The Bean Wars of 2020

My exposure to and association with education started in (or over 35 years) when my need to teach was either optional or as a sub component of my primary tasks and responsibilities. 

That tangential relationship continued until 2001/2002 when I was hired as an Adjunct Instructor then a Full Time Instructor teaching English, Economics, IT, and Project Management courses.

It was during this time that I came up with the ideas about which I have written and posted here related to The Global Corporation of Commerce, Americas United, You Cannot Get There From Here, and The Lord of the Harvest.

At any rate my teaching started with English and quickly involved Economics, both Micro and Macro and it was the later that I enjoyed teaching the most.

In my Economics classes (2002/2003), I recall being ridiculed by my colleagues and laughed at by my students when I mentioned to them that goods and services in the US would start to dramatically if one of two events (an either/or proposition) took place during the next 10-15 years and maybe it could happen within the next 8-10 years.

The first of these events pertained to the growing strength of the Euro Dollar and the fact that the IMF might or just might consider changing the International Currency of Trade from the American Dollar to the Euro Dollar. If that happened, prices would double or triple over night almost, I predicted.

About this time and very cautiously but curiously interesting, the US invaded Iraq where Saddam Hussein Abd al-Majid al-Tikriti was President.

Why?

Well, our invasion came on the coattails of the 9/11 invasion but also because it was affirmed by our Intelligence sources that there were weapons of mass destruction located within Iraq... however, no WMDs were ever found.

Now here is the interesting part that no one talked about except for the fact that CNN had a one time only news segment about fact that just previous to our invasion, Saddam had announced to the rest of the world that he was no longer accepting American Dollars for his oil, only Euro Dollars.

The second of these events that I had mentioned to my colleagues and students was my fear that there was going to be a growing middle class from all parts of the world outside of the middle class here in America and when that happened, they would be demanding the same goods and services that Americans wanted and for all intents and purposes took for granted.

The resulting conclusion I predicted was economic collapse in the US and perhaps a financial crisis but at the very least our middle class would be severely reduced in size. I mentioned that this could also be linked to a wealthy conspiracy of attempting to create a wider gap between them and a growing upper middle class that could potentially swell the ranks of the wealthy.

However, there was no mention on my part of a top 1% like there is now, but that only serves to support those concerns that I had back then.

One of the examples that I used was from the National Geographic Magazine and the issue that dealt with the end of cheap oil. This issue mentioned how there was no more oil to be found at the present time and extracting oil out of the ground by new methods was not cost effective. It also mentioned that oil refineries were operating at 95% capacity so if any new oil could be found, these refineries would be a bottleneck getting the oil to the marketplace. Additionally, it was too expensive to build any new refineries.

This issue had and centerfold (like the Playboy magazines) that provided an excellent photo of all the plastic products that are made from Petroleum Crude Oil.

After seeing that centerfold, my forecast was confirmed because those plastic products were exactly manufactured to target our middle class.

And, I predicted that middle class mindset would be the same all over the world regardless of culture, government, or religion.

When the rest of the world started growing their middle class and demanding those types of products, then a global shortage would naturally be created which according to all models of economic theory and assumptions would increase the price.

Price increases juxtaposed beside unemployment and the exportation of US jobs (Globalization) would in my limited economic opinion cause a financial crisis here in America.

My ideas had nothing to do with and did not predict the financial meltdown of 2008 but because of that meltdown/crisis the US has been incredibly slow to get back on its feet whereas China, India, and the Middle East are economically growing and prosperous.

Yes, I am aware that foreign Governments have stepped in to help out their businesses and that may be construed as giving them a competitive advantage but that does not change what is taking place around the world, does it?

In 2005, Thomas Friedman's book The World is Flat was published and one of the issues that he attributed to this globalization issue that was started by President Ronald Reagan and Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher was the fall of the Berlin Wall.

"Tear down this wall!" was the challenge issued by United States President Ronald Reagan to Soviet Union leader Mikhail Gorbachev to destroy the Berlin Wall, in a speech at the Brandenburg Gate near the Berlin Wall on June 12, 1987, commemorating the 750th anniversary of Berlin.

Quite simply...

When the Berlin Wall came down, East Berliners could see what the rest of the world had and WANTED IT TOO.

And, that desire to want it too spread like wildfire across the globe to every country but American because Americans had (and took for granted for the most part) what the rest of the world now wanted.

How can the US possibly contain a global movement based upon the desire to want more? Especially when that desire is going to do nothing but make American business owners more wealthy and so they fueled those fires as best they could.

Fast Forward to today... February 17, 2015... and, the fact that on CNN this morning, a colleague of Robin Meade was announcing the price of coffee was going to increase twice maybe 3 times the amount of what it is priced at now.

Why?

Because, the global middle class is growing and is consequently demanding more coffee which will put a strain on coffee bean growing and coffee bean production.

The CNN commentator went on to say that this was going to take place in the next 3-5 years... or, right about 2020.

I mean... think this through with me... if the price of coffee is going up because of a growing global middle class, do you not think that other items demanded by the middle class will go up as well putting those in short supply too? Short supply means higher prices.

I for one like coffee but I also have no problems switching to tea or water if I need to. In Economics this is called SUBSTITUTION and works best when there is little product differentiation like one might see with hamburgers.

As I have said many times before: People don't plan to fail... they fail to plan.