• Thanks for stopping by. Logging in to a registered account will remove all generic ads. Please reach out with any questions or concerns.

Canada's Place in the Global Economy

  • Thread starter Thread starter GAP
  • Start date Start date
Status
Not open for further replies.
Nemo888 said:
So how do you suggest we fix the fact that we don't make anything anymore? Wage parity with 90c an hour foreign workers would fix it,....

We don't have many good choices.

I'll try and find an article I saw recently that highlights a drum ERC has been beating for a very long time, AND addresses your point.

The article described how despite the abysmal employment numbers American output was increasing.  American pre-recession manufacturing capacity was been fully utilized and industry was investing in both more capacity AND more inventory.  What they weren't investing in was labour. 

They would rather spend their money on electric motors and PLCs than attempting to train and maintain employees from a pool that to a greater and greater extent are harder to please and harder to train, that can't speak the language of the workplace, and that impose a massive regulatory burden.

As a business owner confronting "environmental regulation" and "labour regulation" I have a much greater chance of being able to afford to meet the technical challenge of the environmental laws than the byzantine and ever shifting challenges of labour laws.  This situation is compounded by the fact that building a new factory that doesn't employ people will result in a smaller, cleaner, more efficient operation whose operating costs are more predictable.

As ERC says above... Pogo wuz right..... the unions especially should take note.

As to the future..... I would suggest that those advocating a future of increased leisure time and Robert Heinlein were both right.  Citizens will work two hours a day.  The rest will get drunk.... or join the Army.  :D

Edit:  This wasn't the article I was thinking of but it supports the case I was making

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/42349181/ns/business-world_business/t/unlike-competition-us-values-profits-over-jobs/
 
Brad Sallows said:
>So how do you suggest we fix the fact that we don't make anything anymore?

Get out of the way and remove impediments to starting and running a business.  Is it the role of the higher HQ staff to make life awkward or easier for the lower commanders?  Bureaucrats should have much less inherent power to say "no" and should be at risk of losing their jobs if they fail to expedite the needs of entrepreneurs and citizens in general.  They must serve, not rule.

We need domestic manufacturing. During the last ramp up for an iPhone release 17 Foxconn workers committed suicide. They worked for 90c and hour and only got 1 day off a month. (they did get a 20% raise after some illegal protests) How do we compete with that? When I worked in tech I was outsourced to a computer engineering graduate from one of India's best universities. He was glad to make 24k(over 1 million rupees) a year. That cured me of the we are smarter exceptionalism that I harboured. He was a fricking genius. So much so that I quit tech and joined the Army. Reducing wages, not deregulation will make us competitive.

I suppose automation is to blame as well. Maybe there are just not enough jobs to go around.  What do we do then?  :dunno:
 
Nemo888 said:
.....I suppose automation is to blame as well. Maybe there are just not enough jobs to go around.  What do we do then?  :dunno:


See my last

As to the future..... I would suggest that those advocating a future of increased leisure time and Robert Heinlein were both right.  Citizens will work two hours a day.  The rest will get drunk.... or join the Army. 

Nemo888 said:
...... I quit tech and joined the Army........

I rest my case. ;D
 
We are not going to repatriate low skill/high wage metal bending jobs because we cannot compete on wages.

We need to build whole new industries that require the sorts of people we have in abundance: not too well educated (even if they have university degrees) but trainable. "Innovation" is the word we use to describe the process of building those new industries - innovation ought not to be punished by governments. (But nor are governments able to "pick winners." The best governments, the ones of countries in which innovation thrives, get out of the way. The USA doesn't need another Solyndra style fiasco but it needs a tax code that allows capitalists to make money by betting on innovators.)
 
Nemo888 said:
Reducing wages, not deregulation will make us competitive.

Do you really believe that there is no cost to regulatory expansion? Prior to this election, I was told that the average small busines person in Ontario needs to spend 30 hr/month dealing with regulatory paperwork (taxes, labour, environment, etc. etc.).

That is almost 25% of the working month devoted to dealing with government imposed regulations rather than doing productive work like marketing, R&D, refining work process, education of workers or self....

IF you had to spend 25% of your time being pulled from your primary task, then it would take a lot longer to get things done, and you wil have less time and resources avalable to invest, make changes or perform other innovations. Clear the regulatory forest and you will increase the productive time and energy available to invest and grow.
 
Thucydides said:
Do you really believe that there is no cost to regulatory expansion? Prior to this election, I was told that the average small busines person in Ontario needs to spend 30 hr/month dealing with regulatory paperwork (taxes, labour, environment, etc. etc.).

That is almost 25% of the working month devoted to dealing with government imposed regulations rather than doing productive work like marketing, R&D, refining work process, education of workers or self....

IF you had to spend 25% of your time being pulled from your primary task, then it would take a lot longer to get things done, and you wil have less time and resources avalable to invest, make changes or perform other innovations. Clear the regulatory forest and you will increase the productive time and energy available to invest and grow.

Let's talk about Labour regulations for a minute, since you keep throwing it up. If a company is complaining that they have to spend thousands of dollars and tons of time (more dollars) complying, it's because they were running unsafe and dangerous operations. We can't get to every workplace in the province, but my peers and myself do what we can. Most of the time, I get called in on a complaint, critical injury or a fatality. If the employer is complying with the Act and Regulations, I'm not there long. If they aren't, they get orders or charged with offences. In this day and age, there is no excuse for not being cognizant of the Occupational Health & Safety Act or it's related Regulations. If they are out of compliance and it costs them time and money, it is simply no one's fault but their own. Trying to blame government is a straw man. If you can't run a safe operation, you shouldn't be in business. Non compliant, unsafe, killer employers cost the Ontario taxpayer many millions of dollars a year. They deserve no one's pity. The same goes for Employment Standards, if they go after an employer, it's because it's been cheating the workers from their just wage.
 
recceguy: while I have sympathy for your position, and fully agree there are more than a few ba****ds in this world, there are also those who have been running legitimate businesses for generations and find themselves trying to accomodate modern, and ever-changing, labour law in substandard facilities - some of which were top of the line for their era.

The period of the low dollar, when Canadian business wasn't investing in new, productivity enhancing equipment, they also weren't it also wasn't investing in new premises and new employee welfare facilities.

Now, my experience is that large employers are more willing to build new premises, with fewer employees, but those employees they do employ are more likely to be catered to.  At least out here in Alberta.

On the other hand, sorry to say, the small businesses present another picture entirely.....
 
Kirkhill said:
recceguy: while I have sympathy for your position, and fully agree there are more than a few ba****ds in this world, there are also those who have been running legitimate businesses for generations and find themselves trying to accomodate modern, and ever-changing, labour law in substandard facilities - some of which were top of the line for their era.

The period of the low dollar, when Canadian business wasn't investing in new, productivity enhancing equipment, they also weren't investing in new premises and new employee welfare facilities.

Now, my experience is that large employers are more willing to build new premises, with fewer employees, but those employees they do employ are more likely to be catered to.  At least out here in Alberta.

On the other hand, sorry to say, the small businesses present another picture entirely.....
Acts and Regulations evolve along with industry. They are not enacted for spite and to make things difficult for no reason. It may not always be obvious, but in my neck of the woods anything new is almost always a result of a new industry process or standard. We are the cart to their horse. I am not unsympathetic to employers that truly endeavour to comply. New premises are very seldom required. Just more safe practices, worker education and cooperation between management and workers. Large employers, especially unionized shops, are seldom the problem.  I say seldom because they have their own special problems. It's small places that lets safety be the first thing to fall off the table when things ($) get tough. What they don't realize is that they are probably taking the biggest gamble they can with their business. Take a chance, in a small place, with worker safety, kill a worker and it'll probably end up costing you more than you ever thought possible. Your initial fine (maybe imprisonment) is just the start. I, and my colleagues, don't endeavour to shut people down or make them spend money needlessly. We are more than willing to help the employer out, but the worker needs to be safe, above all else. If the employer can't do that, they shouldn't be in business. I have no hesitation in prosecuting unsafe employers to the fullest extent the law allows me to. I'll caveat that to include unsafe workers also. It's not a one sided deal about government against employers. Workers found at fault get prosecuted also.

I can only speak to my small bailiwick within the bureaucracy. Bottom line, blaming us for low productivity and tough financial positions is simply a ludicrous farce.
 
I agree there is no malice involved from your side of the table, and I agree with you on your assessment of "mom and pop" establishments.  But Thuc has a point:  as the rule book gets thicker the harder it is to convince yourself to take on the challenge of starting a new enterprise. 

And, in the case of older plants: agreed that each individual investigation, with its concomittent, sensible recommendations, seldom require new facilities.  But after a decade or two of sensible recommendations the barnacles are starting to grow on the barnacles and it becomes difficult to find the original purpose.

In the meantime - an upbeat article on US Productivity from today's Telegraph

...."A surprising amount of work that rushed to China over the past decade could soon start to come back," said BCG's Harold Sirkin.

The gap in "productivity-adjusted wages" will narrow from 22pc of US levels in 2005 to 43pc (61pc for the US South) by 2015. Add in shipping costs, reliability woes, technology piracy, and the advantage shifts back to the US.

The list of "repatriates" is growing. Farouk Systems is bringing back assembly of hair dryers to Texas after counterfeiting problems; ET Water Systems has switched its irrigation products to California; Master Lock is returning to Milwaukee, and NCR is bringing back its ATM output to Georgia. NatLabs is coming home to Florida.

Boston Consulting expects up to 800,000 manufacturing jobs to return to the US by mid-decade, with a multiplier effect creating 3.2m in total. This would take some sting out of the Long Slump......
 
>We need domestic manufacturing.

How do you know what we need?  If this were 30 years ago, do you believe you would just know that we "need" a personal computer in every house to juice the economy?

Most of us, and in particular most people in government - because they are so absorbed by process - do not know and can not know what is needed.  They need to sideline themselves so that people who do have ideas can quickly bring them to fruition.
 
We can have strict workplace safety and environmental and fiscal propriety regulations.  They are all costs of doing business.  Absent some tariffs levied to negate the cost advantage of producers in nations which have no such laws, the point is irrelevant - no industry, no safety/environmental/fiscal problems.

Accept some risks, charge tariffs, or be importers.  We have the choice; let us not whine after we choose option #3.
 
Europe stumbles towards the brink, according to this article which is reproduced under the Fair Dealing provisions of the Copyright Act from the Globe and Mail:

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/international-news/next-summit-could-make-or-break-euro-zone/article2211023/
Next summit could make or break euro zone

ERIC REGULY
ROME— Globe and Mail Update

Last updated Monday, Oct. 24, 2011

European leaders have slogged through about 20 summits since the debt crisis started two years ago. The next summit, on Wednesday, looms as the day that could break the euro zone if it, like the previous ones, proves to be a failure.

After a meeting in Brussels on Sunday, the leaders vowed to meet the self-imposed Wednesday deadline to unveil a giant financial package aimed to snuff out the debt crisis. But they gave little hint of a breakthrough as speculation of a stalemate between Germany and France, the euro zone’s paymasters, persisted.

Time is not on their side. Any suggestion that the leaders have come up short on crisis-fighting measures threatens to inflict severe pain on anxious stock and bond markets. Elsa Lignos, currency strategist in London for RBC Capital Markets, said the longer the crisis drags on, “the more damaging it becomes.”

French President Nicolas Sarkozy was more blunt. He was severely disappointed last week to learn that German Chancellor Angela Merkel would not be able to make a decision on the bailout fund by Sunday. “If we don’t reach a decision now, we’re dead,” he said at the time, according to a weekend report in Der Spiegel, Germany’s biggest newsmagazine.

Mr. Sarkozy continued to vent his frustration in Brussels on Sunday, this time singling out British Prime Minister David Cameron, who has been heaping pressure on France and Germany to fix the debt crisis before it hammers the already reeling British economy. “You have lost a good opportunity to shut up,” he told Mr. Cameron, according to several British reports. “We are sick of you criticizing us and telling us what to do. You say you hate the euro and now you want to interfere in our meetings.”

At a press conference on Sunday afternoon, European Council president Herman Van Rompuy played down the differences between Germany and France while providing no new information about whether, or how, the two countries plan to overcome their differences on the ideal size and function of the European bailout fund.

The fund, known as the European Financial Stability Facility, is touted as the prime weapon in the crisis-fighting arsenal. It now has access to €440-billion ($614-billion) in funds, but many economists and world leaders think it should come equipped with “shock and awe” firepower of perhaps €2-trillion ($2.8-trillion) to prevent the crisis from infecting the largest European countries and plunging the Western world back into recession.

“We are confident that we will get an agreement on Wednesday,” Mr. Van Rompuy said. “We are working in a spirit of compromise, in a spirit of having an ambitious package to reassure the rest of the world of our determination to safeguard the financial stability of the euro zone ... I saw a French President and a German Chancellor determined to work together.”

Mr. Van Rompuy confirmed that one of those countries – Italy – came under extreme pressure Sunday to clean up its financial act for fear that the euro zone’s third-largest economy would be too big to bail out if it, like Greece, were unable to roll over its debt.

He said that meetings were held with Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi, who has been accused of paying scant attention to the debt crisis until recently, when his government pushed through an austerity program that aims to eliminate the budget deficit by 2014. “Clearly we are calling for a major effort to be made by the Italian authorities and I believe that they are willing to do that,” Mr. Van Rompuy said.

Wednesday’s summit has no fewer than four ambitious goals. The first is to give the EFSF more firepower and flexibility. The second is to convince banks that own distressed Greek sovereign bonds to take a 50 per cent reduction, or “haircut,” on those holdings, up from the initial goal of a 21 per cent reduction, so that Greece’s crushing debt load can come down significantly.

The third is boosting the capital of the European banks that will suffer damage when they write down their sovereign debt holdings (this effort, including the total amount required – about €100-billion or $140-billion – has been largely agreed). Finally, the euro zone countries are to outline a tentative plan for fiscal integration, a process that could take many years.

Determining the size and the role of the EFSF has emerged as the potential deal buster. France favours using the European Central Bank to backstop the EFSF. Germany opposes the French proposal because it fears the ECB is being pulled too far away from its primary role as an inflation fighter. Instead, Germany has proposed that the EFSF be used to insure the potential losses of new bonds sold by debt-choked countries such as Italy and Spain.

Economists suspect that Germany, the euro zone’s biggest and wealthiest economy, will get its way even though the insurance model has obvious flaws. Gilles Moec, economist in London with Deutsche Bank, said using the EFSF as an insurer would create two-tier market – the insured debt and the “negatively impacted” uninsured debt.

At the end of the Sunday meetings, Jose Manuel Barroso, president of the European Commission, reiterated Mr. Van Rompuy’s earlier message that the crucial next meeting will not be a disappointment. “I’m sure that progress can be made by Wednesday.”


I'm with Zhou Enlai, who famously answered Henry Kissinger's question about the historical importance of the French Revolution by saying, "It's too soon to tell." It is still too soon to tell if the European Union was one of those once a century French strategic wins or one of those twice a century French strategic blunders; it's too soon to tell if the Euro is a Franco-German strategic win or another blunder; but we may not need Zhou's 'length of view' to tell - this week might do it.

I agree with Gilles Moec and the other unnamed economists: Germany wins this squabble and there is a two-tiered debt market denominated in:

1. Insured (real Euros) - think e.g. Denmark, Germany, Netherlands and so on; and

2. Uninsured (junk Euros) - think e.g. Italy, Portugal, Spain, etc.

That will, de facto, spell the end of the current, big, 17 member Eurozone.
 
From Sarkozy's temper tantrum, I gather France is close to having to absorb its own losses - which is not the way France intended the EU to work at all (power without risk).
 
Brad Sallows said:
From Sarkozy's temper tantrum, I gather France is close to having to absorb its own losses - which is not the way France intended the EU to work at all (power without risk).


That would be my guess, too.
 
Just a minor correction: Denmark is not part of the Eurozone.  It still uses the Krone.

But your point is still clear.  :nod:
 
Kirkhill said:
Just a minor correction: Denmark is not part of the Eurozone.  It still uses the Krone.

But your point is still clear.  :nod:


Oops  :-[

In that case the real Euro zone might be smaller.

I seem to recall that back when the Euro was established the agreement included inflation and or deficit rules (the snake in the tunnel) that limited the financial freedom of members. My sense is that few members felt bound by the rules and that, in any event, there was (is) no way to enforce the rules. My guess is that France and Belgium and many of the newer members (Cyprus, Solvakia, Slovenia, etc) are unable to obey the rules and will end up with junk Euros.
 
Euro Members of the EU

Germany
France

Belgium
Netherlands
Luxembourg

Portugal
Ireland, Republic of (EIRE)
Italy
Greece
Spain

Austria
Estonia
Finland
Slovakia
Slovenia

Cyprus (Member of the Commonwealth)
Malta (Member of the Commonwealth)

Non-Euro Members of the EU

Bulgaria
Czech Republic
Denmark
Hungary
Latvia
Lithuania
Poland
Romania
Sweden
United Kingdom

EFTA Members (Independent of EU)

Switzerland
Norway
Iceland
Liechtenstein

The real crisis is for France and Germany.

The rest of the Eurozone can only watch those two have at it.

Those outside of the Eurozone are in much the same boat as Canada, waiting to see how much damage they will cause.

Curiously Britain and the Non-Euro members of the EU may be best placed.  They share the same (reduced but significant) risk as the Rest Of The World when compared to the Eurozone countries BUT they actually have a voice of influence at the discussions..... Much to the chagrin of Sarkozy

”We’re sick of you criticising us and telling us what to do. You say you hate the euro, you didn’t want to join and now you want to interfere in our meetings,” the French leader told Mr Cameron, according to diplomats.
 
It was just for a situation such as this that Britain never signed onto the Euro.
 
Estonia is the state economic refugees aspire to? Who knew. Valuable lessons for us in Canada:

http://www.spiegel.de/international/0,1518,790293,00.html

Estonia Lives the European Dream

By Ralf Hoppe and Jan Puhl

DPA
The Estonians, with little debt, an enthusiastic attitude toward Europe and a stoic approach to austerity measures, are a model EU nation in the midst of a crisis. They live in a digital republic defined by a business-friendly atmosphere and government transparency, an image that is attracting European expats.

 
When a Greek leaves a sunny country filled with olive trees, magnificent beaches and warm sea foam, when he leaves a place where summer lasts for seven months and moves to a country where he is held captive by a seemingly endless winter, it's bound to raise a few questions. Some relate to the country he has left, but his new home raises even more questions. And there is one question that affects both countries: Why is the one society driving people away, while the other draws them in?

Loukas Nakosmatis, a friendly, stout Greek with a three-day beard, the chef and owner of "Artemis," answers this question with an entire story, his own war of the roses. The 46-year-old began developing his business four years ago while he was living in Athens, he says. It involved importing flowers from the Netherlands -- mostly roses, tulips and a few exotic varieties -- on overnight cargo flights. He intended to sell them in Athens, a dusty city of stone walls and buildings whose residents are desperate for green plants and fresh flowers.
Nakosmatis signed contracts and statements of intent with three or four dozen flower shops that wanted to buy his flowers. The profit margin for flowers is large, says Nakosmatis, a factor of 10 or even 20 percent, and it would have been enough money for everyone, including the retailers and him as an importer. It sounded like a brilliant plan, at least on paper.

But it was a trap, he says. After a year, Nakosmatis had receivables of about €30,000 ($40,000), and after a year-and-a-half they had gone up to €45,000. Almost all of his buyers owed him money. They had recognized his weakness: He was under pressure to unload his product while it was still fresh. You have to sell a rose, says Nakosmatis, quoting a Greek saying, or it will sell you, because it dies.

His customers used every trick in the book. They would have him show up at their shops with a delivery van full of flowers when they knew that they would be away, or they would say that they happened to be out of cash and would promise to pay him later, on another day, or by the next Monday -- but then they kept putting him off, says Nakosmatis.

Moving to Estonia

The retailers soon took it for granted that they could buy his flowers on credit. In the end, 43 out of 46 flower shops owed him money. He eventually gave up hope and fled to Estonia, taking a series of detours to get there. His customers still owe him €45,000, which he owes his bank, which probably owes other banks.

He describes it as a chain reaction straight across Europe. But couldn't he go to court and sue his customers for his money? He laughs bitterly. You should only go to court when you can afford it, he says, quoting another Greek saying.

As he tells his story, Nakosmatis is sitting outside under a blue evening sky, with Elias, Kostas and Krikor, fellow Greek expatriates, in front of the "Artemis," a small street restaurant he has opened in the pedestrian zone of the Estonian capital Tallinn. The business is going well, and Nakosmatis has begun to pay off his debts. A waiter is serving the guests at the next table: souvlaki, a mixed grill platter, Ouzo and Greek salad.

It's one of the few summer evenings in Tallinn when it's warm enough to eat outside. Half of the dozen or so small tables in his restaurant are taken by Japanese, Finns, Danes and Dutchmen, but there are no Estonians. A meal at his restaurant is too expensive for them, says Nakosmatis. Then he describes the two Estonian women he hired as waitresses.

"They are hardworking, honest and never late," he says. The group of Greek men falls silent for a moment. "Strange country," says Elias.

The Little Things

Just what is it that makes such a country work? What's so great about Estonia?

"Muchas cosas pequeñas," or many little things, says Spaniard Naphtali Peral. He says that he established his company here in only half a day, mainly online. The record for establishing a company, he adds, is only 18 minutes. In other words, the government doesn't say: Hey, Peral, who do you think you are, starting a company, just like that? No, he says, the state actually encourages entrepreneurship, and says things like: So you have an idea, Peral! Go for it! And then he says that it takes him 20 minutes to prepare his semi-annual tax return, and that when it was time to slash the government budget, Estonia's cabinet ministers started with their own salaries.

"And they weren't making very much to begin with. I mean, these aren't the people who are filling their pockets," he says. "Some of them are really smart, capable people, who could earn a lot more in other jobs!"

Peral owns a small language coaching company. He gives courses, trains managers and advises film producers looking to work in the Baltic countries. Peral is from Almería in Spain's Andalusia region, where he completed high school and attended university. He says that a few of his fellow students were truly dim-witted -- and they were the ones who went into politics.

"And what did our politicians do the minute they were in office?" he asks. "They ordered themselves an official car. Likely a BMW … preferably with a chauffeur. And they smeared gel into their hair, bought dark suits and were constantly on the road, dedicating buildings, touring sites or giving important speeches that someone else had written. But in that time, they could just as easily have worked for the country and for the people who voted for them."

And is everything better in Estonia, Señor Peral?

"Well, for a Spaniard the people here are rather cold," he says. "I get more hugs and kisses on a single day in Spain than I do here in a year. On the other hand, the business climate is fair and open, and you can trust the police, politicians and bureaucrats."

'We Wanted a Transparent State'

But when one asks Juhan Parts, the country's economics minister, what makes Estonia different, he gives a short answer: nothing. Estonia, says Parts, is a small but perfectly normal country. It's so normal, he says, that it can be discussed in the time it takes to drink a cup of coffee.

In the middle of this year, two rating agencies, Standard & Poor's and Fitch, upgraded Estonia's credit rating. The country had a budget surplus of €115 million in the first two quarters, and it is expected to virtually balance its budget for the entire year. Government debt is about 6.6 percent of the gross domestic product, as compared with 120 percent in Italy, 160 percent in Greece and 80 percent in Germany. In the first two quarters of 2011, the Estonian economy grew at an annualized rate of 8 percent.

What could Greeks, Germans and Italians learn something from the 1.4 million Estonians? "Learn? Now that's a funny thought!" Parts says. "Hey, what do you think about the table back there, under the trees? Go ahead and sit down. I'll get us some coffee. Do you want one of these chocolate things?"

Parts, a 45-year-old born in Tallinn, was the founder of his party, became prime minister and is now economics minister -- an unusual minister, at that.

The garden café is a self-service operation, so he gets in line and waits his turn. Then he orders two coffees and two chocolate pastries. He has come to the appointment alone, without a bodyguard, staff members or a spokesman -- and in his family car. "We want to keep expenses down," he says.

When Parts was prime minister, he had all ministers' bills, notes and files stored in electronic databases, creating Europe's first completely paperless cabinet table.

Parts is vigorous, blonde, and athletic, but seems tired. He tries to conceal a yawn, explaining that he and his wife have just had their fourth child and nights have been short. "Comparisons are always difficult," he says. "But when we had finally escaped from Soviet socialism, we were sick and tired of government centralism. We wanted precisely the opposite in all respects: We wanted a transparent state. A country that isn't constantly intervening, nationalizing businesses, placing a bureaucracy above everything and imposing rules on people in every respect."

Clearing the Way for Achievers

But doesn't the government have to help those on the losing end of social change? Parts sighs and pulls out a pack of Kent cigarettes. But when he sees the photographer about to take a picture, he hesitates and puts them back in his pocket, smiling triumphantly at the photographer.

Of course, he says, it's important to help a society's losers, the ones who are left behind. It would be wonderful, he adds, to have a fantastic healthcare system and offer social guarantees for every emergency. "But you have to have the money. We don't have it. Our average monthly income is €800. So we have to reflect on what's important for a society's development. It's the top performers, the successful ones. Ideas! Companies! Products! If all you do is administer, nothing comes of it. The state must clear the way for those who want to achieve something. That's the function of the state."
When the photographer leaves, he lights a cigarette, inhales and narrows his eyes. "I don't want to pass judgment on Germany or Greece. All I can say is that Estonia is contributing its part of the bailout fund, even though our average income is smaller than that of the Greeks. And that, by the way, is a bitter pill to swallow for many Estonians."

He puts out his cigarette and glances at the clock. "Hey, are you familiar with Skype?"
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top