Thursday, September 3, 2015

An Open Letter To The Governments of the World

I will try to keep this post as simple as possible. It is in regard to the Faustian bargain which many of you have made, and the wealth you share with holders of vital knowledge, by keeping much of that knowledge artificially scarce.

Did you not understand how that would eventually distort the world economy? How could you not have known what was happening, as traditional production became less important than service formation in recent decades? Worse, did you not fully understand how your complicity in the act of restraining knowledge use, would eventually make it impossible to help either your own citizens or those of other nations? Would be refugees are struggling for their very survival, yet nations have not nurtured their own human capital, so as to be able to make room for them.

For more than two years I have tried to explain, how the services marketplace suffers from artificially limited knowledge use. Should these limits on knowledge use remain intact, nations will only become less inclined to leave their doors open to other nations. While this is also true in terms of free trade, it is particularly true in terms of social mobility and immigration. Here in the U.S., people appear as though more adamantly opposed to immigration by the day.

Anyone who is dependent on artificially restricted knowledge is perceived as a "burden", if they are not also being compensated for high skill levels. Think of the "burdens" all over the world, the needless devaluation of human spirit and initiative! Just because millions of people are not fortunate enough to hold advanced degrees, they are perceived as incapable of helping anyone, let along themselves!

Why did nations and their peoples needlessly inflict this psychological damage on themselves? Who is willing to accept more immigrants now...immigrants like so many marginalized who are perceived as further demands on already stretched to the limit healthcare systems? No one! How many more will have to wash up in the surf, such as the young Syrian boy, before governments finally figure this out?

What purpose for governments to "immigrant shame" one another now, when each nation would just as soon not have to deal with the hardships of other nations? For a long time I've kept my emotions out of the immigrant debate. But then the news showed those horrific images over and over again, even though few seemed to want to talk about it afterward. And then the frantic family at the train tracks, who panicked at being held in a containment camp for who knows how long...

This is no time for governments to hold up scorecards or make one another feel guilty for the immigrants they don't want. Too many governments have been complicit in knowledge use restrictions which have made a travesty of vast human capital potential. This, even as millions have invested everything they have, just to gain economic access. Instead of making a place for many of these individuals, governments and special interests alike have profited off the process of economic access, and the constant struggle of humankind just to participate in the human act of assisting one another.

Everyone deserves a better reality than this. When governments enrich themselves by restricting access and the rights to services production, populations are left helpless. Not only are too many citizens left without meaningful work, budgets are also becoming stretched to the point that governments will no longer be able to provide services to the public. Even though it is extremely difficult for me to watch fellow citizens insist on building walls to keep others out, I understand why they think it has become necessary to do so.

In the U.S., limits on knowledge use and the services marketplace has divided the political parties beyond reconciliation. This is hardly the circumstance that anyone could have imagined, even a decade earlier. There is still time to turn this slow motion train wreck around. Find means by which to broaden knowledge use, and the services marketplace it makes possible. Find a way to give human capital the respect it deserves in a 21st century economy. Just do it, while there is still time.

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