I’M READING AS FAST AS I CAN (APRIL 2013 EDITION)

Readin’ books, writin’ book reports. And for the first time in over a year, I’ll be invoking the “Gave Up” category. 

JUST FINISHED

Bellwether by Connie Willis

Having generally enjoyed my first outing with Willis (To Say Nothing Of The Dog), I decided to give her another go with this book about two researchers working for a major corporation. One studies the origins of fads, the other studies chaos theory. They get together. Comedy and science ensue. Some people might dismiss this as a rom-com with gratuitous science, but I think it’s more the other way around – one of the main themes is how the scientific process works, and how chaos theory might play a role. Moreover, it’s a smart and extremely funny satire of fads and corporate bureaucracy (based loosely on Robert Browing’s Pippa Passes, even). So if nothing else, fans of TV shows like Office Space and Big Bang Theory may find a lot to like here (and this book predates Office Space by five years, incidentally). 

JUST STARTED

The Man Who Sold The Moon by Robert A. Heinlein

Short story collection featuring some of Heinlein’s first “Future History” stories, with the title novella as the centerpiece. I actually wasn’t aware Heinlein did much in terms of continuous timelines in his stories (though I know some characters make appearances in different novels from time to time), so this could be interesting.

( ALSO: Bradbury! Stark! Shirley! Wall Street! And the last Le Carre book I'll ever read ... )

Disavowed,

This is dF

“OBAMACARE IS KILLING BUSINESS” AND OTHER LAME EXCUSES

'Scuse me while I get this off my chest ...

One of the ongoing memes over in GOPland™ is that Obamacare, minimum wage and other Big Govt meddling is killing American business and jobs (and thus promoting Communism). The logic goes like this: the more business owners are forced to invest in their workforce, the harder it is to stay profitable, and so they have no choice but to take it out on consumers, their own workers, or both.

Which is why you have the CEO of Papa John’s saying he has no choice but to raise pizza prices because of stupid Obamacare. 

The chief of Applebee’s says thanks to Obamacare, he can’t afford to open any new restaurants or hire any new people (so much for job creation!). 

Darden Restaurants (which runs Olive Garden and Red Lobster) will have to make everyone part-time to avoid paying for their Obamacare. 

John Mackey of Whole Foods thinks Obamacare is fascism socialism something similar to fascism. 

And so on.

The thing is, while some CEOs are weeping and wailing over how hard it is to make money when you have to spend more on yr workforce, other companies are showing that actually, it’s totally doable.

CostCo is the most high profile and widely circulated example. But there’s also businesses like Trader Joe’s and QuikStop, according to The Atlantic:

"Retailers start with this philosophy of seeing employees as a cost to be minimized," says Zeynep Ton of MIT's Sloan School of Management. That can lead businesses into a vicious cycle. Underinvestment in workers can result in operational problems in stores, which decrease sales. And low sales often lead companies to slash labor costs even further. Middle-income jobs have declined recently as a share of total employment, as many employers have turned full-time jobs into part-time positions with no benefits and unpredictable schedules. 

QuikTrip, Trader Joe's, and Costco operate on a different model, Ton says. "They start with the mentality of seeing employees as assets to be maximized," she says. As a result, their stores boast better operational efficiency and customer service, and those result in better sales. QuikTrip sales per labor hour are two-thirds higher than the average convenience-store chain, Ton found, and sales per square foot are over 50 percent higher.

Now, to be fair, not every business model works for every business. Some companies probably can’t implement the same model as QuikTrip, Trader Joe's, and Costco, for whatever reason – whether it’s the size of yr business, or the costs inherent in that business, or whether you have stockholders or board members who expect you to hit yr profit targets no matter how realistic they are or how yr overall market segment is doing, etc.

On the other hand, when the pay gap between CEOs and workers is what it is in the US, despite a massive increase in worker productivity, it’s really hard for me to be all that sympathetic with CEOs who say “we can’t possibly afford this without cutting hours, cutting staff or raising prices”.

Because clearly other CEOs are proving it is possible.

I’m not saying Obamacare and a min.wage hike won't have an adverse effect on jobs and businesses. I’m just saying in a lot of cases, it will be the fault of CEOs who can’t or won’t amend their business model out of stubbornness, dumb ideology, inertia or greed.

IMO.

Stop yr sobbing,

This is dF