[Fwd: Online Community Investing Database Unveiled]

This post transferred from the cdb-l mailing list

I'm afraid to get involved in this because I can smell the torches aiming but I must agree with Don Hinkle.

There is what we have, there is what we want and there is what we are likely to achieve. These are not going to ever be the same. We use our energy better to aim for what we
are likely to achieve and always keep in mind what we want. But if you aim for the stars you may end up with nothing and actually lose ground from what we have. Which is to
say, a failed attempt to acquire what we want may doom efforts to even get what we can achieve.

Besides, there is no consensus on what we want, much less what we truly need. Not everyone is seeking the utopian ideal of a self-contained, self-controlled community. Not
everyone wants that, including some non-corporate types. The "community" has its drawbacks as well.

What do we truly expect a large (or even small) population to be able to agree upon and work toward? It is better, I think, to steer the ship downstream than paddle up it.




"Donald R. Hinkle" wrote:

> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> Subject: Re: Online Community Investing Database Unveiled
> Date: Mon, 07 Jun 1999 13:51:21 -0400
> From: "Donald R. Hinkle" <hinkled@dvcrf.com>
> Organization: Delaware Valley Community Reinvestment Fund
> To: shuman@igc.org
> References: <v0311070ab363406d64d9@[206.139.117.137]> <3740320E.547C4586@dvcrf.com> <37580635.E1004F62@igc.org> <375BEED1.58FAC06A@dvcrf.com> <375BFFA1.D0E2B837@igc.org>
>
> > This is good news for community economics. Why resist it?
> >
>
> I'm not resisting it, and I hate to always carry the torch for real world change versus
> theory and pipe-dreams. I'm just looking for a scale example of an industry actually turning
> in these directions......not unapplied macro-economic theory, and not small, unreplicated
> case studies. Your analysis of the food distribution industry is good, but its being ignored
> by the sector. If it all works so well, where are the 100,000 new community businesses
> revolutionizing a particular industry sector.....I'd like to finance them.
>
> You are right, much of our industry structure is not based on the real economics of scale,
> rather on ego and presumed economies, but they do exist and they do self-perpetuate,
> therefore we need to acknowledge that and incorporate it into our world-view for today.
>
> Of course the internet is a great example of both consolidation and small scale
> effectiveness, and without a pre-existing structure, both are flourishing. Great News. But
> will our existing industry sectors really restructure in the ways you would like? let alone
> in the way that seems rational from an macro-economic or social point of view? I think not.
> Our economic villages today consist of interstate regions with millions of people, not
> individual neighborhoods.
>
> --
> Donald R. Hinkle
> Director, Community Resources Group
> The Reinvestment Fund
> 718 Arch Street, Suite 300N
> Philadelphia, PA 19106
> Voice: 215-925-1130 x212
> Fax: 215-923-4764

--
Paul Swider
PRIDE Africa
prideafrica@erols.com
703-519-7778
100 N. Pitt St.
Suite 202
Alexandria, Va. 22314




This post transferred from the cdb-l mailing list

To Paul and Don,

The only torch I carry is one aimed at finding a path of affordable, equitable, and sustainable community development. When I make the case that economies of scale of
production are dropping and community-scale industries spreading, I'm not saying what I HOPE will happen. It IS happening. The question is whether community financiers will
reform their own global-is-better thinking to provide them with necessary capital to expand and accelerate the rate of adoption.

My example of the dropping economy of scale of food production is hardly being ignored by the sector. What you're seeing in food, as in many other sectors, is that one part of
the sector is merging, going global, and finding a welcome consumer base, while another part of the sector is shrinking, going local, and also finding a welcome consumer base.
The organic food market, which often emphasizes local production and local consumption, has been growing spectacularly in recent years.

"If it all works so well," Don asks, "where are the 100,000 new community businesses revolutionizing a particular industry sector.....I'd like to finance them." Funny you
should ask. I'm actually completing a directory of sustainable-communities organizations (some 5,000 of them), many of which are aimed at doing just that. If I added up the
number of businesses involved in community food, recycling, reusing, refrabricating, local banking, energy conserving/producing, water producing/conserving, flexible
manufacturing networks, I'm sure the total would easily exceed 100,000. If you're not finding them in your own community, I'd argue, you're not looking hard enough.

I'm not advocating community autarky. What I'm saying is that a community ought to pursue self-reliance as far as its cost-effective, because it minimizes its vulnerability to
events outside its control, maximizes the local economic multiplier, pumps up the municipal tax base, and imparts greater skills and excitement on behalf of the citizenry. Yes,
imports and exports still occur, but they are no longer the driving force for development. Once we accept this goal, priorities for finance and policy become clearer.

- A priority for community finance is to look hard to find locally owned, import-replacing investment opportunities.

- A priority for public policy is to help identify those opportunities, since many individual bankers/lenders clearly don't have the time or ability to find them. A further
priority is to desubsidize the 101 white elephants (highways, shopping malls, casinos, stadiums, football teams, Toyota plants, etc.) that state and local governments are
wasting their money on today, most of which have no local ownership and no import-replacing character.

Right now, all kinds of subsidies -- including national laws concerning banking, insurance, taxation, trade, corporations -- favor export-oriented, nonlocal development.
These are the kinds of distortions that convince even community developers to think globally, despite the profound costs to the poor, workers, and the environment. Rather than
decrying true community development as "utopian," wouldn't we be better off removing market barriers that stand in its way?

-- Michael Shuman (Village Foundation)



Paul Swider wrote:

> I'm afraid to get involved in this because I can smell the torches aiming but I must agree with Don Hinkle.
>
> There is what we have, there is what we want and there is what we are likely to achieve. These are not going to ever be the same. We use our energy better to aim for what we
> are likely to achieve and always keep in mind what we want. But if you aim for the stars you may end up with nothing and actually lose ground from what we have. Which is to
> say, a failed attempt to acquire what we want may doom efforts to even get what we can achieve.
>
> Besides, there is no consensus on what we want, much less what we truly need. Not everyone is seeking the utopian ideal of a self-contained, self-controlled community. Not
> everyone wants that, including some non-corporate types. The "community" has its drawbacks as well.
>
> What do we truly expect a large (or even small) population to be able to agree upon and work toward? It is better, I think, to steer the ship downstream than paddle up it.
>
> "Donald R. Hinkle" wrote:
>
> > ------------------------------------------------------------------------
> >
> > Subject: Re: Online Community Investing Database Unveiled
> > Date: Mon, 07 Jun 1999 13:51:21 -0400
> > From: "Donald R. Hinkle" <hinkled@dvcrf.com>
> > Organization: Delaware Valley Community Reinvestment Fund
> > To: shuman@igc.org
> > References: <v0311070ab363406d64d9@[206.139.117.137]> <3740320E.547C4586@dvcrf.com> <37580635.E1004F62@igc.org> <375BEED1.58FAC06A@dvcrf.com> <375BFFA1.D0E2B837@igc.org>
> >
> > > This is good news for community economics. Why resist it?
> > >
> >
> > I'm not resisting it, and I hate to always carry the torch for real world change versus
> > theory and pipe-dreams. I'm just looking for a scale example of an industry actually turning
> > in these directions......not unapplied macro-economic theory, and not small, unreplicated
> > case studies. Your analysis of the food distribution industry is good, but its being ignored
> > by the sector. If it all works so well, where are the 100,000 new community businesses
> > revolutionizing a particular industry sector.....I'd like to finance them.
> >
> > You are right, much of our industry structure is not based on the real economics of scale,
> > rather on ego and presumed economies, but they do exist and they do self-perpetuate,
> > therefore we need to acknowledge that and incorporate it into our world-view for today.
> >
> > Of course the internet is a great example of both consolidation and small scale
> > effectiveness, and without a pre-existing structure, both are flourishing. Great News. But
> > will our existing industry sectors really restructure in the ways you would like? let alone
> > in the way that seems rational from an macro-economic or social point of view? I think not.
> > Our economic villages today consist of interstate regions with millions of people, not
> > individual neighborhoods.
> >
> > --
> > Donald R. Hinkle
> > Director, Community Resources Group
> > The Reinvestment Fund
> > 718 Arch Street, Suite 300N
> > Philadelphia, PA 19106
> > Voice: 215-925-1130 x212
> > Fax: 215-923-4764



This post transferred from the cdb-l mailing list

Michael,

Community financiers -- and any financier, for that matter -- will reform or rethink whatever you can put in front of them that shows a real return. The market is not as hidebound
as some think and not nearly as much so as it once was. There is a lot of money in the world chasing a good place to grow and finding little. True, that money is not looking hard
enough but if you or anyone else can show that the math works, the money will follow.

The idea of somehow insulating a community from outside forces is, I think, shortsighted. I mean that in a literal sense, not as an insult. There is no way to insulate an individual
or any collection of individuals. Indeed, the lesson of failed isolationism (economic or political) is that the insulation only increases the eventual impact from a downfall.
Building walls never works.

I must agree with you, however, on the point of subsidies and the distortion they effect on the economy. However, I think the best way to attack that issue is to attack it, not to
create a subsystem within a community that seeks to avoid the consequence. There are all kinds of distorting economic effects, from primary and secondary subsidies to the tertiary
variety in the form of foreign policy. But taking care of my own backyard might make my backyard nice (temporarily, I maintain) but it does nothing for the overall problems that
remain unsolved and unaddressed. Community issues are definnitely connected to global issues.

My point, which I did not express as clearly as I would have liked, is that free-market economics, for all its many warts, most nearly approximates human nature. The (relative)
success and worldwide attractiveness of capitalism is an outgrowth of this. People have to be taught to think in terms of the community and they forget as soon as they get a chance
to feather their own nests; they take care of themselves instinctively. This may sound like a cynical view but I don't look at it that way. It is a natural circumstance, like the
tides and the winds, and we should embrace it and work with it, not try to defeat it. I have no objection to community investments and am, after a fashion, involved in similar
activities. I merely suggest that focusing too narrowly on the community creates a form of subsidy or distortion just as damaging as any other. No one can confine the market to any
place or time so why try?

Investment will flow where it will grow. The only problem then is management and communication.

--
Paul Swider
PRIDE Africa
prideafrica@erols.com
703-519-7778
100 N. Pitt St.
Suite 202
Alexandria, Va. 22314



Michael Shuman wrote:

> To Paul and Don,
>
> The only torch I carry is one aimed at finding a path of affordable, equitable, and sustainable community development. When I make the case that economies of scale of
> production are dropping and community-scale industries spreading, I'm not saying what I HOPE will happen. It IS happening. The question is whether community financiers will
> reform their own global-is-better thinking to provide them with necessary capital to expand and accelerate the rate of adoption.
>
> My example of the dropping economy of scale of food production is hardly being ignored by the sector. What you're seeing in food, as in many other sectors, is that one part of
> the sector is merging, going global, and finding a welcome consumer base, while another part of the sector is shrinking, going local, and also finding a welcome consumer base.
> The organic food market, which often emphasizes local production and local consumption, has been growing spectacularly in recent years.
>
> "If it all works so well," Don asks, "where are the 100,000 new community businesses revolutionizing a particular industry sector.....I'd like to finance them." Funny you
> should ask. I'm actually completing a directory of sustainable-communities organizations (some 5,000 of them), many of which are aimed at doing just that. If I added up the
> number of businesses involved in community food, recycling, reusing, refrabricating, local banking, energy conserving/producing, water producing/conserving, flexible
> manufacturing networks, I'm sure the total would easily exceed 100,000. If you're not finding them in your own community, I'd argue, you're not looking hard enough.
>
> I'm not advocating community autarky. What I'm saying is that a community ought to pursue self-reliance as far as its cost-effective, because it minimizes its vulnerability to
> events outside its control, maximizes the local economic multiplier, pumps up the municipal tax base, and imparts greater skills and excitement on behalf of the citizenry. Yes,
> imports and exports still occur, but they are no longer the driving force for development. Once we accept this goal, priorities for finance and policy become clearer.
>
> - A priority for community finance is to look hard to find locally owned, import-replacing investment opportunities.
>
> - A priority for public policy is to help identify those opportunities, since many individual bankers/lenders clearly don't have the time or ability to find them. A further
> priority is to desubsidize the 101 white elephants (highways, shopping malls, casinos, stadiums, football teams, Toyota plants, etc.) that state and local governments are
> wasting their money on today, most of which have no local ownership and no import-replacing character.
>
> Right now, all kinds of subsidies -- including national laws concerning banking, insurance, taxation, trade, corporations -- favor export-oriented, nonlocal development.
> These are the kinds of distortions that convince even community developers to think globally, despite the profound costs to the poor, workers, and the environment. Rather than
> decrying true community development as "utopian," wouldn't we be better off removing market barriers that stand in its way?
>
> -- Michael Shuman (Village Foundation)
>
> Paul Swider wrote:
>
> > I'm afraid to get involved in this because I can smell the torches aiming but I must agree with Don Hinkle.
> >
> > There is what we have, there is what we want and there is what we are likely to achieve. These are not going to ever be the same. We use our energy better to aim for what we
> > are likely to achieve and always keep in mind what we want. But if you aim for the stars you may end up with nothing and actually lose ground from what we have. Which is to
> > say, a failed attempt to acquire what we want may doom efforts to even get what we can achieve.
> >
> > Besides, there is no consensus on what we want, much less what we truly need. Not everyone is seeking the utopian ideal of a self-contained, self-controlled community. Not
> > everyone wants that, including some non-corporate types. The "community" has its drawbacks as well.
> >
> > What do we truly expect a large (or even small) population to be able to agree upon and work toward? It is better, I think, to steer the ship downstream than paddle up it.
> >
> > "Donald R. Hinkle" wrote:
> >
> > > ------------------------------------------------------------------------
> > >
> > > Subject: Re: Online Community Investing Database Unveiled
> > > Date: Mon, 07 Jun 1999 13:51:21 -0400
> > > From: "Donald R. Hinkle" <hinkled@dvcrf.com>
> > > Organization: Delaware Valley Community Reinvestment Fund
> > > To: shuman@igc.org
> > > References: <v0311070ab363406d64d9@[206.139.117.137]> <3740320E.547C4586@dvcrf.com> <37580635.E1004F62@igc.org> <375BEED1.58FAC06A@dvcrf.com> <375BFFA1.D0E2B837@igc.org>
> > >
> > > > This is good news for community economics. Why resist it?
> > > >
> > >
> > > I'm not resisting it, and I hate to always carry the torch for real world change versus
> > > theory and pipe-dreams. I'm just looking for a scale example of an industry actually turning
> > > in these directions......not unapplied macro-economic theory, and not small, unreplicated
> > > case studies. Your analysis of the food distribution industry is good, but its being ignored
> > > by the sector. If it all works so well, where are the 100,000 new community businesses
> > > revolutionizing a particular industry sector.....I'd like to finance them.
> > >
> > > You are right, much of our industry structure is not based on the real economics of scale,
> > > rather on ego and presumed economies, but they do exist and they do self-perpetuate,
> > > therefore we need to acknowledge that and incorporate it into our world-view for today.
> > >
> > > Of course the internet is a great example of both consolidation and small scale
> > > effectiveness, and without a pre-existing structure, both are flourishing. Great News. But
> > > will our existing industry sectors really restructure in the ways you would like? let alone
> > > in the way that seems rational from an macro-economic or social point of view? I think not.
> > > Our economic villages today consist of interstate regions with millions of people, not
> > > individual neighborhoods.
> > >
> > > --
> > > Donald R. Hinkle
> > > Director, Community Resources Group
> > > The Reinvestment Fund
> > > 718 Arch Street, Suite 300N
> > > Philadelphia, PA 19106
> > > Voice: 215-925-1130 x212
> > > Fax: 215-923-4764






This post transferred from the cdb-l mailing list

Excellently put!
WAHOO!


Paul Swider wrote:

> Michael,
>
> Community financiers -- and any financier, for that matter -- will reform or rethink whatever you can put in front of them that shows a real return. The market is not as hidebound
> as some think and not nearly as much so as it once was. There is a lot of money in the world chasing a good place to grow and finding little. True, that money is not looking hard
> enough but if you or anyone else can show that the math works, the money will follow.
>
> The idea of somehow insulating a community from outside forces is, I think, shortsighted. I mean that in a literal sense, not as an insult. There is no way to insulate an individual
> or any collection of individuals. Indeed, the lesson of failed isolationism (economic or political) is that the insulation only increases the eventual impact from a downfall.
> Building walls never works.
>
> I must agree with you, however, on the point of subsidies and the distortion they effect on the economy. However, I think the best way to attack that issue is to attack it, not to
> create a subsystem within a community that seeks to avoid the consequence. There are all kinds of distorting economic effects, from primary and secondary subsidies to the tertiary
> variety in the form of foreign policy. But taking care of my own backyard might make my backyard nice (temporarily, I maintain) but it does nothing for the overall problems that
> remain unsolved and unaddressed. Community issues are definnitely connected to global issues.
>
> My point, which I did not express as clearly as I would have liked, is that free-market economics, for all its many warts, most nearly approximates human nature. The (relative)
> success and worldwide attractiveness of capitalism is an outgrowth of this. People have to be taught to think in terms of the community and they forget as soon as they get a chance
> to feather their own nests; they take care of themselves instinctively. This may sound like a cynical view but I don't look at it that way. It is a natural circumstance, like the
> tides and the winds, and we should embrace it and work with it, not try to defeat it. I have no objection to community investments and am, after a fashion, involved in similar
> activities. I merely suggest that focusing too narrowly on the community creates a form of subsidy or distortion just as damaging as any other. No one can confine the market to any
> place or time so why try?
>
> Investment will flow where it will grow. The only problem then is management and communication.
>
> --
> Paul Swider
> PRIDE Africa
> prideafrica@erols.com
> 703-519-7778
> 100 N. Pitt St.
> Suite 202
> Alexandria, Va. 22314
>
> Michael Shuman wrote:
>
> > To Paul and Don,
> >
> > The only torch I carry is one aimed at finding a path of affordable, equitable, and sustainable community development. When I make the case that economies of scale of
> > production are dropping and community-scale industries spreading, I'm not saying what I HOPE will happen. It IS happening. The question is whether community financiers will
> > reform their own global-is-better thinking to provide them with necessary capital to expand and accelerate the rate of adoption.
> >
> > My example of the dropping economy of scale of food production is hardly being ignored by the sector. What you're seeing in food, as in many other sectors, is that one part of
> > the sector is merging, going global, and finding a welcome consumer base, while another part of the sector is shrinking, going local, and also finding a welcome consumer base.
> > The organic food market, which often emphasizes local production and local consumption, has been growing spectacularly in recent years.
> >
> > "If it all works so well," Don asks, "where are the 100,000 new community businesses revolutionizing a particular industry sector.....I'd like to finance them." Funny you
> > should ask. I'm actually completing a directory of sustainable-communities organizations (some 5,000 of them), many of which are aimed at doing just that. If I added up the
> > number of businesses involved in community food, recycling, reusing, refrabricating, local banking, energy conserving/producing, water producing/conserving, flexible
> > manufacturing networks, I'm sure the total would easily exceed 100,000. If you're not finding them in your own community, I'd argue, you're not looking hard enough.
> >
> > I'm not advocating community autarky. What I'm saying is that a community ought to pursue self-reliance as far as its cost-effective, because it minimizes its vulnerability to
> > events outside its control, maximizes the local economic multiplier, pumps up the municipal tax base, and imparts greater skills and excitement on behalf of the citizenry. Yes,
> > imports and exports still occur, but they are no longer the driving force for development. Once we accept this goal, priorities for finance and policy become clearer.
> >
> > - A priority for community finance is to look hard to find locally owned, import-replacing investment opportunities.
> >
> > - A priority for public policy is to help identify those opportunities, since many individual bankers/lenders clearly don't have the time or ability to find them. A further
> > priority is to desubsidize the 101 white elephants (highways, shopping malls, casinos, stadiums, football teams, Toyota plants, etc.) that state and local governments are
> > wasting their money on today, most of which have no local ownership and no import-replacing character.
> >
> > Right now, all kinds of subsidies -- including national laws concerning banking, insurance, taxation, trade, corporations -- favor export-oriented, nonlocal development.
> > These are the kinds of distortions that convince even community developers to think globally, despite the profound costs to the poor, workers, and the environment. Rather than
> > decrying true community development as "utopian," wouldn't we be better off removing market barriers that stand in its way?
> >
> > -- Michael Shuman (Village Foundation)
> >
> > Paul Swider wrote:
> >
> > > I'm afraid to get involved in this because I can smell the torches aiming but I must agree with Don Hinkle.
> > >
> > > There is what we have, there is what we want and there is what we are likely to achieve. These are not going to ever be the same. We use our energy better to aim for what we
> > > are likely to achieve and always keep in mind what we want. But if you aim for the stars you may end up with nothing and actually lose ground from what we have. Which is to
> > > say, a failed attempt to acquire what we want may doom efforts to even get what we can achieve.
> > >
> > > Besides, there is no consensus on what we want, much less what we truly need. Not everyone is seeking the utopian ideal of a self-contained, self-controlled community. Not
> > > everyone wants that, including some non-corporate types. The "community" has its drawbacks as well.
> > >
> > > What do we truly expect a large (or even small) population to be able to agree upon and work toward? It is better, I think, to steer the ship downstream than paddle up it.
> > >
> > > "Donald R. Hinkle" wrote:
> > >
> > > > ------------------------------------------------------------------------
> > > >
> > > > Subject: Re: Online Community Investing Database Unveiled
> > > > Date: Mon, 07 Jun 1999 13:51:21 -0400
> > > > From: "Donald R. Hinkle" <hinkled@dvcrf.com>
> > > > Organization: Delaware Valley Community Reinvestment Fund
> > > > To: shuman@igc.org
> > > > References: <v0311070ab363406d64d9@[206.139.117.137]> <3740320E.547C4586@dvcrf.com> <37580635.E1004F62@igc.org> <375BEED1.58FAC06A@dvcrf.com> <375BFFA1.D0E2B837@igc.org>
> > > >
> > > > > This is good news for community economics. Why resist it?
> > > > >
> > > >
> > > > I'm not resisting it, and I hate to always carry the torch for real world change versus
> > > > theory and pipe-dreams. I'm just looking for a scale example of an industry actually turning
> > > > in these directions......not unapplied macro-economic theory, and not small, unreplicated
> > > > case studies. Your analysis of the food distribution industry is good, but its being ignored
> > > > by the sector. If it all works so well, where are the 100,000 new community businesses
> > > > revolutionizing a particular industry sector.....I'd like to finance them.
> > > >
> > > > You are right, much of our industry structure is not based on the real economics of scale,
> > > > rather on ego and presumed economies, but they do exist and they do self-perpetuate,
> > > > therefore we need to acknowledge that and incorporate it into our world-view for today.
> > > >
> > > > Of course the internet is a great example of both consolidation and small scale
> > > > effectiveness, and without a pre-existing structure, both are flourishing. Great News. But
> > > > will our existing industry sectors really restructure in the ways you would like? let alone
> > > > in the way that seems rational from an macro-economic or social point of view? I think not.
> > > > Our economic villages today consist of interstate regions with millions of people, not
> > > > individual neighborhoods.
> > > >
> > > > --
> > > > Donald R. Hinkle
> > > > Director, Community Resources Group
> > > > The Reinvestment Fund
> > > > 718 Arch Street, Suite 300N
> > > > Philadelphia, PA 19106
> > > > Voice: 215-925-1130 x212
> > > > Fax: 215-923-4764

--
Donald R. Hinkle
Director, Community Resources Group
The Reinvestment Fund
718 Arch Street, Suite 300N
Philadelphia, PA 19106
Voice: 215-925-1130 x212
Fax: 215-923-4764




This post transferred from the cdb-l mailing list

At 9:19 AM -0400 6/8/99, Paul Swider wrote:
PS:
>My point, which I did not express as clearly as I would have liked, is
>that free-market economics, for all its many warts, most nearly
>approximates human nature.
BE:
Your point is just wrong. I doubt if there is one person on this list,
including you, who puts money at the top of her or his priorities. Yet
that is what economic market theory is based on -- homo econimicus. Most
of us have higher values and more basic needs than money. How many mothers
do you know that eat their children when hungry. Yet that is what the
market economists would tell us to do. "Belonging" is a more basic need
than physical existence. Human nature is not in harmony with free-market
economics. So thinking outside the economic box is where it's at.

PS:
>if you or anyone else can show that the math works, the money will follow.
BE:
Yes, for drugs, prostitution, and the sale of babies.

PS:
>The idea of somehow insulating a community from outside forces is, I
>think, >shortsighted. ...
>Building walls never works.
BE:
Living in community does not mean builing walls or isolating oneself. It
means having family and friends and leaving them whenever you want to join
another community. Community provides everyone in it a sense of belonging.
It meets an important human need that globalization can't meet, and even
nationalism distorts. I'm sure even you have some form of community that
you put above money and free=market economics. If you don nourish that you
are a lost soul.
I feel that you are misssing the purpose of life.

************************************************** *******
The people are not the problems, they are the answers;
If the people lead the leaders will follow.

Bill Ellis
TRANET
PO BOX 567
Rangeley ME 04970-0567 USA
(207)864-3784
URL: http://www.nonviolence.org/tranet/
************************************************** **




This post transferred from the cdb-l mailing list

To Paul Swider and Donald Hinkle (again):

Paul, if "any financier...will reform or rethink whatever you can put in front of them that shows a real return," much of this listserve would be unnecessary. We all know the familiar
litany of barriers to rational assessment by financiers: difficulty in thinking about loans or investments under $50,000; reluctance to take on new ("unproven") entrepreneurs with new
("unproven") industries; a preference for the highest rate of return rather than a positive rate; and still, in some deplorable instances, raw sexism and racism. The job of people like
us, as I see it, is to help community financiers become more rational.

Don, I'm glad TRF "stands ready (and proactively searches for) community bsuinesses needing finance...." You also are, I'm sure, keenly aware of how unusual that is. Even your own
efforts, however, are necessarily constrained by your staff resources. And many state-of-the-art community-based businesses, like wind-electric production, are inherently unfamiliar
even to most diligent financier. My earlier point was simply that just because people haven't come to you with good community-scale business plans doesn't mean that they don't exist
or, more importantly, can't exist.

I want to emphasize again that all the projects I mentioned concerning community-level production -- of food, water, energy, materials, even goods through flexible manufacturing
networks -- are not only economic, they are happening. But not enough of them, not in enough places, not with sufficient ambition. Again, this is where the financial community could
help.

Donald, you're apparently quite skeptical about community ownership, but the examples you cite are hardly dispositive. Given that there are 60,000+ cooperatives, 2,500
majority-ESOP-owned companies, and innumerable nonprofits (consituting 6.5% of the U.S. economy) that are operating quite successfully, it seems worth while to maintain a more open
mind.

I can appreciate that you don't want to finance dumb, poorly thought through community-based projects. I wouldn't either. I'm sure conventional bankers have similar stories of dumb,
poorly thought through projects by S&L pirates and petro-dollar recyclers. The world is full of stupidity -- let's not pretend that its presence bears any relationship to scale or
local ownership.

Paul, you're confusing protectionism and isolationism with a rational, freely-chosen preference to buy, sell, hire, invest, and market locally. I have no taste for the former either.
But if people in a community exercise their rights as consumers to buy local, as sellers to use local inputs, as investors to build local -- all in the name of strengthening the
community -- then they hardly are creating "a form of subsidy or distortion just as damaging as any other." The market economics you embrace rightly makes consumer choice the
centerpiece, and if consumer choices prefer to go local, why convince them otherwise? Especially when local preferences benefit the community economy far more than place-blind
preferences. Again, every inidividual choice to buy, invest, and own local tends to reduce local vulnerability, pump up the economic multiplier, build up the local tax base, and
capture positive externalities of production (like skill-building and self-esteem).

Promoting local preferences has nothing to do with erecting absolute barriers to trade. In fact, it's a prerequisite for any healthy vision of globalization. As partners find in a
good marriage, communities are better off relating to one another from positions of relative independence and strength rather than mutual vulnerability and fear. A community that is
relatively self-reliant can THEN relate globally, whether through trade, aid, technology exchange, sister cities, human-right initiatives, and 1001 more ambitious municipal foreign
policies. It's a neoliberal myth that the only way to be globally minded is to submit carelessly to vulnerability-inducing trade.

-- Michael Shuman (Village Foundation)

Paul Swider wrote:

> Michael,
>
> Community financiers -- and any financier, for that matter -- will reform or rethink whatever you can put in front of them that shows a real return. The market is not as hidebound
> as some think and not nearly as much so as it once was. There is a lot of money in the world chasing a good place to grow and finding little. True, that money is not looking hard
> enough but if you or anyone else can show that the math works, the money will follow.
>
> The idea of somehow insulating a community from outside forces is, I think, shortsighted. I mean that in a literal sense, not as an insult. There is no way to insulate an individual
> or any collection of individuals. Indeed, the lesson of failed isolationism (economic or political) is that the insulation only increases the eventual impact from a downfall.
> Building walls never works.
>
> I must agree with you, however, on the point of subsidies and the distortion they effect on the economy. However, I think the best way to attack that issue is to attack it, not to
> create a subsystem within a community that seeks to avoid the consequence. There are all kinds of distorting economic effects, from primary and secondary subsidies to the tertiary
> variety in the form of foreign policy. But taking care of my own backyard might make my backyard nice (temporarily, I maintain) but it does nothing for the overall problems that
> remain unsolved and unaddressed. Community issues are definnitely connected to global issues.
>
> My point, which I did not express as clearly as I would have liked, is that free-market economics, for all its many warts, most nearly approximates human nature. The (relative)
> success and worldwide attractiveness of capitalism is an outgrowth of this. People have to be taught to think in terms of the community and they forget as soon as they get a chance
> to feather their own nests; they take care of themselves instinctively. This may sound like a cynical view but I don't look at it that way. It is a natural circumstance, like the
> tides and the winds, and we should embrace it and work with it, not try to defeat it. I have no objection to community investments and am, after a fashion, involved in similar
> activities. I merely suggest that focusing too narrowly on the community creates a form of subsidy or distortion just as damaging as any other. No one can confine the market to any
> place or time so why try?
>
> Investment will flow where it will grow. The only problem then is management and communication.



This post transferred from the cdb-l mailing list

Michael,

I never suggested we "convince" consumers to do anything. I suggest the exact opposite.

I also never suggested anyone should "submit carelessly to vulnerability-inducing trade." But the free market is, inexorably, a powerful crucible in which to test a business. Surviving that
test is the surest cure for vulnerability.

I don't quarrel with much that you say. I am a bit uneasy about the way you use the term "preference." Investors do have a preference for the highest return but some of them calculate that
in the long term, which, I think, is the kind of investment you prefer. Me too. Those are the investors communities need to court. They are the ones I court.

In terms of consumer preference, I maintain the argument is the same as that for financiers: show me the product. Look at the rise of Japanese auto manufacture. Detroit was sluggish and
complacent. The Japanese companies came in with a better, cheaper product, stole the market and forced Detroit to reinvent itself. Consumer choice was the motive factor but only after a
superior product spurred the consumer. All the "Buy American" campaigns in the world could not stop that. The consumer will prefer what benefits the consumer. If the local company ("local"
is a terribly ambiguous term but I think we know what we mean) can provide a better value in terms of price or quality or service or a combination, the rest will take care of itself. And
that -- like the excellent examples of local business successes you mention -- is happening. And always will.

Some of the problem is marketing. Many of the examples you mention provide ROI that is not conventional: it cannot be measured in dollars. How do you market ROI that is calculated in terms
of quality of life? That is a sticky wicket but is not an insurmountable problem. There are success stories there, as well, and you likely know them better than I. It requires some real
creativity, not in the sense of fabrication but in the sense of making a direct connection with the interests and motivations of the prospective client population(s). Such an activity is
difficult because money being a "medium" makes using it as a reference point mathematically easy and convenient. Much more difficult is either putting intangible goods in monetary terms or
making them appeal in another fashion. It is an evolving science.

Paul

Michael Shuman wrote:

> To Paul Swider and Donald Hinkle (again):
>
> Paul, if "any financier...will reform or rethink whatever you can put in front of them that shows a real return," much of this listserve would be unnecessary. We all know the familiar
> litany of barriers to rational assessment by financiers: difficulty in thinking about loans or investments under $50,000; reluctance to take on new ("unproven") entrepreneurs with new
> ("unproven") industries; a preference for the highest rate of return rather than a positive rate; and still, in some deplorable instances, raw sexism and racism. The job of people like
> us, as I see it, is to help community financiers become more rational.
>
> Don, I'm glad TRF "stands ready (and proactively searches for) community bsuinesses needing finance...." You also are, I'm sure, keenly aware of how unusual that is. Even your own
> efforts, however, are necessarily constrained by your staff resources. And many state-of-the-art community-based businesses, like wind-electric production, are inherently unfamiliar
> even to most diligent financier. My earlier point was simply that just because people haven't come to you with good community-scale business plans doesn't mean that they don't exist
> or, more importantly, can't exist.
>
> I want to emphasize again that all the projects I mentioned concerning community-level production -- of food, water, energy, materials, even goods through flexible manufacturing
> networks -- are not only economic, they are happening. But not enough of them, not in enough places, not with sufficient ambition. Again, this is where the financial community could
> help.
>
> Donald, you're apparently quite skeptical about community ownership, but the examples you cite are hardly dispositive. Given that there are 60,000+ cooperatives, 2,500
> majority-ESOP-owned companies, and innumerable nonprofits (consituting 6.5% of the U.S. economy) that are operating quite successfully, it seems worth while to maintain a more open
> mind.
>
> I can appreciate that you don't want to finance dumb, poorly thought through community-based projects. I wouldn't either. I'm sure conventional bankers have similar stories of dumb,
> poorly thought through projects by S&L pirates and petro-dollar recyclers. The world is full of stupidity -- let's not pretend that its presence bears any relationship to scale or
> local ownership.
>
> Paul, you're confusing protectionism and isolationism with a rational, freely-chosen preference to buy, sell, hire, invest, and market locally. I have no taste for the former either.
> But if people in a community exercise their rights as consumers to buy local, as sellers to use local inputs, as investors to build local -- all in the name of strengthening the
> community -- then they hardly are creating "a form of subsidy or distortion just as damaging as any other." The market economics you embrace rightly makes consumer choice the
> centerpiece, and if consumer choices prefer to go local, why convince them otherwise? Especially when local preferences benefit the community economy far more than place-blind
> preferences. Again, every inidividual choice to buy, invest, and own local tends to reduce local vulnerability, pump up the economic multiplier, build up the local tax base, and
> capture positive externalities of production (like skill-building and self-esteem).
>
> Promoting local preferences has nothing to do with erecting absolute barriers to trade. In fact, it's a prerequisite for any healthy vision of globalization. As partners find in a
> good marriage, communities are better off relating to one another from positions of relative independence and strength rather than mutual vulnerability and fear. A community that is
> relatively self-reliant can THEN relate globally, whether through trade, aid, technology exchange, sister cities, human-right initiatives, and 1001 more ambitious municipal foreign
> policies. It's a neoliberal myth that the only way to be globally minded is to submit carelessly to vulnerability-inducing trade.
>
> -- Michael Shuman (Village Foundation)
>
> Paul Swider wrote:
>
> > Michael,
> >
> > Community financiers -- and any financier, for that matter -- will reform or rethink whatever you can put in front of them that shows a real return. The market is not as hidebound
> > as some think and not nearly as much so as it once was. There is a lot of money in the world chasing a good place to grow and finding little. True, that money is not looking hard
> > enough but if you or anyone else can show that the math works, the money will follow.
> >
> > The idea of somehow insulating a community from outside forces is, I think, shortsighted. I mean that in a literal sense, not as an insult. There is no way to insulate an individual
> > or any collection of individuals. Indeed, the lesson of failed isolationism (economic or political) is that the insulation only increases the eventual impact from a downfall.
> > Building walls never works.
> >
> > I must agree with you, however, on the point of subsidies and the distortion they effect on the economy. However, I think the best way to attack that issue is to attack it, not to
> > create a subsystem within a community that seeks to avoid the consequence. There are all kinds of distorting economic effects, from primary and secondary subsidies to the tertiary
> > variety in the form of foreign policy. But taking care of my own backyard might make my backyard nice (temporarily, I maintain) but it does nothing for the overall problems that
> > remain unsolved and unaddressed. Community issues are definnitely connected to global issues.
> >
> > My point, which I did not express as clearly as I would have liked, is that free-market economics, for all its many warts, most nearly approximates human nature. The (relative)
> > success and worldwide attractiveness of capitalism is an outgrowth of this. People have to be taught to think in terms of the community and they forget as soon as they get a chance
> > to feather their own nests; they take care of themselves instinctively. This may sound like a cynical view but I don't look at it that way. It is a natural circumstance, like the
> > tides and the winds, and we should embrace it and work with it, not try to defeat it. I have no objection to community investments and am, after a fashion, involved in similar
> > activities. I merely suggest that focusing too narrowly on the community creates a form of subsidy or distortion just as damaging as any other. No one can confine the market to any
> > place or time so why try?
> >
> > Investment will flow where it will grow. The only problem then is management and communication.

--
Paul Swider
PRIDE Africa
prideafrica@erols.com
703-519-7778
100 N. Pitt St.
Suite 202
Alexandria, Va. 22314




This post transferred from the cdb-l mailing list

----------
>From: Paul Swider <prideafrica@erols.com>
PS:
> Investors do have a preference for the highest
> return but some of them calculate that
> in the long term,
BE:
You're not clear about what you mean by "long term." If you mean
society's long term future, and not long term personal finncial profit,
then I'm with you. Global warming, ozone depletion, population control,
poverty, health, education, war, racism, and the global problematique in
general will not be solved by market forces.

If you have read, David Korten's "The Post Corporate World" or "When
Corporation Rule the World," of John McMurty's "Unequal Freedoms: the
Global Market as an Ethical System, or the books of Hazel Henderson, Mark
Lutz, Herman Daly, Richard Douthwaite, Paul Hawin and others," you'll have
some idea of where others of us are coming from. It's hard to discuss their
concepts in e-mail sound bites.

But, few leading economists still defend the laissez faire economic you seem
to favor. The Social Investment movement is only the tip of the iceberg of
social investors who recognize that "long term" means more that long term
profits. I personally keep my working capital in Credit Unions, have most
of my investment in SRIs (Socially Responsible Investments), and tither 10%
of my capital for community owned corporations and cooperatives. I believe
these are are in my long term advantage, because they build community, not
because I couldn't make more money invisting otherwise as I once did. I
hope this is what you meant by long term investment.



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