Business

Energy, Productivity, and the Middle Class

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It being Labor Day, there will doubtless be many political speeches and newspaper articles touching on the rise of the American middle class and crediting this rise to labor unions and perhaps also to FDR’s New Deal.

I don’t mind giving some of the credit to unions. But the primary driver of middle class affluence has been the availability of plentiful and low-cost energy…especially in the form of electricity…coupled with a whole array of productivity-increasing tools and methods, ranging from the horse-drawn harvester to the assembly line to the automated check sorting machine.

The middle class affluence enabled by these factors is gravely threatened is gravely threatened by the Democratic-“progressive” hostility toward energy production and distribution in all practical forms, and by the endless set of productivity-sapping policies advocated by the same group of people.

Over the long term, or even the medium term, a nation cannot consume more than it produces. It doesn’t matter how aggressive the unions are, or what tax policies are in place, or how much Oprah-like sympathy for the unfortunate is exuded by politicians–if you harm the productive power of a nation, its average standard of living is going to go down.

Low-energy, low-productivity societies can support a very wealthy elite, and have historically often done so, but they cannot support a broadly affluent middle class.

My Turn For Thoughts On Service

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It seems Carl las opened up quite the can of worms talking about the shoddy service he receives on a regular basis in Chicago.   First off, Carl needs to move to Racine or Valparaiso and start commuting every day so he can begin to enjoy the fruits of living rural.   Jokes aside, I do have some relevant thoughts.

I agree with Ginny in her post on the subject on the red/blue states.

I tend to agree with the comments about red state/blue state divisions, though clearly it is  often a matter of rural/urban and mompop/corporate.

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Further Thoughts on Service

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On Service:   I tend to agree with the comments about red state/blue state divisions, though clearly it is  often a matter of rural/urban and mompop/corporate.   Engagement takes energy and minimal intelligence, but most of all it takes an attitude.   Tailoring service to customers is generally best done by widely distributed responsibility and encouragement of innovation.   Shannon’s observations are good.  Establishing a relationship requires some time a large turnover of either customers or workers means that the relationship can’t grow.   Knowing customers, we soon expect that customer to add the extra change that keeps his pockets cleared though such an exchange was surprising the first time it happened.    After a while, a customer knows what the business can do and a business knows what the customer is likely to like.   In the old days, clerks at stores would put aside certain dresses they knew their customers would like; clerks would step into the dressing room and discuss exactly how a bra should fit.    But the temporary nature of workers, the shifting clientele  – all these make such interactions impossible.  

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Thoughts on Service

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Carl From Chicago’s post on poor service reminded of my own service career during my extended college tenure. I learned that some problems in service have to do with customers.  

For example, Carl innocently observes:  

There are two dimensions for my coffee – “black” and “large”. I have learned through hard experience to wait until the clerk is ready to receive this complex and easily forgotten information; you’ll just have to repeat it five more times.  

The problem that a counter-jockey has with this order lies not its complexity but rather its ubiquity.

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Expectations… and the Productivity of the Service Economy

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Recently I needed to go to the post office in downtown Chicago for a certified letter. Yes, it would seem, the post almost writes itself… the lines were long and, in the middle of it, one of the two employees wandered off to take a break or something. The guy next to me, an older guy, was about to lose his mind with rage. He said “this must be how it is under communism” and seethed with rage. My response was that the selection of employees was essentially designed to “employ the unemployable” in the name of limiting social unrest as a thinly disguised government work program. At one point, an actual competent employee came in and took all the people in line to self-service machines and helped me personally, for which I was thankful. The entire process, which should have been simple, took over an hour.

I was in a local sandwich shop called “Corner Bakery” (which I usually call “Corner Confusion”) where you order in one place and they give you a tag to put on your table, and then you wait for your sandwich to come to you. This sort of process always scares me, because the shop is big and there is a patio outside, so they don’t know where you are sitting and it just seems like they could miss you. Well, this time they found me… a waiter who didn’t speak English very well came over and set my sandwich in front of an older guy and gave him my sandwich (one was flat bread so it should have been obvious which was which). The other guy was about to go apoplectic with rage but I had been watching the whole thing, just assuming that it would be screwed up, and I calmly got up and switched sandwiches with the guy (I was watching him, too, to make sure he didn’t take a bite out of it). He was in mid rant but I didn’t care, I just wanted lunch.

Often I go by McDonalds for coffee (I don’t like Starbucks very much, although I usually go there just because it is preferred by others and I don’t care very much overall) and it is part of the rest of my order. There are two dimensions for my coffee – “black” and “large”. I have learned through hard experience to wait until the clerk is ready to receive this complex and easily forgotten information; you’ll just have to repeat it five more times. It is beyond expectations that you could ask for your order (like a number “9” or something and AT THE SAME TIME say “large coffee, black”) without having to repeat it later. But you need to stay on it, or you never know what you’ll get.

Through myriad travels and eating out continually for years I have three expectations for the US service sector, so that I am never disappointed:

1) they know nothing
2) they do nothing
3) they annoy me

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