Ways to improve?

According to the U.S. Commerce Department, CORPORATE profits are at their highest
level in at least 85 years. Employee compensation is at the lowest level in 65 years.

What does that suggest?

How many ways might we improve this organization?

This is today's bottom-line driven, profit-motivated business model.  A good bad example - Walmart, perhaps.

The six Walmart heirs took more than $1 Billion each in profits last year.  

2014 Walmart sales associates make $8.81 per hour on average. This translates to annual pay of $15,576, based upon Walmart's full-time status of 34 hours per week.  That's below the poverty line for a family, of course.  (UPDATE: WMT upped their minimum to $9/Hr earlier this year, but it hasn't worked out that well as the change only benefits new hires.)

Costco, by comparison, pays a reasonable wage. Costco's CEO and president, Craig Jelinek, has publicly endorsed raising the federal minimum wage to $10.10 an hour, and he takes that to heart. The company's starting pay is $11.50 per hour, and the average employee wage is $21 per hour, not including overtime.

Prices?  Walmart offers no advantage over Costco or Target.

And how do they treat their community? Working at Walmart means you qualify for for SNAP, EITC, and housing assistance programs.  “A single Walmart Supercenter cost area taxpayers between $904,542 and $1.75 million per year," in family assistance costs due to low wages and deliberately restricted hours.

Walmart stock is as unimpressive as their business practices. Costco and Kroger have beaten WMT performance impressively.

Feel free to comment about it to management.  The business still needs to be adjusted.

Walmart Executive Compensation; typical of large corporations, upper management is in the top 0.01% for income.

	Name/Title		2011	2012	2013	2014	2015

	C. Douglas Mcmillon/President and CEO		$8,806,408	$10,961,404	$9,563,093	$25,592,938	$19,392,608

	Charles Holley/Executive Vice President and CFO		$8,186,163	$5,112,172	$6,638,670	$8,199,391	$7,431,841

	Gregory Foran/Executive Vice President		-	-	-	-	$19,535,123

	David Cheesewright/Executive Vice President		-	-	-	-	$10,665,054

	Rosalind G. Brewer/Executive Vice President		-	-	$14,457,122	$11,664,423	$9,560,235

	Neil M. Ashe/Executive Vice President		-	$11,247,988	$8,350,945	$13,178,743	$9,436,775

According to the U.S. Commerce Department, CORPORATE profits are at their highest level in at least 85 years. Employee compensation is at the lowest level in 65 years. What does that suggest?

Children and Dogs Ran Free!

Bicycle trails through the woods were the

shortest route between everywhere and

and everywhere else.

Saturday morning after chores were done, we'd get on our bicycles and go. We'd be home by sunset, usually, without many rules about where we'd go or what we'd do.  We were perhaps as close to free as is possible for a creature to be, and it was magic.

Two blocks from home was the edge of the woods, then by trail to the railroad tracks and across, then through a huge cornfield to a country road and another three miles to my best friend's house.  We'd launch our adventures from there, sometimes with fireworks we bought at the gas station.

Children no longer run free like that; it's not a safe world for them like it was fifty years ago. Why is that?  My little daughter used to disappear early Saturday mornings with a dozen or so of her friends.  She'd come home by sunset with stories of adventures and play.  But that was in Japan in the 80's, not here.

Today, children rarely go anywhere alone.  They don't even wait for the school bus alone.  What changed, and why?  It's worth noting the specific ethical and moral changes, the social changes we've experienced in recent decades.

• Has the mainstream media weakened our culture, sensationalizing bad behavior?  Absolutely. 
• Have the business and personal standards for morality and ethical behavior declined?   Of course.
• Have families become isolated, hiding at home, instead of being part of an interactive community?  Yes.
• Have character and nobility disappeared from our instructional goals?  In many contexts, yes.

Is there a good way forward from here?  
Absolutely, but probably not for all, and probably not a gentle journey.  Today, things are not as they seem.  You and your children were born into a world at war.  Everything you do matters.                                    ~ C.S. Lewis, paraphrased


Picked a side yet?

Nicer Rich People

There's this odd fellow who invented the 5-Hr Energy drink thing.  He hit a home run in the marketplace, and he's worth billions, personally.  He has pledged 99% of his wealth to helping others.

The guy is Manoj Bhargava; he says, "If you have wealth, it's a duty to help those who don't."

Why would he say that?  Is he right?

NATGEO 2011

Instead of simply giving money, Bhargava believes that personal involvement is necessary.  He's probably right on that one.

And who are the wealthy? Perhaps an important question for each of us.

If your household income tops $10/day/person, you're better off than about 70% of humanity.   

If you have a house and a car or two, a positive net worth and some money in the bank, you're perhaps in the top 10% or so.

If you haven't seen the real world in person, it's perhaps something worth pursuing; personal involvement, and all that.

Here's the whole story Billions in Change

Relevant Words

Ever cringe at religious words?    We were visiting somewhere, and this church fellow wanting perhaps to instruct us more perfectly in the way said, "let me minister to you...."  Cringe!

Today, 'ministry' and 'minister' are usually religious things.  In English language bibles, the Greek words (diakonia, diakonos, etc) are sometimes translated as 'minister' and 'ministry'.  Those Greek words appear all through the New Testament, but they are not limited to the pulpit; the words are used to describe a variety of activities.  In each occurrence, the context is one of serving others, and there's a beautiful undertone of having a good heart about it.

While the original word use does include working in the church, it more broadly describes serving the needs of others by pretty much everyone.  And everyone serves (they minister, to use the old word).  Feeding the hungry, taking up collections for the poor, the labors of leadership and of teaching, of helping and hospitality, and caring practically for others near and far.  In such use, 'minister' is not a position, it's a sacrifice.

The words 'minister' and 'ministry' may not have real clarity in young folks' minds.  Such words are perhaps more of a separator, a boundary drawn between inside and outside.  Would our words be clearer if instead we talked about 'lending a hand', 'coming alongside for the duration', 'I got your back', or 'can I help'?

(Offering religious words to an inquirer is like offering beef to a vegan.  I suspect that little could be less appealing than sounding like today's media-portrayed religionists.  When we speak, we need to understand how it will be heard.)

Today, ministry is for ministers, at least the way the word is used.  Perhaps the word has evolved in common vernacular to the near-opposite of its earlier use.  True?  Do your own study, if you like, and consider what it might mean.  :)  It looks to me like everyone is supposed to be involved.

(For the record, my Kenyan friend says they have the same problem in Swahili.)

Ephesians 4:12 to equip his people for works of (ministry) service 

The Walkout

This is Nick Cannon.  His mother got off the abortion table and walked out, sparing his life.

Cannon told his story in a music video entitled, “Can I Live?” which has been credited with saving the lives of many unborn children.

___________________________

Then there's Christina Marie Bennett.  She almost died as an unborn child. Her mother paid for an abortion but walked out of the doctor's office after a janitor told her God would give her the strength to have her baby.

       It was over a decade ago that I stood in the bathroom while my mom struggled to find the words to speak. “You’ll hate me,” she said. “I can’t tell you, because you’ll hate me.”
      “I would never hate you,” I replied. The look in her eyes revealed she wasn’t convinced. I was in my early 20’s, home for a visit from college and looking for answers. I certainly wasn’t pro-life at the time.
       Only months before, a prophetic minister gave me a word that something special happened when I was born. When I asked my mom about it, she said: “I met an angel.”

From Christina's website bio ... Outside pressures and inner anxieties lead her (Christina's mom) to schedule an abortion. She met with a hospital counselor who assured her she was making the right choice. As she sat for a moment in the hallway, an African-American janitor saw her crying and approached her. ‘Do you want to have this baby,' she asked?  When my mother said yes, the janitor replied, 'then God will give you the strength.' After the janitor's encouragement, the doctor called my mother into his office. She told him she changed her mind and wanted to leave. To her dismay, the doctor demanded she stay, insisting it was too late and telling her she had to go through with the abortion. With strength from above, my mom walked out. ... Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. said, ‘Our lives begin to die the day we become silent about things that matter’.  I'm alive today because a stranger refused to be silent.

          ____________________

Then there's Kimberly Henderson.  Apparently she's famous; her video (right, called 'Tiny Hearts') had millions of views in the first week.  She spent seven hours in an abortion clinic, but walked out deciding not to sign the final consent form.  It's a moderately miraculous story, and that's her baby girl there in her arms, the result of her decision.  

How should we process such information?

For some further thoughts, see Life, Abortion, and Conscience

Discovery!

It's called the Discovery Doctrine, and it has a 500 year legal history.

When Christopher Columbus first set foot on the white sands of Guanahani island he performed
 a ceremony to "take possession" of the land for the king and queen of Spain, acting under the
international laws of Western Christendom. Although the story of Columbus' "discovery" has
taken on mythological proportions in most of the Western world, few people are aware that
 his act of "possession" was based on a religious doctrine now known in history as
 the Doctrine of Discovery.

Under the doctrine, a government could claim title to lands it's subjects travelled to and
occupied and whose indigenous inhabitants were not subjects of a European Christian
monarch. The doctrine's legal use has been for invalidating aboriginal claims to their
homeland in favor of colonial governments.

Many historical periods are inaccurately portrayed; the winners write the history books. Dealing objectively and in human terms with conquest, displacement of populations, and genocide hasn't yet become the norm.

Power and hubris have shaped every country in the world. The conquering heroes may have thought well of their own actions, but there was perhaps more to the story in every case. 

The first European explorers knew nothing of the civilizations and cultures of Africa or the Americas, some of which preceded their own by more than a thousand years. Colonization and conquest decimated the populations, divided up the land and resources, and imposed subservience on the survivors.

Recent history includes similar conquest and the death of millions at the hands of those who would advance themselves at the expense of another. WWI and II were attempts at conquest and acquisition of land and resources. Today, Wall Street is headquarters for the ongoing economic war now waged in the marketplace for the same goals. Perhaps we're finally catching on, they're not heroes.

How might we honestly process and respond to such information?

You might appreciate Whose History?