Why don't Americans save?

I loved selling on eBay and was good at it. 2000 transactions and 1 negative feedback. Of course we all want the business that is hands free and continual income, but that’s hard to come by. I like it how you go to an Amway meeting and they talk about how it’s the perfect business. No inventory, no employees, overhead, franchise fees, or regulatory worries. Then you look at everyone there and realize they’re forgetting one thing- no money either. Then you realize they’re really just trying to start their own business using you as commission only labor and responsible for expanding your own business without much traditional help. That’s ok I guess, but it’s certainly not the dream business they promote it as. My overhead was a $75 a month storage unit. I work at a restaurant so I got all the free boxes I wanted. Of course I had to spend thousands of dollars at a time in inventory. No risk, no reward.

 

You make some very good points, and there's money to be made in the DC region and plenty of immigrants willing to work for half of the minimum wage. This makes things much more difficult for honest businesses to compete with the greedy ones.

Maybe its going to be easier to understand if you look at it from the employer point of view: he makes the pizza, he pays all the bills, he pays for the products, the ads, etc....and gives you $5 an hour weather he sells one or 10 pizzas an hour. If he only sells one pizza in that 1 hour: he is taking a cut on his part, he's giving away the potential profit to you. If he sells many pizzas during one hour, you're also making money because you'll get more tips. So from his point of view it's a win-win situation. That $2 delivery charge pays for the $5 he pays you, which is a rip off, but the employer figures that if there are very little or no sales he can still guarantee you the $5 an hour. ( You mentioned earlier that they make you work during off time, that's bad, and if they do, you should be getting paid the same per hour as the other employees that work at the shop).

Also, most business don't make ANY profits during the first 3 years (I think that's the standard, correct me if I'm wrong), and even if they finally start making money, they are not too eager to give it away in good salaries and bonuses...simply because they remember the difficult times and know that the good times will not last forever, not to mention that most are in debt. They would have no choice if there was no unemployment, and no immigrants willing to work for less....and this is not the case.

You have some great aspirations and ideas, but I think it's difficult to judge the situation if you have never been in the position of a business owner. It's not as easy as you think. as a business owner you will come to the realization that 90% of all businesses and people that work for them are there only to make money, and not there to improve the world. This will be the people you're dealing with, and it will make you sick! Once we realize it, it's much easier to become bitter and selfish just like them...it's a vicious cycle....unfortunately

I wish you all the best, and hope you can start a profitable business one day, survive the competition while you rewarding and treating your employees right

 

The Ebay market taught you how to analyze your system. Think of it more as a learning process. I created a way to not spend much time on each transaction - for instance you probably did the same - you created those template pages so all you had to do is track the listing#. Mailing the products was not a big deal because I had to go to the post office anyways to do other stuff - and all the ancillary cost were charged to the winner anyways.

After awhile I wanted bigger gains so I moved to other markets.

 

Who says they don't save?

It is called retirement plans like IRAs, 401Ks, stocks, home equity, and other forms of wealth. But it is not usually considered in "savings."

Even though they have taken a hit, Americans have a huge amount of assets compared to almost every other country,

 

that's a very interesting observation...

 

funny!!


these ideas are nothing new


they are directly from the marx and lenin playbook.

it's called communism when the workers own the means of production. communism failed.

furthermore,

HARD WORK DOES NOT "PAY OFF" you bought the oldest myth in the book.

smart work pays off, and you are simply working dumb


surf


ps. that system you mention, where employees can reinvest their bonus checks is old news, it's called the STOCK MARKET.

 

Hey jaska$$ you contridicted yourself. First you say my ideas are Communist and then you say my idea of reinvesting profits is the stock market. I don't think Communism has a stock market. Which one is it? I don’t think Communism rewards you directly by how well your individual business has done. And in Communism the STATE owns all production, NOT the workers. Do you sit there and listen to Sean Hannity all day or something? You sound very ignorant.

Let me get this straight. The current system works like this. The company hires employees to do a job and pays them just enough so they won’t quit, and the employees works a job just enough so they don’t get fired. Incentive is absent. Efficiency is almost non existent. The customer doesn’t receive the experience that they should. I propose a different system whereby the employees have a direct impact in the profits and losses of the company and share it accordingly. Obviously a new hire in high school is not going to receive the same bonus check as the General Manager who has been there a couple of years. Then when it’s time to build and expand the business, instead of getting an investor to put up the money who simply cares about his return on investment, the employees would instead become partners in the expansion. You think system 1 is better than number 2? Can I get some feedback from everybody else, I don’t understand this.

You are right, smart work pays off not necessarily hard work. So I want to exploit the weaknesses of other businesses. Very few low wage jobs offer any sort of bonus or advancement opportunities. Yet there is great money making opportunities in these areas.

BTW if I’m ever able to do anything like this and ever have a large business, we will never go public. The stock market is the worst thing for a business. All the investors care about is money. They don’t care if the employees get screwed over so they can get a dividend. They don’t care how the business makes money, they just want results and will dump you as soon as you don’t live up to their expectations. That’s how it goes I guess, but I won’t be apart of it. The profit that’s split won’t be company wide, it will be on a per store basis.

 

Sandy, then there will always be people at the bottom who make less, even with your system.

 

Thanks for that. Does anybody have any experience with this? Most of the links were dead or just other portals, but a couple seemed legit. I read the FAQ and it seems that they usually don’t have steady advertising programs. Also I got the impressions that they only accept newer cars, which I certainly don’t have. Otherwise it seems like a great idea.

 

That’s right. I’m not about equal pay, just equal opportunity. Obviously the system is not perfect and never will be. Just like in any other company there will be people who do more than their fair share and others that won’t. But ask yourself, which system would you rather be apart of?