Tag Archives: Business

by | August 1, 2012 · 5:05 am

People relied on themselves and each other to survive

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For the most of us the issue today is survival, how to survive on the income we have in an economy that is hostile to the working mans wallet. Food prices keep rising, the job market is pretty stagnant and business are cutting hours if not jobs. We can not rely on our government to save us or to fix the problems. Big business can only fix the employment issues and we are the only ones that will save our selves. We can learn how to make money stretch, grow our own food and trim the fat from our financial lives from our grandparents and great-grandparents. Some of them lived through the great depression and a world war, times were very tough back then and people relied on themselves and each other to survive.

Our economy is based on consumerism, yet the companies cut pay, jobs and send work over seas. How can Americans be consumers without money or a job? The corporations are cutting their nose off spite their face, they want to save money to make higher profits but they take away the consumers jobs and money that supply the profits. So I say lets start growing gardens, raising livestock and making due with less of the products from the companies that ship work across the oceans and who are cutting wages, benefits and jobs to Americans. I understand it is a global economy now days more so than just a national one, but if you neglect those whom helped you to get rich they will eventually wise up and stop supporting you and / or purchasing your products and services.

Maybe we need to start going back to a bartering system between us working folk and keep our unessential purchases to a minimum. Maybe then the big corporations will learn that the working class and the impoverished are not to be messed with or taken for granted.

Self-reliance, community and co-operation are the things that built the great cities and nations of our world.

Ray Barbier

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by | April 18, 2012 · 7:03 pm

A Fork in the Road

Concept Lately the cycle of life has really sped  up around me, so many pregnancies and people either dying or getting life threatening diseases. This world is speeding up and we are heading towards a fork in the path we are going down. One of the paths ahead is to a dismal and foreboding future of selfishness, greed and eventual depletion of natural resources. The other path though will be rocky and hard to follow leads us as a species to a future of peace, equality and the saving of our wonderful planet and home called earth. We can not continue to walk through life with a selfish and/or apathetic heart, we have to become humble, compassionate and take care of this world we live in. We are all on this rock together and not one race, religion,country or individual has any more or less rights to live here. We are all equal and are equally responsible for our home and the life forms that live within it.

MP900408941 Some of the rich and powerful believe they are superior or at least deserve a better life than the average and impoverished man. This is just plain selfish and heartless thinking and not true, it isn’t about wealth, power or even physical prowess but it is about the spirit and the heart. The common and impoverished are not as naïve or  as uninformed as the rich and powerful believe. We are waking up and seeing that we are not being treated equal in taxation and not being represented equally in our governments. Eventually the meek shall awaken out of their groggy state of mind and will help bring some of the change needed. Sometimes I see big business as a kind of bully, they raise prices to gain huge profits with no concern about if the average person can or can not afford it.  Nothing matters but the profit margin and the bonuses they get each year. They fill their banks with money that was earned by underpaid worker’s in both their home country and 3rd world countries .  I understand the need for profits, but to be too greedy and have no care about the workers or the consumers who helped build that wealth is just not a good business model. Eventual things will become so costly that only the rich will be able to afford to buy anything beyond just food. And since the rich are just a small percentage of the whole consumer base there will be a lot of businesses failing.

Human eye with the recycling emblem inside<br /><br />File contains gradientsThough not all of the current financial crises is the fault of big business a lot of it falls on the consumer as well by using credit to purchase items they can’t really afford to have as well as buying luxury items that they could have lived without. Then the credit card companies also have their part in the mess as well as the mortgage lenders. There is many reasons why our world is in such a financial mess and the blame falls all across the board. The solution will also have to come from each level of the financial pyramid in order to fix it all. Greed and Envy seem to be the root of most of the mess, the businesses want more money and the consumer wants to keep up with the people next door.

We better change direction and choose the better path in the fork ahead, if we don’t our children, grandchildren and the generations afterwards will be living in a very dark future. We need to take care of the imbalance of wealth and start taking care of our home.

Just a rant of a middle-aged man.

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Raymond Barbier

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by | September 2, 2011 · 6:45 pm

Our world may be a mess and in dire need of changes

IMG_1078fbI am but a dreamer, Dreaming of a better world and of more of a compassionate humanity.Though I may dream of better things I live in this nightmare we call modern society. A society were money is more important than the ecology and in some cases our own families. A society where drug companies rather treat a symptom than cure the disease so they can have record high profits. A world were the oil is slowly running out but no one is really trying to get off of the carbon based fuel addiction. Too much money to be made in the oil industry to make alternative fuels and / or energy a high priority.

A society where scientists can not seem to make up their minds on anything. Sometimes it makes you wonder how several research teams can come up with such conflicting results. I do not know if the scientists are on the take or just try for the results that will get them more grant money or what. I really hope it is just incomplete data or something not so sinister. Then here in the U.S. we have a congress that reminds me of grade school kids arguing over a ball in the school playground. Sticking to ones convictions may be a virtue but the well-being of our country and the citizens that elected them should be first priority.

In this country alone the big business has had a 40% profit increase but yet they had no growth new employment. So much money flowing in you would think they would hire on more employees and or offer better benefits. Don’t get me wrong I am all for them making profits, that is what they are in business to do. I just think if they made the money here in the U.S. they should reinvest it here by hiring on American workers and paying their fair share of taxes. The present tax code leaves way too many loopholes for the big businesses to use in avoiding paying their full share of taxes.

So much is changing in the world, yet too many of us just sit by and say or do nothing about it. We just watch it change and let those in power make all the choices for us. Our governmental system is one of the best in the world if we exercise all of our rights and get our voices heard by congress. But they can not hear our voices if we choose not to speak. It is the American people who made this one of the greatest nations in the world and we can do it once again if we choose to act. We have seen in the news how citizens can make a change, though they had to go to extremes that are not necessary in a democratic republic as ours.

Our world may be a mess and in dire need of changes that luckily we can make if we decide to do so. The nations of the world need to pull together and make the changes necessary to make a better world for our children. The children are our future, that is if we leave them a future they can survive in. The choice has always been ours to make, Lets hope we make the right one for both ourselves and our children.

God Bless Our Children and may he lead us to the right choices to be made.
Peace
Raymond Barbier

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by | February 27, 2011 · 3:58 pm

Just a Afternoon Rant.

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Change is something that no matter how hard you try you can only slow down but not totally avoid. This is being discovered on many levels by citizens and governments across the globe. Some change is good and some change is negative or retroactive, though no change is avoidable the end destination of change can be redirected. Even change that has been orchestrated runs its own course and usually will never come out exactly as planed.

So now the middle east and north African countries are going through a political change that has yet to reach its end. It will be many years after the dust settles before the end results will be known. The only thing predictable about the circumstances the world is facing in this unrest is that more than likely that no one will head the warnings of being dependent on oil and not having a fair economical and civilian minded government. It will shock me immensely if any Oil consuming nation and their government even thinks twice about getting off the oil addiction. It will shock me even more if any nation ever puts the citizens before the government officials or the big businesses.

  I have a lot of faith in mankind just not very much in the select few who rule by government or from their corporate towers. They have all the money and power and they surely don’t want to share it or even allow others to reach their status level because less competition equals more control and wealth. To be fair there has to be some in government and in big business that do care and try to do good with what they have, Just seems there is more of them that are greedy and power hungry than compassionate and humane. So being out numbered by their peers they have a lot to overcome to make any difference in the world.

I just think it is time for businesses to get their act together and realize crude oil is eventually either going to run out or become too costly to sustain any industry that requires it to operate. I also think it is time for governments to see that the citizens are the ones paying their paychecks and taking care of all the bills / loan payments the government has. So if you don’t keep the working man and the consumers employed, healthy and somewhat happy that the economy is going to either become stagnant or head into a downward spiral.

  Invest in small business and help the innovative people of your nation so new technologies and new sources of income can be created. Keep them healthy so they can be productive and keep the economy strong and for gods sake listen to the public, they are getting tired of their words falling on deaf ears. And here in the U.S. the political parties need to grow up and get over their differences and be grown up enough to face and tackle the problems facing the country from the federal government down to the back streets of America.

And for as the national debt is concerned, Stop borrowing money as much, cut foreign aid a bit and maybe take a pay cut up their in congress. Most Americans are forced to survive on 20k if not less and rank-and-file members of the House and Senate is $174,000 per year. Far as Social security, leave it alone for most of us middle class and below the social security benefits is all we have to retire on and due to the cost of healthcare most of us wont be able to live to see much past 60 years of age.

O.K. Enough Ranting for now,

Peace

Ray Barbier

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by | February 20, 2007 · 11:36 am

Global Warming

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 Don’t you just love how the government officials and scientists argue over the point that if mankind has contributed to the recent warming of the earth. How can anyone stand there and say that all the carbon monoxide/dioxide,methane gas and other pollutants we pump into our atmosphere is not doing any harm to the earths ecosystem. Regardless of how little or how much we influence the ecosystem should not be a debate. I think we should strive to be more earth friendly due to the fact that the children of today and their children will see the impact of our decisions and the results of our influence that we have on the ecosystem. Most of the arguments about if or if not we should be more green oriented in the world is pretty much being fought due to the issue of the cost of going green. The way I look at it is the benefits down the road will far out weigh the costs. For one thing America can once again be independent in the area of energy including the area of transportation. The oil Giants will have to adapt to survive. Eventually the combustion engine will be a thing of the past and new technologies will arise along with the need of some sort of energy to make them work. At this time it looks like it may be Hydrogen fuel cells and I see no reason why the big oil companies couldn’t start investing in the development of technologies that relate to the hydrogen fuel cells. They can also develop a more efficient way of extracting hydrogen from water. Either way we were blessed with life and a planet to live on. We should take responsibility for our home called earth.

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