The broadening distribution of economic fear and outrage

It is only ten at night and I am already pretty tired, but I have this thing that if I go to bed too early, I will wake an hour or two later and not sleep the rest of the night. The "sweet spot" is between twelve and one in the morning - but that would also be better if I got to sleep in. One of the problems with having a job, is having to get up for it.

This week will be a 60-hour week for me, due to these global meetings that are going on in the evenings and the trainings during the days. I am literally stepping from one session to the next with no breaks between other than lunch, as I spend the coffee breaks in the client meetings, answering questions. Remote sessions suck, though I am pretty good at them - when I know what I am talking about.

The last three hours of today was spent in a meeting listening to a recapping of the business in 2020 and what is planned for 2021 and beyond. New management structures, annual recurring revenue (SaaS company) and how the company performed against the KPIs. I am interested in some of it, but not to the point that I get excited over it, as I know that it is not "mine" - I just work there. Yes, I add value to the bottom line by bringing in income as well as increasing adoption, retention and reducing churn, but I am working for others.

The company actually did quite well and while it didn't hit the pre-Covid planned targets across the board, it hit more than it looked like it would. The training department is a tiny slice of the overall revenue, but as a unit we trained a fair bit more than we have in the past, as so many sessions were pushed remote and then expanded upon. It was a pretty busy year, considering that a lot of the early to mid period was spent facilitating the changeover to remote delivery.

All of the changes take resources of course, so while there were cost saving measures taken, including trading salary for stock options, additional costs were going out, but more importantly, the business supply chain was interrupted. This isn't such a big issue in the short term for a SaaS company as it is subscription based, meaning that as long as companies don't churn it is okay and there are contracts in place that "protect" the revenue for a period of time.

However, the company only moved to a SaaS business model a little over two years ago, which means converting existing contract over and only about half had been shifted at the start of the pandemic. This exposed the other half to having more opportunity to end contracts to save money, but very few actually did. The biggest impact was through delays of planned projects, as other companies scrambled to cope under the new normal conditions.

Of course, some companies did better than others, just like some people did better than others as they are better prepared for or suited to the new conditions. As expected, the over confidence in the economy is now starting to be seen, as predictions of coming economic issues arise, as if they are new.

For example, in Australia the service sector was heavily affected by the pandemic and as a result, middle to low income earners were the ones who lost their jobs and didn't qualify for a lot of the support to keep them employed. 40% of the people who lost their jobs were from the service sectors, even though it is only 15% of the employment share.

Not only this, the real estate industry which has been cheering its resiliency underscored the issue, as the reason it is resilient is that the middle to low income earners are far less likely to own homes, as they can't afford them since they have been priced out of the market. This means that the people who kept their jobs and got the government support are also the ones who are more likely to own their own home, meaning that they didn't have to dump into a failing market. This just makes the wealth gap between rich and poor even worse on average and even if the issues ended today, would take those affected many years to recover, if ever.

The global economy is very complicated and due to this, there are many inefficiencies that those with the knowhow are able to take advantage of, as well as direct. While many small businesses were forced to shut their doors, large businesses were able to remain open. While small companies like myself were trimmed away, large companies kept on trading and got support to do so. When you have a team of accountants and lawyers working to find loop holes and attract or retain income streams, it is easy to out perform all of those that don't have access to the same resources.

The last year has been a consolidation process that has not only pushed wealth into the hands of fewer people, it has also driven consumers to support fewer businesses. Then when the handouts are pumped into the economy, it ends up being used in a lower range of companies and because of the uncertainty, people are looking to pay less, rather than consume locally, which means supporting the multinational conglomerates that can deliver cheap due to their optimized supply chains that have been crushed by their scale.

People are effectively forced to buy from the mass producers, as what choice do they have, since they have lost their jobs or have high uncertainty and mounting debt due to the drive for consumption they have been goaded into. The entire economy is doing the exact opposite of what it should in order to create economic stability, with decisions being made under the guise of delivering that stability.

It seems that the entire world is now on the US bandwagon where, debt no longer matters, just keep printing money and taking debt on the future. People look at the US model as the "richest country" as success, but the social problems and level of poverty is unprecedented for a first world country - yet it seems that this is the way the rest of governments are headed. It makes sense though, as rich people don't have to rub shoulders or share a bus with the poor, so as long as rich enough not to be affected, all is well.

Tomorrow on the 20th is the inauguration of the US president, which is likely to see more turmoil arise and it will probably not be isolated to a region. It seems that while the concentration of wealth keeps narrowing, the distribution of conflict keeps increasing.

I think that this is a good indication of the power of distribution, as currently the tides are turning as the spread of energy through the populations is increasing and they are starting to spend that energy on creating disruption and conflict. Social energy is like wealth, it is a resource that can be applied in many ways that can improve or degrade conditions, depending on the decisions made and how it is invested.

For many in this world, the only wealth they have is the power to choose where they direct their energies. When people are stressed, fearful and outraged, the direction is almost inevitable.

Taraz [ Gen1: Hive ]