i live down south and keep seeing local business owners posting in local groups pleading people to come buy shit at their stores prior to this winter storm because if they have to close for a few days it’s apparently detrimental for them. like they’re entitled to exist. in any other context this behavior would be considered desperate and begging. but we’re conditioned to think small business tyrants are some class above us all who are entitled to not have to work a job like the rest of us. worst case scenario they lose their business and that’s what happens, and working people are conditioned to feel sorry for them. “please don’t let me become underpaid by some asshole exactly like myself!!!”
Theoretically I understand the desire to have places that have texture and aesthetic that separate themselves from the Walmart’s of the world. It would prevent the place from looking like parking lots and big box stores.
But I think the reality of urban design lends itself to the same urban sprawl with a bunch of price gouged bullshit in little post-mall outlets in a shopping center. Each one is looking to get you to pay a 40% mark up+tip over the grocery store price to justify their exorbitant rent, franchise royalties, and personal salaries in exchange for aesthetic. That and the “competitive” wages their employees earn (if they remember to pay them) make it loud and clear that the small business owner is doing nothing but trying to profit off the community and it rings as hollow as can be when they ask for special consideration over the regional manager of a McDonald’s (who themselves is a franchise owner of some such infamy).
If the small business were somehow transcendental to rent and franchising fees, offering cheaper prices for staple goods, they’d be the kind of place you want to keep around. Like when I traveled abroad and eating at a restaurant was cheaper than what I pay in grocery store prices, I would have wanted those people to be successful and happy. It makes me angry to think that the person trying to get 10% over their investment wants to occupy the same space in my heart as the woman whose face lit up when I tipped her (not a tipping culture) the equivalent to ~$20
When I think through it I land on small business could be good if it prevented the power big business gets from economy of scale but after that is there it is just preventing you from benefiting from scale. At best a symbolic act of resistance
I think, in an ideal world, the small business would synthesize the benefit of an economy of scale into a good or service. If they would buy food wholesale, cook it, (and refrigerate it) and give it to me in a recyclable box for a few bucks so I don’t have to do dishes or cook then I’d be really happy. But it has to be some big production with atmosphere and shit instead. Meanwhile the at scale things are filled with corn syrup and sawdust to the point it’s bullshit.
No capitalism in an ideal world
Well, of course. I guess I was thinking that, in general, an economy of scale exists for production. If you’re gonna feed people I kind of hope it works like taking raw ingredients and making less flashy things, even in a cafeteria right next to where production happens
That’s really down to city planning/zoning. Hypermarkets can be built without large parking lots too.
i get it and honestly if i have a choice im picking small business over big business just because one of them is locally evil where as the other is globally evil. but i still say fuck em
Cool, let’s socialize that then. Neighborhood councils get to decide about what kind of businesses they want around and get money from the state to use as capital to either start for themselves or to be started by someone else, in either case the person working in the business earning a wage from the state for their job, and their position there being conditional to the democratic desire of the community. Not only in a “vote with your wallet” way, but also in a “we collectively decided we need two more cafes and we don’t need these two clothing stores” way.