Thomas Lunde said:
>I agree with your exposition that the net flow of capital outside of
>communities destroys those very communities and it is with great sadness
>that I and many others who had that type of childhood feel when we stop
>chasing the buck for awhile and think of the childhood we had as compared
>to the childhood we are currently giving our children. My girls, know more
>about the Spice Girls than they do about their great grandparents and the
>50 years of community living, friendships and relationships that were
>developed when small local communities existed. If I find any consolation
>in the current world situation, it is that capitalism may self destruct on
>the global level and that electronic technology may destroy those great
>capitalistic sumps that suck the life out of the country into cities. The
>land of my childhood is a wasteland of specialized people growing
>specialized crops that are determined by the need to generate income so
>they can farm larger so they can make more income. Their life is no
>different except that their "job" is in the country. Their lifestyle is as
>empty as it is for the rest of us living in the suburbs and fighting the
>morning rush hour. This is all rationalized under the concepts of
>opportunity - but from my standpoint, this is a word from George Orwell.
>Well, enough of my morning rant, I get frustrated with words.
The land of your childhood does sound rather wonderful. Even though I grew
up in much the same area - all over the western provinces - mine was quite
different. My parents were immigrants who came from eastern Europe just
before the Great Depression. They tried to farm in Saskatchewan, but could
never quite get themselves established. My Dad, like so many other would-be
farmers and farmers' sons of the time, rode the rods and became an itinerant
farm hand just to provide some money to keep us alive. We followed him
around and lived wherever there was a job for a few months. There may have
been country dances wherever we lived, but I don't remember ever attending
them. There were undoubtedly some wealthy farmers around too, but the ones
I remember were dirt poor, so poor that they could not afford to pay my Dad
wages for the work he did, which meant we had to move on again. Many of
them were indebted; that is, they relied on capital borrowed from others,
and since there was very little capital in the area, it must have been
imported from elsewhere.
Things changed after the war. Farms became much more prosperous, but they
also became more mechanized and efficient. They did not need many people.
Fortunately, capital was moving into the cities at the time, urban
population was growing, and there were plenty of jobs. When my father
returned from overseas, we moved from a small town in rural Saskatchewan to
Winnipeg where he found employment as a carpenter.
I'm not saying that the world of your childhood was imaginary, but it was
probably quite exceptional, doomed to last for only a brief period until
economic and technological change did away with it. You appear to view
yours with nostalgia; I would not want to relive mine. And I'm very
thankful that I did not have to raise my children in the wretchedness of the
prairies of the 1930s.
I have not read Douthwaite, but if he is making the point that capital
should be used only where it is being generated, then I would strongly
disagree. Capital spells opportunity for a better life. If capital does
not move to where it is needed, people will move to where the capital is
located. And it is very difficult to prevent them from moving. The media
are full of stories of Mexicans trying to get into the US and of the
Americans trying to keep them out. The same thing is going on in many other
parts of the world. In my view it is much more humane to move capital from
surplus to deficit areas than to expect people to uproot themselves and
participate in the perils of migration.
Ed Weick
