New York – Go Lean…Caribbean

Tag: New York

Building Better Cities

Posted on April 19, 2017 in Implementation, Locations, Strategy

Go Lean Commentary

Truth be told, it is hard to fix (reform) the broken processes of a whole country.

It is easier to fix a broken family; and easier to fix/reform just a broken neighborhood.

So a formula for success would be to reform broken neighborhoods (and broken families) one after another, and just like that, the country is transformed.

This “bottoms-up” approach is also the premise of the Six Sigma Quality Management concept (see Appendix below):

Do not try to perform 1 million perfect iterations; rather try to perform 1 iteration perfectly; then repeat it 1,000,000 times.

The book Go Lean…Caribbean presents the quest to elevate the 30 member-states in the Caribbean region. It does not limit the focus to the state governments; it drills down to a subset level: the cities. The book asserts that reforming and transforming cities would be integral to reforming and transforming entire countries.

Fix the cities; fix the world!

This is the theme of these many source materials. Consider the AUDIO Podcast, VIDEO and magazine column/article here:

AUDIO Podcast – Building Better Cities – http://www.npr.org/programs/ted-radio-hour/462178064/building-better-cities?showDate=2017-03-31

Posted March 31, 2017 – Cities are among our greatest experiments in human co-habitation. Do they also hold the answers to some of our biggest problems? This hour, TED speakers explore how cities can change the world. Listen to the full hour here: http://www.npr.org/programs/ted-radio-hour/462178064/building-better-cities?showDate=2017-03-31

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VIDEO – Atlanta’s Kasim Reed: How Are Mayors Better Poised to ‘Get Things Done’? – https://youtu.be/semT61CCNEE

Published on Oct 20, 2014 – “Cities are where hope meets the streets,” says Kasim Reed, mayor and son of Atlanta. In this powerful talk, he argues that transformation is really possible at the municipal level. Reforming the city he loves was not just a matter of tough financial calls, but of really listening to the wisdom within the community.

See more: tedcity2.org

Category: Nonprofits & Activism

License: Standard YouTube License

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Title: The Issues That Drive America’s Mayors
Sub-Title: Whether they’re Democrats or Republicans, a new survey shows that poverty and wealth inequality are what concern them most.
By: Bob Annibale, Mick Cornett

Before he died in 2014, Thomas Menino, a visionary urban leader who served as mayor of Boston for more than two decades, declared that we are living in “the era of the city.” This has never been truer than it is today.

As the world continues to urbanize at an unprecedented rate, cities and their surrounding areas wield more power than ever. Currently over half of the world’s population lives in cities, and that is expected to grow to 70 percent by 2050. In the United States, 82 percent of Americans live in metropolitan areas, an increase of 12 percent just since 2000.

Cities are rich with diversity and serve as vital hubs of innovation, culture and commerce. The world’s top 10 cities by GDP, five of which are in the United States, have economies rivaling all but the 10 most prosperous countries. But while the populations, capital and political power of many cities is enormous, so are the scale and complexity of their challenges — making insight into their leadership important.

Motivated by the belief that “the era of the city” is upon us, Boston University’s Initiative on Cities, with support from Citi, recently published the findings of its 2016 Menino Survey of Mayors to understand the important challenges facing these cities’ leaders. Named for the great Boston mayor, the survey gathered the perspectives of more than 100 sitting mayors from 41 states on contemporary issues through a series of one-on-one interviews conducted last summer.

The survey’s findings reveal that despite remarkable societal advancements in urban centers, new and more complex problems are cropping up or increasing in severity. The environment, infrastructure, public services and household financial security are presenting challenges at a level that cities have never experienced before.

Not surprisingly, the survey found that two of the central issues in the 2016 presidential campaign – wealth inequality and the shrinking middle class — were also of deep concern to mayors of cities throughout the country. Nearly half of those surveyed ranked poverty as their most pressing economic concern. In fact, 48 percent of mayors feel that those living in or near poverty are the most excluded group in their cities; when asked which constituency they need to do more to help, nearly a quarter named poor residents.

What is slightly more surprising is the level of agreement on the top issues regardless of mayors’ party affiliation or city size. Mayors from cities big and small are highly attuned to the plight of their most vulnerable residents, and even in this polarized political climate the focus on poverty is shared by both Democratic and Republican mayors. That’s also true of the benefits of diversity. While issues of economic inclusion and diversity illuminated deep divisions among the presidential candidates, the country’s mayors were united in the goal of building more inclusive cities that are welcoming to all.

The Menino Survey provides a window into how our nation’s mayors think, act and perceive their world. By gathering and synthesizing the priorities and challenges of our cities from the perspective of their leaders, the survey offers a roadmap of opportunities for civic innovation.

It also provides stakeholders in the nonprofit and private sectors with valuable insights that can inform the development of new programs, policies and partnerships, such as universal youth savings accounts in San Francisco, community land trusts in Washington, D.C., or a small-business support program for public-housing residents in New York City.

These types of innovations, often forged through public-private partnerships, enable us to tackle complex urban challenges such as poverty and economic insecurity and build more inclusive cities — ones where residents can fulfill their potential and contribute to thriving urban economies.

About the Authors:

Bob Annibale – Leader of CitiGroup’s partnerships with global, national and local organizations to support inclusive finance and community development

Mick Cornett – Mayor of Oklahoma City and president of the U.S. Conference of Mayors

Related:

5 Simple Urban Fixes for Unpredictable Times

It is important to glean these main points from the foregoing source media/articles:

This is “the era of the city”.
Cities are where hope meets the streets.
Currently, over half of the world’s population lives in cities, and that is expected to grow to 70 percent by 2050. In the United States, 82 percent of Americans live in metropolitan areas, an increase of 12 percent just since 2000.
Cities are rich with diversity and serve as vital hubs of innovation, culture and commerce. The world’s top 10 cities by GDP, five of which are in the United States, have economies rivaling all but the 10 most prosperous countries.

Reform the cities; reform the country!

The Go Lean book studies the good, bad and ugly lessons from a number of cities (New York City; Omaha, Nebraska; Detroit, Michigan; Los Angeles City-County, California); the book then proceeds to detail strategies, tactics and implementation to fix one particular Caribbean city (Freeport, Bahamas).

The Go Lean book presents a plan to grow the regional economy and create jobs. The Go Lean book asserts that this effort is too big a task for just one Caribbean member-state or city alone; all the 30 member-states and their cities must convene, confederate and collaborate in order to effect change. As such, the Go Lean book serves as a roadmap for the introduction and implementation of the technocratic Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU), for the elevation of Caribbean society – for all member-states, and all cities. This CU/Go Lean roadmap has these 3 prime directives:

Optimization of the economic engines in order to grow the regional economy to $800 Billion and create 2.2 million new jobs. Caribbean cities need jobs and entrepreneurial opportunities. This roadmap calls for mini-cities, referred to as Self-Governing Entities, as a solution to optimize industrial policy. See a model/example here.
Establishment of a security apparatus to ensure public safety and protect the resultant economic engines. The origins of cities were for protective walls around the city perimeters.
Improve Caribbean governance to support these engines, including a separation-of-powers between the member-states and CU federal agencies. See a model/example here.

A mission of the Go Lean roadmap is to reboot urban communities – defining a concerted effort in a concentrated area – with empowerments like:

Transportation – “Out of the box” thinking to transport people to places; i.e. Streetcars.
Mixed-use Developments – Optimize communities with one building for retail, office and residences.
Healthcare … on controlled campuses – Facilitating hands-off administration for advanced medical R&D.
Improving Local Government – Connecting citizens online for more and more electronic delivery.
Public Works – Infrastructure projects elevate cities … economically.
Libraries – These are for more than just reading books in this New Economy.
Events/Festivals – Culture, community pride and revenues cannot be ignored.
Main Street – Local Downtowns can be tranformed for the Greater Good.
Sports – These Big Business activities can impact more than just the fans and players.

The book stresses that reforming and transforming Caribbean urban communities must be a regional pursuit. This was an early motivation for the roadmap, as pronounced in the opening Declaration of Interdependence (Pages 11 – 14):

vi. Whereas the finite nature of the landmass of our lands limits the populations and markets of commerce, by extending the bonds of brotherhood to our geographic neighbors allows for extended opportunities and better execution of the kinetics of our economies through trade. This regional focus must foster and promote diverse economic stimuli.

vii. Whereas our landmass is finite and therefore limited as to population growth potential, it is imperative that prudent growth management be practiced so as to protect our legacy and still foster future opportunities for the hopes and fulfillment of a prosperous future for our children.

viii. Whereas the population size is too small to foster good negotiations for products and commodities from international vendors, the Federation must allow the unification of the region as one purchasing agent, thereby garnering better terms and discounts.

xi. Whereas all men are entitled to the benefits of good governance in a free society, “new guards” must be enacted to dissuade the emergence of incompetence, corruption, nepotism and cronyism at the peril of the people’s best interest. The Federation must guarantee the executions of a social contract between government and the governed.

xvi. Whereas security of our homeland is inextricably linked to prosperity of the homeland, the economic and security interest of the region needs to be aligned under the same governance. Since economic crimes … can imperil the functioning of the wheels of commerce for all the citizenry, the accedence of this Federation must equip the security apparatus with the tools and techniques for predictive and proactive interdictions.

xxvi. Whereas the Caribbean region must have new jobs to empower the engines of the economy and create the income sources for prosperity, and encourage the next generation to forge their dreams right at home, the Federation must therefore foster the development of new industries, like that of ship-building, automobile manufacturing, prefabricated housing, frozen foods, pipelines, call centers, and the prison industrial complex. In addition, the Federation must invigorate the enterprises related to existing industries like tourism… – impacting the region with more jobs.

This commentary previously related details of city life – elevating society at the urban level – that can be applied directly in the Caribbean. Here is a sample of previous blogs:

https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=11244	‘To Live and Die in L.A.’ … City/County …
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=4587	Burlington, Vermont: First city to be powered 100% by renewables
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=3641	‘We Built This City …’
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=3326	M-1 Rail: Alternative Motion in the MotorCity
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=1918	Philadelphia Freedom – We can Look, Listen and Learn
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=1596	Book Review: ‘Prosper Where You Are Planted’

The Go Lean book and these accompanying blogs posit that the economic failures in the Caribbean in general and in cities in particular are the direct result of the lack of diversity in industrial development, and the subsequent societal abandonment. The region depends too heavily on one industry: tourism.

The roadmap asserts that this strategy is flawed; that while prudence dictates that the Caribbean nations expand and optimize their tourism products, the Caribbean must also look for other opportunities for economic expansion. Cities can be laboratories in urban civilization, but the requisite investment of the resources (time, talent, treasuries) for this goal may be too big for any one city alone. So rather, this roadmap shifts the responsibility to a region-wide, professionally-managed, deputized technocracy that will result in greater production and greater accountability. The end result of these “urban laboratories” will facilitate economic diversity and job creation.

This is the charge of the Go Lean…Caribbean roadmap, to do the heavy-lifting, to implement the organization dynamics to impact Caribbean society here and now. The following are the community ethos, strategies, tactics and operational advocacies to effectuate this goal:

Community Ethos – People Respond to Incentives	Page 21
Community Ethos – Economic Systems Influences Choices & Incentives	Page 21
Community Ethos – Job Multiplier	Page 22
Community Ethos – Lean Operations	Page 24
Community Ethos – Ways to Impact the Greater Good	Page 37
Strategy – Vision – Make the Caribbean the Best Address on Planet	Page 45
Strategy – Mission – Protect our residents, visitors and repatriates	Page 45
Strategy – Mission – Fix the broken systems of governance	Page 46
Tactical – Separation of Powers – Union versus Member-States	Page 71
Implementation – Implement Self-Governing Engines	Page 105
Implementation – Ways to Deliver	Page 109
Implementation – Ways to Re-boot Freeport – Sample City	Page 114
Implementation – Ways to Promote Independence – Autonomous Cities	Page 120
Planning – 10 Big Ideas for the Caribbean	Page 127
Planning – Ways to Make the Caribbean Better	Page 131
Planning – Lessons from New York City	Page 137
Planning – Lessons from Omaha	Page 138
Planning – Lessons from Detroit	Page 140
Advocacy – Ways to Grow the Economy	Page 151
Advocacy – Ways to Create Jobs	Page 152
Advocacy – Ways to Improve Local Governance	Page 169
Advocacy – Ways to Enhance Tourism	Page 190
Advocacy – Ways to Market Southern California – Learning from L.A. City	Page 194
Advocacy – Ways to Impact Main Street	Page 201
Advocacy – Ways to Improve Urban Living	Page 234

This Go Lean book accepts that the current State of the Cities does not have to be a permanent disposition. Under the Go Lean roadmap, cities can do better; all of the Caribbean can do better. This roadmap is a 5-year plan to effect change, to make our homeland a better place to live, work and play.

Now is the time to build better Caribbean cities; the people and governing institutions are urged to lean-in to this Go Lean … Caribbean roadmap. 🙂

Sign the petition to lean-in for this roadmap for the Caribbean Union Trade Federation.

Download the free e-book of Go Lean … Caribbean – now!

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Appendix – The Bottom Line on Six Sigma

Six Sigma is a set of tools and strategies for process improvement originally developed by Motorola in 1985, but popularized in 1995 by General Electric’s Jack Welch as his central business strategy. Today it is used in different sectors of industry. Six Sigma seeks to improve the quality of process outputs by identifying and removing the causes of defects (errors). It uses a set of quality management methods, including statistical methods, and creates a special infrastructure of people within the organization (Champions, Black Belts, Green Belts, Orange Belts, etc.) who are experts in these very complex methods.

With Six Sigma the maturity of a manufacturing process can be described by a sigma rating indicating its yield or the percentage of defect-free products it creates. A six sigma process is one in which 99.9999998% of products manufactured are statistically expected to be free of defects (3.4 defects per million). According to Wikipedia, Six Sigma projects follow a methodology, aimed at improving existing business processes, composed of five phases, bearing the acronyms DMAIC:

Define the problem, the voice of the customer, and the project goals, specifically.
Measure key aspects of the current process and collect relevant data.
Analyze the data to investigate and verify cause-and-effect relationships. Determine what the relationships are, and attempt to ensure that all factors have been considered. Seek out root cause of the defect under investigation.
Improve or optimize the current process based upon data analysis.
Control the future state process to ensure that any deviations from target are corrected before they result in defects.

Source: Go Lean … Caribbean (Page 147)

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Detroit, Model, New York, Omaha, Transform

Model of the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade – By The Numbers

Posted on November 25, 2016 in Economics, Government, Strategy

Go Lean Commentary

“We are giving this for free as a gift to America” – CNBC Newscast: Amy Kule, Executive Producer, 2014 Macy’s Thanksgiving Parade^*.

Free?

Hardly! There is nothing free about American Thanksgiving. This is just another example of American Crony-Capitalism. Consider the facts in this VIDEO here of the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade, by the numbers:

VIDEO – Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade by the Numbers – http://www.aol.com/video/channel/news/582e4599134aa15f420ded1a/

Click on the Photo to Play VIDEO

This discussion is promoting the idea of the Caribbean modeling the best-practices of American commerce – there are a lot of economic returns from events. The Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade, in the foregoing, is an event – one of the biggest on the calendar for New York City. So the focus of this commentary is the impact that one event can have on the societal engines of a community: economics, security and governance.

One person – or company – can make a difference.

Notice how this parade is mostly administered by one private company: Macy’s Department Stores.

Reference Title: Macy’s Department Store
Macy’s, originally R. H. Macy & Co., is a department store owned by Macy’s, Inc. It is one of two divisions owned by the company, with the other being Bloomingdale’s. As of January 2014, the Macy’s division operates 789 department store locations in the continental United States, Hawaii, Puerto Rico, and Guam, including the prominent Herald Square flagship location in Midtown Manhattan, New York City.^[2]:35

Macy’s has conducted the annual Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade in New York City since 1924 and has sponsored the city’s annual Fourth of July fireworks display since 1976. Macy’s Herald Square is the largest department store in the world. The flagship store covers almost an entire New York City block, features about 1.1 million square feet of retail space, includes additional space for offices and storage, and serves as the endpoint for Macy’s annual Thanksgiving Day parade. It is estimated that the value of Herald Square is under $3 billion to more than $4 billion.^[3]

As of 2015, Macy’s is the largest U.S. department store company by retail sales and is the 15th-largest retailer in the United States for 2014 in terms of revenue.^[4][5]Source: Retrieved November 25, 2016 from: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Macy%27s

The focus of the book Go Lean…Caribbean is to elevate the Caribbean economic disposition, based on the existing infrastructure and new implementations. So we would want to look-listen-learn from this American model and then apply the lessons here in the Caribbean. Events are integral to the touristic experience; this is why the Go Lean book, serving as a roadmap for the introduction and implementation of the technocratic Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU), details so many dimensions of eco-system for events. The book prominently highlights that even small towns can get in on the economic buoyancy of events by detailing the role model of the City of Sturgis (population 6,600) in the US State of South Dakota – Page 191. Their annual event – Sturgis Motorcycle Rally in August – generates about $800 million in community revenues.

Successful management of events is a mission of Go Lean roadmap. The region needs the jobs. These events – think Carnival or Junkanoo in the Bahamas – create permanent and temporary jobs. This is part-and-parcel of the Go Lean/CU prime directives, as identified with the following 3 statements:

Optimization of the economic engines in order to grow the regional economy to $800 Billion & create 2.2 million overall new jobs; 9,000 jobs are attributed to Events.
Establishment of a security apparatus to protect the resultant economic engines.
Improve Caribbean governance to support these engines.

The Go Lean book presented the roadmap to imbrue the Caribbean region with new community ethos, plus new strategies, tactics, implementation and advocacies to improve event-job creation in the region. The following is a sample of these specific details from the book:

Community Ethos – Deferred Gratification	Page 21
Community Ethos – Economic Principles – People Choose	Page 21
Community Ethos – Economic Principles – People Respond to Incentives in Predictable Ways	Page 21
Community Ethos – Economic Principles – Economic Systems Influence Individual Choices	Page 21
Community Ethos – Economic Principles – The Consequences of Choices Lie in the Future	Page 21
Community Ethos – Governing Principles – Lean Operations	Page 24
Community Ethos – Governing Principles – Cooperatives	Page 25
Community Ethos – Ways to Impact the Future	Page 26
Community Ethos – Ways to Foster Genius – Consider Artists, Musicians and Performers	Page 27
Community Ethos – Ways to Help Entrepreneurship	Page 28
Community Ethos – Ways to Promote Happiness	Page 36
Community Ethos – Ways to Impact the Greater Good	Page 37
Strategy – Vision – Confederate 30 Member-States	Page 45
Strategy – Mission – Celebrate the Music, Sports, Art and Culture of the Caribbean	Page 46
Tactical – Confederating a Permanent Union	Page 63
Tactical – Fostering a Technocracy	Page 64
Tactical – Separation-of-Powers – CU Federal Agencies versus Member-State Governments	Page 71
Implementation – Ways to Pay for Change	Page 101
Implementation – Ways to Deliver	Page 109
Planning – 10 Big Ideas for the Caribbean Region	Page 127
Planning – Ways to Make the Caribbean Better	Page 131
Planning – Lessons from New York City	Page 137
Planning – Lessons from Omaha – College World Series Model	Page 138
Advocacy – Ways to Grow the Economy	Page 151
Advocacy – Ways to Create Jobs	Page 152
Advocacy – Ways to Enhance Tourism	Page 190
Advocacy – Ways to Impact Events	Page 191
Advocacy – Ways to Promote Fairgrounds	Page 192
Advocacy – Ways to Preserve Caribbean Heritage	Page 218
Advocacy – Ways to Improve Sports – Fairgrounds as Sport Venues	Page 229
Advocacy – Ways to Improve the Arts	Page 230
Advocacy – Ways to Promote Music	Page 231

The empowerments in the Go Lean book calls for permanent change to ensure that Caribbean people have opportunities; they only want to be able to provide for their families and preserve their unique Caribbean culture.

The Go Lean roadmap offers the technocratic execution of these deliverables. Imagine the expansion of the existing events in the region. Plus, imagine the artistic expressions and entertainment (singers, dancers, musicians, performers, etc.). Just like for the Macy’s Parade in the foregoing, economic gains await. This is the business model of “events”. From the outset, the Go Lean book recognized the significance of events and festivities in the roadmap with these statements in the opening Declaration of Interdependence (Page 12 & 14):

xxi. Whereas the preparation of our labor force can foster opportunities and dictate economic progress for current and future generations, the Federation must … recognize and facilitate excellence in many different fields of endeavor, including sciences, languages, arts, music and sports. This responsibility should be executed without incurring the risks of further human flight, as has been the past history.

xxxii. Whereas the cultural arts and music of the region are germane to the quality of Caribbean life, and the international appreciation of Caribbean life, the Federation must implement the support systems to teach, encourage, incentivize, monetize and promote the related industries for arts and music in domestic and foreign markets. These endeavors will make the Caribbean a better place to live, work and play.

There are many other communities that have flourished in this strategy – business model of fun and festivities – as depicted with the example of the Macy’s Thanksgiving Parade. Success is possible; we need only to look, listen and learn.

Many previous Go Lean blog-commentaries have focused on the business of events. See samples-examples detailed in these previous blogs:

https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=9712	Forging Change: Panem et Circenses
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=5251	Post-Mortem of Inaugural Junkanoo Carnival
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=4879	Model of a Sports Event: Martinique Surfing
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=3292	Model of an Artistic Event: Art Basel Miami
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=2152	Model of a Sports Event: Little League World Series
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=1341	College World Series Time – Lessons from Omaha
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=1214	Landlord of Temporary Stadiums
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=535	Event Security: Remembering and learning from Boston
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=318	Collegiate Sports in the Caribbean

Now is the time for all of the Caribbean, the people and governing institutions, to lean-in for the empowerments in the book Go Lean … Caribbean. This is a Big Idea for the region; that of expanding Caribbean events for greater economic throughput. We have the foundations in place already, the many artistic, cultural and sporting events for locals and visitors.

We can employ the strategies, tactics and implementations from models like the Macy’s Thanksgiving Parade to make our Caribbean region a better place to live, work and play. 🙂

Download the book Go Lean … Caribbean – now!

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Appendix * – Source References:

https://youtu.be/61kyIsEBuUA posted Published on Nov 26, 2014; (retrieved November 25, 2016).

Executive producer of the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade, Amy Kule, provides insight to the numbers behind tomorrow’s big parade and reveals some new characters.

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Appendix VIDEO – 7 Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade Facts You Never Knew! – https://youtu.be/zOtWeyh1aRs

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ENCORE: Lesson from MetroCard

Posted on August 18, 2016 in Economics, Planning

They got me … too!

This is not a warning; this is an applause!

Even after describing the MetroCard program’s propensity for retaining unused balances – in the ENCORE below – this writer ends up stuck with 2 active MetroCards with outstanding balances.

Rather than feeling suckered, I feel impressed. (It means “free” cash from the idle balances).

See the story from August 20, 2014 again here, how the MetroCard program always ends up divesting leftover balances. (Note: The all-electronic payment scheme does allow for refunds, using an Old World, snail-mail process with self-addressed-pre-stamped envelopes). Also see the VIDEO in the new Appendix below on how to purchase a MetroCard.

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Go Lean Commentary: MetroCard – Model for the Caribbean Dollar

The MetroCard, the New York City Metropolitan Transportation Authority’s (MTA) payment system is the subject of the referenced source appendix below. But this subject is about more than just simple bus/subway tokens, instead this subject refers to a whole eco-system that constitutes an electronic payment scheme. This system generates $4 billion (2012) and services the transit needs of 15.1 million people. The MTA drives the NYC regional economy, the largest in the US, facilitating the connection for many to traverse from home to work; then after work, the MTA network enables the NYC metropolitan area (New York, New Jersey, and Connecticut) to get to a host of leisure activities: music, theater, cultural events, sports, and shopping. MetroCard is therefore a de facto currency for this region to live, work and play.

MetroCard is a digital currency and not “hard money”, so there are not paper stock or coinage issues to be managed with this approach. (MetroCard replaced the previous ubiquitous tokens in 2003). This attribute relates to the effort to re-boot and optimize the Caribbean regional economy and society. The book Go Lean…Caribbean points to NYC as a model and source of many lessons that the Caribbean can learn and apply, especially related to the adoption of the regional currency, the Caribbean Dollar (C$).

The book Go Lean…Caribbean serves as a roadmap for the introduction and implementation of the Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU) and the Caribbean Central Bank (CCB). This Go Lean roadmap has 3 prime directives:

Optimization of the economic engines in order to grow the regional economy to $800 Billion & create 2.2 million new jobs.
Establishment of a security apparatus to protect the resultant economic engines.
Improve Caribbean governance to support these engines.

The Caribbean Central Bank has the role of heavy-lifting in the facilitation of the electronic payments modes of the Caribbean Dollar. While the traditional central banking role of currency/coinage distribution do not come into play, with the e-Payment schemes, there are still many responsibilities and benefits for central bank command-and-control. This refers to the subject of M1 monetary supply. M1 refers to the measurement of the total of currency/money in circulation (M0) plus overnight bank deposits (like demand deposits, travelers’ checks & other checkable deposits). So when digit currencies, as MetroCard, are factored in, there is no M0, but an increase in M1. As M1 values increase, there is a dynamic in the regional banking system that creates money “from thin-air”; this is referred to as the money multiplier. The more M1 money in the system, the more liquidity for investment and development opportunities.

The Caribbean needs this increase in development capital/liquidity.

This subject of electronic payment systems has been previously covered in Go Lean blogs, highlighted here in the following samples:

https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=1350	PayPal expands payment services to 10 markets
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=906	Bitcoin needs regulatory framework to change ‘risky’ image
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=528	Facebook plans to provide mobile payment services
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=360	How to Create Money from Thin Air

This Go Lean/CU/CCB roadmap looks to employ electronic payments / virtual money schemes to impact the growth of the regional economy. There are two CU schemes that relate to this MetroCard structure:

Cruise Passenger Smartcards – The Go Lean roadmap posits that the cruise industry needs the Caribbean more than the Caribbean needs the industry. But the cruise lines have embedded rules/regulations designed to maximize their revenues at the expense of the port-side establishments. The CU solution is to deploy a scheme for smartcards that function on the ships and at the port cities (Page 193).
e-Commerce Facilitation – The Go Lean roadmap defines that the Caribbean Dollar (C$) will be mostly cashless, an accounting currency. So the Caribbean Central Bank (CCB) will settle all C$ electronic transactions (MasterCard-Visa style or ACH style) and charge interchange/clearance fees (Page 198). This scheme allows for the emergence of full-throttle e-Commerce activities.

Overall, stewardship of the single market economy and single regional currency was envisioned and pronounced early in the Go Lean roadmap with this Verse XXIV (Page 13) of the Declaration of Interdependence, with these words:

Whereas a free market economy can be induced and spurred for continuous progress, the Federation must install the controls to better manage aspects of the economy: jobs, inflation, savings rate, investments and other economic principles…

New York City is a great model for this Caribbean empowerment effort to look, listen, and learn. The same as tourism is the primary economic driver in the Caribbean (80 million visitors), NYC also plays host to 25 million visitors annually. Many NYC tourists ride the MTA public transportation modes and have to acquire a MetroCard – many times, they leave unspent balances to just sit there. What becomes of those monies? See this news article here:

Unspent MetroCard Money Means Millions for M.T.A.

(http://www.nyctransitforums.com/forums/topic/43954-unspent-metrocard-money-means-millions-for-mta/)

Think of it as New York’s biggest sock drawer, except that instead of nickels, dimes and quarters, what is squirreled away in its dark recesses are millions of lapsed yellow-and-blue MetroCards with digital loose change still dangling from their magnetic strips.

In the decade ending in 2010, nearly $500 million worth of unspent balances on expired bus and subway MetroCards accumulated, and that money can no longer be redeemed.

Cards that are bought, never used but still valid are counted for bookkeeping purposes as a liability, because they might eventually be used. Outdated cards with pending balances become an asset after they expire, about two years from the date of sale. The balances are listed as revenue under the category of “fare media liability.”

Tens of millions of dollars a year may not seem like much out of $4 billion in annual MetroCard revenue for New York City Transit, but there is no stream of cash that the agency scoffs at.

Kevin Ortiz, a spokesman for the Metropolitan Transportation Authority, which includes the transit agency, said: “Expired card value does benefit the M.T.A. It gets counted as fare box revenue.”

The peak year for replenishing New York City Transit’s fare media liability account was 2012, when $95 million was credited. That followed a surge in purchases in 2010, before a fare increase. Those cards, many presumably with outstanding balances, have expired.

Considering the governance for the MetroCard, the MTA has been described with some adjectives of efficiency and effectiveness. Their website described their charter as follows:

While nearly 85 percent of the nation’s workers need automobiles to get to their jobs, four of every five rush-hour commuters to New York City’s central business districts avoid traffic congestion by taking transit service – most of it operated by the MTA. MTA customers travel on America’s largest bus fleet and on more subway and rail cars than all the rest of the country’s subways and commuter railroads combined.

This mobility helps ensure New York’s place as a world center of finance, commerce, culture, and entertainment, and New York ranks near the top among the nation’s best cities for business, Fortune magazine has written, because it has “what every city desires. A workable mass transit system.”

MTA mass transit helps New Yorkers avoid about 17 million metric tons of pollutants while emitting only 2 million metric tons, making it perhaps the single biggest source of greenhouse gas (GHG) avoidance in the United States. The people living in our service area lead carbon-efficient lives, making New York the most carbon-efficient state in the nation.

Over the past two decades, the MTA has committed some $72 billion to restore and improve the network so that today it runs at unprecedented levels of efficiency. Our employees at all of our agencies work diligently to maintain high service and safety standards.

(Source: Retrieved August 19, 2014 from: http://web.mta.info//mta/network.htm)

The governance for the MetroCard may be in good hands, a technocratic reflection. Creating a technocratic CU/CCB governance is “Step One, Day One” in the Go Lean roadmap. Implementing this allows for rock-solid monetary integrity for local financial systems, providing the foundation so the regional society can be elevated, economically and governmentally. In this vein, we examine specific lessons & applications in consideration of the MetroCard business model in the Appendix below:

MetroCard Facts	Go Lean *book considerations/reflections (actual Page* Numbers)**
MetroCard History	Roadmap with Project Delivery Obligations (Page 109); Fostering a Technocracy (Page 64)
Multiple Jurisdictions	Confederation of 30 Member-States (Page 45); Fostering Interstate Commerce (Page 129)
Pricing/Cost Increases	Unified Command & Control on Inflation (Page 153)
Technology	Foster Technology (Page 197); e-Commerce (Page 198); Bridging Digital Divide (Page 31)
Transfers	People respond to economic incentives (Page 21)
Card type consideration – Pay-Per-Ride cards	Improve M1 by encouraging stored balances (Page 198)
Card type consideration – Student cards	Facilitation Education (Page 159) and Transportation (Page 205)
Card type consideration – Disabled/Senior Citizens	Improve Elder-Care (Page 225) and Impact Persons with Disabilities (Page 228)
Purchase Options – Subway Station Booths	Manage Federal Civil Servants (Page 173)
Purchase Options – Vending Machines	Foster Technology (Page 197); e-Commerce (Page 198); Bridging Digital Divide (Page 31)
Purchase Options – Neighborhood Merchants	Help Entrepreneurship (Page 28); Impact Main Street (Page 201);
Future	Impact the Future (Page 26)
Bad Actors: Fraud/Scams	Bad Actors Emerge – Reduce Crime (Page 178); Impact the Greater Good (Page 37)

The Go Lean book details additional community ethos, strategies, tactics, implementations and advocacies to foster electronic payment systems, and the unified command & control necessary for its success:

Community Ethos – Money Multiplier Principle	Page 22
Community Ethos – Lean Operations	Page 24
Community Ethos – Cooperatives	Page 25
Tactical – Separation of Powers – Central Banking	Page 73
Implementation – Assemble Central Bank Cooperative	Page 96
Planning – Lessons Learned from New York City	Page 137
Anecdote – Caribbean Currencies	Page 149
Advocacy – Ways to Mitigate Black Markets	Page 165
Advocacy – Ways to Impact Public Works	Page 175
Advocacy – Ways to Foster Cooperatives	Page 176
Advocacy – Reforms for Banking Regulations	Page 199
Advocacy – Ways to Impact Urban Living	Page 234
Appendix – New York City Economy Details	Page 277

Now is the time for all of the Caribbean, the people and governing institutions, to lean-in for the empowerments described in the book Go Lean … Caribbean. We can all benefit by studying and modeling the successes of New York City!

Any visitor to the city quickly realizes how unique this jurisdiction is compared to other urban areas in the US, or the world for that matter. Millions of people (31,483,000 according to 2010 census) live in a limited congested area that is the Greater Tri-State area, yet there is a recognizable level of efficiency – some technocratic deliveries. For example, NYC does not have the proliferation of yellow school buses that dot the landscape of most American communities. Most students in the city rely on the MTA, funded by their MetroCard, to get back and forth for school. So in effect, MetroCard services the full community needs to live, work, learn and play.

MetroCard is truly a model for the Caribbean … Dollar.

Download the book Go Lean … Caribbean – now!

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Appendix – Reference Source:

MetroCard – New York Metropolitan Transportation Authority’s Payment System

The MetroCard is the payment method for the New York City Subway rapid transit system; New York City Transit buses, including routes operated by Atlantic Express under contract to the Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA); MTA Bus, and Nassau Inter-County Express systems; the PATH subway system (an entity of the Port Authority of New York & New Jersey); the Roosevelt Island Tram; AirTrain JFK; and Westchester County’s Bee-Line Bus System.

The MetroCard is a thin, plastic card on which the customer electronically loads fares. It was introduced to enhance the technology of the transit system and eliminate the burden of carrying and collecting tokens. The MTA discontinued the use of tokens in the subway on May 3, 2003, and on buses on December 31, 2003. The MetroCard is managed by a division of the MTA known as MetroCard Operations and manufactured by Cubic Transportation Systems, Inc.

History

01Jun1993	MTA distributes 3,000 MetroCards in the first major test of the technology for the entire subway system and the entire bus system.
06Jan1994	MetroCard live testing with compatible turnstiles at select lines and stations.
15May1997	The last MetroCard turnstiles were installed by this date, and the entire bus and subway system accepted MetroCards
04Jul1997	First free transfers available between bus and subway at any location with MetroCard.
01Jan1998	Bonus free rides (10% of the purchase amount) were given for purchases of $15 or more.
04Jul1998	Unlimited Ride MetroCards introduced, at $17 for 7 days, $63 for 30 days, Express Bus Plus for $120.
01Jan1999	1-Day Fun Pass was introduced: unlimited use for one day for $4.
25Jan1999	The first MetroCard Vending Machines installed.
13Apr2003	Tokens/coins no longer sold.
04May2003	Tokens only accepted as a $1.50 credit towards the $2 MetroCard ride.
02Mar2008	A new 14-day unlimited-ride was introduced for $47
30Dec2010	1-Day Fun Pass and the 14-Day Unlimited Ride MetroCards discontinued.
20Feb2013	Cards can now be refilled with both time and value.
03Mar2013	A $1 fee is imposed on new card purchases in-system

Pricing/Cost increases – since the complete cut-over in 2003

Date	Daily	Weekly	Monthly
04May2003	$2	$21	$70
27Feb2005	$2	$24	$76
02Mar2008	$2	$25	$81
28Jun2009	$2.25	$27	$89
30Dec2010	$2.25	$29	$104
19Dec2012	$2.50	$30	$104

Technology

During a swipe, the MetroCard is read, re-written to, then check-read to verify correct encoding.

Each MetroCard stored value card is assigned a unique, permanent ten-digit serial number when it is manufactured. The value is stored magnetically on the card itself, while the card’s transaction history is held centrally in the Automated Fare Collection (AFC) Database.

When a card is purchased and fares are loaded onto it, the MetroCard Vending Machine or station agent’s computer stores the amount of the purchase onto the card and updates the database, identifying the card by its serial number. Whenever the card is swiped at a turnstile, the value of the card is read, the new value is written, the customer is let through, and then the central database is updated with the new transaction as soon as possible. Cards are not validated in real time against the database when swiped to pay the fare. The AFC Database is necessary to maintain transaction records to track a card if needed. It has actually been used to acquit criminal suspects by placing them away from the scene of a crime. The database also stores a list of MetroCards that have been invalidated for various reasons (such as lost or stolen student or unlimited monthly cards), and it distributes the list to turnstiles in order to deny access to a revoked card.

MetroCard keeps track of the number of swipes at a location in order to allow those same number of people to transfer at a subsequent location, if applicable. The MetroCard system was designed to ensure backward compatibility, which allowed a smooth transition from the old (blue) format to the (gold) format.

Cubic later on used the proprietary MetroCard platform to create the Chicago Card, which is physically identical to the MetroCard except for the labeling.

Transfers

MetroCards allows for transfers (within two hours of initial entry) among the many transportation modes – incentivizing a preferred behavior. (Pricing rules are built into the system for upgrades like Express Buses, PATH, and JFK Airport AirTrain).

One free transfer from:

subway to local bus
bus to subway
bus to local bus
express bus to express bus
bus or subway to Staten Island Railway
subway to subway

Card type – consideration – Pay-Per-Ride MetroCards

$5 – $80 initial value in any increment (though vending machines only sell values in multiples of 5 cents).
Card purchases or refills equal to or greater than $5 receive a 5% bonus (ex. $50 buys 21 rides).
Cards can be refilled up to $80 in one transaction and up to a total value of $100.
Though cards expire, the balance may be transferred to a new cards.

Card type – consideration – Student MetroCards: NYC does not have the propensity of yellow school business as other communities, therefore a partnership is forged between school districts and MTA.

MetroCards are issued to some New York City public and private school students allowing discounted access to the NYC Transit buses and trains, depending on the distance traveled between their school and their home. The card program is managed by the NYC-DOE Office of Pupil Transportation.
In Nassau County, Student MetroCards are issued by individual schools which have pre-paid for the cards.

Card type – consideration – Disabled/Senior Citizen Reduced-Fare MetroCards

Given to senior citizens and the disabled as a combination photo ID and MetroCard.
Allows half-fare within the MTA system. (Express Bus during off-peak hours only)
Half fare is also available on the 7-day and 30-day Unlimited MetroCards.
Card back is color-coded to match gender of card holder.
Card face is marked as “Photo ID Pass”

Purchase options

All new MetroCard purchases are charged a $1 fee, except reduced fare customers and those exchanging damaged / expired cards.

Subway Station Booths

Booths are located in all subway stations and are staffed by station agents. Every type of MetroCard can be purchased at a booth with the exception of the SingleRide ticket, and MetroCards specific to other transit systems (PATH, JFK Airtrain). All transactions must be in cash.

MetroCard Vending Machines

MetroCard Vending Machines (MVMs) are machines located in all subway stations and transit centers. They debuted on January 25, 1999 and are now found in two models. Standard MVMs are large vending machines that accept cash, credit cards, and debit cards and are in every subway station. Cash transactions are required for purchases of less than $1, and they can return up to $8 in coin change. There are also smaller versions of these machines that only accept credit and ATM/debit cards. Both machines allow a customer to purchase any type of MetroCard through a touch screen. The MVM can also refill to previously issued cards. PATH fare vending machines can also dispense MetroCards.

The machines are compliant with the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990 through use of braille and a headset jack.

Neighborhood MetroCard Merchants

MetroCards can be sold by retail merchants not affiliated with MTA. Vendors can apply to sell MTA fare media at their businesses. Only presealed, prevalued cards are available, and no fee is charged.

Future

In 2006 the MTA and Port Authority of NY/NJ announced plans to replace the magnetic strip with smart cards.

On July 1, 2006, MTA launched a six-month pilot program to test the new “contact-less” smart card fare collection system, initially ending on December 31, 2006 but extended until May 31, 2007. This program was tested at all stations on the IRT Lexington Avenue Line and at four stations in the Bronx, Brooklyn and Queens. The testing system utilized Citibank MasterCard’s PayPass keytags. This smart card system is intended to ease congestion near the fare control area by reducing time spent at paying for fare. MTA and other transportation authorities in the region say they will eventually implement system-wide.

Beginning October 7, 2012, MetroCard vending machines scattered throughout Manhattan dispensed something other than the classic blue and gold MetroCard. The MTA has begun to sell advertisement space on the front and back of the card to raise additional revenue. The 2012 ad appearing on the cards was purchased by The Gap [retail stores] and reads: “Be Bright NYC” with multicolored letters on a navy blue background. It encourages New Yorkers to visit Gap’s newly remodeled flagship store at 34th Street and Broadway starting October 10, 2012. Customers who present the MetroCard at any Gap store were entitled to a 20% discount on merchandise purchases through November 18, 2012. The MTA has been running advertisements on the back of MetroCards since its inception, earning advertiser fees along with expired card value (accruing when purchased fares wind up not being used on a card deemed a collectible by fans). Deals were arranged as early as 1997. However, this Gap deal is the first time the front of the cards have changed in over 10 years. Approximately 10% of the MetroCards sold throughout the system in a typical month will carry the Gap advertising. Future MetroCard advertising campaigns will include the word “MetroCard” on the back of the card, flush right in the white space above the zone available for advertising.

Bad Actors: Fraud and Scams

The MetroCard system is susceptible to various types of frauds, perpetrated by con artists. Usually these frauds involve the con artist preventing or dissuading the commuter from using his or her own MetroCard, and then charging the commuter for entry to the system (entry is gained by a method that costs the con artist nothing).

Also, MetroCard Vending Machines are programmed to disable the bill or coin acceptor after a series of rejected bills or coins, which can result in a row of MVMs all saying “No Bills” or “No Coins”.

If a con artist is not using a stolen or broken card, he or she can use an array of unlimited cards. Multiple cards are needed because of the 18-minute delay between each swipe at the same station. Using unlimited cards, a con artist is able to sell rides for $1 instead of $2.

A report from New York State Senator Martin J. Golden claims this scam is costing the MTA $260,000 a year, and some con artists are making up to $800 a day executing it. All aspects of this scam have been recently prohibited by MTA policy and a New York State law.

The introduction of MetroCards did eliminate one class of criminals. When the NYC subway still used tokens, token suckers would steal tokens by jamming turnstile coin slots, waiting for unsuspecting passengers to deposit tokens (only to discover that the turnstile did not work), then returning to suck out the token. The retirement of tokens in 2003 put the token suckers out of commission.

The MetroCard does have a magnetic stripe, but both the track offsets and the encoding differ from standard Magstripe cards. It is a proprietary format developed by the contractor Cubic. Off-the-shelf reader/writers for the standard cards are useless, and even hypothetically could work only with both physical and software modification. Some have had partial success decoding it using audio tape recorder heads, laptop sound cards, and custom Linux software.
Source: Wikipedia Online – encyclopedic source; retrieved 08/18/2014 from: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MetroCard_(New_York_City)

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Appendix VIDEO – Which New York City Subway MetroCard to Buy – https://youtu.be/dB05rRU0qVE

Published on Jan 23, 2015 – Should you buy a pay-per-ride or an unlimited New York City Subway MetroCard? Watch this video for tips on which to buy and how to buy them at the vending machines. Check out the full article on Free Tours by Foot’s website at http://www.freetoursbyfoot.com/how-to…

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Where the Jobs Are – Futility of Minimum Wage

Posted on August 5, 2015 in Economics, Implementation, Industries

Go Lean Commentary

There are laws and there are absolutes.

Gravity is an absolute: what goes up must come down!

Minimum wage is a law, not an absolute.

The book Go Lean…Caribbean, which calls for the elevation of Caribbean economics, asserts that the Caribbean has to better managed the realities of minimum wage jobs. The book examined the anatomy of minimum wages (Page 152) and its effect on a community’s eco-system. This classic case study on this subject is quoted as flows:

A minimum wage is the lowest hourly, daily or monthly remuneration that employers may legally pay to workers. Equivalently, it is the lowest wage at which workers may sell their labor. Although minimum wage laws are in effect in many jurisdictions, differences of opinion exist about the benefits and drawbacks of a minimum wage.

The minimum wage is generally acknowledged to increase the standard of living of workers, reduces poverty, reduces inequality, boosts morale and forces businesses to be more efficient. Critics of the minimum wage, predominantly followers of neo-classical economic theory, contend that a minimum wage increases unemployment, particularly among workers with very low productivity due to inexperience or handicap, thereby harming less skilled workers and possibly excluding some groups from the labor market; additionally it may be less effective and more damaging to businesses than other methods of reducing poverty.
Source: Black, John (September 18, 2003). Oxford Dictionary of Economics. OxfordUniversity Press. p. 300.

The reality of minimum wage, helping some workers while harming others, has been bantered about in the news as of late, consider the following news articles:

Title #1: Fast Food Workers Win A Historic Raise
By: Cole Stangler, International Business Times

New York made shockwaves on Wednesday when a specially-convened state wage board called for a hike in the minimum pay for fast food workers to $15 an hour. Assuming it’s approved by Gov. Andrew Cuomo –and no signs suggest otherwise– the new rate will be, at once, a jaw-dropping victory for labor activists, a rare political setback for name-brand restaurant chains, and the latest piece of fodder for a national debate about the value of fair pay. It also can’t come soon enough for David Ramirez.

“We need that raise, my man,” says Ramirez, 52, an employee at the same Subway restaurant in midtown Manhattan for the past 10 years, where he earns the state minimum, now $8.75. “We bust our a– up in here.”

On most days, Ramirez wakes well before dawn in downtown Brooklyn, where he splits monthly rent of $1300 with his mother who receives Social Security benefits. He usually starts work at 5 in the morning. When his shift ends at 3 in the afternoon, he heads to a different Subway in Woodmere, Queens –about an hour and a half away by train– and works another 4 hours. It makes for an exhausting 60 hour work week. Since he divides the time over two jobs, neither tallying more than 40 hours per week, Ramirez doesn’t earn any overtime. In New York City, he says, those annual earnings of about $21,000 are hard to get by on. A raise of $6 would go a long way.

“It would make a big difference, not just to me,” he says, “but other families too.”

Unchartered Waters
That was also the thinking of the Fast Food Wage Board, which voted unanimously in support of the $15 rate. The pay hike would apply to fast food chains with 30 or more locations nationwide, and be phased in over time, becoming mandatory in New York City by 2019, and the rest of the state by July 2021. Backed with enthusiasm by Gov. Cuomo, the raise can proceed without legislative approval: a New Deal era law allows state regulators to boost wages for specific industries and occupations where they deem pay “insufficient to provide for the life and health” of workers. The raise comes after two and a half years of high-visibility protests from the so-called Fight For 15, a movement of low-wage workers and labor activists backed by the powerful Service Employees International Union that demands higher wages in fast food and other low-paying sectors.

Amid pressure from these activists, other major cities have already approved $15 minimum wages –Seattle, San Francisco and both the city and county of Los Angeles– but New York’s looming pay hike is unique for a couple of reasons. For one, it’s the only one to apply to a single industry. It also would take effect across the entire state, whereas the other ambitious wage hikes have all been limited to cities.

Jay Holland, government affairs coordinator for the New York State Restaurant Association, blasted the state’s decision to single out the fast food industry. “This is an economic policy that’s never been tried before,” he says of the sector-wide wage. “The idea that an EMT worker or a home care aide should make less than a fast food worker flies in the face of reason.”

“Most restaurants operate under really thin margins,” he adds. “You’re gonna have to raise prices, lay people off or come up with some creative scheduling practices to save money.”

Anna agrees with Holland. She earns $9.75 an hour and works 32 hours a week, scrubbing tables and mopping floors at a McDonald’s in midtown Manhattan. Like many low-wage workers, she lacks job protections and did not provide her last name. “It sounds good,” she says of $15 an hour, “but you know they’re gonna cut hours. That’s what they’re already doing.”

James Sherk, labor policy expert at the conservative Heritage Foundation, says the pay mandates will accelerate the industry’s turn toward automation — self-service tablets, for example, that replace the need for cashiers. Such technologies are already being developed, but are not yet widely used.

“The main barrier to implementation is the up-front cost and then maintenance,” Sherk says. “But with the minimum wage going up it will make a lot more sense for McDonald’s to do this. It changes the financial calculus.”

Tsedeye Gebreselassie, staff attorney at the left-leaning National Employment Law Project, shrugs off the criticism. Businesses always tend to complain when the wage floor rises, she says, and this is no exception. Plus, the hike is staggered over time, giving the firms –which include some of the largest corporations in the nation– plenty of time to adjust.

The boost will also deliver broader benefits to the economy, as workers find themselves with more spending power than before. That bottom tier of the labor force is in despearate need of economic gains. “Part of why there has to be such a dramatic increase is that wages have fallen so dramatically,” Gebreselassie says. “This is about playing catch up.”

It’s also about setting high standards for an increasingly large part of the labor force, she says. More than 4 million people work in the fast food sector nationwide; 180,000 of them are in New York.

As the recovery continues to inch forward, lingering myths of fast food as a temporary gig for teens simply don’t reflect the new economic reality. A New York survey found 87.5 percent of the state’s fast food workers are aged 19 and older. “Because this is such a growing industry, more and more adults are going to be spending their careers in it,” she says. It makes sense that decent pay should follow.

Another benefit of the wage hike is that it remains largely immune to a common threat of employers confronted with mounting high labor costs: relocation. Unlike the sorts of manufacturing jobs that companies can easily ship to cheaper states or countries — say, General Electric’s ongoing relocation from a unionized capacitor plant in Fort Edward, New York to non-union Clearwater, Florida — fast food restaurants aren’t about to up and leave the state en masse. “You need to be where your customers are, where the demand is,” says Gebreselassie.

“Everything’s Rising Except For The Pay”
For many workers, business concerns don’t change the fact that current pay practices verge on the nightmarish.

“Everything’s rising except for the pay — rents, food, transportation” says Filiberto Carrillo, who, like David Ramirez, has to work at two different New York City Subways to make ends meet. He’s worked at Subway for 6 years, he says, and earns $10 an hour. “Right now, when you ask for more pay, they just give you more hours.”

Physically, he cannot tolerate much more. Carrillo says he usually works 15 to 16 hour days, or 75 hours a week. A $15 wage would be a relief, he says, before going to fix coffee for an anxious customer in line.

Meanwhile, for David Ramirez, a pay raise might resolve his MetroCard dilemma. Right now, he uses a weekly pass. He knows it’s cheaper to get the monthly one, but it’s especially prone to malfunction if it bends a lot — it’s happened before and takes far too long to get fixed. The monthly cost difference between the two passes is about 7 dollars. He would rather not make such calculations.

Source: International Business Times Web News – Posted 07-23-2015; retrieved from:
http://www.msn.com/en-us/money/markets/fast-food-workers-win-a-historic-raise/ar-AAdnvse?ocid=HPCDHP
————
VIDEO – New York City Gives Fast Food Workers a Raise to a Minimum $15 an Hour – https://youtu.be/2QaFCrhFLjg

Published on Jul 22, 2015 – New York City fast food workers are getting a pay raise after the state’s wage board approved a new minimum hourly pay of $15, up from $8.75 which would take effect by 2018 and 2021 for the rest of the state. The wage hike applies to fast food workers — whether at big corporations like McDonald’s (MCD) and Burger King …

Poor McDonalds!

No wait … the foregoing article highlights:

… the pay mandates will accelerate the industry’s turn toward automation — self-service tablets, for example, that replace the need for cashiers. Such technologies are already being developed, but are not yet widely used.

This is the theme of this commentary, minimum wage is a law, not an absolute; technology will simply be deployed to mitigate the high costs of labor. See this subsequent article, posted earlier, during the 4^th Quarter of 2014:

Title #2: McDonald’s has joined the list of food chains looking to put more machines to work
By: Patrick Thibodeau, ComputerWorld Magazine Contributor

Oct 24, 2014 – McDonald’s this week told financial analysts of its plans to install self-ordering kiosks and mobile ordering at its restaurants. It isn’t the only food chain doing this.

The company that owns Chili’s Grill & Bar also said this week it will complete a tablet ordering system rollout next month at its U.S. restaurants. Applebee’s announced last December that it would deliver tablets to 1,800 restaurants this year.

The pace of self-ordering system deployments appears to be gaining speed. But there’s a political element to this and it’s best to address it quickly.

The move toward more automation comes at the same time pressure to raise minimum wages is growing. A Wall Street Journal editorial this week, “Minimum Wage Backfire,” said that while it may be true for McDonald’s to say that its tech plans will improve customer experience, the move is also “a convenient way…to justify a reduction in the chain’s global workforce.”

The Journal faulted those who believe that raising fast food wages will boost stagnant incomes. “The result of their agitation will be more jobs for machines and fewer for the least skilled workers,” it wrote.

The elimination of jobs because of automation will happen anyway. Gartner says software and robots will replace one third of all workers by 2025, and that includes many high-skilled jobs, too.

Automation is hardly new to retail. Banks rely on ATMs, and grocery stores, including Walmart, have deployed self-service checkouts. But McDonald’s hasn’t changed its basic system of taking orders since its founding in the 1950s, said Darren Tristano, executive vice president of Technomic, a research group focused on the restaurant industry.

The move to kiosk and mobile ordering, said Tristano, is happening because it will improve order accuracy, speed up service and has the potential of reducing labor cost, which can account for about 30% of costs. But automated self-service is a convenience that’s now expected, particularly among younger customers, he said.

“It’s keeping up with the times, and the (McDonald’s) franchises are going to clamor for it,” said Tristano, who said any labor savings is actually at the bottom of the list of reasons restaurants are putting in these self-service systems.

McDonald’s is already deploying mobile ordering in other countries. In France, you can order a McDonald’s hamburger from a mobile device, tablet or desktop and pick it up later at a restaurant, said Thomas Husson, a Forrester analyst in a report.

“By reducing the stress of the ordering, McDonald’s has significantly increased the average revenue per order,” wrote Husson of the experience in France.

Chili’s has deployed some 45,000 tablets from Ziosk, which makes the system. Ziosk CEO Austen Mulinder says the tablets are used for ordering drinks, appetizers and desserts and for making payments, but they remain optional for customers. The waitstaff will take the first drink and entrée orders, which are often modified by people at the table.

Mulinder said there’s no capital cost to installation, and the multi-year subscription price for the system is more than offset by increased revenues it generates.

The tablet also includes games and an opportunity for people to give feedback, and to join a loyalty program. That creates the potential for increased sales, because customers aren’t necessarily waiting to catch an employee’s attention to refill a drink. It also avoids the frustration of waiting for the check, said Mulinder.

“Restaurants want to speak the language of the millennials and the language of millennials is digital,” said Mulinder.

Wyman Roberts, the CEO of Chili’s parent company, Brinker International, spoke to financial analysts this week in a conference call about the new system. “We’re excited about the potential this has to create a stronger connection and smarter interactivity between us and our guests,” said Roberts, according to a transcript by Seeking Alpha.

Patrick Thibodeau – Senior Editor – covers cloud computing and enterprise applications, outsourcing, government IT policies, data centers and IT workforce issues for Computerworld.
Source: http://www.computerworld.com/article/2837810/automation-arrives-at-restaurants-but-dont-blame-rising-minimum-wages.html

The current Federal minimum wage is $7.25/hour; a change to $15 is considered by some: Extreme!

Needless to say, this issue is highly charged politically.

There are forces on the “left” that want to elevate many in poverty by mandating a higher minimum wage, setting a higher entitlement benefit. Then there are forces on the “right” that want the Free Market to reign, despite any suffering by those at the lowest rungs of society’s economic ladder. Consider this right-leaning commentary here in the following article:

Title #3: McDonald’s Announces Its Answer to $15 an Hour Minimum Wage – Touch-Screen Cashiers
By: Jim Hoft, June 15th, 2015

This is exactly what the left pushed for… Fast Food chains were never meant to be a place for someone to raise a family of 6, they were to be part time positions with some full-time advancements. Mostly the fast food restaurants were for school aged kids to learn how to interact with people, with a job, to offer spending money, and to begin responsibility learning for their future.

The part time position was not intended to pay for a house, it is a stepping stone to move on.

$15.00/hr x 8 hrs= $120/day x 5 days= $600/week x 52 weeks = $31,200/year!!

Of course when this happens, like it did today in Los Angeles, the poor and unskilled workers will go on Welfare, and cost American workers more to support them.

McDonald’s recently came out with their answer to those that want $15/hr pay:

Robots.

This month in Europe McDonald’s hired 7,000 touch-screen cashiers. See a related article here:http://www.cnet.com/news/mcdonalds-hires-7000-touch-screen-cashiers/

From a Caribbean perspective, neither extreme – “left” nor “right” – is acceptable!

The $31,200 annual salary for New York proposed minimum wage is higher than the average income for all Caribbean member-states, except the states with bloated figures from residing expatriates and offshore banking activity (Bermuda, BVI, Caymans & St. Barths). This new $31,200 minimum wage development would therefore lure even more Caribbean citizens away, as those minimum wage jobs in New York would be higher than their normal income/experiences at home. The Caribbean crisis will therefore deepen.

These ‘Agents of Change’ (Technology and Globalization/Mobilization of Labor Force) align with the book Go Lean … Caribbean. The book calls for the elevation of Caribbean economics, asserting that the Caribbean region has been losing the battle of technology and globalization. The consequence of our defeat is the sacrifice of our most precious treasures: our people, especially our youth. The assessment of all 30 Caribbean member-states is that every community has lost human capital to emigration. Some communities, like Puerto Rico (and the US Virgin Islands) have suffered with an abandonment rates of more than 50% , thus the term “Nuyorican”. Other states have watched as more than 70% of their college-educated citizens flee their homelands for foreign shores.

These ‘Agents of Change’ are affecting everyone, everywhere. The Go Lean book therefore posits that there is a need to re-focus, re-boot, and optimize the engines of commerce – fix the broken eco-systems – so as to make the Caribbean a better place to live, work and play. We need jobs; though our focus is on higher-paying jobs, the minimum wage variety, must not be ignored. The foregoing news articles therefore are very relevant … and fear-inspiring.

The book Go Lean… Caribbean, serves as a roadmap for the introduction and implementation of the technocratic Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU) with the charter to facilitate jobs in the region. The book posits that ICT (Internet & Communications Technology) can be a great equalizer for the Caribbean to better compete with the rest of the world. This job-creation focus is among these 3 prime directives of CU/Go Lean roadmap:

Optimization of economic engines in order to grow the regional economy to $800 Billion and create 2.2 million new jobs.
Establishment of a security apparatus to protect the resultant economic.
Improvement of Caribbean governance to support these engines.

Early in the Go Lean book, the responsibility to create jobs was identified as an important function for the CU with these pronouncements in the Declaration of Interdependence (Pages 14):

xxvi.     Whereas the Caribbean region must have new jobs to empower the engines of the economy and create the income sources for prosperity, and encourage the next generation to forge their dreams right at home, the Federation must therefore foster the development of new industries, like that of ship-building, automobile manufacturing, prefabricated housing, frozen foods, pipelines, call centers, and the prison industrial complex. In addition, the Federation must invigorate the enterprises related to existing industries tourism, fisheries and lotteries – impacting the region with more jobs.

xxvii.    Whereas the region has endured a spectator status during the Industrial Revolution, we cannot stand on the sidelines of this new economy, the Information Revolution. Rather, the Federation must embrace all the tenets of Internet Communications Technology (ICT) to serve as an equalizing element in competition with the rest of the world. The Federation must bridge the digital divide and promote the community ethos that research/development is valuable and must be promoted and incentivized for adoption.

xxviii.   Whereas intellectual property can easily traverse national borders, the rights and privileges of intellectual property must be respected at home and abroad. The Federation must install protections to ensure that no abuse of these rights go with impunity, and to ensure that foreign authorities enforce the rights of the intellectual property registered in our region.

According to a previous blog/commentary, computers are reshaping the global job market; now the foregoing articles relate that the impact is also affecting the low-end Fast-Food industry’s jobs. Nothing is safe! Consider these other blog/commentaries related to the current state of the job market:

https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=5597	Wage-Seeking: Market Forces -vs- Collective Bargaining
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=5210	Cruise Ship Labor/Commerce: Getting Ready for Change
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=4278	Businesses Try to Stave-off Brain Drain as Boomers Retire
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=3446	Forecast for higher unemployment in Caribbean in 2015
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=2857	Where the Jobs Are – Entrepreneurism in Junk
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=2025	Where the Jobs Are – Attitudes & Images of the Diaspora
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=2003	Where the Jobs Are – One Scenario: Shipbreaking
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=1698	Where the Jobs Are – STEM Jobs Are Filling Slowly
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=242	The Erosion of the Middle Class

The book Go Lean…Caribbean details the creation of 2.2 million new jobs for the Caribbean region, many embracing ICT/STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics/Medicine) skill-sets. How? By adoption of certain community ethos, plus the executions of key strategies, tactics, implementations and advocacies. The following is a sample from the book:

Community Ethos – Deferred Gratification	Page 21
Community Ethos – Economic Principle – Economic Systems Influence Choices & Incentives	Page 21
Community Ethos – Consequences of Choices Lie in the Future	Page 21
Community Ethos – Job Multiplier	Page 22
Community Ethos – Lean Operations	Page 24
Community Ethos – Return on Investments	Page 24
Community Ethos – Ways to Impact the Future	Page 26
Community Ethos – Ways to Help Entrepreneurship	Page 28
Community Ethos – Ways to Promote Intellectual Property	Page 29
Community Ethos – Ways to Impact Research & Development	Page 30
Community Ethos – Ways to Bridge the Digital Divide	Page 31
Strategy – Mission – Education Without Further Brain Drain	Page 46
Tactical – Fostering a Technocracy	Page 64
Tactical – Tactics to Forge an $800 Billion Economy – High Multiplier Industries	Page 70
Tactical – Separation of Powers – Commerce Department – Patents & Copyrights	Page 78
Implementation – Ways to Pay for Change	Page 101
Implementation – Ways to Deliver	Page 109
Implementation – Ways to Impact ICT and Social Media	Page 111
Planning – Ways to Improve Trade	Page 128
Advocacy – Ways to Create Jobs	Page 152
Advocacy – Ways to Improve Education	Page 159
Advocacy – Ways to Better Manage Food Consumption – Reality of Quick Serve Restaurants	Page 162
Advocacy – Ways to Impact Labor Markets and Unions	Page 164
Advocacy – Ways to Foster Technology	Page 197
Advocacy – Ways to Foster e-Commerce	Page 198
Advocacy – Ways to Battle Poverty – Third World Realities	Page 222
Advocacy – Ways to Help the Middle Class	Page 223
Advocacy – Ways to Impact Youth – Usual Candidates for Fast-Food Jobs	Page 227
Appendix – Growing 2.2 Million Jobs in 5 Years	Page 257
Appendix – Job Multipliers	Page 259
Appendix – Nuyorican Movement	Page 303

The CU must foster job-creating developments for above minimum-wage jobs, by incentivizing many high-tech start-ups and incubating viable companies. The primary ingredient for CU success must be Caribbean people, so we must foster and incite participation of many young people into STEM fields.

The automation trend will continue. We cannot be on the receiving end of these monumental changes; we must help foster the change as well. These previous commentaries highlighted how the Go Lean roadmap is preparing the region for engagement with autonomous systems:

https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=5376	Drones to be used for Insurance Damage Claims
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=3187	Robots help Amazon tackle Cyber Monday
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=1487	Here come the Drones … and the Concerns
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=1277	The need for highway safety innovations – here comes Google
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=673	Ghost ships – Autonomous cargo vessels without a crew

The Caribbean must not be parasites, we must be protégés!

The Caribbean is arguably the best address on the planet, but jobs are obviously missing. Everyone is hereby urged to lean-in to this Go Lean roadmap, so that we can create the high-paying, community-impacting jobs. This roadmap provides the turn-by-turn directions to get the region to its desired destination: a better place to live, work and play. 🙂

Download the free e-Book of Go Lean … Caribbean – now!

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College, Diaspora, ICT, Jobs, Model, New York, STEM, Trade, Transform

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A Christmas Present for the Banks from the Omnibus Bill

Posted on December 16, 2014 in Economics, Industries, Strategy

Go Lean Commentary

What do you get for $5.3 Billion? There must be some return on that investment.

The book Go Lean … Caribbean asserts that the US Federal Election-Campaign system is not the model that the Caribbean should want to emulate. This book relates that $5.3 Billion was spent for the 2008 Federal Elections (Page 116), a lot of it contributed by corporations, resulting in a lot of influence peddling. This drama was vividly demonstrated this Saturday evening when the “lame-duck” Congress (the Senate in particular), delayed the required Omnibus Spending Bill – just in time – to extort favorable legislation that would roll back some of the federal regulations enacted after the Great Recession of 2008 to protect against banking systemic risks.

The Shadow Influences spearheading these changes are known to adhere to the principle that “a crisis is a terrible thing to waste” – a quotation credited to famed American Economist Paul Romer. While others will think that this drama was just politics as usual, the following article depicts the more strategic nature of the new legislation, to foster the environment and industry for financial derivative trading – this is too specific for any life-long politician (the US Senate) to advocate on the sly. No, this has the fingerprints of Wall Street Shadow Influences all over it. (See Appendix below for encyclopedic references on derivatives and swaps). See the news article here:

Title: A Christmas Present For The Banks From The Omnibus Bill
Forbes Magazine Investing Online Blog (Posted 12/13/2014; retrieved 12/15/2014) –
http://www.forbes.com/sites/robertlenzner/2014/12/13/wall-street-reverses-ban-on-trading-derivatives-backed-by-uncle-sam/
By: Robert Lenzner, Contributor

Wall Street banks like Citigroup and JP Morgan Chase have flexed the power of their influence to pressure Congress and the White House into a key change in the law that will allow the trading of risky financial derivatives in bank operations that are insured by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. This means the nation’s largest banks used the deadline for passing the Omnibus spending bill as pressure to reverse a key section of the Dodd-Frank bill of 2010 that was meant to prohibit a federal government bailout of swaps entities.

It was the existence of over $500 billion of Credit Default Swaps on the balance sheet of AIG in 2008 that threatened to bankrupt the largest insurance company in the world. So, in effect, six years later, the same Wall Street banks that were bailed out by federal largesse, are being given a legislative gift that will enable them to freely trade the securities that brought Lehman Bros down in 2008 — and obtain access to the benefit of insurance and loans from the federal government.

Behind the scenes, unbenownst to the media or the public, the nation’s Too Big To Fail banks used the Omnibus spending bill that is necessary to finance federal spending in 2015 to undo this little-known Dodd Frank provision that might have restricted the volume of trading in financial derivatives that have been a major source of profits as well as controversy since the 2008 financial crisis. Most financial derivatives will be able to be traded in entities holding deposits guaranteed by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. and subject to borrowing at the Federal Reserve’s discount window. This is a key advantage for the banks that will enable them to increase their activity in these securities.

Former Rep. Barney Frank, who was a key sponsor of the Wall Street reform legislation, attacked the change in Dodd-Frank as “a road map for further attacks on our protection against financial instability.” Frank was incensed that the last-minute procedure was “inserted with no hearings, no chance for further modification, and no chance for debate into a mammoth bill in the last days of a lame-duck Congress.”

If President Obama signs the Omnibus spending bill, he will have effectively rewarded Wall Street by reversing a provision that prohibits any federal assistance from being provided to “swaps entities,” including registered swaps dealers, security-based swap dealers, major swap participants and major security-based swap participants, according to information obtained by Forbes. This measure required banks to remove their swaps dealing from the bank itself and do its trading in non-bank affiliates not eligible for deposit insurance. Access to the Fed’s discount window would also be denied in case of a financial crisis in the markets.

The net effect of the changes in the Omnibus spending bill would be to expand permissible swaps activities within a bank and to only exclude swaps based on asset-backed securities that are unregulated and not of a credit quality.

All very technical, but the net result is to allow Citigroup, JP Morgan Chase and others to use the Fed’s discount window to borrow money in case of a crisis that roiled the derivative market for credit swaps again as took place in September 2008. In effect, it means the major banks need not limit their trading of financial derivatives to non-bank operations that the market will never be fooled into thinking some future risk of danger has just been avoided. It is a complex holiday present for Wall Street. And it is a warning sign that other sections of the Dodd-Frank Wall Street reform may also be vulnerable to political rollback.

An additionally relevant blog by Robert Lenzer: http://www.forbes.com/sites/robertlenzner/2014/12/08/the-ten-reasons-why-there-will-be-another-systemic-financial-crisis/

The crisis of the 2008 Great Recession was the lynchpin for the Go Lean movement, (book and blogs). This book, serving as a roadmap for the introduction and implementation of the Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU), posits that the effects of the 2008 Great Recession continue to linger in the Caribbean. Therefore the book advocates learning lessons from 2008 and to turn-around, reform, and reboot the region’s economic, security and governing engines to ensure that “never again” will our society be so vulnerable to the financial misgivings of our American neighbors; or the “plutocratic” elements there-in.

The field of economics is not always solutions-oriented; sometimes, they have been responsible for the problem. Consider this VIDEO snippet here:

Documentary Film “Inside Job” – http://youtu.be/CaXNqGgIc-g

Published on Apr 19, 2012 – Since the repeal of Glass-Steagall in 1999, the total notional value of derivatives has grown by over 700% for holdings companies and 674% for commercial banks. Even more alarming, since the third quarter of 2008 when the cracks in the financial system were clearly evident, derivatives at the commercial banks have grown from $175 TRILLION to $234 TRILLION ” a $59 TRILLION increase. To put this in perspective, the cumulative Gross Domestic Product in the United States over that same time frame (Q3 2008 through Q3 2010) was approximately $32 TRILLION.

Despite our region’s small size (42 million people in 30 member-states), we do have some control over our own destiny. We want to be a protégé, not a parasite.

The CU’s prime directives, elevating the Caribbean’s economic-security-governing engines, recognize that the changes the region needs must start first with the adoption of new community ethos and controls. Early in the book, the need for this shift is pronounced (Declaration of Interdependence – Page 13) with these statements:

xxiv. Whereas a free market economy can be induced and spurred for continuous progress, the Federation must install the controls to better manage aspects of the economy: jobs, inflation, savings rate, investments and other economic principles. Thereby attracting direct foreign investment because of the stability and vibrancy of our economy.

xxv. Whereas the legacy of international democracies had been imperiled due to a global financial crisis, the structure of the Federation must allow for financial stability and assurance of the Federation’s institutions. To mandate the economic vibrancy of the region, monetary and fiscal controls and policies must be incorporated as proactive and reactive measures. These measures must address threats against the financial integrity of the Federation and of the member-states.

The Go Lean book, and previous blog/commentaries, stressed the key community ethos, strategies, tactics, implementation and advocacies necessary to effect change in the region ourselves, to improve the stewardship over the economy. They are detailed as follows:

Who We Are – 2008 Internal Experiences	Page 8
Community Ethos – Economic Principles	Page 21
Community Ethos – Security Principles – Private Interest –vs- Public Protection	Page 23
Community Ethos – Security Principles – “Light Up Dark Place”	Page 23
Community Ethos – Governing Principles – Lean Operations	Page 24
Community Ethos – Ways to Impact the Future	Page 26
Community Ethos – Impact Research and Development	Page 30
Community Ethos – Ways to Improve Negotiations	Page 32
Community Ethos – Ways to Impact Turn-around – 2008 Crisis	Page 33
Community Ethos – Ways to Impact the Greater Good	Page 37
Strategy – Mission – Fortify the Stability of the Securities Markets	Page 47
Strategy – CU Stakeholders to Protect – Banks & Depositors	Page 47
Tactical – Growing the Economy – Minimizing Bubbles	Page 69
Tactical – Separation-of-Powers – Depository Insurance & Regulatory Agency	Page 73
Anecdote – Turning Around CARICOM – Effects of 2008 Financial Crisis	Page 92
Implementation – Assemble Caribbean Central Bank as Cooperative	Page 96
Implementation – Assemble Constitutional Convention	Page 97
Implementation – Ways to Better Manage Debt – Optimizing Wall Street Role	Page 114
Implementation – Ways to Impact Elections	Page 116
Planning – 10 Big Ideas – Single Market / Currency Union	Page 127
Planning – Lessons Learned from 2008	Page 136
Planning – Ways to Measure Progress	Page 147
Advocacy – Ways to Grow the Economy – Case Study of $5.3 Billion Influence	Page 151
Advocacy – Ways to Improve Credit Ratings – 2008 Lessons	Page 155
Advocacy – Ways to Improve Housing – 2008 Mortgage Crisis Lessons	Page 161
Advocacy – Ways to Impact Labor Unions – 2008 Effects on Main Street Jobs	Page 164
Anecdote – Caribbean Industrialist – Growing without Shadow Influence	Page 189
Advocacy – Reforms for Banking Regulations	Page 199
Advocacy – Ways to Impact Wall Street	Page 200
Appendix – Whitepaper: The 2008 Financial Crisis and Its Aftermath	Page 276
Appendix – Currency Capital Controls	Page 325

The points of effective, technocratic regional stewardship, especially in response to the 2008 Great Recession / Financial Crisis, were further elaborated upon in these previous blog/commentaries:

https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=3311	Detroit to exit historic bankruptcy – Finally recovering from 2008
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=3164	Michigan Unemployment – Then (2008/2009) and Now
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=3090	Lessons Learned – Europe Sovereign Debt Crisis of 2009
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=3028	Why India is doing better than most emerging markets since the crisis
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=2930	‘Too Big To Fail’ – Caribbean Version
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=2448	‘Consumer Reports’ Survey Finds the American Consumer is Back
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=2435	Korea’s Protégé Model – A Dream for Latin America / Caribbean
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=2338	Lesson Learned – How Best to Welcome the Dreaded ‘Plutocracy’
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=2259	The Criminalization of American Business – Big Banks Let Loose
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=2105	Recessions and Public Health – Lessons from the 2008 Crisis
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=2090	The Depth & Breadth of Remediating 2008
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=1896	The Crisis in Black Homeownership since 2008
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=1309	5 Steps of a Bubble
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=841	Post 2008 – Having Less Babies is Bad for the Economy?
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=782	Open/Review the Time Capsule: The Great Recession of 2008
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=709	Post 2008 – Student debt holds back home buyers
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=522	Financial Crisis Jokes – Reflecting the cultural impact on society
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=518	Post 2008 – What Banks learn about financial risks
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=378	Fed Releases Transcripts from 2008 Meetings
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=242	Post 2008 – The Erosion of the Middle Class

The 2008 Great Recession brought major upheaval to American and Caribbean societies, plus the rest of the world. Much of the world is interconnected; this is even more acute in our region. Our economy is structured as parasites on the US economy. According to the foregoing news article, our parasitic host is not worthy of our devotion. What qualifies the Go Lean promoters to make these assessments? Principals of this publishing foundation were also there in 2008, engaged with major stakeholders of the Global Financial crisis: Lehman Brothers, JPMorganChase, Citigroup, etc. They were on the inside looking out, not the outside looking in. They were equipped to discern the Shadow Influence.

The Go Lean movement advocates the role of protégé, not parasite. We must diversify our economy and additionally cater to other markets, other countries and other industries. This is the purpose of the Go Lean roadmap, to provide a turn-by-turn direction to accomplish this diversification.

If we want to make our homeland a better place to live, work and play then we cannot depend on the stewards of the US economy to shepherd the Caribbean. Look! Despite the cruel and harsh lessons from 2008, it appears – from the foregoing article and the Appendix below – that the Wall Street Shadow Influence wants to repeat the “Bubble” that lead up to 2008. When they succeed, they profit; but when they fail, the “low man” on Main Street – and parasite economies like the Caribbean – has to endure the pain, not Wall Street.

The Go Lean roadmap does not seek to change America, (though we lobby against these arbitrary “Derivative” rule changes in the Omnibus Budget Bill); only teach the lessons to the Caribbean. We can do so much better.

Download the free e-Book of Go Lean … Caribbean – now!

——————–

Appendix – Derivatives:
(Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Derivative_(finance) )

In finance, a derivative is a contract that derives its value from the performance of an underlying entity. This underlying entity can be an asset, index, or interest rate, and is often called the “underlying”.^[1][2] Derivatives can be used for a number of purposes – including insuring against price movements (hedging), increasing exposure to price movements for speculation or getting access to otherwise hard to trade assets or markets.^[3]

Some of the more common derivatives include forwards, futures, options, swaps, and variations of these such as collateralized debt obligations, credit default swaps, and mortgage backed securities. Most derivatives are traded over-the-counter (off-exchange) or on an exchange such as the Chicago Mercantile Exchange, while most insurance contracts have developed into a separate industry. Derivatives are one of the three main categories of financial instruments, the other two being equities (i.e. stocks or shares) and debt (i.e. bonds and mortgages).

Speculation
Derivatives can be used to acquire risk, rather than to hedge against risk. Thus, some individuals and institutions will enter into a derivative contract to speculate on the value of the underlying asset, betting that the party seeking insurance will be wrong about the future value of the underlying asset. Speculators look to buy an asset in the future at a low price according to a derivative contract when the future market price is high, or to sell an asset in the future at a high price according to a derivative contract when the future market price is less.

Risks
The use of derivatives can result in large losses because of the use of leverage, or borrowing; (see VIDEO below). Derivatives allow investors to earn large returns from small movements in the underlying asset’s price. However, investors could lose large amounts if the price of the underlying moves against them significantly. There have been several instances of massive losses in derivative markets, such as the following:

American International Group (AIG) lost more than US$18 billion through a subsidiary over the preceding three quarters on credit default swaps (CDSs).^[42] The United States Federal Reserve Bank announced the creation of a secured credit facility of up to US$85 billion, to prevent the company’s collapse by enabling AIG to meet its obligations to deliver additional collateral to its credit default swap trading partners.^[43]
The loss of US$7.2 Billion by Société Générale in January 2008 through mis-use of futures contracts.
The loss of US$6.4 billion in the failed fund Amaranth Advisors, which was long natural gas in September 2006 when the price plummeted.
The loss of US$4.6 billion in the failed fund Long-Term Capital Management in 1998.
The loss of US$1.3 billion equivalent in oil derivatives in 1993 and 1994 by Metallgesellschaft AG.^[44]
The loss of US$1.2 billion equivalent in equity derivatives in 1995 by Barings Bank.^[45]
UBS AG, Switzerland’s biggest bank, suffered a $2 billion loss through unauthorized trading discovered in September 2011.^[46]

This comes to a staggering $39.5 billion; the majority in the last decade after the Commodity Futures Modernization Act of 2000 was passed.

Financial Reform and Government Regulation
Under US law and the laws of most other developed countries, derivatives have special legal exemptions that make them a particularly attractive legal form to extend credit.^[47] The strong creditor protections afforded to derivatives counterparties, in combination with their complexity and lack of transparency however, can cause capital markets to underprice credit risk. This can contribute to credit booms, and increase systemic risks.^[47] Indeed, the use of derivatives to conceal credit risk from third parties while protecting derivative counterparties contributed to the financial crisis of 2008 in the United States.^[47][48]

In November 2012, the SEC and regulators from Australia, Brazil, the European Union, Hong Kong, Japan, Ontario, Quebec, Singapore, and Switzerland met to discuss reforming the OTC derivatives market, as had been agreed by leaders at the 2009 G-20 Pittsburgh summit (see Photo) in September 2009.^[54] In December 2012, they released a joint statement to the effect that they recognized that the market is a global one and “firmly support the adoption and enforcement of robust and consistent standards in and across jurisdictions”, with the goals of mitigating risk, improving transparency, protecting against market abuse, preventing regulatory gaps, reducing the potential for arbitrage opportunities, and fostering a level playing field for market participants.^[54] They also agreed on the need to reduce regulatory uncertainty and provide market participants with sufficient clarity on laws and regulations by avoiding, to the extent possible, the application of conflicting rules to the same entities and transactions, and minimizing the application of inconsistent and duplicative rules.^[54] At the same time, they noted that “complete harmonization – perfect alignment of rules across jurisdictions” would be difficult, because of jurisdictions’ differences in law, policy, markets, implementation timing, and legislative and regulatory processes.^[54]

VIDEO: Leverage Explained – https://youtu.be/GESzfA9odgE
When things turn out good, big risk means big return; but if it turns out bad, you lose everything and left with a debt.

Source References:
1.       Derivatives (Report). Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, U.S. Department of Treasury. http://www.occ.gov/topics/capital-markets/financial-markets/trading/derivatives/index-derivatives.html. Retrieved February 2013. “A derivative is a financial contract whose value is derived from the performance of some underlying market factors, such as interest rates, currency exchange rates, and commodity, credit, or equity prices. Derivative transactions include an assortment of financial contracts, including structured debt obligations and deposits, swaps, futures, options, caps, floors, collars, forwards, and various combinations thereof.”
2.       Derivative Definition Investopedia
3.       Koehler, Christian. “The Relationship between the Complexity of Financial Derivatives and Systemic Risk”. Working Paper: 10–11.
——
42.   Kelleher, James B. (September 18, 2008). “”Buffett’s Time Bomb Goes Off on Wall Street” by James B. Kelleher of Reuters”. Reuters.com. Retrieved August 29, 2010.
43.   “Fed’s $85 billion Loan Rescues Insurer”
44.   Edwards, Franklin (1995). “Derivatives Can Be Hazardous To Your Health: The Case of Metallgesellschaft”. Derivatives Quarterly (Spring 1995): 8–17
45.   Whaley, Robert (2006). Derivatives: markets, valuation, and risk management. John Wiley and Sons. p. 506. ISBN 0-471-78632-2.
46.   “UBS Loss Shows Banks Fail to Learn From Kerviel, Leeson”. Businessweek. September 15, 2011. Retrieved March 5, 2013.
47.   “Michael Simkovic, Secret Liens and the Financial Crisis of 2008.”. American Bankruptcy Law Journal, Vol. 83, p. 253. 2009. Retrieved March 5, 2013.
48.   Michael Simkovic (January 11, 2011). “Bankruptcy Immunities, Transparency, and Capital Structure, Presentation at the World Bank”. Ssrn.com. doi:10.2139/ssrn.1738539. Retrieved March 5, 2013.
——
54.   “Joint Press Statement of Leaders on Operating Principles and Areas of Exploration in the Regulation of the Cross-Border OTC Derivatives Market; 2012-251”. Sec.gov. December 4, 2012. Retrieved March 5, 2013.

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Banks, Crony-Capitalism, New York, Power

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How ‘The Lion King’ roared into history

Posted on September 25, 2014 in Economics, Industries

Go Lean Commentary

There is money in the ‘Arts’.

One “Broadway” musical play, The Lion King has made $6.21 billion. That is significant. In fact that is a record, according to the foregoing news article:

By: Alison Boshoff

Title: How The Lion King roared into history: As show is crowned biggest box office earner ever, the secrets of its success emerge

Hakuna Matata!

Sir Elton John has long observed that The Lion King musical ‘is a law unto itself’ — and how so.

After more than a decade of performances in cities all over the world, it was confirmed this week that the stage show is the biggest beast in the jungle.

The Lion King — based on the 1994 Disney film of the same name — has taken more money at the box office than any other production in history.

Since its first night on Broadway in 1997, the show has made more than £3.8 billion ($6.21 billion) in ticket sales alone.

Not only has it conquered the stage, it has massively out-earned every cinema release — including blockbusters such as James Cameron’s Avatar, which took a mere £1.7 billion ($2.78 billion) globally after its 2009 release.

A further fortune has been made in souvenir T-shirts, posters and the rest. At the last count, there were eight different cast recordings of the show’s songs on sale.

Featuring music by Sir Elton John and lyrics by Sir Tim Rice, The Lion King opened in Minneapolis in July 1997 before moving to Broadway in November that year.

It arrived at the Lyceum Theatre in London’s West End in October 1999 and currently takes more than £30 million ($49 million) a year in the UK.

A STORY WITH BITE

The musical tells the story of Simba, a lion cub born on the Serengeti who runs away from his pride when his father Mufasa dies.

Aided by his friends, he must defeat his evil uncle Scar, who engineers Mufasa’s death in a stampede and convinces Simba he was to blame, to reclaim his rightful position as king.

THE MAGIC FORMULA

According to music historian Cary Ginell, the musical is a ‘spectacle that satisfies’ on many different levels.

‘For the kids, it’s the visual elements, the colours, the costumes and the puppetry,’ he says. ‘For the adults, it’s Hamlet.’

Many have noted the parallels between Disney’s and Shakespeare’s plots, which both feature a murdered king avenged by his rightful heir.

GOING GLOBAL

Disney says that the 22 Lion King productions around the world have been seen by an estimated 75 million people. That’s the entire population of the United Kingdom, plus the population of Belgium.

Last year, it was the highest-grossing musical on the New York stage, and it retains its number-one position so far in 2014. It has always been a sell-out in London.

MONEY MATTERS

Disney dipped its toe in the water with a Broadway version of its Oscar-winning Beauty And The Beast before pouring an estimated £6.5 million ($10.62 million) into staging The Lion King — the most expensive show ever staged.

THE STAGE GURU

In a colossal creative gamble, Disney hired Julie Taymor, an avant garde director who had trained in mime in Paris and spent years studying Japanese and Indonesian theatre.

Taymor thought the film ‘superficial’. She said: ‘I had to make The Lion King my own. Otherwise it’s a Disney product and I don’t like the way Disney looks.’

WE NEED A HEROINE!

Taymor’s great visual innovation was using puppetry, masks and mechanical headpieces to portray the animals. When the lions cry, they pull rolls of white silk from their masks’ eye holes; the actors playing giraffes walk on stilts.

The drought that ravages the savannah is illustrated by a dwindling waterhole — a circle of silvery material that shrinks as it is pulled across the stage.

There were other changes, too: the stage production has more songs than the film; and Rafiki, the baboon with mystic powers, became a ‘she’, as Taymor felt that the film lacked a leading female character.

A STAMPEDE FOR SEATS

In the immediate aftermath of its Broadway debut, there were reports of pushy New York parents putting their children’s names down for theatre tickets years in advance.

At one point seats were reselling for up to ten times their face value. Things have since calmed down, but a ticket to the London production costs at least £27.50 ($44.92) a seat.

THE CRITICS’ VERDICT

‘Visually breathtaking,’ said the New York Times. ‘Pure, exhilarating theatre, unlike anything ever seen on Broadway,’ cheered USA Today.

But not everyone was convinced. One critic who saw the show open in London’s West End wrote that once the last Zulu drum had fallen silent, a tiny part of him was left whispering: ‘So what?’

Catch it immediately, he said, thinking it was not destined to run and run. Oops.

And the late, great Sheridan Morley opined: ‘A lot of people say, “This is not real theatre. It’s theatre by way of the movies, or by way of the theme park.” It’s Disneyfication, if you like.’

STARS IN THEIR AISLES

Celebrities including Dame Judi Dench, Dame Shirley Bassey, model Claudia Schiffer and former Spice Girl Geri Halliwell attended the opening night in London.

All said that they had been moved to tears and ovations. Dame Judi said afterwards: ‘I don’t want to be in any play in the future where an elephant doesn’t walk down the aisle.’

But the show has not brought in big-name stars to fill seats, instead relying on talented ensemble casts.

SPOOKING THE PHANTOM

Even though twice as many paying punters have seen Andrew Lloyd Webber’s long-running The Phantom Of The Opera, The Lion King’s steeper ticket prices and larger theatres mean its earnings are greater.

THAT’S ENOUGH, ZAZU

Zazu the hornbill’s big musical number, The Morning Report, was cut from the show in 2010, making the show nine minutes shorter.

ELTON’S CASH COW

No one will say how much Sir Elton was paid for licensing his melodies for The Lion King film — such as the hit Can You Feel The Love Tonight — to be used in the stage version.

What can be noted is that pre-Lion King his annual income was said to stand at around £12 million ($19.6 million) a year. More recently, Forbes magazine put it at £48 million ($78.4 million) a year.

ONCE MORE WITH FEELING

Buoyed by The Lion King’s success, Sir Elton was then involved in two musicals: Aida, which had minor success, and Lestat, based on Anne Rice’s gothic novels about an 18th-century nobleman turned vampire. That was a thumping disaster and closed after 39 performances in 2005.

He stepped back into the world of musical theatre that year with the hugely popular Billy Elliot — though he did tell an interviewer in 2011: ‘Just between you, me and the gatepost, I’m not really a lover of musicals.’

MAN BEHIND THE MUSIC

The show is completed by the music of South African composer Lebo M, who was exiled to America in 1979 after student riots in Soweto.

He told the South Bank Show: ‘The Lion King is not necessarily political, but I could relate to the life of Simba, a young cub who grows up in exile and goes back to fight for his country.’
The Daily Mail – London’s Daily Newspaper (Posted September 23, 2014) – http://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-2767423/How-Lion-King-roared-history-As-crowned-biggest-box-office-earner-secrets-success.html

This news story aligns with the book Go Lean…Caribbean in stressing the economic impact of artistic and entertainment endeavors. The book asserts that Caribbean society can be elevated by improving the eco-system to live, work and play. Broadway-style theatrical productions come under the category of “play”.

The book Go Lean…Caribbean strives to accomplish this elevation vision by serving as a roadmap for the introduction and implementation of the technocratic Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU). There is a lot involved in this vision; the prime directives are stated as follows:

Optimization of the economic engines in order to grow the regional economy to $800 Billion & create 2.2 million new jobs.
Establishment of a security apparatus to protect the resultant economic engines.
Improve Caribbean governance to support these engines.

“Art imitates Life and Life imitates Art” – Literary expression.

There is another message from this commentary/blog, that one person, a role model, can make a difference in transforming society. The Go Lean roadmap stresses the mission of creating jobs in the areas of Science, Technology, Engineering and Medicine (STEM), but it also recognizes that many people show ‘genius qualifiers’ in unrelated areas: music, visual arts, performing arts, sports and theatrical endeavors. This point is pronounced early in the following statements in the book’s Declaration of Interdependence (Page 14):

xxi. Whereas the preparation of our labor force can foster opportunities and dictate economic progress for current and future generations, the Federation must ensure that educational and job training opportunities are fully optimized for all residents of all member-states, with no partiality towards any gender or ethnic group. The Federation must recognize and facilitate excellence in many different fields of endeavor, including sciences, languages, arts, music and sports. This responsibility should be executed without incurring the risks of further human flight, as has been the past history.

xxxii. Whereas the cultural arts and music of the region are germane to the quality of Caribbean life, and the international appreciation of Caribbean life, the Federation must implement the support systems to teach, encourage, incentivize, monetize and promote the related industries for arts and music in domestic and foreign markets. These endeavors will make the Caribbean a better place to live, work and play.

There are economic and image considerations with this subject. The Go Lean book accepts that “show business” can have an impact on society and the world, as also depicted in the foregoing article. Already, this commentary has analyzed the Broadway play “Motown, The Musical” and contributions of role model Berry Gordy.

The Go Lean roadmap accepts that change has come to “show business” (Music, Film, Visual Art and Theater). This is due mostly to the convergence of technology (the internet to be exact). The book posits that [market] “size no longer matters”, that content can be created in any location in the world and then distributed to an appreciative audience anywhere. The first requirement is the community ethos of valuing Intellectual Property. This ethos would be new, a change, for the Caribbean.

Today, most Intellectual Property is consumed digitally with a lot of retailing via the World-Wide-Web. This changed landscape now requires new tools and protections, like electronic payment systems, digital rights management and Performance Rights Organizations. The Go Lean/CU roadmap details these solutions. With these efforts and investments, the returns will be undeniable.

To harvest these investment returns, there is the need for some technocratic facilitations. The book posits that this burden is too big for any one Caribbean member-state, and thus the collaboration efforts of the CU is necessary, as the strategy is to confederate all the 30 member-states of the Caribbean despite their language and legacy, into an integrated “single market”. This will allow for better leverage of the consumer market for the consumption of media.

The CU is designed to do the heavy-lifting of organizing Caribbean society. The following list details the ethos, strategies, tactics, implementations and advocacies to foster a similar successful path like The Lion King on the world stage:

Community Ethos – Forging Change	Page 20
Community Ethos – Lean Operations	Page 24
Community Ethos – Return on Investments	Page 24
Community Ethos – Ways to Foster Genius	Page 27
Community Ethos – Help Entrepreneurship	Page 28
Community Ethos – Promote Intellectual Property	Page 29
Anecdote – Valedictorian Experience	Page 38
Strategy – Strategy – Caribbean Vision	Page 45
Strategy – Agents of Change – Globalization	Page 57
Separation of Powers – Central Bank – Electronic Payment Deployments	Page 73
Tactical – Separation of Powers – Patents & Copyrights Office	Page 78
Separation of Powers – Culture Administration	Page 81
Planning – Ways to Make the Caribbean Better	Page 131
Planning – Lessons Learned from New York City	Page 137
Advocacy – Ways to Grow the Economy	Page 151
Advocacy – Ways to Create Jobs	Page 152
Advocacy – Education – Performing Arts Schools	Page 159
Advocacy – Reforms for Banking Regulations	Page 199
Advocacy – Ways to Impact Hollywood	Page 203
Advocacy – Ways to Improve the Arts	Page 230
Advocacy – Ways to Promote Music	Page 231
Advocacy – Impact Urban Living – Art & Theaters	Page 234
Appendix – New York / Broadway / Theater Jobs	Page 277
Appendix – Caribbean Music Genres	Page 347
Appendix – Protecting Music Copyrights	Page 351

Considering the experience of Julie Taymor in the foregoing article, the Go Lean roadmap asserts that one man, or woman, can make a difference in the quest to elevate Caribbean society. We want to foster any ‘genius qualifiers’ found within the region. This refers to “on stage/on camera” talent and behind-the-scenes talent, like Ms. Taymor.

The Go Lean/CU roadmap represents the change that has come to the Caribbean. The people, institutions and governance of the region are all urged to “lean-in” to this roadmap for change. We know there is a “new” Julie Taymor somewhere in the Caribbean member-states, waiting to be fostered.

This will not be the first time a Caribbean artist has impacted the world with his/her artistic contributions. We have the proud legacy of Bob Marley and his musical genius. His songs are sung and hummed around the world:

i.e. Song: One Love – “Let’s get together and feel alright”

He is so recognizable that he is considered an icon.

The movie and Broadway play, The Lion King, is also iconic… and impactful. Consider the experience of this “Cast” flash-mob / song-and-dance depicted in this video:

THE LION KING Australia: Cast Sings Circle of Life on Flight Home from Brisbane
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wgSLxl1oAwA

Download the book Go Lean … Caribbean – now!

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Arts, History, Music, New York, Play, Transform

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Breaking Up – The Port Authority – Is Hard To Do

Posted on August 20, 2014 in Implementation, Planning

Go Lean Commentary

The concept of a super-national / multi-state administration to foster development and growth in the Caribbean sounds so revolutionary. Has such a concept ever been attempted or succeeded before?

Yes … and yes.

The book Go Lean…Caribbean identifies one such winning role model (Page 137): The Port Authority of New York and New Jersey (PANYNJ).

This entity was created in 1921 by an act of the US Congress, an interstate compact, to coordinate the common interest of the two states, even above and beyond the self-interest of each state. The focus is on common interest, not self interest. This charter facilitates trade and transportation. This is a very exacting model for a Caribbean focus, as the Go Lean book serves as a roadmap for the introduction and implementation of the Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU). Facilitating trade is a parallel objective of both the CU and the PANYNJ. In fact, this Go Lean/CU roadmap has these 3 prime directives:

Optimization of the economic engines in order to grow the regional economy to $800 Billion & create 2.2 million new jobs.
Establishment of a security apparatus to protect the resultant economic engines.
Improve Caribbean governance to support these engines.

The Port Authority of New York and New Jersey operates much of the region’s key transportation infrastructure. But some assets are profitable while others are not; some hubs chew up a lot more cash than they generate. So says the following news article:

By: Aaron Elstein
Subtitle: Why the agency endures despite political interference, scandal and lots of red ink.

It didn’t take long after the George Washington Bridge traffic caper erupted for people to start demanding dramatic change at the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey. By a unanimous vote, the New Jersey state Senate urged Congress to examine the “organizational structure” of the agency, which runs the region’s bridges, tunnels, airports and much else. Others called for more drastic measures.

“I’ve started hearing people say that it’s time to break the Port up,” said Carol Kellermann, president of the Citizens Budget Commission.

A breakup might sound like fair comeuppance for the Port Authority, a massive government body that’s now seen as a jobs bank for Gov. Chris Christie’s friends. Carving up the agency into its New York and New Jersey parts would certainly simplify the chain of command in an unwieldy organization that effectively has two chief executives and a board that reports to two governors, who each have veto power over decisions. Even a consulting firm hired by the authority described management two years ago as “dysfunctional.”

“It could be simpler and cleaner if you separated the different parts of the Port into individual agencies,” said Stephen Berger, a former Port Authority executive director. “It would also be insane.”

Dismantling the agency is not a new idea. The idea was first broached in the 1940s and most recently in 1996, when Mayor Rudolph Giuliani unveiled a plan to merge PATH into the Metropolitan Transportation Authority, sell the World Trade Center, fold the Port Authority police into the city’s Police Department and create a new agency called the New York Airport Authority that would have been in charge of rebuilding the city’s airports.

Mr. Giuliani, who didn’t return a call seeking comment, argued at the time that the Port Authority was riddled with inefficiencies and mismanagement. The idea went nowhere.

The agency endures for a simple reason: The economics of a breakup don’t work. Many of the authority’s operations lose substantial sums and couldn’t survive without hefty subsidies from other parts of the organization.

PATH, for instance, devoured $2.3 billion in cash between 2007 and 2011. The harbor ports and midtown bus terminal chewed up $755 million and $537 million, respectively, during the same period. Rebuilding the WorldTradeCenter has cost the agency about $8 billion in the past decade.

Cash Cows

Yet even amid these gushers of red ink, the Port Authority in 2012 managed to generate $1.1 billion in net income on $4 billion in revenue. That gain was all thanks to the huge toll and fee revenue coming from the region’s three major airports and the George Washington Bridge. Those four hubs generated about $5 billion in operating cash between 2007 and 2011.”One of the most powerful things about the Port is how it moves revenues from one place to another,” Mr. Berger said.

The Port Authority’s diverse revenue streams also mean it can borrow more cheaply than the airports or bridges could on their own. That’s an important consideration because the agency has $20 billion in debt obligations and is expected to borrow another $8 billion over the next four years to pay for such projects as completing the World Trade Center, building a new central terminal at LaGuardia Airport and raising the Bayonne Bridge so larger ships going to and coming from the Panama Canal can dock here.

“The Port is different from just about any city or state in that they can go to the market and raise whatever capital they need whenever they want,” said Matt Fabian, a managing director at independent debt-research firm Municipal Market Advisors. “The management team is seen by investors as very sophisticated.”

“Sophisticated” might not be the word preferred by most people to describe the management team behind the Fort Lee traffic jam engineered by aides of Mr. Christie, but interference from elected leaders and their lackeys isn’t new at the agency.

Jameson Doig, a professor of government at DartmouthCollege, dates the first example to 1927, six years after the Port Authority’s creation. That’s when the governor of New Jersey demanded—and won—the right to veto agency decisions because he wanted to help a company get a contract installing wire cables on the GeorgeWashingtonBridge.

Political Interference

Mr. Doig said many of the Port Authority’s current problems stem from an agreement made in 1995, when Gov. George Pataki appointed an investment banker with no experience in transportation to the executive director job. After New Jersey Gov. Christine Todd Whitman objected, the leaders compromised by creating a new deputy executive director position to be filled by the New Jersey side. The executive director and the deputy share the same box on the authority’s organizational chart, and the deputy can’t be fired by the executive director.

At the time, the move was applauded as a sensible division of power, but “that’s when you started seeing the management problems that are blindingly obvious today,” said Mr. Doig, author of a book about the agency called Empire on the Hudson.

He added that Port Authority management suffered further when Mr. Christie rewarded up to 60 political backers with jobs for them or their family members after he was elected in 2010. In the past, governors have appointed no more than five supporters to Port Authority jobs.

“The first thing you change with the Port is eliminate those patronage appointees and put in people who are strong and independent,” Mr. Doig said. “And get rid of that deputy executive director job.”

At least for now, that job is vacant. Bill Baroni, one of the masterminds behind the Fort Lee traffic jam, resigned last month.

See Revenue/Profit Appendix below.

Crains New York Business News Online Site (Posted 01-19-2014; retrieved 08/18/2014) –http://www.crainsnewyork.com/article/20140119/POLITICS/301199988/breaking-up-the-port-authority-is-hard-to-do#

The foregoing article was a published news item; this generated feedback and commentary. As follows is a valid and relevant comment by a regular citizen identified as Roger. His comments are “spot on“, as follows:

Roger wrote on 01/19/14 at 6:44 AM:

Breaking up the Port brings the region back to the bad old days of NY-NJ rivalry and stalemate that necessitated the creation of the bi-state Authority in the first place in 1921. The Port Authority for most of its history was an incredibly effective, highly professional and often visionary agency of development of the region’s essential trade and transportation infrastructure. This it did reasonably free of political interference and cronyism, especially considering the political cultures of the two state parents. Its great fault was a dearth of public accountability and transparency, in response to which the Governors have steadily sought greater oversight which morphed into outright control, ending in the current miasma of political patronage that now afflicts the Port Authority. What is needed is a new regime of state oversight that provides broad policy direction but keeps hands-off to let the agency do what it once was permitted – as intended – to do so well.

This subject of regional administration is important in the consideration of Caribbean elevation. How do we learn from the successes and failures of PANYNJ and ensure that we do our multi-state compact right. (The CU is a confederation of 30 member-states). Some previous Go Lean blogs, highlighted here in the following samples, showed how the application of the Go Lean roadmap is designed to benefit the region, and glean insights, intelligence and wisdom from other models/examples:

https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=888	Book Review: ‘Citizenville – Take the Town Square Digital and Reinvent Government’
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=829	Trucks and Trains Play Well Together
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=798	Lessons Learned from the American Airlines merger
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=353	Book Review: ‘Wrong – Nine Economic Policy Disasters and What We Can Learn…’

The people and institutions of the Caribbean must lean-in to the initiatives spelled out in the book Go Lean…Caribbean. Similar to the PANYNJ, there is no need for CU member-states to fund the CU Trade Federation, just the opposite, the CU will generate revenues to remit back to each member-state. This commission involves duplicating a lot of the functions that PANYNJ conduct now, but we must do it better (efficiently and effectively). This point is clearly defined in (Page 12) of the Declaration of Interdependence, with these statements:

xi. Whereas all men are entitled to the benefits of good governance in a free society, “new guards” must be enacted to dissuade the emergence of incompetence, corruption, nepotism and cronyism at the peril of the people’s best interest. The Federation must guarantee the executions of a social contract between government and the governed.

xii. Whereas the legacy in recent times in individual states may be that of ineffectual governance with no redress to higher authority, the accedence of this Federation will ensure accountability and escalation of the human and civil rights of the people for good governance, justice assurances, due process and the rule of law. As such, any threats of a “failed state” status for any member state must enact emergency measures on behalf of the Federation to protect the human, civil and property rights of the citizens, residents, allies, trading partners, and visitors of the affected member state and the Federation as a whole.

xiv. Whereas government services cannot be delivered without the appropriate funding mechanisms, “new guards” must be incorporated to assess, accrue, calculate and collect revenues, fees and other income sources for the Federation and member-states. The Federation can spur government revenues directly through cross-border services and indirectly by fostering industries and economic activities not possible without this Union.

xvi. Whereas security of our homeland is inextricably linked to prosperity of the homeland, the economic and security interest of the region needs to be aligned under the same governance. Since economic crimes, including piracy and other forms of terrorism, can imperil the functioning of the wheels of commerce for all the citizenry, the accedence of this Federation must equip the security apparatus with the tools and techniques for predictive and proactive interdictions.

Enacting a multi-state compact, and the related governance, is “Step One, Day One” in the Go Lean roadmap. Implementing the CU with a heightened regulatory framework compared to PANYNJ as depicted in the foregoing news article, allows the transparency and checks-and-balances that stakeholders deserve, but not to undermine the fundamentals of a technocracy – we must be able to deliver first and foremost on our obligations, irrespective of political maneuvering. The CU emergence would therefore provide the foundation so that the regional society can be elevated, economically and governmentally.

The Go Lean book details samples in this series of community ethos, strategies, tactics, implementations and advocacies to foster progress in regional administration:

Community Ethos – Deferred Gratification	Page 21
Community Ethos – Voluntary Trade Creates Wealth	Page 21
Community Ethos – Lean Operations	Page 24
Community Ethos – Cooperatives	Page 25
Community Ethos – Ways to Impact the Future	Page 26
Community Ethos – Impact the Greater Good	Page 37
Strategy – Vision – Confederating 30 Member-States	Page 45
Strategy – Agents of Change – Globalization	Page 57
Tactical – Fostering a Technocracy	Page 64
Tactical – Growing the Region’s Economy to $800 Billion	Page 67
Tactical – Separation of Powers – Legislative Oversight	Page 72
Anecdote – “Lean” in Government	Page 93
Implementation – Ways to Pay for Change	Page 101
Implementation – Start-up Benefits from the EEZ	Page 104
Implementation – Ways to Deliver	Page 109
Implementation – Ways to Re-boot an Existing Port Authority	Page 112
Planning – Ways to Improve Trade	Page 128
Planning – Lessons from New York City	Page 137
Advocacy – Ways to Grow the Economy	Page 151
Advocacy – Ways to Improve Governance	Page 168
Advocacy – Revenue Sources … for Regional Administration	Page 172
Advocacy – Ways to Improve Transportation	Page 205
Appendix – Enacting Interstate Compacts	Page 278

The Port Authority of New York and New Jersey set out to manage the common waterways (and related trade) of the Hudson River as it empties into the Atlantic Ocean. That was the initiation; it has since over-reached, but still for the providential benefit of the people of States of New York and New Jersey. As a parallel, the Caribbean Union Trade Federation sets out to manage the common waterscapes of the Caribbean Sea, with the built-in “over-reach” mandate from the beginning – the focus is not just limited to port activities. In fact the Go Lean roadmap details 144 different mission/advocacies.

This, the CU, is not for political gain, or to accumulate power and wealth for a few. No, the purpose, planning and execution of the CU is for the Greater Good. In fact, a lot of the executions for the CU is neutral/agnostic of politics. While politicians may have influence on budgets and policies, as a technocracy the Federation is required to just deliver – think postal mail (“neither snow nor rain nor heat nor gloom of night stays these couriers from the swift completion of their appointed rounds”).

Now is the time for all of the Caribbean, the people and governing institutions, to lean-in for the elevations described in the book Go Lean … Caribbean. The benefits are too alluring, a better place to live, work and play.

Download the book Go Lean … Caribbean – now!

—————————————————————————–

APPENDIX – PANYNJ Revenues / Profits

TOTAL AVIATION: +$2.5 BILLION

Airport	Profit
JFK	+$990 million
LaGuardia	+$273 million
Newark	+$1.3 million
Teterboro, Stewart, heliports	-$65 million

TOTAL BRIDGE AND TUNNEL: -$537 MILLION*

Bridge/Tunnel	Profit
GW Bridge	+$1.3 billion
Lincoln Tunnel	+167 million
Holland Tunnel	+$141 million
Port Authority Bus Terminal	-$479 million
PATH	-$2.3 billion

TOTAL PORT COMMERCE: -$755 MILLION*

Port	Profit
Port Newark	-$317 million
Port Jersey	-$184 million
Howland Hook	-$160 million
Brooklyn Marine Terminal	-$27 million

TOTAL WORLD TRADE CENTER: -$3.1 BILLION

GRAND TOTAL: -$2.5 BILLION

The total shows the authority doesn’t generate enough from tolls, fees and grants to cover its costs. It borrows to cover the shortfall.

*Total includes other entities not listed here.

Source: Phase II report to the special committee of Port Authority’s board, prepared by consulting firm Navigant in September 2012.

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Model, New York, Power

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MetroCard – Model for the Caribbean Dollar

Posted on August 20, 2014 in Economics, Planning

Go Lean Commentary

Optimization of the economic engines in order to grow the regional economy to $800 Billion & create 2.2 million new jobs.
Establishment of a security apparatus to protect the resultant economic engines.
Improve Caribbean governance to support these engines.

The Caribbean needs this increase in development capital/liquidity.

This subject of electronic payment systems has been previously covered in Go Lean blogs, highlighted here in the following samples:

https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=1350	PayPal expands payment services to 10 markets
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=906	Bitcoin needs regulatory framework to change ‘risky’ image
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=528	Facebook plans to provide mobile payment services
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=360	How to Create Money from Thin Air

Cruise Passenger Smartcards – The Go Lean roadmap posits that the cruise industry needs the Caribbean more than the Caribbean needs the industry. But the cruise lines have embedded rules/regulations designed to maximize their revenues at the expense of the port-side establishments. The CU solution is to deploy a scheme for smartcards that function on the ships and at the port cities (Page 193).
e-Commerce Facilitation – The Go Lean roadmap defines that the Caribbean Dollar (C$) will be mostly cashless, an accounting currency. So the Caribbean Central Bank (CCB) will settle all C$ electronic transactions (MasterCard-Visa style or ACH style) and charge interchange/clearance fees (Page 198). This scheme allows for the emergence of full-throttle e-Commerce activities.

Whereas a free market economy can be induced and spurred for continuous progress, the Federation must install the controls to better manage aspects of the economy: jobs, inflation, savings rate, investments and other economic principles…

Unspent MetroCard Money Means Millions for M.T.A.

(http://www.nyctransitforums.com/forums/topic/43954-unspent-metrocard-money-means-millions-for-mta/)

Think of it as New York’s biggest sock drawer, except that instead of nickels, dimes and quarters, what is squirreled away in its dark recesses are millions of lapsed yellow-and-blue MetroCards with digital loose change still dangling from their magnetic strips.

In the decade ending in 2010, nearly $500 million worth of unspent balances on expired bus and subway MetroCards accumulated, and that money can no longer be redeemed.

Cards that are bought, never used but still valid are counted for bookkeeping purposes as a liability, because they might eventually be used. Outdated cards with pending balances become an asset after they expire, about two years from the date of sale. The balances are listed as revenue under the category of “fare media liability.”

Tens of millions of dollars a year may not seem like much out of $4 billion in annual MetroCard revenue for New York City Transit, but there is no stream of cash that the agency scoffs at.

Kevin Ortiz, a spokesman for the Metropolitan Transportation Authority, which includes the transit agency, said: “Expired card value does benefit the M.T.A. It gets counted as fare box revenue.”

The peak year for replenishing New York City Transit’s fare media liability account was 2012, when $95 million was credited. That followed a surge in purchases in 2010, before a fare increase. Those cards, many presumably with outstanding balances, have expired.

Considering the governance for the MetroCard, the MTA has been described with some adjectives of efficiency and effectiveness. Their website described their charter as follows:

While nearly 85 percent of the nation’s workers need automobiles to get to their jobs, four of every five rush-hour commuters to New York City’s central business districts avoid traffic congestion by taking transit service – most of it operated by the MTA. MTA customers travel on America’s largest bus fleet and on more subway and rail cars than all the rest of the country’s subways and commuter railroads combined.

This mobility helps ensure New York’s place as a world center of finance, commerce, culture, and entertainment, and New York ranks near the top among the nation’s best cities for business, Fortune magazine has written, because it has “what every city desires. A workable mass transit system.”

MTA mass transit helps New Yorkers avoid about 17 million metric tons of pollutants while emitting only 2 million metric tons, making it perhaps the single biggest source of greenhouse gas (GHG) avoidance in the United States. The people living in our service area lead carbon-efficient lives, making New York the most carbon-efficient state in the nation.

Over the past two decades, the MTA has committed some $72 billion to restore and improve the network so that today it runs at unprecedented levels of efficiency. Our employees at all of our agencies work diligently to maintain high service and safety standards.

(Source: Retrieved August 19, 2014 from: http://web.mta.info//mta/network.htm)

MetroCard Facts	Go Lean *book considerations/reflections (actual Page* Numbers)**
MetroCard History	Roadmap with Project Delivery Obligations (Page 109); Fostering a Technocracy (Page 64)
Multiple Jurisdictions	Confederation of 30 Member-States (Page 45); Fostering Interstate Commerce (Page 129)
Pricing/Cost Increases	Unified Command & Control on Inflation (Page 153)
Technology	Foster Technology (Page 197); e-Commerce (Page 198); Bridging Digital Divide (Page 31)
Transfers	People respond to economic incentives (Page 21)
Card type consideration – Pay-Per-Ride cards	Improve M1 by encouraging stored balances (Page 198)
Card type consideration – Student cards	Facilitation Education (Page 159) and Transportation (Page 205)
Card type consideration – Disabled/Senior Citizens	Improve Elder-Care (Page 225) and Impact Persons with Disabilities (Page 228)
Purchase Options – Subway Station Booths	Manage Federal Civil Servants (Page 173)
Purchase Options – Vending Machines	Foster Technology (Page 197); e-Commerce (Page 198); Bridging Digital Divide (Page 31)
Purchase Options – Neighborhood Merchants	Help Entrepreneurship (Page 28); Impact Main Street (Page 201);
Future	Impact the Future (Page 26)
Bad Actors: Fraud/Scams	Bad Actors Emerge – Reduce Crime (Page 178); Impact the Greater Good (Page 37)

Community Ethos – Money Multiplier Principle	Page 22
Community Ethos – Lean Operations	Page 24
Community Ethos – Cooperatives	Page 25
Tactical – Separation of Powers – Central Banking	Page 73
Implementation – Assemble Central Bank Cooperative	Page 96
Planning – Lessons Learned from New York City	Page 137
Anecdote – Caribbean Currencies	Page 149
Advocacy – Ways to Mitigate Black Markets	Page 165
Advocacy – Ways to Impact Public Works	Page 175
Advocacy – Ways to Foster Cooperatives	Page 176
Advocacy – Reforms for Banking Regulations	Page 199
Advocacy – Ways to Impact Urban Living	Page 234
Appendix – New York City Economy Details	Page 277

MetroCard is truly a model for the Caribbean … Dollar.

Download the book Go Lean … Caribbean – now!

————————————————————————-

Appendix – Reference Source:

MetroCard – New York Metropolitan Transportation Authority’s Payment System

History

01Jun1993	MTA distributes 3,000 MetroCards in the first major test of the technology for the entire subway system and the entire bus system.
06Jan1994	MetroCard live testing with compatible turnstiles at select lines and stations.
15May1997	The last MetroCard turnstiles were installed by this date, and the entire bus and subway system accepted MetroCards
04Jul1997	First free transfers available between bus and subway at any location with MetroCard.
01Jan1998	Bonus free rides (10% of the purchase amount) were given for purchases of $15 or more.
04Jul1998	Unlimited Ride MetroCards introduced, at $17 for 7 days, $63 for 30 days, Express Bus Plus for $120.
01Jan1999	1-Day Fun Pass was introduced: unlimited use for one day for $4.
25Jan1999	The first MetroCard Vending Machines installed.
13Apr2003	Tokens/coins no longer sold.
04May2003	Tokens only accepted as a $1.50 credit towards the $2 MetroCard ride.
02Mar2008	A new 14-day unlimited-ride was introduced for $47
30Dec2010	1-Day Fun Pass and the 14-Day Unlimited Ride MetroCards discontinued.
20Feb2013	Cards can now be refilled with both time and value.
03Mar2013	A $1 fee is imposed on new card purchases in-system

Pricing/Cost increases – since the complete cut-over in 2003

Date	Daily	Weekly	Monthly
04May2003	$2	$21	$70
27Feb2005	$2	$24	$76
02Mar2008	$2	$25	$81
28Jun2009	$2.25	$27	$89
30Dec2010	$2.25	$29	$104
19Dec2012	$2.50	$30	$104

Technology

During a swipe, the MetroCard is read, re-written to, then check-read to verify correct encoding.

Cubic later on used the proprietary MetroCard platform to create the Chicago Card, which is physically identical to the MetroCard except for the labeling.

Transfers

One free transfer from:

subway to local bus
bus to subway
bus to local bus
express bus to express bus
bus or subway to Staten Island Railway
subway to subway

Card type – consideration – Pay-Per-Ride MetroCards

$5 – $80 initial value in any increment (though vending machines only sell values in multiples of 5 cents).
Card purchases or refills equal to or greater than $5 receive a 5% bonus (ex. $50 buys 21 rides).
Cards can be refilled up to $80 in one transaction and up to a total value of $100.
Though cards expire, the balance may be transferred to a new cards.

MetroCards are issued to some New York City public and private school students allowing discounted access to the NYC Transit buses and trains, depending on the distance traveled between their school and their home. The card program is managed by the NYC-DOE Office of Pupil Transportation.
In Nassau County, Student MetroCards are issued by individual schools which have pre-paid for the cards.

Card type – consideration – Disabled/Senior Citizen Reduced-Fare MetroCards

Given to senior citizens and the disabled as a combination photo ID and MetroCard.
Allows half-fare within the MTA system. (Express Bus during off-peak hours only)
Half fare is also available on the 7-day and 30-day Unlimited MetroCards.
Card back is color-coded to match gender of card holder.
Card face is marked as “Photo ID Pass”

Purchase options

All new MetroCard purchases are charged a $1 fee, except reduced fare customers and those exchanging damaged / expired cards.

Subway Station Booths

MetroCard Vending Machines

The machines are compliant with the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990 through use of braille and a headset jack.

Neighborhood MetroCard Merchants

MetroCards can be sold by retail merchants not affiliated with MTA. Vendors can apply to sell MTA fare media at their businesses. Only presealed, prevalued cards are available, and no fee is charged.

Future

In 2006 the MTA and Port Authority of NY/NJ announced plans to replace the magnetic strip with smart cards.

Bad Actors: Fraud and Scams

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Role Model Berry Gordy – No Town Like Motown

Posted on August 6, 2014 in Ethos, Social

Go Lean Commentary

This is a memorable dialogue:

Berry Gordy: You went from singing love songs to now anti-war songs. I understand you want to reflect change in society…

Marvin Gaye (interrupting): I don’t want to reflect change, I want to effect change.

Thus the alignment of the Broadway play Motown, The Musical and the book Go Lean…Caribbean. It is an established fact that any difficult subject can be more easily communicated if backed-up by a catchy melody and rhyming words. An underlying theme of the above-cited play, based on the autobiographical story of Motown founder Berry Gordy, is that music effected change in America and forged integration and elevation of society.

By: Robert Simonson

Title: No Town Like Motown: Navigating the Life, Times and Tunes of Starmaker Berry Gordy

First-time Broadway director Charles Randolph-Wright is at the helm of one of the more pulse-quickening titles of the season, Motown: The Musical, about record producer Berry Gordy’s heyday.

In terms of backstage politics, Charles Randolph-Wright may have the trickiest job of any director working on Broadway this spring. He is staging Motown: The Musical, a musically overflowing new show about the life and career of recording mogul Berry Gordy.

One of his producers is Berry Gordy as well. Gordy completes his hat trick by having written the libretto for the piece.

“Sometimes I’ll forget the person I’m talking to is the same person that is depicted on stage,” said Randolph-Wright.

One imagines such waters are difficult to navigate. What if Producer Gordy tells the director not to interfere with Writer Gordy’s work? “It’s something we talked about from the beginning,” said Randolph-Wright. “He’s very open as to what the story is.”

The show, which is playing at the Lunt-Fontanne Theatre, is largely based on Gordy’s 1995 memoir “To Be Loved: The Music, the Magic, the Memories of Motown.”

“He wrote the book 20 years ago,” Randolph-Wright explained. “Now he has an even different perspective on that. You have to ask, ‘How do we tell the story of this big character, who is based on this real person, and yet that person is involved with the creation of the show, and is working on it?’ It’s a challenge, but the way we have worked is a very open process.”

Randolph-Wright recalled one particular moment when Gordy confided in him an episode from his past when he was at his most vulnerable. “We were walking around and he told me this story. I couldn’t believe it. I said, ‘You want that on stage?’ I thought it was very brave. But at this point at his life, what does he have to prove?”

Randolph-Wright added that Gordy, now 83, has no trouble juggling his many roles. After all, it is something he’s been doing for decades. “In most cases that would be a challenge,” he said. “But he spent his whole career wearing so many different hats. When I’m with the writer, that’s who I’m with. The producer is a different person. I am always with the person who’s doing all those things, but in each separate instance I’m with who Berry is at that moment.”

Charles Randolph-Wright was one of several directors who interviewed with Gordy. From the start, he thought he was right for the project. “This is in my DNA,” he said. He doesn’t mean that he grew up with Motown’s music (as many of us did) — though that is part of it. His connection to the material is more complex. “I’ve done every angle of this story. I’ve been in a music group. I’ve danced to the music. I’ve sung it. And I’ve lived in all those worlds he did, though not the same way he did.”

When the marquee was hung on the Lunt-Fontanne, Randolph-Wright glanced down the street and noticed he was only yards away from the Imperial Theatre. In the early 1980s he passed through the stage door of that theatre every night as a member of the original cast of Dreamgirls — the fictional account of the rise of The Supremes, a group Gordy helped found. “What’s happened in those years from that show to this show, it’s been an amazing journey,” he mused. “From the Broadway musical version of this story to the real story.”

Motown‘s greatest asset is the iconic songbook the Detroit-based record label produced; and they’ll get ample helpings of that hit parade, including songs made famous by Smokey Robinson and The Miracles (“Shop Around”), Diana Ross and The Supremes (“Stop! In the Name of Love”), Marvin Gaye (“What’s Going On”), Stevie Wonder, The Temptations, and Michael Jackson and The Jackson Five (“I Want You Back”).

Randolph-Wright said it was hard, given the rich catalogue, deciding which songs to keep in the show and which to leave out. “Every song you hear in this show, you want to hear,” he said. “But how do you put this journey into two and a half hours? There’s so much, so many people. They’re all part of this story. But we found out how to take the story and condense what could easily have been a miniseries.” He said he wouldn’t know the exact song count until opening night, but promised the show would contain more numbers than does your average musical.

To sing the classic pop hits, the director has assembled a large cast, including Valisia LeKae as Diana Ross and Charl Brown as Smokey Robinson — both particular Gordy favorites. Brandon Victor Dixon will play Gordy himself.

Randolph-Wright said he didn’t want note-by-note recreations of their numbers, “I want [the actors] to evoke these artists, not copy them, not be an impersonator. But it has to be the Motown sound. The actors have been tremendous in finding those things that make them seem real as those people.”

The tunes will be used in various ways. Some will be presented as straightforward performances; others will be used as narrative tissue, to further along the story. In addition, the score will include three or four new songs, written by Gordy expressly for the musical.

The director has found it a particular delight to see Gordy returning to his songwriting roots. “We forget that he wrote a lot of those early hits. Over the years, as Motown grew, he became less about being an artist, and more about being a businessman. It’s thrilling to see him become completely creative again.”

(This feature appears in the March 2013 issue of Playbill magazine.)
Play Bill Broadway Magazine/Web Site (Posted March 10, 2013; Retrieved 08-06-2014) – http://www.playbill.com/news/article/175778-No-Town-Like-Motown-Navigating-the-Life-Times-and-Tunes-of-Starmaker-Berry-Gordy

Like Berry Gordy, the prime directive of the Go Lean book is also to elevate society, but in the Caribbean, not in America, by integrating a confederated brotherhood. In fact, the declarative statements are as follows:

Optimization of the economic engines in order to grow the regional economy to $800 Billion & create 2.2 million new jobs.
Establishment of a security apparatus to protect the resultant economic engines.
Improve Caribbean governance to support these engines.

Berry Gordy accomplished his mission through music/song and entertainment. The book Go Lean…Caribbean strives to accomplish its mission with the introduction and implementation of the technocratic Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU). Berry Gordy is hereby recognized as a role model that the Caribbean can emulate. He has provided a successful track record of forging change, overcoming incredible odds, managing crises to successful conclusions and rebooting failing institutions. The Go Lean book, serving as a roadmap, initiates with a “Prologue” that identifies community ethos that must be embraced for any chance of success and permanent change. This list of ethos from the book corresponds with the history of Berry Gordy, as portrayed in the Motown, The Musical Broadway play:

Go Lean…Caribbean	Berry Gordy Role Modeling
Job Multipliers	Economic Opportunities
Future Focus	Crossover / Integration
Foster Genius	Producing Artists
Help Entrepreneurship	New Record Labels, Movies
Promote Intellectual Property	Music Business Excellence
Research & Development	New Artists Development
Bridge the Digital Divide	Embrace of New Media
Improve Negotiations	Hollywood Interactions
Impact Turn-Around	Move from Detroit
Manage Reconciliations	Motown Reunions
Improve Sharing	Common Studios/Producers
Promote Happiness	Music Essential to Life
Greater Good	Impact Society

“No town like Motown” is the title of the foregoing article from the PlayBill magazine. But the Berry Gordon legacy is not the town of Detroit, but rather the musical contributions of his movement. It should be noted that Gordy moved the record company, Motown, out of the failed-city of Detroit, early in the 1970’s. So Gordy’s legacy is really how he grew in his management of change!

According to the opening dialogue, Berry Gordy was a reluctant advocate of change; he tried to be a businessman first. In the end, he conducted a lot of business, but he effected change as well. Thank you Marvin Gaye for that inspiration, for impacting Berry Gordy with the lesson that “one man, and his music” can make difference.

The Go Lean book accepts that the business of music can have a major impact on Caribbean society and the world. Already, this commentary has analyzed how a Caribbean music artist has made an impact on the world scene, with this post:

https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=866

Bob Marley: The legend lives on!

In the Go Lean roadmap to elevate the Caribbean, the eco-systems of music get due respect. This point is detailed in the Declaration of Interdependence at the outset of the book, pronouncing this need for regional solutions (Page 14):

xxxii. Whereas the cultural arts and music of the region are germane to the quality of Caribbean life, and the international appreciation of Caribbean life, the Federation must implement the support systems to teach, encourage, incentivize, monetize and promote the related industries for arts and music in domestic and foreign markets. These endeavors will make the Caribbean a better place to live, work and play.

The Go Lean roadmap accepts that change has come to the music business. It is no longer the same world that was dominated by Berry Gordy, and his cast of musical geniuses. Now, there is the need for some technocratic facilitations. The book posits that this burden is too big for any one Caribbean member-state, and thus the collaboration efforts of the CU is necessary, as the strategy is to confederate all the 30 member-states of the Caribbean despite their language and legacy, into an integrated “single market”. This will allow for better leverage of the consumer market for the consumption of music. From this eco-system, should emerge our own generations of Berry Gordy’s in the Caribbean to impact the world with their art, music, and contributions.

Today, most music is consumed digitally with a lot of retailing via the world wide web. This changed landscape now requires new tools and protections, like electronic payment systems, digital rights management and Performance Rights Organizations. The Go Lean/CU roadmap details these solutions. With these efforts and investments, the returns will be undeniable. The CU is designed to do the heavy-lifting of organizing Caribbean society, and interacting with the wide-world to better reap the benefits of music and related eco-systems. The following list details the strategies, tactics, implementations and advocacies to foster the next Motown movement, Caribbean style:

Community Ethos – Forging Change	Page 20
Community Ethos – Lean Operations	Page 24
Community Ethos – Return on Investments	Page 24
Strategy – Strategy – Caribbean Vision	Page 45
Strategy – Agents of Change – Globalization	Page 57
Tactical – Growing the Caribbean Economy to $800 Billion	Page 67
Separation of Powers – Central Bank – Electronic Payment Deployments	Page 73
Tactical – Separation of Powers – Patents & Copyrights	Page 78
Separation of Powers – Culture Administration	Page 81
Planning – Ways to Make the Caribbean Better	Page 131
Planning – Lessons Learned from Detroit	Page 140
Advocacy – Ways to Grow the Economy	Page 151
Advocacy – Ways to Create Jobs	Page 152
Advocacy – Reforms for Banking Regulations	Page 199
Advocacy – Ways to Impact Hollywood	Page 203
Advocacy – Ways to Promote Music	Page 231
Appendix – Caribbean Music Genres	Page 347
Appendix – Protecting Music Copyrights	Page 351

The Go Lean roadmap has simple motives: enable the Caribbean to be a better place to live, work and play. One man, or woman, can make a difference in this quest. We want to foster the next generation of “stars’ in music and other fields of endeavor.

According to his autobiography and the Broadway musical, Berry Gordy was inspired by other role models in his youth, i.e. Joe Louis. Now the world in general, the Caribbean is particular, is being inspired by Berry Gordy.

This is how to reflect and effect change in society. That opening dialogue with Marvin Gaye and Berry Gordy is captured for our inspiration. The end result:

Mother, mother
There’s too many of you crying
Brother, brother, brother
There’s far too many of you dying
You know we’ve got to find a way
To bring some lovin’ here today

Father, father
We don’t need to escalate
You see, war is not the answer
For only love can conquer hate
You know we’ve got to find a way
To bring some lovin’ here today

Download the book Go Lean … Caribbean – now!

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Zuckerberg’s $100 Million for Newark’s Schools was a waste

Posted on May 31, 2014 in Economics, Government, Social

Go Lean Commentary

Throwing money at a problem does not, in itself, solve it!

The foregoing article helps us appreciate this point more succinctly. It was 2010. There was Newark’s Mayor Cory Booker (now New Jersey Senator), Facebook founder and philanthropist Mark Zuckerberg and the Governor of the State of New Jersey (and possible 2016 Presidential candidate) Chris Christie – all men of goodwill. Their goal: fix a failing school system in the City of Newark. On paper, the plan seemed credible, they had the power, they had the money – $100 million dollars. The result? After four years – “a waste”.

The issues of education reform, best practices, and funding options are stressed in the book Go Lean…Caribbean, even though these are not the primary focus of the book. Rather this book serves as a roadmap for the introduction and implementation of the Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU), with the focus being on these following 3 prime directives:

Optimization of the economic engines in order to grow the regional economy to $800 Billion & create 2.2 million new jobs.
Establishment of a security apparatus to protect the resultant economic engines.
Improve Caribbean governance to support these engines.

Yet, the book posits that education is a vital consideration for economic empowerment; so too are non-government organizations, like Zuckerberg’s foundation. The book specifically highlights an important role that foundations execute in the sphere of foreign aid, sometimes even better than national governments (Page 219):

One major argument against federally funded foreign aid is that the money is often lost to governmental corruption in the countries it was supposed to help. In 2003, a top university in Bangladesh claimed that at least 75% of all foreign aid given to that government was lost because of corruption. Since faith-based foreign aid focuses on churches or organizations operating independently of the government, funding has a better chance of being used effectively.

The below news article though, highlights an onshore example, in the US, with multi-level governmental support, plenty of money, and yet still: failure!

Title: Mark Zuckerberg Gave New Jersey $100 Million To Fix Newark’s Schools, And It Looks Like It Was A Waste
By: Caroline Moss
In the fall of 2010, Mark Zuckerberg announced on Oprah that he’d be making a generous gift to Newark, New Jersey.

As Oprah said in her Oprah way, “one … hundred … million … dollars” would be given to Newark Mayor Cory Booker and New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie as the three began the Startup:Education foundation.

The plan was to turn Newark into what Zuckerberg called “a symbol of educational excellence for the whole nation,” spent on retaining the best teachers, and creating environments that would produce successful students and, one day, graduates.

Newark is a city wrought with crime. Its graduation rate is about 67%. It needed the help, and Booker’s vision sounded promising.

Between 2010 and 2012, The New Yorker reports that “more than twenty million dollars of Zuckerberg’s gift and matching donations went to consulting firms with various specialties: public relations, human resources, communications, data analysis, [and] teacher evaluation.” Many of the consultants were being paid upwards of $1,000 a day.

“Everybody’s getting paid but Raheem still can’t read,” Vivian Cox Fraser, president of the Urban League of Essex County, was quoted saying.

Today, the money is pretty much gone, and Newark has hardly become that symbol of excellence.

The New Yorker has the full 12-page story today, and we’ve dug into it to find some of the main timeline points you need to know.

In 2010, Mayor Booker found a loophole in getting money to help fund Newark’s educational reform. It came in the form of philanthropic donations, which, unlike government funding, required no public review of priorities or spending. Gov. Christie approved the plan, and Booker’s job was to find the donors.

Meanwhile, in Silicon Valley, Zuckerberg (like many other tech billionaires) had pledged to donate half of his fortune, but as The New Yorker reports, he knew very little about urban education or philanthropy.

Booker and Zuckerberg met to discuss a vision for Newark’s future. Booker wanted to significantly reward Newark teachers who improved student performance rather than focus on seniority and tenure. Teachers would be challenged and rewarded to do their jobs well, and students would benefit.

Zuckerberg was confident Newark and Booker were the right recipients for this huge gift (given over five years), and agreed to gift $100 million dollars with a few stipulations:

Booker would also have to raise $100 million dollars. Zuckerberg’s money would be released to Newark as matching dollars rolled in.

Booker would have to replace the current superintendent with a “transformational leader.

”The reform ended up looking like this: taking low-performing public schools and closing them, turning them into charter schools and “themed” high schools. But there was no easy way to expand charters without destabilizing traditional public schools.

In the months following the gift announcement, Booker and Christie still had no superstar superintendent and no reform plan.

Zuckerberg was concerned and urged Booker to find the superintendent, even sending Booker a poster widely seen around the Facebook campus that read, “Done is better than perfect.”

Immediately, Booker appointed Cami Anderson for the job. She implemented ways to help students and improve schools (all which The New Yorker detailed), but there were roadblocks along the way, like how the students brought the issues going on in their homes with them to the classroom.

Anderson wanted to give schools more support to help students on emotional and social levels, but Newark had already been spending more money per student than most districts in the entire country, none of which was reaching the children it existed to help.

New contracts were being created, money was being hemorrhaged, and the district was going broke. But interviews — like this one in Forbes — regarding the money and the future of Newark’s schools were always positive, highlighting, of course, only the good aspects of the huge monetary donation.

Then, in January of this year, The Washington Post reported on “dozens of emails between the Zuckerberg camp (including Zuckerberg himself) and the Booker camp (including Booker himself),” which ended up revealing that state education officials were going above and beyond to get money from big private donors to remake public schools in the way they want to.

Anderson came up with another plan called One Newark, which sounded like it could work. Families would choose which charter or public schools they would want to send their children to. Children from the lowest-income families would get first pick. So would kids with special needs.

It all sounded great until parents and teachers realized it was only on paper. Solutions hadn’t been figured out fully. Programs hadn’t been developed. Issues like transportation had not yet been tackled. Things that were promised didn’t come to fruition.

According to The New Yorker, Anderson, Booker, Zuckerberg, and Christie, “despite millions of dollars spent on community engagement—have yet to hold tough, open conversations with the people of Newark about exactly how much money the district has, where it is going, and what students aren’t getting as a result.”
Business Insider Vertical e-Zine (Posted 05/13/2014; retrieved 05/30/2014) –
http://www.businessinsider.com/mark-zuckerbergs-newark-grant-2014-5#ixzz33DsBvaIw

The people and institutions of the Caribbean understand this plight of Newark, New Jersey all too well. There is a long record of failure with the Caribbean education initiatives. Then where there is success, the quality students have a propensity to abandon the region and emigrate to the US, Canada or Europe. So with the best of the Caribbean’s talents gone, we find that we’ve “fatten frog for snake”; then with the rest, we muddle along as best we can; hoping to nation-build with the remnants of a broken educational system.

It’s time for a change!

The proposed change is detailed in the Go Lean roadmap. It provides turn-by-turn directions on how to reform the Caribbean education systems, governance and Caribbean society in general. This roadmap commences with the assessment that the Caribbean is in crisis, and that this “crisis would be a terrible thing to waste”. As a planning tool, the roadmap commences with a Declaration of Interdependence, pronouncing the approach of regional integration (Page 12) as a viable solution to elevate the region’s educational opportunities. The statement is included as follows:

xxi. Whereas the preparation of our labor force can foster opportunities and dictate economic progress for current and future generations, the Federation must ensure that educational and job training opportunities are fully optimized for all residents of all member-states, with no partiality towards any gender or ethnic group. The Federation must recognize and facilitate excellence in many different fields of endeavor, including sciences, languages, arts, music and sports. This responsibility should be executed without incurring the risks of further human flight, as has been the past history.

The strategy is to confederate all the 30 member-states of the Caribbean, despite their language and legacy, into an integrated “single market”. Tactically, this will allow a separation-of-powers between the member-states governments (including their education proxies) and federal agencies, allowing an open role for benevolent foundations to fulfill their charters on the region. The roadmap recognizes the need to lead, or to follow best-practices, as formulated by other entities. This then becomes a process of leading-by-following. The CU will facilitate the eco-systems, metering and measuring the effect of so many educational options. Think Champion-Challenger; allowing for alternate methodologies to be explored for effectiveness, and then measuring the success criteria.

The Go Lean book details series of community ethos, strategies, tactics, implementations and advocacies to foster good educational progress, and the agile methodologies to adjust/adapt dynamically:

Anecdote – Lean On Me – New Jersey School Lesson	Page 5
Community Ethos – Lean Operations	Page 24
Community Ethos – Cooperatives	Page 25
Community Ethos – Non-Government Organizations	Page 25
Community Ethos – Ways to Foster Genius	Page 27
Tactical – Separation of Powers – Education Dept.	Page 85
Implementation – Ways to Pay for Change	Page 101
Implementation – Ways to Deliver	Page 109
Advocacy – Ways to Grow the Economy	Page 151
Advocacy – Ways to Create Jobs	Page 152
Advocacy – Ways to Improve Education	Page 159
Advocacy – Ways to Improve Governance	Page 169
Advocacy – Ways to Foster Cooperatives	Page 176
Advocacy – Ways to Improve Libraries	Page 187
Advocacy – Ways to Impact Foundations	Page 219
Advocacy – Ways to Impact the One Percent	Page 224
Appendix – The Giving Pledge Signatories	Page 292

Now is the time for all of the Caribbean, the people and governing institutions, to lean-in for the changes described in the book Go Lean … Caribbean. We welcome the “Mark Zuckerberg”’s of the world … and their money. We entreat them to help us to make the Caribbean a better place to live, work, learn and play.

Download the free e-Book of Go Lean … Caribbean – now!

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