I believe that I do not have to be poor to be progressive.
I have a calling - as deep as others' callings to be priests, doctors, relief workers and just as vital to the effective workings of the world, and the good of humankind. I am an entrepreneur. Specifically, I help companies make stuff that other people need and then figure out how to get it to those people. I get paid well to do it, too.
But I believe that riches come with responsibilities as well as rewards. That makes me a Prosperous Progressive and this is my Manifesto.
- Money is a tool, period.
Money itself is neither good nor bad. You can invest in offshore oil rigs or wind farms. Money is often how business people keep score, and I admit that I salt my own business conversations with terms like ROI, breakeven time, gross margins and cost allocation models. But it's still just a tool.
- Economies are personal.
It doesn't matter what GDP is if you're unemployed. Yet even in the worst economic times, people get hired every day. You only need one job - not 10,000 - and while discrimination is real - I've experienced it first hand - it is not an excuse for giving up. A surprising number of great companies that are household names today were founded during the Great Depression.
- Wealth == discretionary time and the money to enjoy it.
The optimal balance of discretionary time and money is a personal decision that no one can dictate to anyone else. I know people who have a lot of money but no wealth, and people with very little money but a lot of wealth. To become wealthier, we must first trade our time for enough money to meet our basic needs and then strike a balance between the two. The fastest way to wealth is to learn how to make the same income - or more - for less time.
- People can pull themselves up by their own bootstraps - but you have to give them the bootstraps.
People who are hungry, cold and sick don't have the energy to build much of anything. Rich, or even middle class people who believe otherwise don't understand how the world works. During my fabulously broke years, I needed help from Pell Grants and low interest student loans, low income housing, unemployment insurance, and free health clinics, plus a lot of kindness from strangers. In addition to the basic safety net, beef up the SBA to provide more practical assistance, and better loan programs to support the kinds of businesses that people are most likely to run successfully.
- Everyone needs financial literacy.
We are going to be forever vulnerable to the big bankers no matter how much regulations are in effect as long as people lack the ability to understand the basics of finance: how to balance a checkbook and manage a household budget, how loans and interest rates work, the power of compound interest when you're the one earning it. The more we move towards electronic systems, the more we need to work to understand the basics.
- The contract between employer and employee was broken long ago.
Simply put: you can't trust the bastards who write your paycheck - you have to take care of yourself. That means ensuring that you take advantage of opportunities to keep your skills sharp and your personal networks strong.
- We don't do anyone any favors by protecting them from reality,
This may seem harsh, but if someone else on the planet can make my product at a lower cost than I can, within ethical boundaries, and get other people to buy from them instead of me, then it's my responsibility to deal with that or find another line of work. If I work in a field that can be done less expensively in another country, then I can't blame the company for moving my job to that country, and you do not help me if you enable me to persist in the delusion that my job is secure through things like job insurance.
- But companies have the responsibility to help employees adapt.
Companies made many offshoring and outsourcing decisions stupidly - destroying value for shareowners, employees and customers - and often with clumsy disregard for the hidden costs of dislocation. Job retraining programs and unemployment insurance systems were all built under the old model where people held jobs for many years but today's workforce is more mobile, and needs services that reflect that. An employer that is not investing in training and development for its employees to prepare them for the 21st century economy is as rapacious as a strip mining company practicing mountaintop removal.
- And our nation needs to manage its strategic assets more carefully.
The last year proved that an economy based so heavily on the financial markets is on shaky ground. Alternative energy, climate change and health care reforms will all create opportunities for entrepreneurs to open up new markets - but only if we have the ability to build these products domestically. We can - and should - protect and nurture the industries that have long-term strategic value, and companies that don't understand that - especially the ones with headquarters in Burmuda or Dublin - need to be treated like the foreign agents that they are.
- Health care is not a right or a privilege - it's a public responsibility.
We cannot afford the drain on our society from an underclass of people who have treatable conditions that are not treated. It's expensive - but more important - it diminishes us as a society to have so many people suffering needlessly but for the political will to change it, and it creates an environment where diseases like swine flu get transmitted more easily.
- Taxes are the entrance fees to participate in the marketplace with all the supporting infrastructure that requires.
Businesses can't grow without good infrastructure - including things like public schools and safety nets for the poor. Even if the average corporate director sends his or her kids to private schools from gated neighborhoods, the legions of front line employees rely upon these services to provide the basics that make it possible to do great things in the workplace. Those of us who earn more, benefit more and therefore pay more. High tax bills are a nice problem to have.
- Regulations are a necessary evil.
They're blunt instruments when sometimes a surgical scalpal will do, but they also help make the link between action and consequence clear - which is something that myopic marketplace perspectives tend to obscure. So, until something better comes along, this is what we have to ensure that businesses remember that community health, safety and well being comes ahead of profits.
- Philanthropy is vital and even fun but it will never be enough.
Yes, it's a kick to see one's name on a donor list but it doesn't replace public funding for vital services. Not even Bill Gates or Warren Buffett have enough money to replace the role government plays in creating a civil society. Still, those of us who have benefited from the opportunities in this country have a responsibility to do what we can.
and finally. . .
- I vote for the good of society - not the good of my pocketbook.
I can't be bought by tax cuts or special favors to members of my class. If you want my vote, pass real health care reform, restore our international standing in the world, strengthen the public schools and the safety nets, re-regulate the financial markets and invest in the sectors of the economy that will lead us into the future.