To commemorate Labor Day, let me bring an old story about greed into a modern American context.
It’s Christmas Eve, and old Ebenezer Scrooge is counting the gold coins he has accumulated as a result of replacing his accounting department with an accounting service based in India. He’s visited by three ghosts that night.
The first ghost takes him back to his middle class family that always had food on the table, to his first job where his employer was so kind and generous to him, then to his early days as a private entrepreneur who employed a few of his fellow townspeople.
The second ghost appears. Time has passed, and greed has gotten the better of him. He takes the company public, brings in new management. Soon they’re looking for ways to reduce labor costs. The offshore accounting services are lined up at the door. Bob Cratchit is feverishly working into the night, training his Indian colleagues on the back office work while he is “positioned” for a sales job.
The third ghost appears and shows him the future. Bob Cratchit didn’t make quota and was laid off. Tiny Tim got depressed and died of a drug overdose. Scrooge is now too old to stay up all night talking with his offshore management company. He has cashed out his shares to pay for a miracle drug to cure his cancer, but in the end there is nothing left and he expires. What a pity, but nobody misses him.
Christmas morning arrives and Scrooge awakens determined to change course. He hires Cratchit back and gives him a raise, but exorbitant taxes and regulations make it unprofitable, and his competition is still boosting productivity with technology and cheap labor. He goes out of business and dies penniless but at peace with God.
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