Is Capitalism Always The Answer?

Posted by The Happy Rock on September 8, 2009

I know that probably sounds like blasphemy to a lot of folks out there, but I am starting to feel like it is the truth. As much as I like free markets, they don’t magically solve every problem. We all probably have different definitions of what we think capitalism is, so let’s define it so we all start off on the same page. I am not saying this is a perfect definition, but one that is probably is digestible by all of us.

Capitalism – An economic system characterized by private or corporate ownership of capital goods that are distributed chiefly by competition in a free market

I am really not here to bash capitalism, as I can only think of two other system that would work better, a completely benevolent king/dictator or communism. That’s right communism, not Marxism or the cold war kind or even the Communist China type of communism, but voluntary communism. Despite what you think about those two systems and how they might succeed or fail, free markets are wonderful and have a multitude of advantages.

Capitalism in and of itself is is fairly amoral, although one might argue the natural effects of capitalism on the human condition often leads us down immoral paths. With that said, what I really want to do is start a dialogue about some holes I am beginning to see in the American capitalism. I am not going to bore you with economic theory or politics, I would rather discuss actual stories of people that are near and dear to my heart.

Mom – The Hard Working Volunteer

First, let me set the stage for who my mom is. She is a poster-child for free market success and the American dream. As a poor single mother at the age of twenty she hustled her way from nearly homeless and living off food stamps and government cheese, to waitressing, to an associate’s degree, and finally to a $60,000+ a year job in a little over 25 years. She is the type of person that realizes that she needs to get n degree and within weeks is enrolled in classes, regardless of the numerous roadblocks like money, time, and child care. She escaped poverty , owned a home, and had a decent sum of money in the bank. The American Dream in action, with one little problem… she hated her field with a passion and only did it to get me through my expensive private school and provide for us. What an awesome unselfish parent! My life reaped the benefits of her love and devotion many times over.

After I left home, she decided to the sell the house, quit the job, and take up volunteering. This is where capitalism started to turn its back on her. She traveled to Zambia to help out in orphanages, educated children and adults on global poverty and hunger, rebuilt after Katrina, was a community organizer in a forgotten about city, and much more. Through all of this, she is left without being able to afford health insurance, and barely able to afford a car and housing let alone many luxuries. Why, because there aren’t profits to be made when working with poor and needy.

Now this is one of the hardest working ladies you will probably know. She isn’t the stereotype of the lazy person who doesn’t want to help themselves that people often use as reasoning for the government to not help people and for people to justify not giving their time and money. She is ambitious, motivated, committed, and hard working and has exceptional skills that she is bringing to society.

So where exactly does she fit in? I would think as a society we would want to support people like her. People who are willing to move travel where there are needs and give their time, energy, and love are in short demand. The ones that do exist have to barely eek out a financial existence. They have to waste their energy worrying about meeting the basic necessities of life, when instead they want to use that energy to pour themselves into people and problems that could use their full attention. It seems like there has to be a better way.

My Father In Law – The Devoted Farmer

Story number is two about a farmer from birth. He lives and breathes farming, and for those that don’t know any farmers they might work harder than any profession I have ever seen. Imagine working seven days from morning till night. The alarm goes off at 5:00am and he quickly grabs a small first breakfast and heads out to greet a never ending list of tasks often before the sun even rises. As much as he wants to take off on the seventh day or take a vacation, he can’t. Crops and animals don’t stop needing your attention just because it is Sunday. Work must go on whether it is in the blazing sun, bitter cold, or windy rain. Weather can also ruin months of work in a matter of days or hours. No rain for a week or two when the corn is first planted and it all shrivels up. I have gained a new found respect for the food I eat after spending years visiting a farm, it is brutal.

As hard as my father in law works, he will most likely never get ahead. Corporate farms and foreign imports usually ravage any semblance of profit he might of been able to ring out of the earth. He is forced to hop from one thing to another just trying to keep his head above water. I have seen him go from milking dairy cows, to raising beef cattle, to pigeons, to pigs, to raising animals for other farmers, all in less than 10 years.

He also isn’t a business man; that just isn’t one of the gifts that he has to offer this world. He’s a farmer with an awesome heart. He sells his sweet corn cheaper than most people because his customers are mostly fellow church members, friends or neighbors, and his dozen is more like 14 than 12. I remember the first time I helped the family weigh and wrap scrapple to sell. The capitalist in me struggled to watch him always round up and provide more product than he was ‘supposed’ too at prices that were already too low. As time moves on I have come to really appreciate the heart and love for people that goes into most everything he does. I know it doesn’t make business sense, but he can’t ignore his heart. It is big like that, with a focus that is always on others. He doesn’t have expensive tastes and he isn’t wasting money either. Even with all his frugality, he won’t ever ‘make it’.

Again this is someone I would think society would want to encourage, not discourage. A man with that type of heart and that type of work ethic deserves to be rewarded not beaten down. He would be happy if he could just pick a crop or animal to raise that would fetch a fair price and rewarded him just reasonably well. But I am just not sure that will happen in this day and age. It seems like the system often discourages certain skill sets that we deem not as important rather than making sure that he has a revered and useful and compensated place. What is someone like this supposed to do?

What’s The Answer?

There you have it. Two beautiful hard working people that are outcasts in a capitalist system. There are others outcasts too(the poor, the sick, and the producers for starters), but these two people are real. I can’t help but root for them, although they won’t ever ‘win’. I know capitalism doesn’t mean them any direct harm, but it isn’t doing anything to help encourage them or even the playing field. The question is what is the answer? Do we need government to step in? Do we need to focus on a guiding morality to help govern our choices within a capitalist society? Should they just get with the program and start trying to acrue as much money as possible? Should they move to a different country? I certainly don’t have any answers yet, but I think the questions are definitely worth asking.

[Title Edit 9/9/09] Changed from Capitalism Is Not The Answer to better reflect the spirit of the post rather than be sensational and distract from the discussion.

» Filed Under Careers, Chasing Dreams, Happiness, Materialism, Salary, Serving Others

Marriage and Money – Giving Your Partner A Choice

Posted by The Happy Rock on April 13, 2009

The Rockette and I were traveling to our in-law’s house and we were having an informal marriage budget meeting. It was the perfect time to bring up a few new areas that we could grow our giving. I failed.

I failed at including my wife in a way that gave her any input. I failed, because I assumed I had the right answers all worked out. I failed, because I acted as if I just needed her approval on my right answer. I failed because I didn’t value her input or perspective. I failed at a chance to draw us closer, instead I was building a wall between us.

Here is how the conversation went :

The Happy Rock : I was thinking about expanding our giving.

The Rockete : Really

The Happy Rock : I would like sponsor a child at Urban Promise, an after school program in Camden New Jersey, and I also want to increase our support for my best friend from college.

FAIL

You might be thinking that there wasn’t anything wrong with that statement, but let’s dissect it a little further. The Rockette only has two real choices: agree with my idea or shoot down my idea. This is especially true considering my tone reflected my confidence about the decision. She knew I wasn’t really asking for her input. She had no say and it wasn’t the first time I presented ideas this way There wasn’t any room for her opinion on what to do with our limited resources. I wasn’t asking what she thought and that is the key point. Include your spouse and be willing to have you mind changed. Leave room for them to have an opinion that is different than yours and use the multiple perspectives to arrive at an even better decision and a closer relationship.

The Rockette handled it well and politely requested I ask in a way that gave her a choice. I quasi-quickly apologized and then instantly rephrased the statement to be a question. I said, “what do you think about giving to Urban promise and increasing our support for our friends from college?”. Subtle change, but extremely different in its tone and respect for my wife. She was quite agreeable as I suspected she would be and then we had a very pleasent discussion about the above material. Disaster averted, giving increased, and a closer connection fostered.

Treat your partner like they matter.

» Filed Under Marriage, Marriage(Communication), Serving Others

Picture Post – Got Room In Your House?

Posted by The Happy Rock on March 22, 2009

Got room?

» Filed Under Materialism, Serving Others

Grandma, Please Stop Spoiling Our Children

Posted by Debt Destroyer on March 19, 2009

Grandparents are great aren’t they?

I don’t know about you, but I have very fond memories of my grandparents. There’s the trips to the zoo, baseball games, & museums. I remember having lots of sleepovers with great food and a never ending supply of cookies. But above all I remember lots and lots of treats and toys.

I see that same pattern repeating itself for my children and their grandparents. And that is wonderful, but…

Our house is full of the crap that the grandparents give their “precious little angles”.

For example, at the end of January my son turned two. The previous Christmas, Santa Claus brought him 4 toy dinosaurs. He loved them! The grandparents must have caught wind of this so for his birthday he must have got every dinosaur the store had.

dinos-toys

“What’s the problem DD, that isn’t so bad?”

You’re right, there is nothing wrong with that. But that wasn’t the only gifts he got from them. He also got a train set, remote control cars, a sit & spin, some action figures, and a bunch of other stuff.

Putting aside the problem that most of his presents were not age appropriate (his older sister has decided that they are her toys), our main issue with our parent’s generosity is that it’s starting to feel like our dinning room has turned into a toy storage room.

I remember a couple of years ago my mother-in-law joking with me, telling me that she could help me fill up my basement and garage. I’m starting to think she wasn’t joking (See the cackle throws you off. You think its a laugh, but in reality the cackle is mother-in-law for “sucka”).

Before I totally bemoan the act of grandparents spoiling their grandchildren rotten, let me say that I love the bags of clothes we get from their rummage sales exploits, and the occasional free babysitting. I’m just wondering if any Happy Rock readers out there has dealt with this before?

Is there a tactful way of looking a gifthorse in the mouth and ask it to lighten up ?

Dropping hints doesn’t seem to work. Neither does saying, “Please don’t buy that.”

We’ve resigned to just smile and bear it.

We’ve tried holding a rummage sale before, but our parents ended up coming to it. It was quite obvious that they didn’t like seeing all the stuff they’ve given to us over the years for sale. Of course in true parent form, they don’t say anything, they just laid on the guilt later on.

So what happens is that we try not to open the things that we don’t think the kids will play with, then we regift. That’s right I admit to regifting. It is a wonderful way to get rid of unused or unwanted gifts! Heck, I think we still have a few wedding presents that we looking to unload.

Just last night we discovered that our daughter has 5 sets of “Go Fish” card games, all given to her by grandparents. Luckily two of them haven’t been opened yet. So look out parents of little girls…if you invite us to a B-Day celebration you know what you’ll be getting.

Do you have any 5′s…Go Fish

Until next time,

-DD

» Filed Under About Me, Children and Money, Serving Others

Reader Stories : The Beauty of Frugality and Family

Posted by The Happy Rock on January 26, 2009

A Happy Rock reader shared this story with me and I loved the images so much and thought the readers would too.

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The scene was a ‘girls night out’ were the girls of the family went out to run errands and grab a bite to eat. This exchange took place :

Mom asked her daughter(11 years old) how she and her friends were getting along. The daughter said that everything was fine, but sometimes she wished she had a cell phone as a lot of her friends got one or an updated one for Christmas. Nobody in the family has an expensive cell phone right now, and Mom continued on and asked if it bothered her a lot that she doesn’t have one. Then came this beautiful reply.

She responded with “sometimes, but not really. I don’t see why they pay to “text” their friends when it’s pretty much the same as e-mailing. I can e-mail for free. So why pay for it? And why do they need one right now. You are always there when I need you, so I don’t have to call and find out where you are or when you are picking me up, we always have that worked out. I think they are just wasting money.”

Mom didn’t quite know what to say and just smiled as they ate their Arby’s 4 for $5 dinner.

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So much great stuff in there :

Mom was intentional about the time she spent with her children. It would have been easier to run errands with out the children around, but they need that type of interaction and learning. Opportunities to parent happen much more frequently when you intentionally create opportunities were the relationship can move deeper.
They didn’t need to do something fancy, the relationship was the most important part of the equation.
Mom took an interest in her daughter’s life and was willing to go past the surface. She could have just stopped at the cell phone complaint, but she didn’t. Even if the daughter gave a different answer it would have been a great time to help guide her.
Mom had already set a good financial example. The daughter knew were the family stood on money issues and what was really important to them.
Mom lived her values. The daughter trusted that Mom would always be there and that only comes from years trust creating experiences.
The daughter isn’t defined by what she has or by what her friends do, but she defines herself at least partially by her family and can be her own person.

Money and frugality is there to free ourselves for these types of moments in life. Money can’t create this type of beauty!

» Filed Under Children and Money, Materialism, Serving Others

Accepting The Bailout For The Van

Posted by Debt Destroyer on October 17, 2008

I received a ton of good comments on my last post about my bailout option. They were loaded with valuable input. I am constantly thankful for how nice it is to have such a knowledgeable and sharing group to ask these kind of questions to.

And then totally ignore their advice

That’s right folks, we took the bailout.

From the comments most people were worried about how taking such a gift would affect my relationship with my mother, understandably so. But it was my wife who ended up having the final say in the matter.

She made a very compelling argument on why we should take it.

It would eliminate our van payment – which was the whole point of selling the van.
She likes using a “nicer” vehicle for her business.
We didn’t want to sell it in the first place.

The main point of her train of thought was the part of using the van for her business (wedding photography). She frequently transports the bride and others members of the wedding party in our van, and she likes having a nice vehicle to do this in. ( As superficial as that may sound, remember that Andre Agassi was talking about photography when he said “Image is everything”)

I think under different circumstances we would’ve made a different choice.

For example, not having a full-time job during a severe economic downturn made it difficult to turn down such an offer. Add on top of that a rather hectic schedule and I don’t really have the time to try to deal with this right now. I barely have time to write these posts, much less buy & sell a vehicle.

On the flip-side, if I wasn’t going back to school when we decided to sell the van I don’t think this offer would’ve even be made. I’m pretty sure this is my mother’s not-so-veiled attempt to help me pay for school. I think this because she offered to loan me about this same amount when I said I was going back to school, but I turned her down and took out a conventional student loan instead.

I’m pretty sure she came up with this cockamamie story about my Grandma & my Dad because she knew I’d be too stubborn and turn her down otherwise. And you know what?

I’m fine with that.

I totally understand where the comments were coming from when they said I should stick to my guns, turn down the offer and sell the van. I was there myself a couple of weeks ago. But then life throws you a curveball and all of a sudden your plans have a way of changing.

I’ve been involved with The Happy Rock for less than four months now. And there’s no way that I could’ve predicted that in that time, that I’d lose my job, go back to school, and receive a generous gift.

All I know is that we are committed to a journey that will help us get out of debt so we don’t have to worry about this kind of stuff in the future. Instead we’ll only have to worry about the important issues in life, such as how to get out of Thanksgiving Dinner with the in-laws.

Until next time,

-DD

» Filed Under Debt Elimination, Friends, Serving Others

A New Twist to Selling the Van – A Bailout Plan

Posted by Debt Destroyer on October 9, 2008

Another page has been added to our selling the van story. You long time readers can skip ahead, but if you want to catch up here is the first part, and here is the second part.

Now for the third installment of “Will They or Won’t They?”

I was having dinner at my parents house a couple of weeks ago and my Mom asked how we were doing financially. I gave her my pat answer that I always give her,

“Just fine.”

But then I made the mistake of offering a little more.

“But we’ll be in much better shape after we sell the van.”

That set off her maternal alarms:

“What’s wrong?”
“But I thought you liked your van?”
“Is the business not doing good?”

After I calmed her down, I did my best to explain to her what our plan was:

Sell the van ($15,500).
Pay off the $11,000 grand we still owed, which would eliminate the $330 monthly payment.
Buy a $4500 vehicle and save up for a nicer vehicle.

She thought I had lost my mind.

I knew a lot of people wouldn’t like our plan (especially her), so I didn’t really give her protest much thought, until…

Later that night she called me up and asked if we were seriously going to sell our van? I assured her we were, right after Native American Day (in South Dakota, Columbus Day = Native American Day). She then proceeds to tell me how much I will regret that decision because I’ll end up with a junker that I’ll have to throw money at and this will money saving idea will backfire in my face.

She then made the offer…to pay off our van.

“What’s the catch?” I asked. She said there wasn’t one. $5000 would be from my money my Dad left me that I gave her to hold onto. And the other $6,000 would be from money my Grandma left my Mom to spend however she wanted.

I was a little fishy right away because where was this offer two years ago when we started my wife’s business and needed almost exactly this amount of money. Plus I could’ve swore I used up all the money my Dad left me for a down payment on our house. I mentioned this to her, and she said she’d check into it. Then I said how about she give just my Dad’s money to me so then I’d have enough for a $9500 vehicle after selling the van. She didn’t like the sound of that.

I knew it was fishy.

Another problem was that I had really wanted to do the responsible thing and sell the vehicle, learn from our mistake, and sacrifice for the next few years until we could afford another used van. But now a personal bailout plan is offered and I’m rather confused.

I know Frugal Dad recently wrote a post saying that you shouldn’t lend relatives money, but what about the flip-side of that coin? and what if it’s not a loan?

Even though it’s fishy, I’m thinking of taking her up on it. We don’t really want to sell our van, the whole point was to get rid of the payment, and this would accomplish that. So Happy Rock Readers I turn to you once again…

What would you do? Are there any pros & cons that I’m missing? Have any of you accepted a “bailout” before? If so, how did it turn out?

I thank you in advance for any responses and please stay tuned for the next episode of “Will They or Won’t They?”

Until next time,

-DD

» Filed Under About Me, Cars, Children and Money, Debt Elimination, Serving Others

Picture Post – Spend Time With Me

Posted by The Happy Rock on July 31, 2008

“I don’t need more stuff, I need someone to spend time with me”

Photo Credit – LightChaser: Luis Cruz

» Filed Under Children and Money, Materialism, Serving Others

Play A Game And Help End Global Hunger

Posted by The Happy Rock on November 20, 2007

“About 25,000 people die each day from hunger or hunger-related causes, most of them children.”

“The United Nations estimates that the cost to end world hunger completely, along with diseases related to hunger and poverty, is about $195 billion a year.”

This is post is about shedding some light on poverty around the world. It is so easy to get wrapped up in our small world and own finances without giving as much as a thought to those who have much less around the world.

The quotes above were provided by an innovative new new site called FreeRice.com(click the banner to check out the site). The site promises to donate grains of rice to the United Nations World Food Program (WFP) for each question correctly answered in a vocabulary game. The non-profit business model will use the money from advertising to buy the grains of rice that are earned by the players. Players get 10 grains of rice for each question that is answered correctly. Yesterday, 170,885,620 grains of rice were earned by the community of players.

I am not sure that the business model is sustainable in its current form or if the statistics are very accurate, but I love the sentiment. Create a site that has intrinsic value for the users by providing fun and learning, increase the conversation about global poverty, and attempt to do something to help. The site is a brainchild of poverty.com‘s private owner John Breen. Kudos!

One other intersting note is that “twenty-two developed countries below have pledged to work towards each giving 0.7% (a little less than 1%) of their national income in international aid, which would raise the $195 billion.” The US is one of them. Click here to see a full list and the progress that has been made.

I achieve level 35-40 in the vocab game, if any one is interested. It takes a fair amount of guessing correctly to get that my score that high though.

» Filed Under Food, Giving, Serving Others

Change Your Child’s Genetics By Giving Up The BMW

Posted by The Happy Rock on October 18, 2007

We recently talked about financially changing your family tree as financial motivation, but for those of us needed some more convincing here is evidence that our decisions about money go much deeper than just dollars and cents. Our choices are crucially importance to our children and this offers early stage evidence that our choices can cover over ‘bad’ genetics.

The researchers “studied 109 children who had been removed from their parents’ care due to reports of abuse or neglect and 87 control children with no reports of abuse or maltreatment.” The children also had two gene polymorphisms that put them at a greater risk for depression. The researchers also assessed each child’s support system and assigned each one a score for their support system quality .

I picked up three import things from the recap of the study. First, the effects of the depression amplifiers only held true for the children who were abused and neglected. Second, children with strong support systems almost completely escaped the effects of the ‘bad’ genes. Third, genes alone weren’t likely to make a child depressed, but maltreatment alone can.

Picture the ‘bad’ genes as little seeds. Give the seeds water polluted with mistreatment and lack of support and the ‘bad’ genes flourish. Nurture them with a safe supportive water and the children could likely overcome the ‘bad’ genes. At least in this small study the age old question of nature versus nurture is answered. Nurture wins .

To me, this is truly amazing! Think about the implications. Does it change how important we view sacrificing the BMW and huge backyard, so that we can have a stay at home spouse. Do you have to work 60 hours a week to support your current lifestyle? Is your debt stressing your relationship with your spouse and your children? Maybe we are sacrificing too much? Maybe we should be giving more time and money to support those willing to adopt and provide supportive homes for maltreated children? Hopefully studies like this help to illuminate which decisions are the truly important ones in life. What do you think?