inkbluesky

eastern influences

Not by way of endorsing a candidate, but some interesting micro-economics, Creating a World Without Poverty

Social Business

Presently, the dominant business for is the profit-maximizing business (PMB). Yunus proposes an alternative, and its promotion is the main goal of the book: the social business. A social business is a business, it is not a charity, it is not a non-profit. It operates on business principles and aims to cover its own costs, rather than rely on other funding as charities do. The difference between a social business and PMB is that the explicit goal of a social business is to solve a social problem, meet a social need and provide a social benefit. The product or service offered by a social business is not free. It charges a fee (and it can be extremely low fees) in order to cover its costs in order to be self-sustaining and to potentially grow and expand (much as Grameen Bank has done).

The major difference here is that the principle of profit maximization is replaced with the principle of social benefit. The success of a social business will not be measured by the size of its profits or the dividends distributed to its investors but how much of a positive impact it has had in solving, or at least alleviating, the social problem it was created to solve.

The general idea which I’ll proceed to do an injustice in such few words, is that we’ve gotten the paradigm about business wrong. Looking out for profits, or more accurately the maximization of profits and what social improvements that followed many were happy to take credit for, but which were not the manifest goal of most of those seeking the profit. This was called the “greed is good” model and still is by some. A little selfishness is inevitable and may in some cases have benefits, but ultimately unbridled greed has a tendency to empty the pantry without thinking about the consequences.

cheery blossom. it was supposed to be cherry blossom, but i liked the typo.

some people say they love their children even as they backhand them across the room. a similar mentality at work here, Military tells Bush of troop strains

Behind the Pentagon’s closed doors, U.S. military leaders told President Bush they are worried about the Iraq war’s mounting strain on troops and their families. But they indicated they’d go along with a brief halt in pulling out troops this summer.