The premise: We are being controlled by mega corporations. The following points suport this hypothesis:
- Corporations exist to maximize profits and minimize costs.
- From this perspective, employees are a cost.
- Paying the lowest wage the local market will allow reduces the employee related cost - even if this doesn't constitute a living wage.
- Hiring multiple part-time employees (without benefits) rather than full-time employees (with medical, insurance and retirement benefits) cuts these costs further for the corporation.
- Limiting choices in brands, styles and sizes enables mega-corporations
to decrease production costs.
- Large assembly lines are cheaper than individual craftsmen.
- Distribution from a central warehouse is more dependable than purchasing
from local sources.
- These large source tend to locate where real estate and wages are cheapest.
- These central sources then unify trends in what is available for purchase, eliminating choice and individuality.
- The funds generated by local businesses stay in the community. The profits buy the homes of the owners, finance their parties, get spent by their families. The salaries are paid to neighbors, church members - people the local business person has much more concern for than a corporation does.
- Welcome to 1984 by way of the marketplace, where eventually we all wear the same clothes, eat the same food and watch the same video tapes - since that's all that we can buy once local merchants have gone bankrupt and Wal-Mart is our only market, McDonalds is our only fast-food outlet and Olive Garden is the only Italian resturant.
- Do we want a homogenized America? Yes, its nice to know that any town you travel in will have "predicatble" food at the big chains. Isn't it nice, though, to have the little local coffe shop, the local grocer, the farmer's market? Don't they say more about our regional and cultural identity? Do we value these enough to spend a few cents extra? I hope the answer is yes.
What can you do? Vote with your dollars.
- Choose small, local businesses to patronize. Get to know their employees. Converse with their management and encourage them to pay a living wage and benefits to their employees.
- Oppose the construction of new mega-chain stores by going to City Board meetings, writting to corporations to tell them they aren't welcome, and picketing new stores.
- Organize a movement to reinvigorate your downtown. Try a street fair, concerts in the park, an arts festival or rennesance fair. Talk to local media about doing an article on your ideas.
- Get your message out. Start a program on your local public radio, tv or cable access channel. Create a web page giving people alternatives to the mega-chains.
- Get behind a local garage band and support them.
I've create a web page of alternatives for to Mega-Corporate stores for the town of Ocean Springs, Mississippi. You're welcome to use it as a starting point in creating your own page.
This page was last updated on Monday, May 27, 2002 12:20 AM
Get your own Free Home Page