My mother is utterly confused and I think slightly annoyed at my desire to snub large corporations, and although I think she's not seeing the whole picture, I must admit that I think it may be impossible to NEVER interact with a franchise or a box store. For example, I only have about a quarter tank of gas left. Usually, I stop at the WaWa close to where I work because it's oftentimes the cheapest. But now, do I still do that?
WaWa poses an interesting dilemma- first of all, it is not a national company, it's rather regional, popping up mostly in NJ and PA. But I do believe it's still a franchise. And, as I'm learning from the latest book I've been reading, Fast Food Nation, the franchising system is set up to help the owners get richer, while keeping the workers as poor as possible. Additionally, the percentage of money that goes to the corporate office versus the percentage of money which stays within the local economy (for workers' wages, site improvement, etc) is significantly skewed. Franchising is one of the biggest criminals in widening the disparity between rich and poor, and in moving money out of local economies.
So maybe, when having to interact with these companies, I should research them in comparison to each other to find out:
1) Which franchises are the smallest.
2) Which have the best payouts for franchise owners.
... and since I would like to be supporting "good" companies:
3) Which support Democratic candidates/support HRC/support progressive movements.
4) Which pay living wage or at least closest to it.
5) Which offer decent benefits to employees.
6) Which try to use local/independent suppliers whenever possible.
7) Which don't use overseas plants/child labor/chemicals/hormones/generally bad stuff..
In looking at this list I think (hope) it will be much easier to find a smaller airline that can match some of these expectations than an oil company... just because of the nature of the two industries. I'll research that and post my findings on here.
Meanwhile, one of the friends I'm traveling with went ahead and booked the Ramada Limited. I did some research on the company.. the chain is owned by Wyndham Worldwide, which just happens to be the largest lodging franchiser in the world. It has 6,900 hotels under 12 brand names on 6 continents! So much for going for the smaller, more regional company! This is by far the biggest company you can possible get a hotel room from. Unfortunately, the only Bread & Breakfasts in the area were pricey "have-your-wedding-here" type places. What happened to cute little inns? And camping? I'd be all for it, but I think the rest of my friends like the luxuries of real buildings.
The only solace I have is that my friends would have reserved this room whether I was going or not and it's only costing $35 per person. So $35 of my money is going to Wyndham Worldwide. Just this once... =(
As far as the title of this post, I'm thinking maybe what I'm doing isn't so much anti-capitalism, but more localism... which is kind of anti-capitalistic... not sure, I'll have to keep reading!
Just my two cents... we are living in a resource-concentrating global economy. Wherever you turn, people are singing the methods and practices to move money into less and less hands; it's the business blue-print of the century, perhaps the last few millennia. I appreciate that you're sharing your thoughts and that you're looking at the details of the businesses you involve yourself with as a consumer. But your missing the forest for the trees; your expectations as a consumer are in alignment with money flowing up, and you've learned to demand a quality of product that requires sophisticated and usually global manufacturing methods (paper, gasoline, metals, electronics). Lastly, the for-"profit" business model is the founding principle behind nearly every functioning business (and often the institutions) that you will run into in most of the world today. That "profit" doesn't exist; it's a measure of wealth taken from the least defended members of our ecology (starting with the environment, then the laborers, and up) and moved up; everyone in the chain is getting a cut, but the points with the most accumulation have the largest network beneath them. That's the whole draw of a business model: creating the illusion of profit. I'll spare you by not writing my own blog post on the subject; just saying, this play has much deeper roots than seem to be writing about. Look to yourself, to the roots of greed, and to the illusion of profit. Is it an illusion? See for yourself.
ReplyDeleteBlessings~