We’re starting to adjust to the Covid mess. I’m thinking this is a whole new life we will be embarking on. What do we have going for us as a culture that will push us into this new age?
First, America is a make it work culture, meaning, we take nothing and make something. How did we arrive at being this way? We all come from immigrant roots, most came voluntarily, some did not. So as an immigrant culture, we have it in our blood to take scraps valuing nothing and turn them into new things that we sell and trade and use personally.
Because we’re starting over, no one should be considered wise or smart anymore. I mean, when even your churches are closed down, I guess even God locked down. So, what are we going to do? If nothing else, we start pulling the weeds in our backyard.
I did that once. I collected these weeds, glued them together and sold it as a piece of postmodern art. I was nine or ten at the time. My aunt bought it for five dollars. That inspired me.
So, I came up with another idea. During one telethon, I went door to door and raised money. Instead of sending the money, totaling nine dollars, to the telethon, I buried it.
So, I started out with nothing and came up with a couple of ideas. Now, I had five honest dollars and nine dishonest dollars.
From that day, I decided to be an honest person, and kept coming up with new ideas. I started a lawn mowing business with a buddy of mine. He only showed up when I was almost done. We split the money 50/50. From that I learned that having a partner wasn’t for me. So I’m on my way in life. I’ve learned that you can make money by just coming up with new ideas. I’ve learned that I wanted to make money honestly, and I’ve learned not to have partners. Pretty good for a kid who started out with nothing.
I then started teaching swim lessons in my backyard. I made more money doing that than anything else I did. But, then I learned that one of my friends made much more money than I did, and bought himself a hot rod. Next lesson, if I wanted a car, I needed to work much harder. It then dawned on me: just not ideas and work, but ideas and really hard work is golden.
Next, while we’re starting over, the government should keep stimulating the economy by putting dollars in our pockets. I don’t care who you are, once you have money in your pocket you spend it, plus, it’s human nature to look for ways to have more money in your pocket after that.
As long as we are able to spend, there will be those who make products to spend it on. And the more products there are, the more workers are needed to make those products and services.
So, as you can see, this new world we’re looking at isn’t much different than the old world we made great. In summary, here’s the formula: take nothing and make something, work real hard to sell it, make sure everyone has some cash in their pockets to spend, and then make more stuff to sell.