Madame M:
National Independence
Week it is then!
Diving into some details…What
about the sectors of the economy that others in the world rely on (however they
rely on them), such as the stock market?
And what about the service industries?
Restaurants, grocery stores, gas stations, airlines, trains, hotels, etc.? Surely they (or rather, their employees and
owners) need a break. Do all or most of
them get shut down for the whole week, forcing people to “stock up” ahead of
time? Do they get opened one day in the
middle of the week? Do only some of them
get opened, on a sort of lottery system?
Do all of them to get to be opened for part of the time, only on a
carefully thought out rotational basis?
There will be, as there
nearly always is in societies in general and democratic capitalist ones in
particular, conflicting desires. Many
people, when they are off, want to travel, and to be able to pull into, for
example, a filling station anywhere along the way. Given the deficiency of planning (and
logistics) skills in a fair amount of the populace, this could pose a real problem
of stranded travelers.
Others want to dine out
on their time off. Do they forego that
pleasure altogether for the period, or will it exist but be limited? And if limited, will it be limited as to hours
(to allow the employees/owner to enjoy many of the benefits of the week), or
will it be limited as to number of places open?
All of this goes to the
complex heart of a modern economy. There’s
so much we take for granted as being always available. And we all want free time, but we want our
whims and desires to be fillable when they strike us on that free time, whether
that be for a bookstore, restaurant, hotel, train, convenience store, etc., let
alone what we feel are “needs.” One way
we might “have our celebration and shopping too” is to borrow a page from Chinese
New Year and permit some farmers markets, etc. to be open. Since they would not necessarily be
classified as “regular” businesses, the burden on them wouldn’t be too much and
it wouldn’t be an “unfair” advantage (as it might be for conventional
businesses). Yes, I am aware that it
might be greatly advantaging the farmers markets, but that’s okay. One, they
largely deserve it, and two, it’s only for a short period of time.
And of course, we haven’t
even addressed the “just in time” feature of our economy, which depends on
continual transport and delivery of goods, as there really isn’t much of a
stockpile of, well, much. We could get a
taste for just how slim is the margin that we live on.
Which might not be a bad
thing.
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