Shopping Locally: An Idea That Just Makes Sense
When you spend your hard earned dollars just where does the money go? Is it funneled back into your community or does it god to enhance the economy of some distant corporate town perhaps thousands of miles from your home? In 2012, this is a fundamentally important question to ask.
I believe strongly that we should be thinking locally if we are going to have a strong economy and a vibrant community.
Let me just list a few of the problems as I see them...
If you spend your money in your local Walmart the profits are realized in Bentonville, Arkansas.
Target shoppers, your dollars are transferred to Minneapolis, Minnesota.
Shop at Bed Bath and Beyond and you enrich the company located in Union, New Jersey.
K-Mart shoppers send their dollars to Hoffman Estates, Illinois.
And this is just the short list! Oh sure, by shopping at these big box stores you claim you are saving money.
But pick up the shirt you pay a mere pittance for and note that it was manufactured in some sweatshop in a far away land like Viet Nam, Singapore, India Pakistan or some other third-world country.
Note the quality of the workmanship and the care taken in manufacture; generally not so hot.
While you are doing this also remember that for every job outsourced to these far away places one equivalent job is lost in the United States.
While that seems harsh, even more problematic is the fact that for every big box store that is built, local businesses close.
The big box is like a vacuum cleaner sucking the very life out of a community, replacing the strength that small businesses bring to a community with low-paying (often minimum wage) jobs while sucking the profits out of the community and sending them to distant towns and cities.
So what's the solution to this madness? Without sounding like a shopping terrorist, I believe that we must begin to think locally before we think globally.
When given the opportunity the right thing to do is look for local merchants that supply the same things that you can buy at your local big box store.
Sure, you may pay a bit more but you can be assured that the money you spend will be put back into the community, create jobs in the community and strengthen the economic well being of the community.
One great place to start is to shop locally for the food that you put on your table.
Local farmer's markets introduce you to local growers and that means that you are getting the freshest fruits and vegetables available.
Often these growers are also either certified organic farmers or grow with organic methods so you aren't pumping genetically modified Frankenfood into your or your kid's bodies.
In the long run, shopping locally is good for all of us.
It keeps money local to strengthen our local economy, creates jobs for local citizens both by discouraging outsourcing to foreign lands and by allowing local small business owners to reinvest and expand at home, thereby strengthening our community and it creates a greater sense of community by building bridges between local businesses and local residents.
I believe strongly that we should be thinking locally if we are going to have a strong economy and a vibrant community.
Let me just list a few of the problems as I see them...
If you spend your money in your local Walmart the profits are realized in Bentonville, Arkansas.
Target shoppers, your dollars are transferred to Minneapolis, Minnesota.
Shop at Bed Bath and Beyond and you enrich the company located in Union, New Jersey.
K-Mart shoppers send their dollars to Hoffman Estates, Illinois.
And this is just the short list! Oh sure, by shopping at these big box stores you claim you are saving money.
But pick up the shirt you pay a mere pittance for and note that it was manufactured in some sweatshop in a far away land like Viet Nam, Singapore, India Pakistan or some other third-world country.
Note the quality of the workmanship and the care taken in manufacture; generally not so hot.
While you are doing this also remember that for every job outsourced to these far away places one equivalent job is lost in the United States.
While that seems harsh, even more problematic is the fact that for every big box store that is built, local businesses close.
The big box is like a vacuum cleaner sucking the very life out of a community, replacing the strength that small businesses bring to a community with low-paying (often minimum wage) jobs while sucking the profits out of the community and sending them to distant towns and cities.
So what's the solution to this madness? Without sounding like a shopping terrorist, I believe that we must begin to think locally before we think globally.
When given the opportunity the right thing to do is look for local merchants that supply the same things that you can buy at your local big box store.
Sure, you may pay a bit more but you can be assured that the money you spend will be put back into the community, create jobs in the community and strengthen the economic well being of the community.
One great place to start is to shop locally for the food that you put on your table.
Local farmer's markets introduce you to local growers and that means that you are getting the freshest fruits and vegetables available.
Often these growers are also either certified organic farmers or grow with organic methods so you aren't pumping genetically modified Frankenfood into your or your kid's bodies.
In the long run, shopping locally is good for all of us.
It keeps money local to strengthen our local economy, creates jobs for local citizens both by discouraging outsourcing to foreign lands and by allowing local small business owners to reinvest and expand at home, thereby strengthening our community and it creates a greater sense of community by building bridges between local businesses and local residents.
Source...