We have been taught by the governmental shut down of small businesses that the freedom to purchase goods and services in this country has slipped from our control. America had a manufacturing economy—we made things. We largely gave that up to become a service-based economy—we sold things (made elsewhere) and were our own best customer.
Perhaps you have noticed the latest shift in our economy. I call it the privilege-based economy. In this model buying and selling is a privilege. If a business chooses to interact with you, you should be properly grateful for the opportunity to enrich them and show the proper deference to their grant of favor.
Eastern Europe is very familiar with this economy. It is not a market economy in which someone sees a need and moves to supply a product or service to fulfill that need. We are on the verge of being told what we need, where to buy it, and how much to pay for it.
I’ve noticed the seedlings of this new economy breaking through the ground. Many online businesses no longer have an easy means to address problems beyond directing you to their community. They don’t want to talk to you because, frankly—they don’t care. You should be happy that you even get to buy their product.
Am I the only one who is wondering why an online business (one that deigns to answer calls) has longer wait times due to a virus? Now, if it was a computer virus, I could understand. But, unless I’ve missed the latest knowledge dispensed by the media, CoVid has not learned to travel across internet connections.
Someone may say the slowdown is due to workers being sick. I’m old-fashioned. I remember when businesses planned for that and hired extra help or used temps. Has the nation no unemployed?
I don’t know if where I live is worse than other areas, but around here businesses are eaten up with machines that don’t work, and staff inflicted with the same malady. It seems no one can do the fundamentals of their job. Sorry is the watchword for business these days.
Sorry, we don’t have that. Sorry, we no longer do that. Sorry, our dining room is for empty chairs, drive around. I went to an event not long ago, a restaurant advertised “Sasquatch Saturday” the attraction, (for me) Bigfoot sized biscuits. The payoff?
“Sorry, we don’t have biscuits.”
“But,” I pointed at the sign above her. “Sasquatch Saturday biscuits.”
“We ran out.”
“Didn’t you expect to sell a lot of them at your event?”
“Sorry.”
I’m willing to bet that my readers are running into this kind of thing more and more, just as I am. Businesses allowed to stay open—know they are invulnerable. Their competition is dead. And they don’t give a rat’s rectum what you think. Go elsewhere if you think you can find someplace.
The economy, like our society at large, is becoming more regimented by the hour. It has only just begun. Every aspect of our lives is being slowly brought under the control of the government and its favored partners.
The truly sad part is, that like the loss of our freedom to move around and gather, this state of affairs is being accepted not only in quiet submission but that our neighbors whole-hearted welcome it.
I don’t have an answer that doesn’t involve concerted joint action by a large number of people. That too is a thing of the past. So, for the moment, I am simply going to challenge every place of business and wring as many “Sorry” responses as I can, as publicly as I can in the vain hope someone will join in.
At ease.
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