« August 2007 | Main | October 2007 »
September 30, 2007
A Cautionary Tale for Foreign Companies in China
The always insightful Dan Harris of the China Law Blog just got back from China with this gem:
Posted by John at 10:58 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBackA Chinese lawyer told me he now asks all of his Chinese clients who their foreign competitors are and then offers to see if he can put them out of business for operating illegally. This has become so lucrative for him that he does not even charge to determine if they are legal or not. He makes that determination for free and if they are, he charges a large flat fee for putting them under. He proudly gave me the name of a Seattle company I know (but do not represent) which was next on his list. He also said that come 2008, he would be suing foreign companies whose Chinese employees did not have written contracts.
Dodo Businesses
Entrepreneur picks ten businesses facing extinction within ten years; their list includes several predictable selections: newspapers (in print, that is), pay phones, used bookstores, camera film manufacturing, and record stores.
How about transcription services? Can we hope that in ten years we'll be relieved of the spaghetti bowl mess of wires behind our computers and televisions?
Posted by John at 7:32 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBackQuote of the Day for Sunday, September 30, 2007
 |
|
September 29, 2007
China's Sovereign Wealth Fund Officially Launched
The China Investment Corporation is officially open for business:
Posted by John at 7:55 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack. . . The fund will initially have about $200bn (€140.5bn, £98bn) under management, with the bulk of the remainder of the reserves, which stood at $1,410bn at the end of August, remaining under the control of an agency of the central bank.
A large portion of that $200bn will be used to buy the assets of another agency, which holds the government’s shares in state banks. This will leave the CIC with much less to invest initially.
About $67bn will be spent acquiring assets of the agency, Central Huijin Investment, and tens of billions more may be set aside for the future recapitalisation of state financial institutions.
The CIC has had to grapple with intense internal jockeying over its investment strategy inside China and demands from rival agencies to be represented on its management committee. . . .
Gauging China's Economic Outlook
The Economist offers an extended look at the Chinese economy, on which overall global economic growth is more dependent than ever before:
The list of potential threats to China's economy is long and some might shave a couple of percentage points off its growth rate (leaving it close to 10%). But none seems likely by itself to cause the economy to collapse in the next two years—ie, during the time when America's economy is likely to stumble. But what if several blows land at the same time? For example, an American recession breeds greater protectionism, global financial turmoil unnerves Chinese stockmarket investors, share prices collapse and a downturn creates social unrest. The overall impact on the economy would then be more painful.
China's best insurance against this is that its budget finances are in better shape than those of any other big economy. China's leaders are acutely aware of the risks of social unrest and they will be willing and able to try to spend their way out of trouble. That makes a sharp downturn in China less likely in the near future. But what about farther ahead?
China's economic success has been based on the essential ingredients of growth: high savings, openness to trade, good education and strong productivity growth. This means its long-term prospects remain strong, although its trend growth rate will inevitably slow as its economy matures and its labour force starts to shrink.
Tao Wang, Bank of America's economist in Beijing, says she is optimistic about China's economy in the short term and the long term, but thinks the medium term looks risky. There is a high chance of a sharp slowdown sometime within the next ten years. The problem with years of rapid growth is that it hides problems that are then painfully exposed when times are hard. But for the time being, the chances are that China can keep sprinting even if America takes to its sick bed. That is good news for the world.
Read the entire analysis here.
Posted by John at 6:17 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBackChinese Equities: "A Family Resemblance to a Bubble"
That's how experienced China watcher Donald Straszheim characterizes this year's soaring Chinese equity prices in a USA Today article. As the paper notes, there are only 37 Chinese companies with shares listed on major U.S. exchanges, while there are over 2,700 securities listed on just the New York Stock Exchange alone. It's a classic case of limited supply versus available demand.
One classic characteristic of most burst bubbles is that the supply of securities rises not only to meet demand, but ultimately overwhelm it. Such was the case with U.S. tech stocks in 1999-2000, or South Florida condos last year. In both cases, there were relatively few restrictions on supply developing to meet demand.
In 1999, for example, it was ridiculously easy for the "next great Internet company" to get thrown together and go public with a business plan which would hardly be considered in a more clear headed time. Remember Webvan?
The SEC's regulatory stance was (and is) based largely on adequate disclosure of risk factors. Webvan and its ilk certainly received more scrutiny as the tech bubble expanded and regulators saw poorer quality offerings coming their way. The SEC, however, viewed their role as helping investors have correct and comprehensive facts, not to prevent them from a stupid investment decision.
Such a caveat emptor regulatory philosophy does not exist in the Chinese system. A wide and often arbitrary variety of factors determine whether a Chinese company gets approved for public flotation of its shares. One key element of this decision making process, moreover, is that Chinese authorities seek to actively influence supply and demand for equities (and many other goods and services) at a macro level. Acutely aware of market history, China's regulators seek to prevent investors from succumbing to their own greed by keeping a tight choke hold on the supply of equities. A loosening of such controls on quality don't appear likely anytime soon.
That's why Straszheim sees only a "family resemblance" to a bubble. Until Chinese versions of Webvan starts hitting the market, extraneous events which significantly reduce demand for Chinese equities (and most other equities around the world, most likely) will probably be required to burst this "bubble".
Posted by John at 8:16 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBackQuote of the Day for Saturday, September 29, 2007
 |
|
September 28, 2007
Private Equity Great for Employees, Terrible for CEOs
According to a study conducted by Ernst & Young, private equity backed firms outperform public companies using a variety of measures:
Last year, the average annual growth rate in enterprise value for U.S. private equity-backed companies was 33%, compared to 11% for public companies. In Europe, this comparison was 23% and 15%, respectively.
Contrary to the popular media perception (better yet, fantasies), firms backed by private equity extract value primarily through growth rather than cost cutting. About two-thirds of earnings growth was due to business expansion, with increases in organic revenue comprising the most significant factor.
In U.S. deals, employment levels were the same or higher at exit versus entry in 80% of the time, and 60% in Europe.
For U.S. private equity-backed companies, CEOs or CFOs were replaced about three-fourths of the time, and at the beginning of ownership 39% of the time.
More at TheDeal.com ($).
Posted by John at 6:01 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBackA Disgrace
In the U.S., more blacks and Hispanics live in prison cells than in college dorms. [Source: ABC News]
Posted by John at 5:03 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBackQuote of the Day for Friday, September 28, 2007
 |
|
September 27, 2007
Nuclear Powering Up
The first new application to build a nuclear power plant was filed this week by NRG Energy; almost 30 more applications for greenfield nuclear facilities are expected over the next 15 months. The Christian Science Monitor reports.
Posted by John at 9:22 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBackQuote of the Day for Thursday, September 27, 2007
 |
|
September 26, 2007
Delta Receives an Atlanta-Shanghai Route
Delta Airlines was a winner in a number of new routes to China approved by the FAA. Beginning early next year, Delta will begin direct service from Atlanta to Shanghai. (See the story from Global Atlanta here.) Those of us who travel to China from Atlanta and the Southeast generally are delighted.
From the China side, having a direct flight to Atlanta highlights the city, the state of Georgia, and the Southeast in an extremely positive way. It will increase awareness among many in China for whom Atlanta might have seemed a distant consideration for business relative to New York, Los Angeles, or San Francisco.
Congratulations to Delta Airlines and the many advocates for this flight in Georgia and around the Southeast which helped make this happen. The fruits of their effort will be significant.
Posted by John at 10:35 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBackEastern Europe Rising
Singapore placed first--for the second year in a row--in the last Doing Business report compiled by the World Bank, while Hong Kong came in at number four behind New Zealand and the United States.
Most interesting is the rise of Eastern Europe, which has witness so much reform in recent years that the region has actually edged out East Asia in the report's overall ranking of business-friendly environment. In 2006-2007, for example, about four of five Eastern European countries made at least one positive reform.
Consequently, the number of registered businesses in Eastern Europe is approaching levels similar to global leaders. The Czech Republic and Slovakia have as many registered businesses per capital as Singapore. Estonia and Poland now match Hong Kong with the same measure. Georgia has as many registered enterprises per capital as Malaysia.
Could anyone have foreseen such a situation two decades ago?
Posted by John at 10:13 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBackQuote of the Day for Wednesday, September 26, 2007
 |
|
September 25, 2007
China's "One Child Gift to the World"
Interesting perspective on the China's one child policy from Thomas P.M. Barnett, who responded to a pessimistic assessment of the same by Nicholas Eberstadt. Barnett calls it China's "one child gift to the world":
Posted by John at 5:35 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBackThe efforts by India and China to control their population growth over the past several decades changes human history forever--and to our collective great benefit. All those predictions of a global population boom out of control never materialized as a result. But, of course, some cost is involved. China heads into a demographic challenge of immense proportions. Eberstadt sees a slo-mo humanitarian tragedy. What is it about demographers and their amazingly self-confident hyperbole? . . . Eberstadt even goes so far to raise the spooky specter of all those Chinese males unable to marry. But, of course, there we've already seen a preview in the form of Korean males facing a similar problem right now. Their answer? They fly to Vietnam and marry a young woman over the weekend--just like that. Guess what China's males will do (those that don't leave as economic refugees for work elsewhere, which is a huge informal escape hatch)? Will they riot or demand war with other nations? Or will they also simply go farther afield? Ditto for China's demographic challenge in general. Is importing workers (meaning, immigration) a complete impossibility? Is China somehow a sealed unit that will collapse under its own weight over the next 30 years, or--GODFORBID!--might it simply open up its system further to tap the necessary labor and investment and technology? Eberstadt sees a tragedy because he's operating with an image of China that he cannot shake: the isolationist system that's hostile to outsiders. But that image is dissolving with time, as China has proven to be amazingly open to outside influences, right down to the point of letting foreigners adopt baby girls en masse (if they can manage that, what's the big deal about Chinese males marrying non-Han?). Somehow China managed to cope with this "sudden and very rapid emergence" of unwanted female babies, so why can't this highly practical society deal with the "sudden and very rapid emergence" of unmarried men? I mean, we estimate that 100 million Chinese will travel abroad every year by 2020, so might we assume some of these "trapped" single guys might actually chose something besides instability? . . . We have to remember: this is the same Chinese culture where men have left behind families for years on end to earn money abroad. If this culture can handle that level of practicality, what's so unbelievable about China self-correcting on this issue down the road? After all, they had the guts to set it in motion in the first place! Obviously, I see something very different from Eberstadt on the issue of demographics: I see the huge impracticality of China going hostile and isolating itself from the world. By setting in motion the demographic wave, China inexorably commits itself to interdependency. It simply cannot navigate future challenges without remaining amazingly open to the outside world, and that means its ability to turn hostile is severely circumscribed. To me, as a grand strategist, this is very good news. Trying to hype it inside out to the point of turning this positive into yet another negative fear of China's possible threat to us is misguided (although Eberstadt does not do this, I hear this pitch from national security types all the time). Yes, China will naturally do as Eberstadt argues: it will lift the restriction, confident that the economic dynamics already deeply in place will prevent any big uptick in births. The time for this temporary fix is done. Now is the time to return the decision making back to the people--yet another example of how power naturally devolves downward with China's rise. But don't present this as a mistake. This huge effort was China's gift to human history and it's an incredibly valuable one: relieving the danger of uncontrolled global population growth, plus forcing China down a path of economic interdependency that keeps its "rising" peaceful. Good deal on both points for us.
Even in South Florida, Hispanic Children Not Retaining Spanish Language
Even in a region of the country teeming with Spanish-speakers, South Florida, Hispanic parents are frustrated that their children are losing their ability to speak Spanish. The Ft. Lauderdale Sun-Sentinel reports:
Posted by John at 4:26 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack. . . While Florida boasts a large concentration of Spanish speakers — roughly 20 percent of Floridians over age 5 speak Spanish or a variation at home — experts say a strong command of the language wanes with the second and third generations. . . .
Parents trying to raise bilingual children worry that a strong sense of cultural identity and job prospects are at stake for Hispanic youth who speak little or no Spanish.
Javier Almazan, of South Bay, the son of Mexican immigrants, bemoans the fact that his two youngest children, both middle schoolers, can barely roll their r's.
"I try to emphasize to my kids that they're hurting themselves. They're closing doors as far as careers go," said Almazan, 39, adding that he's lost hope that his youngest children will speak Spanish. . . .
Quote of the Day for Tuesday, September 25, 2007
 |
|
September 24, 2007
Retiree Population to Mushroom in Georgia and the Sunbelt
Among large metropolitan areas, Atlanta's growth in pre-seniors (age 55-64) was the fourth fastest from 1990-2005, behind Las Vegas, Austin, and Raleigh, NC. Georgia, along with other Southern and Western states like Florida, Texas, and Nevada, are expected to see their numbers of retirees in 2030 to equal an amount about 2 1/2 times greater than that in 2000. [Source: New York Times]
Posted by John at 4:15 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBackLegrain on Mexican Immigrants in the U.S.
British economist Philippe Legrain, author of Immigrants: Your Country Needs Them, recent spoke with TCS editor Nick Schultz about the arguments for open immigration he makes in his book. The complete interview can be found here; an excerpt follows:
Schulz: Advocates of firmer restrictions on immigration in the United States say that past historical experience with large waves of migration is not a useful guide. When Europeans came to the US, for example, they had an ocean separating them from their homeland. This helped foster assimilation. But with Mexican immigration, things are different since the homeland is only a river away. What do you make of this distinction?
Legrain: It is certainly conceivable that geographical proximity could be significant, but in practice I don't think it's decisive. The fact that Mexico is next door does not necessarily make it easier for Mexican immigrants to stay in touch with their country of origin: those who are in the US illegally, for instance, cannot readily travel back and forth to Mexico. And thanks to ethnic TV and radio, the internet, cheap telephone calls and low-cost travel, it is just as easy for Vietnamese or Russian immigrants to keep up links to their country of origin if they want to. Conversely, the Amish have been in the US for centuries with little contact with their Swiss-German origins and yet have remained isolated from mainstream society. So I think it's more a question of whether people want to fit in, and whether others are willing to accept them.
I devote a whole chapter of the book to considering Samuel Huntington's argument that Latino immigrants are splitting America in two and find little evidence to substantiate his thesis. To quote just a few facts, census figures show that only 4.2 million of those born in the US--a mere 1.8%--speak Spanish at home and English less than very well, while only 1.2 million of the 232 million people born in the US--one in 200--speaks Spanish at home and has poor or no English.
Posted by John at 3:53 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBackHuntington inveighs against Latinos trying to maintain their cultural heritage, but what's wrong with that? Being American does not require giving up your roots--and if there is no problem with Irish Americans celebrating St Patrick's Day, indeed with American presidents of non-Irish origin officially celebrating it too, what is wrong with Mexican Americans celebrating Mexico's national holiday on the 5th of May?
Huntington also warns of "the creation of a large, distinct, Spanish-speaking community with economic and political resources sufficient to sustain its Hispanic identity apart from the national identity of other Americans and also able to influence US politics, government, and society." But even in areas where Latinos predominate, America's defining institutions remain intact. The US Constitution remains in place. Democracy and other aspects of the American political system remain intact. Capitalism is thriving. People are still free, the media uncensored, private property protected, the courts uncorrupted. Nothing like Mexico, in fact.
Huntington also claims that "Many Mexican immigrants and their offspring simply do not appear to identify primarily with the United States." But while only one in three foreign-born Latinos describe themselves as American, this rises to 85 percent among their US-born children--and 97 percent among the US-born kids of US-born Latino parents.
Of course, Latino immigrants will change America, as well as being changed by it. But this is neither exceptional, nor need it fracture America's forever changing national identity.
Quote of the Day for Monday, September 24, 2007
 |
|
September 23, 2007
An Hispanic "Parallel Universe" in Memphis
The Commercial Appeal reports on the "parallel universe" in Memphis: the area's sizable Hispanic population and the economy and culture it has spawned, largely unrecognized by mainstream residents. The full story is here.
Posted by John at 8:34 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBackQuote of the Day for Sunday, September 23, 2007
 |
|
September 22, 2007
Rising Numbers of U.S. Hispanic Evangelicals
I ordered and have started reading Mark Penn's book Microtrends, which I mentioned previously. One of the microtrends he identifies--one which we've highlighted as well for you as well--is the rapidly growing numbers of Hispanics in the U.S. who identify themselves as Pentecostal, evangelical, or born again:
. . . a remarkably important subgroup of Latinos in America are Protestant. According to the 2005 book Latino Religions and Civic Activism in the United States, nearly one-quarter of U.S. Latinos identify themselves as Protestant or other Christian, including Jehovah's Witnesses and Mormons. That's about 10 million people in America--more than the number of Jews, or Muslims, or Episcopalians, or Presbyterians in the U.S. And of those 10 million Protestant Latinos, nearly 90 percent describe themselves not a "mainline" or liberal Protestants, but as Pentecostal, evangelical, or "born again".
To some degree, this is all part of the worldwide explosion of Pentecostals, who grew from fewer than 50 million to over 400 million worldwide int he last several decades. Clearly, some of the Latino immigrants' Protestant identity took hold in their home countries. But a lot of it is happening here. According to a 2003 study on Hispanic Churches in American Public Life (pdf), Catholic affiliation drops almost 15 percentage points between first-generation Latino Americans and their grandchildren. Sure, shedding our immigrant ethnic traditions is an old melting pot story--except that now, it's the opposite. New generations aren't so much "blending in" to America as choosing a different niche identity. . . .
To further confound misconceptions about the Hispanic population, Penn goes on to point out that more than half of Hispanic Protestants are predominate English speakers. To many religious Latinos, Penn observes, becoming truly "American" seems to consist both of learning English and turning away from Roman Catholicism in favor of Pentecostalism.
Posted by John at 9:36 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBackQuote of the Day for Saturday, September 22, 2007
 |
|
September 21, 2007
Quote of the Day for Friday, September 21, 2007
 |
|
September 20, 2007
Quote of the Day for Thursday, September 20, 2007
 |
|
September 19, 2007
Quote of the Day for Wednesday, September 19, 2007
 |
|
September 18, 2007
Quote of the Day for Tuesday, September 18, 2007
 |
|
September 16, 2007
Quote of the Day for Monday, September 17, 2007
 |
|
Quote of the Day for Sunday, September 16, 2007
 |
|
September 15, 2007
Quote of the Day for Saturday, September 15, 2007
|
|
September 14, 2007
Tough Times for Atlanta's Hispanic Business Community
. . .thanks to a lackluster residential construction market and new state immigration laws, which have even immigrants with legal status alarmed. The Atlanta Journal-Constitution reports:
. . . the fallout has spread far beyond car dealers, which immediately felt the impact from a law that went into effect on July 1 requiring a Georgia driver's license or ID card to get a car tag. It's affecting bakeries, insurance peddlers, banks, food manufacturers, supermarkets, restaurants and other businesses.
Why the slowdown in spending?
Tougher state and local laws that affect illegal immigrants and the lack of resolution over their status after the proposed immigration reform collapsed in Washington earlier this year have left many saving money, spending less and wondering what will happen next.
Add to this a slowdown in the housing market, which affects the job stability of a portion of the Hispanic work force in Georgia.
"This is like a double whammy," says UGA demographer Douglas Bachtel, who studies the Hispanic population. "Whenever there's anything new, there's fear and uncertainty, especially with the immigration status."
Nearly half of the Hispanic population in Georgia is undocumented, Bachtel explains. The census estimates there are 700,000 Hispanics in Georgia, but Bachtel says Hispanics are way undercounted.
"It's affecting all businesses," says Neil Moreno, who sells car insurance in a storefront next to Espinosa.
His business, which dropped by about 30 percent in July and August, now consists mostly of renewing auto insurance policies, not selling new ones. He can't afford to replace his assistant. On a recent morning, close to noon, he sat at his desk waiting for clients.
"This is dead," says Moreno, who is from Puerto Rico. "It's terrible. The phone's not ringing." . . .
Spending by Hispanics will grow at a slower rate in the next five years, says Jeffrey Humphreys, a University of Georgia economist. In 2006, Georgia Hispanics spent $12.4 billion, 10th in the nation, according to his research.
A study released last month by the Washington-based Inter-American Development Bank found that the percentage of Mexicans in "new destination" states who send remittances regularly to their homeland declined from an average of 80 percent in 2006 to 56 percent this year. "New destination states" are those where immigration from Latin America is most recent, such as Georgia, North Carolina and Pennsylvania.
States that have long had Hispanic communities, such as New York, Florida and California, showed a tinier fall, from 68 percent last year to 66 percent this year.
In the "new destination" states, about half a million migrants have stopped sending money home, according to the IDB study.
Miami-based public opinion researcher Sergio Bendixen, who carried out the survey, says that the Mexicans in states such as Georgia don't feel welcome and face an uncertain future.
"They feel alienated. They feel unprotected," Bendixen says.
His sample of 900 subjects included 100 from Georgia. Interview subjects said they felt abused, exploited and discriminated against. "People in states like Georgia don't want them there," Bendixen says.
"They'd never tried to close the doors so much, [as] in the case of the car tag, as they have now," said Zayda Zavala, 26, as she worked at La Suprema Bakery in Marietta. "People don't want to drive." . . .
You can read the complete AJC article here.
Posted by John at 5:29 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBackQuote of the Day for Friday, September 14, 2007
 |
|
September 13, 2007
Quote of the Day for Thursday, September 13, 2007
 |
|
September 12, 2007
Quote of the Day for Wednesday, September 12, 2007
 |
|
September 11, 2007
Quote of the Day for Tuesday, September 11, 2007
 |
|
September 10, 2007
China Invests in Illinois
According to Norman Li, Managing Director of Illinois's Hong King-based Far East Office, more than fifty Illinois firms have been funded by Chinese companies. Sectors of investment include industrial companies, consumer goods, and logistics. [Source: China Daily]
Posted by John at 4:47 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBackChange, Change, Change for U.S. Business
A rapidly changing job market is the result of rapid change among employers. Chris Zook, director of global strategy at consulting firm Bain & Co., gives some signposts in an interview with Universia-Knowledge@Wharton:
Bain conducted an extensive analysis of change in the Fortune 500 over the past two decades. We found that 153 of the top 500 companies in 1994 either ended up in bankruptcy or were acquired and integrated into another company. An additional 130 had made fundamental changes in their core strategy. Only one in three survived intact.
Posted by John at 4:32 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBackOverall, the facts are quite sobering:
--Only 1 in 10 companies achieve sustainable growth over a 10-year period.
--Business life spans have plummeted to an average of 14 years.
--CEOs are leaving their jobs twice as often as in previous decades, with today’s average tenure only four years.
--The average period an investor holds a share of common stock has decreased from about eight years to eight months.
--Market leaders are more quickly losing their lead positions.
--Product lifecycles in many industries have shrunk by 70% or more.
In the next decade, we expect the survival rate to approach only one-in-four, as major global forces accelerate the pace of change. . .
. . . Three decades ago, only about 20% of industries could be described as turbulent. Today we estimate it to be 62% . . .
Quote of the Day for Monday, September 10, 2007
 |
|
September 9, 2007
A Swirling U.S. Job Market
Some interesting facts from U.S. Labor Secretary Elaine Chao:
The U.S. labor force is 153 million people strong. Three traits of the American work force position our nation for tremendous gains in the increasingly competitive 21st century worldwide economy: high productivity, flexibility and mobility.
The mobility and flexibility of America's work force are truly remarkable. Every year, about one-third of U.S. jobs change hands, largely because workers have found better opportunities. Change is the norm in our society and is a primary route to advancement.
America's economy is increasingly a knowledge-based economy. Two-thirds of all the new jobs being created require some kind of post-secondary education. Over the next decade, America will need 3 million health-care professionals and 1.7 million schoolteachers. We will need more than 900,000 engineers, including aerospace, biomedical, civil, computer software, and environmental engineers. We will also need workers in other high-growth industries including nanotechnology, geospatial technology, and the life sciences, to name a few. . . .
If Chao's statistics are correct--and I have no reason to dispute them--then the number of jobs which changes hands each year roughly equals the entire population of South Korea. It's one statistic which makes it easy to understand why our economy can produce tremendous innovation, economic opportunity, and anxiety among many workers simultaneously.
Chao's complete commentary can be found here.
Posted by John at 9:00 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBackThe Power of 1%
Mark Penn, CEO of Burson-Marsteller, has just released Microtrends: The Small Forces Behind Tomorrow's Big Changes. I was attracted to the book by an introductory summary (pdf) you can find at ChangeThis.com:
. . . small choices have redefined society. We used to live in the “Ford economy,” where workers created one black car, over and over, for thousands of consumers. Now we live in the “Starbucks economy,” where workers create thousands of different cups of coffee, for individual customers.
That explosion of choice has, in turn, created hundreds of small, intense communities defining themselves in new ways. So now, we can no longer understand the world in terms of a few megaforces sweeping us all along. Rather, society is being pushed and pulled by “microtrends”—small, under-the-radar forces that can involve as little as 1 percent of the population.
In fact, by the time a trend hits 1 percent, it is ready to spawn a hit movie, create a political movement, or even start a war. In today’s mass societies, it takes only 1 percent of people making a dedicated choice—contrary to the mainstream’s choice—to change the world.
Highlighted below are just a few examples.
Any marketing guru or political consultant will say the key to communications is short, short, short. Bumper sticker messages. You can’t expect people to listen for more than 8 seconds. Well, slow down. As the chapter on Long Attention Spanners shows, there is a serious and growing group of people who are tired of the sound bite. They like to wrap themselves in ideas and activities that take commitment. They will engage you at length, if you respect their interests and concerns. So, shrink it all up at your peril.
Another example is Extreme Commuters. Forecasters of a decade or so ago said we’d all be telecommuting by now, with the workplace virtually defunct. Well, some people telecommute, but an equal number (about the 1 percent bullseye) travel more than 90 minutes each way to get to work. That has huge implications for traffic, gas prices, and car design—not to mention employers’ plans for where to locate. If you want to make smart business decisions, look at the different, intense ways people are making choices about their lives.
And the phenomenon is hardly limited to the U.S. Vietnam once fought a war in defense of Communism, and the Communists still rule. But you know what? Vietnam may now be the #1 entrepreneurial hotspot on earth. Microtrends is about the niching of society. People are self-defining in smaller and smaller ways, and neither “gut sense” nor conventional wisdom will likely get you to the truth. . . .
Penn's book looks like one I need to have on my list.
Posted by John at 6:49 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBackQuote fo the Day for Sunday, September 9, 2007
 |
|
September 8, 2007
Quote of the Day for Saturday, September 8, 2007
 |
|
September 7, 2007
China's Labor Pool Geting Shallower
From the Christian Science Monitor's "To China's migrants: Stay west, young man":
Posted by John at 5:39 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack. . . More than half of employers in Guangzhou and surrounding cities in the Pearl River Delta reported that they were 25 percent short of their full employment goal last year, according to a recent study by the Ministry of Labor and Social Security. A study earlier this year by the State Council, China's cabinet, found that 74 percent of the villages surveyed no longer had any surplus laborers available to work in distant cities.
"We cannot say that the pool of labor is drying up, but it is dramatically reduced," says Cai Fang, head of the Institute of Population and Labor Economics at the China Academy of Social Sciences. "The problem is that many Chinese companies got used to using low-cost labor. With incremental labor shortages and increasing wages some of them can no longer compete. There will be a large and serious adjustment for these enterprises." . . .
Quote of the Day for Friday, September 7, 2007
 |
|
September 6, 2007
If the Labor Can't Come to Me, I'll Just Go to the Labor
Farming since he was a teenager, Mr. Scaroni, 50, built a $50-million business growing lettuce and broccoli in California’s Imperial Valley, relying on the hands of immigrant workers, most of them Mexicans and many probably in the United States illegally.
But early last year he began shifting part of his operation to rented fields here. Now some 500 Mexicans tend his crops in Mexico, where they run no risk of deportation.
“I’m as American red-blood as it gets,” Mr. Scaroni said, “but I’m tired of fighting the fight on the immigration issue.” . . .
Western Growers, an association representing farmers in California and Arizona, conducted an informal telephone survey of its members in the spring. Twelve large agribusinesses that acknowledged having operations in Mexico reported a total of 11,000 workers here.
“It seems there is a bigger rush to Mexico and elsewhere,” said Tom Nassif, the Western Growers president, who said Americans were also farming in countries in Central America.
Precise statistics are not readily available on American farming in Mexico, because growers seek to maintain a low profile for their operations abroad. But Senator Dianne Feinstein, the California Democrat, displayed a map on the Senate floor in July locating more than 46,000 acres that American growers are cultivating in just two Mexican states, Guanajuato and Baja California. . . .
Thanks for Latino Pundit for the pointer.
Posted by John at 5:39 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBackQuote of the Day for Thursday, September 6, 2007
 |
|
September 5, 2007
America in Decline?
Alan W. Dowd convincingly disputes the notion in The American:
. . . .Just consider what the U.S. economy has lost since 9/11. One estimate posited that by the end of 2003 the U.S. could have lost as much as $500 billion dollars in GDP as a result of 9/11. That’s roughly the size of the entire Iranian economy or half the Canadian economy.
As to Katrina, Congress poured $122 billion into the vast disaster area—and that was just in the 12 months immediately following the storm.
None of this was budgeted or foreseen, yet the U.S. economy dusted itself off and soldiered on. . . .
Read Dowd's entire commentary here.
Posted by John at 3:47 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBackQuote of the Day for Wednesday, September 5, 2007
 |
|