As the battlements of safety dissolve into each day’s stock market and bailout reports, people across our state go through the unenviable task of cutting back on what previously seemed very reasonable expectations. These expectations are as simple as spending time with family, going on a one week holiday each year, buying lobster once in a while, and going out to dinner on your child’s birthday.
It is amazing what six months of economic depression can do to people.
When the conversation starts each morning at the coffee shop, most of those present will tell a new story of something having been cut from their lives. This “something” is always very basic to their identity, and they tell their individual stories gently, with a sadness that cuts deep into the hearts of everyone assembled. These stories often revolve around a special treat for a spouse, a tune-up on a dying vehicle or the possibility of sending their last child to the college from which they just received an acceptance letter. These routine sources of pleasure, which always were based on financial considerations, are now an exercise in futility. Not knowing where the next paycheck is coming from is the grand leveler in a melting world. We realize how connected we are in this time of deep fear and a generalized feeling of helplessness.
These small, but normal economic events that have defined the simple introspective life of Mainiers are being replaced on an hourly basis with calls from friends about rumors of job cuts at even the most stable companies. Everyone has roughly the same story of how they never really thought about living on unemployment benefits, but may have no other choice. These are people who have worked hard their entire lives, and from that experience carry their self-esteem in a canister of self-sufficiency, but having nothing left in their IRAs they now will be foisted upon an already weakened system of benefits which offers more a Band-aid than a bridge to better times.
Where will all of this lead? That is the trillion dollar question.
Most of the company owners around the table have been saying that 25 percent of all small businesses in Maine will fail in the coming six months. I’m not sure where they got that figure, but I’ve heard the same number from every business owner I know.
People here are very good at calculating risk. It’s a skill wrought through both lean years and boom times. Maine small business owners are rarely wrong about the economic pulse and the resulting prognosis. They are scared. They also are manning their businesses alone for the first time in their lives. Much like the Kansas farm-ers who put their entire families into the tornado shelter before heading back to the house to do battle with the twister, these local business owners are piloting their small businesses without staff until they can see economically stability in the distance. They have told staff that their jobs are safe as soon as the economy works itself out, but they will have to keep their companies going until then, and to do that may be difficult.
They aren’t blowing smoke. They mean precisely what they say. They may not have a business in a year. These are businesses that were built by their fathers and grandfathers, and many of these are landmarks in the towns where they were born and raised.
Try to imagine Maine without the businesses that have defined the local landscape for our entire lives. Try also to imagine Maine without a back-up source of provisions to take up the slack the failure of these businesses would require. If we were to sustain a 25 percent to 50 percent loss in local businesses over the coming year, where would we go to buy our food, or have our dying cars repaired? The big box stores are even less likely to survive the economic turn in a small market like Maine. They may disappear faster than our corner grocery stores. What will life be like, driving to neighboring towns to buy a loaf of bread? We may see soon.
John Rockefeller is a nonprofit development consultant in Camden and a former trustee of the Camden Public Library. He may be reached at rockefeller@zeroconsult.com.