Outside The Box

They say the United States has a “mixed economy.” It combines elements of a command economy, where government or central authority regulates economic activity, and a market economy where prices respond to supply and demand.

Economists with a more historical perspective describe the evolution of our economy from agrarian to industrial, to today’s economy based on information and services. Information and services is a big umbrella, but looking across the laptop through my window to the Amazon box on the deck that was delivered yesterday by UPS, it seems to mean we buy and sell information on where to buy things manufactured somewhere else.

Catherine Austin Fitts described our system as a “tapeworm economy, ” where financial “instruments,” derivatives, and complex bundles of monetized debt extract value from commerce. At every turn and in every transaction some kind of local, state or federal authority also feeds off of the transaction. Government now taxes future generations to sustain current levels of spending. Bloated government and corporate entities exist, not by creating value, but by extracting it.

Thinking outside the Amazon box delivered by UPS, we are beginning to develop our own terms for understanding the economy. For the record, I’m here to tell you that for the average American, we now live in a Zip Tie Economy. You heard it here first. If you don’t follow, bear with me.

Living in the country and disdaining home garbage service, every week or so Tracey and I bundle up our Amazon boxes and other refuse and haul it all to the transfer station. Afterwards we go into town and support the local economy in various ways. We refer to this trip as our “dump date.” “Nothing but the best for my gal,” he says. “He treats me like a queen,” says she.

Yesterday our dump date was almost spoiled when a quarter mile from the house, the windshield wiper, brand new, top of the line and expensive, detached itself and danced on the hood of the truck. The cheap plastic clip had failed at precisely the wrong place, exactly where the most torque would occur in the movement of the wiper. If you wanted a wiper to fail, you couldn’t have picked a better place to skimp on the plastic.

We were not stranded in the rain, however. Having been aware for some time of our transition to a Zip Tie Economy, I was able to reach into the glove box and retrieve a quick solution to our problem. A zip tie saved the day, and I think I’ve fundamentally improved on the wiper design since the plastic in my tie is of a superior quality to that being used by the wiper manufacturer.

Zip ties secure the throttle cable on my mower because the inferior clamps manufactured in Asia and sold by an American company failed. They anchor the tarp covering that mower because the elastic tie downs manufactured in Asia and sold by an American company failed as well. They hold in place some of the wiring under the hood of my pickup because the replacement cable guides sold by the manufacturer cost half as much as the cables.

Some people might prefer the term, “Duct Tape Economy,” but the principle is the same. Zip ties and duct tape both serve to compensate for the deficiencies in quality suffered by so many manufactured goods. Technology has enabled us to build more sophisticated devices, but it has also enabled us to build things more cheaply. Just how thin can we make that metal part before it fails? Keep in mind that we want it to fail eventually, preferably just after the warranty expires. How much can we save the company if we shave off another nanometer from the widget that connects to the thingy?

The history of quality makes for an interesting study. As a good friend recently retired from one of our few remaining industrial giants explains, American companies in the 1980’s felt threatened by the quality and affordability of automobiles manufactured in Japan, and so for a decade or so, quality became synonymous with a sustainable business model in the US. Eventually, however, as the tapeworm infestation grew, the manipulation of stock prices began to be prioritized over quality.

We keep a plentiful supply of duct tape at home. I carry zip ties in my toolbox and there are some in the emergency kit of every vehicle. Alas, the tapeworms are now infesting my supply of zip ties. The last ties I ordered were ever so slightly, almost unnoticeably thinner than the ones I bought last year.