"Low prices are a danger to our standard of living."

This is a bold and sweeping statement, but bear me out for a minute.

We all want to spend as little on what we need so that we can buy more of what we need. That is the basis of western consumerism. The problem with the solutions to this lowest cost formula is that we eventually price ourselves out of the very market we want to shop in.
Millions of people shop daily in discount stores, Wal-Mart being the easy target to point at, but there are others as well. Thousands of the employees of these stores cannot afford to shop in the very same stores because they work at or close to minimum wage .. they need to top up basic health/medical benefit coverage that the majority of us take for granted which moves their money from an average to a lower standard of living because, to keep the prices low for us, the wages are lower for the employees ..

So, the next time you see a low price, ask yourself which one of your neighbors lost their job to an overseas company/producer so you could buy it.

And ask yourself what would happen to your job if the only requirement for it's saleability was to do it much more cheaply that is current.

I bet the answer scares the hell out of your future.
- posted by Rob Lee @ 12:07 AM