Posted on 08/03/2003 2:37:02 AM PDT by sarcasm
Edited on 04/13/2004 2:10:34 AM PDT by Jim Robinson. [history]
In fact, I teach 30-60 students a year at the U. of Dayton, mostly jr.s and sr.s Their first project is to do a family business history---to find someone in their family who has or has had a business. Surprisingly, in about three years of doing this (+ or - 100 students), I have only had 2-3 who did not have a family member who owned his own business or who had owned one (usually grandparents in the latter case).
What surprised me, knowing the statistics as I do about companies not being profitable for at least two years, is that recently, I'd say 80-90% of the firms were profitable in a year or less. Some have really boomed. Grunder Landscaping, for example: Marty Grunder was a student who came back to UD as a very young man, having started his own landscaping company in HIGH SCHOOL, and today has a multi-million-dollar company with 40 full-time employees.
Interestingly, though, at least FOUR other students have parents or uncles who have started competitors to Grunder, including Buckeye Ecocare, a booming landscaping company.
Most of the family businesses (I'd say 30%) are restaurants/catering/carry-out. These, on average, aren't as big as some of the others, but I didn't detect from my questions to students any unhappiness on the part of their family members.
Another 20% or so are computer-related home businesses that either do on-site work, at-home consulting (I've had several home-based computer sales, everything from labels to gadgets), and general diagnostic. The balance of the firms are insurance, tax preparation, small manufacturing (aluminum siding, special parts, even some heavy machinery).
I don't claim my "teaching" has had one IOTA worth of impact on these firms, because they were in existence when I got the kids. My point was to have the kids see how much entrepreneurship is out there, and how many self-made men and women there are.
Now take off your freaking nasty hat.
I talked at length to the head of AK Steel, who told me that he regretted in the 1970s not firing the number of people he needed to fire because of his company's "family" type policy. In the long run, he said, it caused far more heartache, and they had to be fired anyway, and in the meantime, other wages were held down trying to keep them on. I think the same would happen here.
I have only had 2-3 who did not have a family member who owned his own business or who had owned one.
That is an amazing stat. But in my own family, yea, there's an uncle who owns his own biz. Interesting.
Most of the family businesses (I'd say 30%) are restaurants/catering/carry-out. ... Another 20% or so are computer-related home businesses that either do on-site work, at-home consulting (I've had several home-based computer sales, everything from labels to gadgets), and general diagnostic. The balance of the firms are insurance, tax preparation, small manufacturing (aluminum siding, special parts, even some heavy machinery).
Alright, this is great. You have actual hands-on experience with American businesses. Excellent. Now, the types of businesses described above probably don't have that much exposure to offshore outsourcing (with the exception of the co's. in the last sentence) - can we agree on this?
I think I'm coming to an understanding of your point-of-view. However, I think that outsourcing is a threat to middle-class folks who are employed by fortune 500 firms who sit in cubicles. These people are at risk, imho.
I'm for free trade as an ideal, but for fair trade in order to cushion the blow.
Now take off your freaking nasty hat.
It's off, but I think you had the same hat on in some of your own posts. Thanks for the post. Oh hey - any good books you can recommend on starting a small biz?
Now, as to books, heheh. Look at my book on Amazon, "The Entrepreneurial Adventure: A History of Business in the U.S." (Harcrourt, 2000).
I do deal with the offshore stuff, though my book came out in 2000, and was completed in 1999, when Japan, not China or India, was the concern. However, you might be interested in the dozen 1990s "self-made men" or women who started all sorts of unusual and successful businesses.
BTW, what I find most rewarding is the number of black students I have who gain a new appreciation for entrepreneurship and for the hard work required to make a business "go." And, as I said, what I find surprising is how many businesses (of those associated with my students) are successful (of course, I guess the failures can't afford to send their kids to a private school, though!).
...I've been testy since harpseal said I should be EXECUTED as a traitor because I don't believe in tariffs!
Yep, I kind of got in at the tail end of that. Kind of got out of hand. Harpseal has written a lot, and I agree with most of it (coming to his defense). But I did wrong - I apologize.
On a related note, I have a call in to cpusa regarding their stand on free trade. Left a message.
Discuss your last BTW para. in the near future. Have a good one.
Although innovation is historical, a particular innovation is something new. The economy is no longer a hunter gatherer economy and its new characteristics require new non-historical alternatives that not only result in efficiency but also embrace the notion that people who don't own cash generating property have to work to sustain their families as well as invest in their futures. The government does not have to control the actions of the steel industry or any other industry and the CEO of Steel may have to downsize to manage cost in competition with external forces. So what are the potential solutions for the need to downsize and the need to make a living when they appear to be in conflict?
My suggestion is to get government and business and labor and education to collaborate. Establish a National New Business Incubator in a National Free Economic Enterprise Zone. The Zone would be free from unnecessary regulations and taxes. The only requirement to operate in the Zone would be to downsize excess labor into the Zone so that it could work on new business initiatives. In the alternative, businesses operating in the Zone, could move labor into it (instead of downsizing) and receive economic benefits established by government regulation for operating within the Zone. A host of other incentives could be developed to create the economic environment needed for full employment. For example, all public transfer payments such as unemploymnet compensation could be transferred to the Zone for investment in new business. No doubt you can think of many more incentives, such as tax free investing as long as the investment is made in new businesses operating in the Free Economic Enterprise Zone.
Now since you friend at AK Steel did not think of this, it is not likely that he/she will. So Business, Government, Education, and Labor have to put their heads together to develop this notion and help make it part of our economic infrastructure. The alternative, "long term layoff" is not an acceptable use of scarce (human) resources nor is it a appropriate means to encourage individuals to be responsible for their incomes and the future incomes of their children.
Yes, human resources are scarce. Take a look around, there is more work that needs to be done than we know how to do or that we have the skilled labor to do. What is needed is the political will to adapt the infrastructure to the realities of a globalized economy.
"In the context of a free and civil society at work: To All According to Their Needs And To Each According to His Will." . . . pipus willabi
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