judicial balance...particularly to neutralize any extremism if Justices Ginsburg, Breyer, or Sotomayor have to leave the bench within the next two years.

Call it the #TwoMoreRobes movement. It would be historically unprecedented (FDR tried to do it – and failed – back in the late-1930s)...but, if the Far Right succeeds in securing a clear majority on the U.S. Supreme Court in the present, then the rest of us might not have any other choice.

LGBT people need better representation in all areas of public life. The #MeToo movement needs to clearly become about sexual survivors taking back power from their abusers and predators...not this divisive binary that gets boiled down to “women-vs.-men.”

We’ve missed a lot of great opportunities for positive change in this country. That’s why we must change the narrative itself. That’s why we must put forth constructive policies as a clear rebuttal to the smarmy Talking Heads of cable news.

It’s obvious that power-hungry deviants wish to tear us apart for their own financial gain. But that doesn’t mean we have to let them!

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rivaco · 4 years

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10 Ground rules for business messaging that leaders need to implement

The workplace is evolving. There’s no denying that people’s work habits and preferences are changing in lockstep with this evolution. More businesses are encouraging workers to bring their whole selves to work. Likewise, business tools are now designed to look and feel more like consumer grade social tools.

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The software industry is changing... 2009: Enterprise-style front end + Enterprise-scale back end 2019: Consumer-style front end + Enterprise-scale back end

— @bhalligan

As more people now have the freedom to use messaging apps for at work, business leaders and HR teams can find themselves navigating tricky situations. Many of us have heard of conversation threads going awry or peers complaining about off-color messages.

At Flock, we believe businesses should strive for transparency and enable direct collaboration across teams and employees. The payoff for improved collaboration is substantial. According to Salesforce, 86% of workers say that lack of communication accounts for workplace failures. But when people start chatting about projects, hobbies, or even politics at work, tensions are bound to arise. It’s important for leaders to establish ground rules around messaging to ensure that teams work effectively together and keep things from going off the rails.

With a little bit of thought, you can ensure that your team uses messaging tools to their full potential — whether it’s for conversations on a specific project work or general bonding. At Flock, we have our own “10 commandments” for respectful workplace communications.

Here are 10 rules we think every business should set for internal messaging:

Push for transparency and communication but be explicit about acceptable and unacceptable behavior

Ask employees to send messages that they would say in person

Ask everyone to assume good intent

Avoid sending messages or @ teammates in off hours

Ask coworkers and teams to share their messaging preferences

Specify if a message is urgent or if it can wait

Encourage employees to use DND and mute channels

Set some ground rules for how topic-oriented channels should operate

Make it clear that conversations aren’t 100% private

Have clear escalation paths for inappropriate behavior

Realize your team’s potential to do great things! Check out our guide to effective team collaboration.

1. Push for transparency and communication but be explicit about acceptable and unacceptable behavior.

Set ground rules for how you expect employees to communicate with each other. Having a codified set of expectations that everyone can access ensures that everyone understands the rules of engagement. Make sure you call out unacceptable behavior clearly. Post your rules of engagement in your company announcements channel, pin it so it’s easily accessible, and add it to your new hire onboarding processes.

2. Ask employees to send messages that they would say in person

Tensions can arise any time a group of people have to spend most of their days together. Just as you want employees to be respectful of each other in person, they should do the same virtually. Acknowledge the phenomena that people sometimes send things behind the security of a screen that they would otherwise never say in person. Then set the expectation that communication software is used at work to enable productive collaboration and that everyone needs to be respectful towards each other.

3. Ask everyone to assume good intent

It can be hard to figure out tone with messaging and email. In the spur of the moment, an innocuous line of text may read as a complaint or criticism. Ask you employees to consider two things when messaging:

Check if the message they’re sending matches the tone they’re hoping to establish

Take a step back after receiving a message and assume good intent from the sender, rather than the worst case scenario

This is not to take away from truly disruptive or inappropriate messaging behavior, which we address later in this post. Assuming good intent is a great general practice to build a culture of understanding and avoid unintentional miscommunication, but it should not be a bandaid for larger behavior issues.

4. Avoid sending messages or directly mentioning teammates in off hours

Many workers struggle with expectations of being always on. Messaging software enables quick collaboration and flexible work, it also can exacerbate an always on mentality when used improperly. It is up to leadership to create a culture that encourages maintaining a good work-life balance. Leaders can first set the example by avoiding sending messages during off hours. Encourage folks who prefer to work off hours to not directly @ mention colleagues who may be with family or taking well deserved time off. If messages need to be sent during off hours, have the message sender indicate if something is truly urgent or if it can wait so people don’t feel pressured to respond immediately.

5. Ask coworkers and teams to share their messaging preferences

Encourage employees to ask each other how they prefer to communicate. Many folks like to use messaging for quick questions but prefer email for topics that require more thought or attention. Asking employees to think about their coworkers’ messaging preferences builds empathy as well as mutual respect for each other’s working styles.

6. Specify if a message is urgent or if it can wait

When making a request via messaging, it’s a best practice to let the person know when they need to respond. Just like in the off hours example, explicitly call out if you need an immediate answer. If the request is less urgent, give them a due date. If you’re simply giving a teammate a heads up, let them know that the message is informational and requires no response.

7. Encourage employees to use “Do not disturb” and mute channels

Messaging tools like Flock have features meant to help people turn off, for good reason. We work better when we are not constantly interrupted. Encourage people to proactively turn on ‘Do not disturb’ so that coworkers know they’re unreachable and to mute active channels to reduce the number of notifications they receive.

8. Set some ground rules for how topic-oriented channels should operate

One of the best things about business messaging software is the ability to create custom channels for special interests like sports, movies, or books. Messaging software enable conversations and team building that may otherwise never happen. For instance, the Flock team loves chatting in our many channels for shared interests , and I can personally say they have helped us all better connect as coworkers. However, it is important for leadership to give some guidance on acceptable behavior and empower employees to make sure conversations stay respectful (except for our #sportstalk channel, where trash talking is basically required).

9. Make it clear that conversations aren’t 100% private

Business messaging software contains more robust security and compliance controls than consumer-grade messaging apps like WhatsApp or Facebook Messenger. For businesses, records are kept for compliance, HR, or legal reasons. Business-grade tools like Flock allow company admins to export all message records, so it’s a good idea to let your employees know that what they discuss isn’t 100% private.

10. Have clear escalation paths for inappropriate behavior

Lastly, provide clear escalation paths if someone feels uncomfortable about a conversation or message thread. It can be an anonymous feedback form or HR email address. If you’ve set clear ground rules for communication, everyone in your company should be able to identify what is and isn’t okay. It’s crucial that leaders do not put the onus on employees who may already feel disenfranchised or harassed to resolve issues.

Great things happen when people talk to each other

Messaging and collaboration software are incredibly powerful tools to jumpstart communication and help teams work better together. Ultimately, company culture is key to creating healthy internal messaging norms. At Flock, we believe that leaders must establish ground rules and set an example for how the wider team should communicate to generate the best results.

10 Ground rules for business messaging that leaders need to implement was originally published in Flock Blog on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

#Flock #Enterprise Chat

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jam2289 · 5 years

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On Resentment as the Path to Destruction

Resentment is the most destructive emotion. It seems like hate and anger might be, or jealousy. But, notice that all of these things spring from resentment. Resentment is the underlying foundation that fuels these other destructive emotions. Let's take a quick look at six demonstrations.

Aesop created some fables 2,600 years ago. Those stories are still popular. That's impressive. "The Fox and the Grapes" deals directly with resentment. There are many versions, here's one.

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ONE hot summer’s day a Fox was strolling through an orchard till he came to a bunch of Grapes just ripening on a vine which had been trained over a lofty branch. “Just the things to quench my thirst,” quoth he. Drawing back a few paces, he took a run and a jump, and just missed the bunch. Turning round again with a One, Two, Three, he jumped up, but with no greater success. Again and again he tried after the tempting morsel, but at last had to give it up, and walked away with his nose in the air, saying: “I am sure they are sour.”

“IT IS EASY TO DESPISE WHAT YOU CANNOT GET.”

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The story of Cain and Abel is 6,000 years old, maybe quite a bit older than that. It also perfectly addresses resentment as the path to destruction.

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1Now Adam knew Eve his wife, and she conceived and bore Cain, saying, “I have gotten a man with the help of the LORD.” 2And again, she bore his brother Abel. Now Abel was a keeper of sheep, and Cain a worker of the ground. 3In the course of time Cain brought to the LORD an offering of the fruit of the ground, 4and Abel also brought of the firstborn of his flock and of their fat portions. And the LORD had regard for Abel and his offering, 5but for Cain and his offering he had no regard. So Cain was very angry, and his face fell. 6The LORD said to Cain, “Why are you angry, and why has your face fallen? 7If you do well, will you not be accepted? And if you do not do well, sin is crouching at the door. Its desire is contrary to you, but you must rule over it.”

8Cain spoke to Abel his brother. And when they were in the field, Cain rose up against his brother Abel and killed him. 9Then the LORD said to Cain, “Where is Abel your brother?” He said, “I do not know; am I my brother’s keeper?” 10And the LORD said, “What have you done? The voice of your brother’s blood is crying to me from the ground. 11And now you are cursed from the ground, which has opened its mouth to receive your brother’s blood from your hand. 12When you work the ground, it shall no longer yield to you its strength. You shall be a fugitive and a wanderer on the earth.” 13Cain said to the LORD, “My punishment is greater than I can bear. 14Behold, you have driven me today away from the ground, and from your face I shall be hidden. I shall be a fugitive and a wanderer on the earth, and whoever finds me will kill me.” 15Then the LORD said to him, “Not so! If anyone kills Cain, vengeance shall be taken on him sevenfold.” And the LORD put a mark on Cain, lest any who found him should attack him. 16Then Cain went away from the presence of the LORD and settled in the land of Nod, east of Eden.

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These stories point out important truths about the world. Specifically, they show how resentment develops and what it leads to. Here are some definitions of resentment.

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a feeling of indignant displeasure or persistent ill will at something regarded as a wrong, insult, or injury

to dislike or be angry at something or someone because you have been hurt or not treated fairly

the feeling of displeasure or indignation at some act, remark, person, etc., regarded as causing injury or insult

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The Fox was resentful, and so was Cain. The Fox was rejected and denied by the grapes, Cain was rejected and denied by God. Then, naturally, they had hate. What do you think would have happened if the Fox had seen someone else eating and enjoying the grapes? I'm guessing bloody things, just like Cain. What follows are historical examples of the same thing in action: the Columbine shooters, Timothy McVeigh, the Unabomber, Hitler, and Panzram.

For instance, the Columbine shooters were pretty straight forward about why they did what they did. They wanted to destroy the world because in their eyes the world sucked. So, they tried to create the greatest spectacle of destruction that they could imagine pulling off. The plan was much worse than the actual event. They killed 13 people, if they did what they had planned to do they would have killed hundreds.

Eric Harris had long posts on his website where he listed what he loved and what he hated. Here are a couple of examples.

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YOU KNOW WHAT I HATE!!?

---When people mispronounce words!and they dont even know it to, like ofTen, or acrosT, or eXspreso, pacific (specific), or 2 pAck, learn to speak correctly you morons.

YOU KNOW WHAT I LOVE!!?

---Natural SELECTION!!!!! God damn its the best thing that ever happened to the Earth. Getting rid of all the stupid and weak orginisms........but its all natural! YES!I wish the government would just take off every warning label. So then all the dumbasses would either severely hurt themselves or DIE! And boom, no more dumbasses. heh.

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There's some resentment showing through there. These two entries were some of the nicest ones. His partner Dylan Klebold was a completely different personality, but they had resentment in common. Here are some of his journal entries.

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Fact: People are so unaware... well, Ignorance is bliss I guess... that would explain my depression.

I swear -- like I'm an outcast, & everyone is conspiring against me...

The lonely man strikes with absolute rage.

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Now, obviously these kids had other problems too. One was a psychopath and the other had a psychotic break. But, resentment was the driving force.

They are not alone. Here's a disturbing chain of events. The massacre at Ruby Ridge led to the massacre at Waco. The massacre at Waco directly led to the Oklahoma City bombing. The Oklahoma City bombing was an inspiration for the Columbine shooters. An evil chain of events. Here are a few selections from the letters of Timothy McVeigh.

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I chose to bomb a federal building because such an action served more purposes than other options. Foremost the bombing was a retaliatory strike; a counter attack for the cumulative raids (and subsequent violence and damage) that federal agents had participated in over the preceding years (including, but not limited to, Waco). From the formation of such units as the FBI's Hostage Rescue and other assault teams amongst federal agencies during the 80s, culminating in the Waco incident, federal actions grew increasingly militaristic and violent, to the point where at Waco, our government - like the Chinese - was deploying tanks against its own citizens.

When the post-inferno investigations and inquiries by the Executive and Legislative branches of government concluded that the federal government had done nothing fundamentally wrong during the raid of the Branch Davadians at Waco, the system not only failed the victims who died during that siege but also failed the citizens of this country. This failure in effect left the door open for more Wacos.

Some time after the fact they received awards, bonus pay and in some cases promotions for their disgusting and inhumane actions at Waco and Ruby Ridge.

It was in this climate then, that I reached the decision to go on the offensive - to put a check on government abuse of power where others has failed in stopping the federal juggernaut run amok.

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You can see that this thinking is quite a bit different than the Columbine shooters. Harris and Klebold resented the world in general. Harris for everyone being stupid and having no worth or value. Klebold for being a rejected outcast. They chose the closest, easiest, and most brutal target they could think of. McVeigh resented the US government specifically and made his choice for that reason. Cain resented the person that was getting what he thought he deserved, and God. The Fox resented what he couldn't get.

This is not a fun article to write, I've kind of emotionally exhausted myself at this point by even paying attention to all of these evil thoughts and deeds. But, it's important to see the bad and how it works so that we can both avoid it and seek the good. I only have three more examples to go.

Theodore Kaczynski was a math prodigy that went to Harvard at age 16. While there he was put into a psychology experiment that he was lied to about. He had to develop essays on his personal life philosophy. Then he was subjected to military style interrogation techniques specifically designed to mentally break enemy combatants and spies. This experiment went on for 3 years. The records of all of that were purposefully destroyed to keep them secret from the public, but I think we can get a pretty clear idea of what the essays were about from the Unabomber's manifesto that he wrote later in life. Here are several selections.

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1. The Industrial Revolution and its consequences have been a disaster for the human race. They have greatly increased the life-expectancy of those of us who live in “advanced” countries, but they have destabilized society, have made life unfulfilling, have subjected human beings to indignities, have led to widespread psychological suffering (in the Third World to physical suffering as well) and have inflicted severe damage on the natural world. The continued development of technology will worsen the situation. It will certainly subject human beings to greater indignities and inflict greater damage on the natural world, it will probably lead to greater social disruption and psychological suffering, and it may lead to increased physical suffering even in “advanced” countries.

59. We divide human drives into three groups: (1) those drives that can be satisfied with minimal effort; (2) those that can be satisfied but only at the cost of serious effort; (3) those that cannot be adequately satisfied no matter how much effort one makes. The power process is the process of satisfying the drives of the second group. The more drives there are in the third group, the more there is frustration, anger, eventually defeatism, depression, etc.

60. In modern industrial society natural human drives tend to be pushed into the first and third groups, and the second group tends to consist increasingly of artificially created drives.

178. Whatever else may be the case, it is certain that technology is creating for human beings a new physical and social environment radically different from the spectrum of environments to which natural selection has adapted the human race physically and psychologically. If man is not adjusted to this new environment by being artificially re-engineered, then he will be adapted to it through a long and painful process of natural selection. The former is far more likely than the latter.

179. It would be better to dump the whole stinking system and take the consequences.

211. In the late Middle Ages there were four main civilizations that were about equally “advanced”: Europe, the Islamic world, India, and the Far East (China, Japan, Korea). Three of those civilizations remained more or less stable, and only Europe became dynamic. No one knows why Europe became dynamic at that time; historians have their theories but these are only speculation. At any rate, it is clear that rapid development toward a technological form of society occurs only under special conditions. So there is no reason to assume that a long-lasting technological regression cannot be brought about.

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The Unabomber was resentful about all of science and technology. He's written several books specifically on this.

Lastly, we have Adolf Hitler. The entire story of Hitler is filled with all kinds of resentment. On a larger scale we have the surrender of Germany in WW1. This was seen by the German army as a betrayal by the government officials. The signers of the Armistice were called "The November Criminals." The Nazis promoted this idea and said that it was the Jews that had stabbed the nation in the back to take power. This is called the stab-in-the-back myth today.

Then, there were a bunch of war reparations imposed on Germany. They had traditional German land taken, they had to pay billions of dollars in damages, they suffered a hyperinflationary economy, and had severe restrictions on a bunch of other things. To a large extent resentment was the fuel behind all of WW2.

But, let's just look at Hitler the man. It's commonly known that he wanted to go to art school when he was young. He used his inheritance from his dead father to move to Vienna. He applied to the art institute in Vienna twice, and was twice denied. He was told he was good at drawing and painting buildings, but he lacked talent in representing the human form. During this time his mother was dying of cancer. He made a poor living trying to sell his art. Some of his friends, his art dealer, and some of his patrons were Jews at this time. After that he joined the army and fought in WW1, then went into politics. But, he never let go of art. Here's a quote from Hitler in 1939 from the "British War Blue Book".

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I am an artist and not a politician. Once the Polish question is settled, I want to end my life as an artist.

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A resentful and rejected artist, plus a resentful generation of army veterans, plus a resentful national populace equals WW2.

I think all of this clearly shows the dangers of resentment at multiple levels and across different contexts. There is value in the real-life stories, but I think the pure stories are more valuable for a couple of reasons. One, they are less depressing to think about and research. Two, they are a hyperreality, meaning that they select what is important and leave out what is not. With the real-life stories there is just too much information, it's overwhelming. We can see that the same principles apply, but it's much easier to see in "The Fox and the Grapes" and "Cain and Abel" rather than in the other examples. Three, there is a little detachment in the stories. You can get a better perspective because they are less real. This helps you to clearly see what is happening, how it's happening, and why. In the real-life stories important points can be lost in the details.

I've heard it said so many times that no one can know why these horrible things are done. That just isn't true. It's very easy to know why horrible things are done. It's very easy to know how these people think. It's fairly easy to find out why they did what they did and what motivated them. Most people just don't want to know, and hey, fair enough. It's not fun. But, self-deception is a dangerous thing. It's important to realize that we are all susceptible to resentment. And, that's a problem that has to be dealt with on the inside, in the attitudes and views that we take towards the world. These attitudinal values are the most important values.

Most of us let our resentment become some sort of passive aggressiveness, mostly resulting in snide comments. This is a lot better than violence, but it's walking down the wrong road and is sure to lead to nothing good. Others run rather than walk down that road. One last example, here are some excerpts from the letters of Carl Panzram.

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After serving about 2 years there I was pronounced by the parole board to be a nice, clean boy of good morals, as pure as lily and a credit to those in authority in the istatution where I had been sent to be reformed. Yes sure I was reformed all right, damn good and reformed too. When I got out of there I knew all about Jesus and the bible so much so that I knew it was all a lot of hot air. But that wasn’t all I knew. I had been taught by christians how to be a hypocrite and I had learned more about stealing, lying, hating, burning and killing. I had learned that a boys penis could be use for something besides to urinate with and that a rectum could be use for other purposes than crepitating. Oh yes I had learned a hell of a lot, from my expert instructors furnished to me free of charge by society in general and the state of Minnesota in particular. From the treatment I received while there and the lessons I learned from it, I had fully desided when I left there just how I would live my life. I made up my mind that I would rob, burn, destroy and kill every where I went and everybody I could as long as I lived. That’s the way I was reformed in the Minnesota State Training School. Thats the reasons why.

If you or any one else will take the trouble and have the inteligence and paitince to follow and examine every one of my crimes and actions you will find that I have consistently followed one idea thru all my life. I preyed upon the weak the harmless or unsuspecting. Those I have harmed were all either weaklings either mentaly or phisicaly. Those who were strong in either mind or body I first lied to and led into a trap where they were either asleep or drunk or helpless in some way. I always had all the best of it, because I knew ahead of time just what to expect and the others did not. I therefore was strong in my knolledge and stronger in body than those preyed upon. This lesson I was taught by others. Might makes right.

You know that I spent several years in one of those places [reform school] when I was a boy and the so called Training that I recieved while there is mainly the cause of my being the degenerate beast that I am today. I have thought about that system of Training young boys for all of my life and I know that the whole system is wrong. That system of beating goodness, religion and Jesus into boys in the 99 times out of 100 has the direct opposite effect of taking all of the goodness, kindness and love out of them and then replacing those with hate, envy deciete, tyrany and every other kind of meaness there is.

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You see the same type of pattern here. Now, I'm not giving a solution to resentment here. What I'm saying is that it's important. It's an important problem to confront and overcome, lest we become overwhelmed by it. We cannot ignore this type of problem, but we can seek to understand it and do something about it by changing ourselves. By knowing about evil we can learn to avoid it and to seek the good.

(In the book "Moral Disengagement: How People Do Harm and Live With Themselves" Albert Bandura breaks down the eight mechanisms that allow people to do these types of things. But, for today, I'm done with this subject. Maybe that's a topic for another time.)

________________________________________________

You can find more of what I'm doing at http://www.JeffreyAlexanderMartin.com

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sufredux · 4 years

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The Progressive Case Against Protectionism

It has almost become the new Washington consensus: decades of growing economic openness have hurt American workers, increased inequality, and gutted the middle class, and new restrictions on trade and immigration can work to reverse the damage. This view is a near reversal of the bipartisan consensus in favor of openness to the world that defined U.S. economic policy for decades. From the end of World War II on, under both Democratic and Republican control, Congress and the White House consistently favored free trade and relatively unrestrictive immigration policies. Candidates would make protectionist noises to appease various constituencies from time to time, but by and large, such rhetoric was confined to the margins. Almost never did it translate into actual policy.

Then came the 2016 presidential election. Donald Trump found a wide audience when he identified the chief enemy of the American worker as foreigners: trading partners that had struck disastrous trade agreements with Washington and immigrants who were taking jobs from native-born Americans. Everyday workers, Trump alleged, had been let down by a political class beholden to globalist economic ideas. In office, he has followed through on his nationalist agenda, withdrawing the United States from the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) and routinely levying higher tariffs on trading partners. On immigration, he has implemented draconian policies against asylum seekers at the border and undocumented immigrants within the United States, as well as reducing quotas for legal immigrants and slowing down the processing of their applications.

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But Trump has not been alone in his battle against economic openness. During the 2016 campaign, he was joined in his calls for protectionism by the Democratic primary candidate Bernie Sanders, who also blamed bad trade agreements for the plight of the American worker. Even the Democratic nominee, Hillary Clinton, who as secretary of state had championed the TPP, was forced by political necessity to abandon her earlier support for the agreement. Democrats have not, fortunately, mimicked Trump’s anti-immigrant rhetoric, but when it comes to free trade, their support has often been lukewarm at best. While some Democrats have criticized Trump’s counterproductive tariffs and disruptive trade wars, many of them hesitate when asked if they would repudiate the administration’s trade policies, especially with respect to China. The political winds have shifted; now, it seems as if those who purport to sympathize with workers and stand up for the middle class must also question the merits of economic openness.

Trade, not tariffs, will improve the plight of regular Americans.

American workers have indeed been left behind, but open economic policies remain in their best interest: by reducing prices for consumers and companies, free trade helps workers more than it hurts them, and by creating jobs, offering complementary skills, and paying taxes, so do immigrants. Instead of hawking discredited nationalist economic ideas, politicians seeking to improve Americans’ economic lot—especially progressives focused on reducing inequality and rebuilding the middle class—should be looking to domestic policy to address workers’ needs, while also improving trade agreements and increasing immigration. That, not tariffs and walls, is what it will take to improve the plight of regular Americans.

THE TRADE BOOGEYMAN

Forty years of widening inequality and slow wage growth have left many Americans searching for answers. It may be tempting, then, to blame the United States’ trading partners, many of which have experienced remarkable jumps in GDP and wages. China, perhaps the most spectacular example, saw its GDP per capita expand more than 22-fold from 1980 to 2018—in terms of 2010 U.S. dollars, from $350 to $7,750. Yet during the same period, U.S. GDP per capita grew from $28,600 to $54,500. That’s less in relative terms—advanced economies usually grow more slowly than poor ones—but far more in absolute terms, and enough to significantly boost standards of living.

The problem, however, is that the gains have not been evenly shared. Adjusted for inflation, the average income of the bottom 50 percent of earners stayed nearly flat between 1980 and 2014. For those in the 50th to 90th percentiles, it grew by about 40 percent, lagging far behind expectations based on the experience of prior generations. Among the top one percent, meanwhile, average income has skyrocketed, ballooning by 205 percent over the same period. No wonder so many Americans are disappointed. The U.S. economy has failed to achieve its most basic aim: generating inclusive growth.

Trade does deserve some of the blame. When the United States buys goods from labor-abundant countries such as China and India, the demand for domestic labor falls. This appears to be what happened after the big surge in Chinese imports to the United States in the early years of this century. In a series of oft-cited research papers about “the China shock,” the economists David Autor, David Dorn, and Gordon Hanson estimated that trade with China may have displaced the jobs of one million to two million Americans during this period. But it’s important to keep those numbers in perspective. The U.S. economy is a dynamic place, with more than six million jobs lost and created every single quarter. Moreover, the share of Americans working in manufacturing has been declining steadily since 1950, even as growth in trade has waxed and waned—suggesting that factors other than trade are also at play.

The U.S. economy has failed to achieve its most basic aim: generating inclusive growth.

Indeed, the U.S. economy has experienced other huge changes. Workers have lost bargaining power as unionization has declined (from 30 percent of the labor force in 1960 to less than 11 percent today) and large companies have steadily increased their market power (corporate profits as a share of GDP are 50 percent higher than they were in prior decades). Perhaps most important, technology has disrupted countless industries and lowered the demand for less educated labor. Most economists believe that technological change is a far more important factor than international trade in explaining the disappointing outcomes in American labor markets. Across all industries, the returns to education have increased, as less educated workers are disproportionately displaced by automation and computerization. And although manufacturing output continues to rise, manufacturing employment has fallen, as capital takes the place of labor and workers steadily move into the service industry. Yet in spite of all this evidence about the effects of technological change, politicians still point fingers at foreigners.

THE MYTH OF BAD DEALS

Critics of trade on both the left and the right contend that much of the problem has to do with bad trade deals that Washington has struck. On the left, the concern is that trade agreements have prioritized the interests of corporations over those of workers. On the right, it is that trade agreements have focused on the goal of international cooperation at the expense of U.S. interests. Trump has argued that U.S. trade deals have been tilted against the United States, contributing to the large trade deficit (meaning that the country imports more than it exports) and hollowing out the manufacturing sector. Sanders has echoed these concerns in the past, for example, claiming that the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) cost 43,000 jobs in Michigan and is behind Detroit’s urban decline.

But just as trade in general is not to blame for the woes of the American worker, neither are the specifics of individual trade deals. In fact, the terms of trade agreements are typically highly favorable to the United States. That’s because such deals usually require U.S. trading partners to lower their trade barriers far more than the United States must, since Washington tends to start off with much lower trade barriers. Such was certainly the case with Mexico, which, prior to NAFTA, had tariffs that averaged ten percent, compared with U.S. tariffs that averaged two percent.

This is not to say that trade agreements cannot be improved; useful tweaks could counter the excessive prioritization of intellectual property and reduce the reach of the mechanism by which investors and states resolve disputes, which critics allege gives companies too much power to fight health and environmental regulations. The TPP attempted to modernize NAFTA by placing a greater emphasis on the rights of workers and protecting the environment, and future agreements could go even further.

That said, it is easy to overstate the stakes here. Even ideal trade agreements would do little to address economic inequality and wage stagnation, because trade agreements themselves have little to do with those problems. Compared with other factors—the growth of trade in general, technological change, the decline of unionization, and so on—the details of trade agreements are nearly inconsequential. In fact, in the late 1990s, just after the adoption of NAFTA, the United States saw some of the strongest wage growth in four decades. As studies by researchers at the Congressional Research Service and the Peterson Institute for International Economics have shown, any disruption to the labor market caused by NAFTA was dwarfed by other considerations, especially technological change. And even when trade has cost jobs, as with the China shock, the effect did not depend on the particulars of any trade deal. There was and is no U.S. trade agreement with China, just the “most favored nation” status the country was granted when it joined the World Trade Organization in 2001—a status that it would have been hard to deny China, given the country’s massive and growing economy. What really mattered was the mere fact of China’s emergence as an economic powerhouse.

Critics of trade are also dead wrong when they argue that U.S. agreements have expanded the trade deficit. In fact, it’s the result of borrowing. As economists have long understood, trade deficits emerge whenever a country spends more than it earns, and trade surpluses arise whenever a country earns more than it spends. Trade deficits and surpluses are simply the flip side of international borrowing and lending. Some countries, such as the United States, are borrowers. They consume more of others’ goods than they send abroad, and they pay the difference in IOUs (which take the form of foreign investment in U.S. stocks, bonds, and real estate). Other countries, such as Germany, are lenders. They loan money abroad, accruing foreign assets, but receive less in imports than they send in exports. Which country is getting the better end of the deal? It is hard to say. U.S. households enjoy consuming more now, but they will eventually have to repay the debt; German households get returns on their investments abroad, but they forgo consumption in the present.

What this means is that if policymakers wish to reduce the U.S. trade deficit—and for now, it is not alarmingly large—they should reduce borrowing, which they can accomplish by shrinking the budget deficit. Instead, policymakers are moving in the opposite direction: the budget deficit has swelled in recent years, especially after the 2017 tax cuts. The new U.S. tariffs, meanwhile, have done nothing to improve the trade deficit. That came as no surprise to economists.

THE PRICE OF PROTECTIONISM

As easily debunked as these myths about trade are, they clearly have a powerful hold on policymakers. That is troubling not merely for what it reflects about the state of public discourse; it also has profound real-world implications. As they lambast trade, politicians are increasingly reaching for protectionist policies. Yet for American workers, such measures only add insult to injury, making their lives even more precarious. They do so in four distinct ways.

First and foremost, tariffs act as regressive taxes on consumption. Although the Trump administration likes to claim that foreigners pay the price of tariffs, in truth, the costs are passed along to consumers, who must pay more for the imports they buy. (By this past spring, the cost of the trade war that began in 2018 exceeded $400 per year for the average U.S. household.) Beyond that, tariffs fall disproportionately on the poor, both because the poor consume more of their income and because a higher share of their spending goes to heavily tariffed products, such as food and clothing. That is one reason why progressives in the early twentieth century, outraged by the inequality of the Gilded Age, pushed for moving away from tariffs and toward a federal income tax: it was widely recognized that tariffs largely spared the rich at the expense of the poor. Now, the reverse is happening. After having championed tax cuts that disproportionately benefited well-off Americans, the administration has tried to collect more revenue from regressive taxes on trade.

Second, tariffs and trade wars wreak havoc in U.S. labor markets by raising costs for American companies. Many large U.S. manufacturers are heavily dependent on imports. Boeing is a top U.S. exporter, but it is also a major importer, relying on crucial parts from around the world. General Motors now pays over $1 billion in annual tariffs, no doubt one factor behind the company’s recent decision to shutter a plant in Ohio. When tariffs interrupt global supply chains, they disadvantage U.S. companies relative to foreign ones. If the goal is to make the United States a more internationally competitive place to locate jobs and direct investment, protectionism is a completely backward approach.

Tariffs and trade wars wreak havoc in U.S. labor markets by raising costs for American companies.

Third, trading partners do not sit on their hands when Washington raises tariffs on their products. Already, the Chinese, the Indians, and the Europeans have slapped serious retaliatory tariffs on U.S. goods. The victims of these measures include soybean farmers in Iowa and Minnesota (who have lost market share to Canada as Chinese buyers look elsewhere) and whiskey distillers in Kentucky and Tennessee (who have seen their exports to Europe and elsewhere plummet).

Finally, trade wars harm the global economy and U.S. trading partners, weakening Washington’s network of alliances and jeopardizing the cooperation required to deal with pressing international problems. Recent meetings of the G-7 and the G-20 have been dominated by discussions aimed at diffusing trade conflicts, distracting precious diplomatic attention from climate change and nuclear nonproliferation. It is easy to take peace and international cooperation for granted, but they are prerequisites for the success of the U.S. economy in the decades ahead. The world is witnessing another rise in economic nationalism, which makes it easy for politicians and publics to embrace nationalist tendencies in other spheres. It is worth remembering that after the last era of globalization came to a halt, what followed was the Great Depression and World War II.

PEOPLE POWER

Protectionism is harmful for most American workers, but even more destructive are policies that make the United States less welcoming to immigrants. Setting aside the Trump administration’s actions against refugees and the undocumented—a serious moral stain on the country—its efforts to limit immigration are also economically harmful.

Immigration has long been an enormous boon for the U.S. economy. Study after study has shown that it is good for economic growth, innovation, entrepreneurship, and job creation and that almost all economic classes within the United States benefit from it. Even though only 14 percent of the current U.S. population is foreign-born, immigrants create a disproportionate number of businesses. Fifty-five percent of the United States’ $1 billion startups were founded or co-founded by immigrants, and more than 40 percent of the Fortune 500 companies were founded or co-founded by immigrants or their children. In recent decades, immigrants have accounted for more than 50 percent of the U.S.-affiliated academics who have won Nobel Prizes in scientific fields.

Immigrants also provide countless skills that complement those of native-born American workers. Highly educated foreigners with technological skills (such as computer programmers) make up for persistent shortages in the U.S. high-tech sector, and they complement native-born workers who have more cultural fluency or communication skills. Less skilled immigrants also fill labor shortages in areas such as agriculture and eldercare, where it is often difficult to find native-born workers willing to take jobs.

Immigration has long been an enormous boon for the U.S. economy.

There is little evidence that immigration lowers the wages of most native-born workers, although there is some limited evidence that it may cut into the wages or hours of two groups: high school dropouts and prior waves of immigrants. In the case of high school dropouts, however, there are far better ways to help them (such as strengthening the educational system) than restricting immigration. As for prior waves of immigrants, given how substantial their economic gains from migration are—often, they earn large multiples of what they would have made back home—it’s hard to justify their subsequent slower wage growth as a policy concern.

Immigrants have another economic benefit: they relieve demographic pressures on public budgets. In many rich countries, population growth has slowed to such an extent that the government’s fiscal burden of caring for the elderly is enormous. In Japan, there are eight retired people for every ten workers; in Italy, there are five retirees for every ten workers. In the United States and Canada, although the budget pressures of an aging population remain, higher immigration levels contribute to a healthier ratio of three retirees for every ten workers. It also helps that recent immigrants have above-average fertility rates.

Many objections to immigration are cultural in nature, and these, too, have little grounding in reality. There is no evidence that immigrants, even undocumented ones, increase crime rates. Nor is there evidence that they refuse to integrate; in fact, they are assimilating faster than previous generations of immigrants did.

Given the many benefits from immigration, greater restrictions on it pose several threats to American workers. Already, the United States is beginning to lose foreign talent, which will hurt economic growth. For two years straight, the number of foreign students studying in U.S. universities has fallen, which is a particular shame since these students disproportionately study science, technology, engineering, and mathematics—areas in which the country faces large skills shortages. Encouraging such students to stay in the country after graduation would help the United States maintain its edge in innovation and promote economic growth. Instead, the Trump administration is discouraging foreign students with visa delays and a constant stream of nationalist rhetoric. Restricting immigration also harms the economy in other ways. It keeps out job creators and people whose skills complement those of native-born workers. And it increases the pressure on the budget, since restrictions will lead to a higher ratio of retirees to workers.

A more sensible immigration policy would make it easier for foreign students to stay in the United States after graduation, admit more immigrants through lotteries, accept more refugees, and provide a compassionate path to citizenship for undocumented immigrants currently living in the United States. Promoting U.S. interests means more immigration, not less.

WHAT WORKS

While reducing trade and immigration damages the prospects of American workers, free trade and increased immigration are not enough to ensure their prosperity. Indeed, despite decades of relative openness to trade and immigration, wages remain stagnant and inequality high. This has dire implications. As the economist Heather Boushey has argued, inequality undermines the U.S. economy by inhibiting competition and stifling the supply of talent and ideas. Unmet economic expectations also fuel voter discontent and political polarization, making it easy to blame outsiders and embrace counterproductive policies. For the sake of both the country’s economy and its politics, economic growth needs to be much more inclusive.

To achieve that, the United States needs, above all, a tax system that ensures that economic prosperity lifts all boats. The Earned Income Tax Credit is a powerful tool in that regard. A credit targeted at lower-income workers that grows as those workers earn more, the EITC subsidizes their work, making each hour of it more lucrative. This credit should be expanded in size, it should reach further up the income distribution, and it should be made more generous for childless workers—changes that would particularly benefit those lower- and middle-class Americans who have seen their wages stagnate in recent decades. This policy would work well alongside an increase in the federal minimum wage, which would help combat the increased market power of employers relative to employees.

Beyond these steps, the federal government should set up a wage insurance program, which could make up some of the difference in lower wages for workers who have been displaced by foreign competition, technological change, domestic competition, natural disasters, or other forces. The federal government should also make greater investments in infrastructure, education, and research, all of which would benefit workers by increasing their productivity and thus their incomes. And it should strengthen the safety net, making improved health-care access and affordability a top priority.

None of this will be cheap, of course. To raise revenue, the U.S. tax system needs to be modernized. For corporations, Congress should curb international tax avoidance, closing loopholes and reforming minimum taxes so as to raise government revenues without chasing profits offshore. Congress should also strengthen individual and estate taxation, and it can do so without resorting to extreme rates. For the income tax, it can cap or end various deductions and preferences; for the estate tax, it can raise rates and reduce exceptions. And it can beef up enforcement of both. Congress should also enact a long-overdue carbon tax. Coupled with the other policies, a carbon tax could raise substantial revenue without harming poor and middle-class Americans, and it would fight climate change.

For the sake of both the country’s economy and its politics, economic growth needs to be much more inclusive.

Finally, policymakers need to reckon with corporations’ growing market power. They should modernize antitrust laws to put more emphasis on labor and modernize labor laws to suit the nature of work today, making sure that they adequately protect those in the service sector and those in the gig economy. Although large companies are often good for consumers, their market power narrows the share of the economy that ends up in the hands of workers. So the balance of power between companies and their workers needs to be recalibrated from both ends: policies should empower labor movements and combat companies’ abuses of market power.

In the end, global markets have many wonderful benefits, but they need to be accompanied by strong domestic policies to ensure that the benefits of international trade (as well as technological change and other forces) are felt by all. Otherwise, economic discontent festers, empowering nationalist politicians who offer easy answers and peddle wrong-headed policies.

American workers have every reason to expect more from the economy, but restrictions on trade and immigration ultimately damage their interests. What those who care about reducing inequality and helping workers must realize, then, is that protectionism and nativism set back their cause. Not only do these policies have direct negative effects; they also distract from more effective policies that go straight to the problem at hand. On both sides of the aisle, it’s time for politicians to stop vilifying outsiders and focus instead on policies that actually solve the very real problems afflicting so many Americans.

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energysolutions · 6 years

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Speech: International Business Festival Speech has been published on Energy Solutions News

New Post has been published on http://www.energybrokers.co.uk/news/beis/speech-international-business-festival-speech

Speech: International Business Festival Speech

It’s fantastic to be here at the largest business festival anywhere in the world.

On today’s theme, shipping and logistics I can think of no better location than here in Liverpool.

Just over a century ago, the historian W.T. Pike wrote…

In olden times it used to be said that ‘all roads lead to Rome’. Today, all seas lead to Liverpool.

Indeed – at the turn of the 20th century Liverpool was a titan of the global goods trade.

This city conducted one third of the UK’s export trade, owning one third of UK shipping, and one seventh of all registered shipping anywhere in the world.

Today – Liverpool is retaking its place as a major player in world trade.

In 2016, the completion of Liverpool’s £400 million container terminal meant that instead of accommodating just 5% of the world’s container vessels the port can now accept 95%.

But despite its strong history in goods this is also a region which excels in services.

Head to almost any country on earth and examples are right before your eyes.

Just take China.

On Shanghai’s historic waterfront, you’ll find three buildings modelled on Liverpool’s ‘Three Graces’ which stand just a mile north of here.

Across the country the Chinese are discovering our creative industries; in other words, services.

Harry Potter spin-off Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them filmed on the streets of Liverpool took more than £30 million in China on its opening weekend.

And in Beijing as soon as you step off the plane you’ll enter a terminal designed by architect Norman Foster.

Who was born in Stockport and studied at the University of Manchester.

Frankly – we’ve got a services sector that other countries would kill for.

The labels ‘designed in Britain’, ‘filmed in Britain’, ‘recorded in Britain’ are hallmarks of quality.

And our Industrial Strategy is all about growing strengths just like these.

So today I want to talk about how we can build on our deserved reputation as a go-to destination for quality services to make the UK the very best in the world.

Here in North West England three million jobs are in services sectors.

That’s 8 out of 10 of all jobs in the region.

When we think about those people who work in ‘services’ across the UK, we think of bankers, lawyers, and accountants. They make a big contribution to our economy.

In Liverpool, Manchester and Leeds – legal and financial services have had a long history.

But, that’s not the whole story. Services cover many other sectors you might not immediately think of.

Lots of the people I grew up with on Teesside have enjoyed good careers, earning good money for themselves, their family and the country servicing offshore oil rigs in the North Sea. Learning a set of skills which they could then take with them and use around the world.

On top of this, the contribution services make to our manufacturing sector is not always fully appreciated.

More than a third of the value of UK manufacturing exports reflects service sector value added.

While half of the jobs in UK manufacturing are actually in services occupations.

In a world of cutting-edge, hi-tech goods, a product and the services needed to keep it running smoothly are often inseparable.

In this sense, exporting a product abroad isn’t just the ‘end of a deal’ but also the ‘beginning of a relationship’.

For example, when Rolls-Royce sells an engine the business value often comes from the long term in-service support and partnership with the customer rather than the initial sale itself.

From film, to healthtech, to services roles linked to advanced manufacturing. So many jobs rest on our ability to export beyond our shores.

British services have a deserved reputation for quality, which has reached all four corners of the earth.

But right now, we need to recognise that, the EU is by far and away the single biggest consumer of our services exports.

£90 billion of services exports went to the EU in 2016.

That’s more than to our next eight largest partners: the United States, Switzerland, Japan, Australia, Canada, China, Singapore and Norway – combined.

And if you needed more proof of our strength in services, we export far more services to the EU than we import from them.

With a surplus of over £14 billion in 2016.

This extraordinary performance has been built on the back of established trading relationships with the EU. And in particular by being able to be confident in the right to sell services as well as goods.

This arrangement has made sure UK firms are treated the same way as EU ones.

Ensured others recognise our professional qualifications.

Made it easier to set up a subsidiary in the EU. Allowed profits to be returned to the UK without restriction.

And set out rules that made it easy for companies providing services to send workers to wherever they were needed.

Over the years, we’ve become used to these things.

But they don’t happen without agreement.

So, as we leave the European Union, we must deliberately set out to maintain these rights and introduce as few new barriers to trade in services as possible.

This is every bit as important as avoiding barriers in manufactured goods.

So far, however, the debate has focused mainly on goods.

About how our new customs arrangements with the EU need to keep the borders flowing and avoid costly delays and paperwork.

That’s entirely right. But in order to provide services, it is people who must not be held up.

‘Mobility is to services what customs is to goods’.

According to the Engineering Employers Federation, three quarters of manufacturers are posting workers.

Sending their UK employees to undertake activities in other EU member states.

Doing everything from attending trade fairs to selling and marketing their products.

From undertaking training courses, to installing, servicing and repairing their products.

And when I talk to UK companies who offer services, many of them stress the importance of this business mobility. The temporary cross-border service provision which underpins their business-as-usual.

From creatives, to engineers, to global aerospace firms, every single day, fly-in, fly-out trips keep the wheels of business turning.

Let me give you some examples.

Just this morning, I was at Prinovis, a printing company just up the road from here, hearing how they regularly send their UK employees to sites across Germany on business.

I’ve also heard from Colchester Machine Tool Solutions.

In their words:

Going to Germany is like going to Aberdeen.

With 40% of their exports going to the EU, they often need to deploy service engineers to member states within 24 hours for urgent site visits to service the manufacturer’s warranty, for example.

Or take Airbus in the UK.

Their employees made 18,000 trips to France alone in 2017.

Because they need to move employees in such numbers at such high frequency they operate their own internal shuttle between their site at Broughton, not far from here in North Wales, and their Bristol and Toulouse sites, in addition to commercial flights.

This ferries around 50 employees a day to undertake business critical work.

If we were to include all movements both ways, including commercial flights, then it’s around 30,000 trips!

So I completely understand when companies say that they rely on efficient mobility as it currently stands, raising concerns that restricting people’s ability to travel at short notice would be as damaging to our economy as frictions and disruption at our borders.

The issue of mobility is an important one.

The Prime Minister touched upon it in her Mansion House speech, saying that we want to:

Agree an appropriate labour mobility framework that enables UK businesses and self-employed professionals to travel to the EU to provide services to clients in person.

So I hear, loud and clear:

5 requirements that business has to ensure that our services trade with the EU, and the manufacturing that is inextricably linked to it can continue to flourish:

the mutual recognition of professional qualifications

the clear right to continue to be able to send people to provide services across Europe

simple intra-company transfers of people

the right to establish operating bases or offices on the same basis as a local firm

the ability to remit the profits of those activities

Let me clearly say that I, and the Prime Minister value the contribution of businesses, including the ones we’re celebrating at today’s festival.

Because the business view puts evidence before ideology.

You all know the reality of employing people and exporting across the world.

And that is something we need to listen to.

Beyond Brexit, our modern Industrial Strategy is helping Britain seize the vast opportunities of new innovations and technologies, which could transform our services sector.

On Monday, the £12 million ‘Next Generation Services Challenge’ opened for applications.

As part of our Industrial Strategy Challenge Fund, it will Invest in projects using AI and data technologies to transform accountancy, insurance and legal services.

And when the next generation of researchers and innovators look at where to develop their next big idea we want the UK to be top of their list.

So today we’re announcing £1.3 billion of investment, to grow our research and innovation talent.

Helping to create the tech CEOs, research pioneers and Nobel Prize winners of the future.

The inaugural Future Leaders Fellowship Programme will provide funding for 550 rising stars of science and innovation.

These new fellowships, awarded in the next three years, will have a lifetime value of nearly £900 million.

They will be open to people from all over the world.

On top of this we are investing £350 million in prestigious National Academy fellowships and allocating £50 million for additional PhDs.

The money will help ensure the UK invests 2.4% of GDP in R&D by 2027.

And help us become the world’s most innovative economy by 2030.

So ladies and gentlemen,

Just as in the past, ‘all seas led to Liverpool’, I know that, in the future, we must make sure that roads, railways, sealanes and runways will take not only British goods, but British people to, and from, Britain as they continue to ply a prospering trade in good and services.

And at this – a festival of business it’s only right that we celebrate our prowess in goods and services.

Across the world, and across Europe, customers opt for our apps, our films, our healthtech and other services pioneered right here in the UK.

In the years to come I know that we will build upon this position of strength.

The great city of Liverpool stands as an example.

Founded on trade in physical goods, it is even more renowned for its cultural strength – in other words, the services it trades on.

So, let’s keep looking outwards, let’s keep being open, and let’s keep sending British people, as well as British goods to serve us well in markets across Europe and around the world.

Thank you very much.

#BEIS

0 notes

sualkmedeiors · 7 years

Text

4 Content Promotion Strategies to Increase Engagement

Author: Alan Cassinelli

There’s no doubt that inbound marketing has fundamentally changed demand generation.

The strategy of attracting prospects through content, social media, search engine optimization, and more has taken over the B2B world and for good reason: inbound marketing costs 61% less than traditional advertising and produces 54% more leads than outbound marketing.

Your prospects and customers don’t want to be targeted with disruptive and annoying advertisements. They want to engage with quality content that educates, entertains, or inspires them.

There’s just one problem…

Businesses are investing more in content marketing, which focuses on creating valuable content to guide buyers through the customer journey. Now, every marketing team worth their salt is publishing content for their audience, from blog posts, to whitepapers, webinars, ebooks, newsletter, and more. The bar has been raised and now creating more content isn’t enough. In order to get your content seen by your intended audience, you need to differentiate your brand and rise above the noise by offering value.

The New 80/20 Rule

If you were an early adopter of inbound marketing, you might have spent 80% of your time creating content and 20% of your time promoting it. With all the noise out there, the formula has flipped. Derek Halpern of Social Triggers popularized the new 80/20 rule that has resonated with marketers who haven’t seen the results they wanted from creating more and more content. To increase engagement, you need to spend 20% of your time creating content and 80% of your time promoting it.

Becoming more strategic in your content promotion requires taking a fresh look how you communicate with your audience and ensuring that you are providing not only the right content, but that it’s in the right spot, at the right time. Here are four ways you can promote your content to increase engagement:

1. Promote Content Across Your Website

Your whitepapers and ebooks don’t have to be hidden away and confined to your resources page. Give them the visibility they deserve by promoting them all across your website.

It just makes sense. If a visitor is browsing your website, there’s a good chance they’ll be interested in or want more information about related topics. You can provide that to them with your content. Aside from improving the user experience, it also increases conversions by making your gated assets more visible. This can be especially impactful if you are using web personalization to offer your known visitors the next relevant step in their content journey. Zuora does a great job of this, recommending related guides and ebooks at the bottom of their product page for subscription billing.

2. Promote Content in Your Email Signature

Did you know that the average office worker sends or receives 121 emails a day, according to a report by the Radicati Group? By encouraging employees to promote content in their email signature, you can take advantage of this under-utilized channel and increase the visibility of your content.

While you can be scrappy and just add these to your footer or signature yourself, there are also solutions, like Sigstr and Exclaimer, that allow you to quickly change the content of email signature as needed depending on the recipient. This way, you can offer a tailored experience and different content to employees, customers, prospects, and partners like Canvas Solutions does below.

3. Use Ad Retargeting

Many marketers are running retargeting campaigns to re-engage prospects who previously visited their website and drive them back to complete an action like starting a free trial or requesting a demo. It’s extremely effective because you’re only investing in qualified leads who are interested in your product or services. However, don’t be a marketer that misses the opportunity to use retargeting to drive traffic to gated content, which you can track conversions from to prove the ROI.

Using a comprehensive marketing platform, you can listen to website activity and then retarget visitors with digital ads to promote relevant content. For example, if someone browsed your website for information about your account targeting solution, you may want to serve them an ad that promotes your latest gated asset on account-based marketing.

4. Pin It to Your Twitter Profile

Last but not least, pinning a tweet to your Twitter profile is a quick (and free) way to increase the visibility of your content. While other social platforms like Facebook offer similar features, Twitter Pins are shown by default at the top of your profile page no matter how old they are. In this example, you can see industry influencer Michael Brenner has pinned a blog article to the top of his Twitter profile.

Not sure this is worth the time? You might be surprised how much traffic your pinned post gets. In fact, when Buffer pinned one of their Twitter cards, they saw 10x as many conversions. To glean insights on your own posts, use Twitter Analytics to see how people engaged with your profile and posts in a 28 day period.

With the competitive landscape of B2B marketing, getting your content to stand out is harder than ever. Have you tried any of these strategies? What other ways are you promoting your content? I’d love to hear in the comments below.

4 Content Promotion Strategies to Increase Engagement was posted at Marketo Marketing Blog - Best Practices and Thought Leadership. | http://blog.marketo.com

The post 4 Content Promotion Strategies to Increase Engagement appeared first on Marketo Marketing Blog - Best Practices and Thought Leadership.

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maxslogic25 · 7 years

Text

4 Content Promotion Strategies to Increase Engagement

Author: Alan Cassinelli

There’s no doubt that inbound marketing has fundamentally changed demand generation.

Your prospects and customers don’t want to be targeted with disruptive and annoying advertisements. They want to engage with quality content that educates, entertains, or inspires them.

There’s just one problem…

The New 80/20 Rule

1. Promote Content Across Your Website

Your whitepapers and ebooks don’t have to be hidden away and confined to your resources page. Give them the visibility they deserve by promoting them all across your website.

2. Promote Content in Your Email Signature

3. Use Ad Retargeting

4. Pin It to Your Twitter Profile

4 Content Promotion Strategies to Increase Engagement was posted at Marketo Marketing Blog - Best Practices and Thought Leadership. | http://blog.marketo.com

The post 4 Content Promotion Strategies to Increase Engagement appeared first on Marketo Marketing Blog - Best Practices and Thought Leadership.

from RSSMix.com Mix ID 8217493 http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/modernb2bmarketing/~3/__SXzHBvqSw/4-content-promotion-strategies-to-increase-engagement.html

0 notes

archiebwoollard · 7 years

Text

4 Content Promotion Strategies to Increase Engagement

Author: Alan Cassinelli

There’s no doubt that inbound marketing has fundamentally changed demand generation.

Your prospects and customers don’t want to be targeted with disruptive and annoying advertisements. They want to engage with quality content that educates, entertains, or inspires them.

There’s just one problem…

The New 80/20 Rule

1. Promote Content Across Your Website

Your whitepapers and ebooks don’t have to be hidden away and confined to your resources page. Give them the visibility they deserve by promoting them all across your website.

2. Promote Content in Your Email Signature

3. Use Ad Retargeting

4. Pin It to Your Twitter Profile

4 Content Promotion Strategies to Increase Engagement was posted at Marketo Marketing Blog - Best Practices and Thought Leadership. | http://blog.marketo.com

The post 4 Content Promotion Strategies to Increase Engagement appeared first on Marketo Marketing Blog - Best Practices and Thought Leadership.

from RSSMix.com Mix ID 8217493 http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/modernb2bmarketing/~3/__SXzHBvqSw/4-content-promotion-strategies-to-increase-engagement.html

0 notes

racheltgibsau · 7 years

Text

4 Content Promotion Strategies to Increase Engagement

Author: Alan Cassinelli

There’s no doubt that inbound marketing has fundamentally changed demand generation.

Your prospects and customers don’t want to be targeted with disruptive and annoying advertisements. They want to engage with quality content that educates, entertains, or inspires them.

There’s just one problem…

The New 80/20 Rule

1. Promote Content Across Your Website

Your whitepapers and ebooks don’t have to be hidden away and confined to your resources page. Give them the visibility they deserve by promoting them all across your website.

2. Promote Content in Your Email Signature

3. Use Ad Retargeting

4. Pin It to Your Twitter Profile

4 Content Promotion Strategies to Increase Engagement was posted at Marketo Marketing Blog - Best Practices and Thought Leadership. | http://blog.marketo.com

The post 4 Content Promotion Strategies to Increase Engagement appeared first on Marketo Marketing Blog - Best Practices and Thought Leadership.

from RSSMix.com Mix ID 8217493 http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/modernb2bmarketing/~3/__SXzHBvqSw/4-content-promotion-strategies-to-increase-engagement.html

0 notes

zacdhaenkeau · 7 years

Text

4 Content Promotion Strategies to Increase Engagement

Author: Alan Cassinelli

There’s no doubt that inbound marketing has fundamentally changed demand generation.

Your prospects and customers don’t want to be targeted with disruptive and annoying advertisements. They want to engage with quality content that educates, entertains, or inspires them.

There’s just one problem…

The New 80/20 Rule

1. Promote Content Across Your Website

Your whitepapers and ebooks don’t have to be hidden away and confined to your resources page. Give them the visibility they deserve by promoting them all across your website.

2. Promote Content in Your Email Signature

3. Use Ad Retargeting

4. Pin It to Your Twitter Profile

4 Content Promotion Strategies to Increase Engagement was posted at Marketo Marketing Blog - Best Practices and Thought Leadership. | http://blog.marketo.com

The post 4 Content Promotion Strategies to Increase Engagement appeared first on Marketo Marketing Blog - Best Practices and Thought Leadership.

from RSSMix.com Mix ID 8217493 http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/modernb2bmarketing/~3/__SXzHBvqSw/4-content-promotion-strategies-to-increase-engagement.html

0 notes