Over the last few weeks, I have spent a lot of time watching the debate over the debt ceiling. Congress has many very talented speakers that raise compelling points, but even as it appears the crisis will be averted, I will be left with many concerns about the polarity of our country. This willingness to play a deadly game of chicken with our nation's credit rating is a dramatic symptom of the current chasm in our political system.
Coming into the fourth quarter of the year, many large companies automatically begin terminating employees in order to ensure that year end stock prices reflect a positive year. This is not some casual assumption, it is in fact the fiduciary duty of each Chief Executive Officer of a publicly traded corporation to protect the share holder investment.
Consulting Engineering has become big business. Over a decade ago, I worked for what was then one of the largest engineering firms with little more than 10,000 employees. Today several of the largest engineering firms have 50,000 to 60,000 employees. With the large number of acquisitions, engineering firms with between 100 and 250 employees has been reduced precipitously. As firms get larger, decisions are more often made based upon numbers and not the talent of their employees. Examples would be deciding to cut a percentage of their staff instead of "trimming the fat". With smaller markets such as Vermont and New Hampshire some of the larger companies have simply elected to eliminate their offices in these smaller states. Some may be happy to see some of the larger firms exit the state, but these are also well paying jobs leaving that won't necessarily result in a compatible growth in the companies remaining.
Time will tell what impact the whole debt crisis will have over the economy. If nothing else, we have taught the world market that the United States defaulting on our obligations is not outside the realm of possibilities. Even if we now raise the ceiling, there will be some countries less willing to offer us credit. As a minimum, I would expect interest rates to rise even if we do not have our credit rating dropped from AAA to AA.
I was more concerned that the earlier votes were perfectly along party lines. I resented feeling like the American public had a gun to our head through this process. Over the weekend I happened to read "My Declaration of Independence" by former Senator James Jeffords from Vermont. On May 24, 2001, the Vermont Senator effectively switched parties from Republican to Independent. For organizational purposes he shifted his alignment to the Democratic party which at the time shifted the majority vote of the Senate over to the Democrats including many key committee chairmanships over to the Democrats. At the time, I had only appreciated the action as a defection of a long-standing political tradition. At the time this was one of the longest held seats by a single party in the country. Watching our political process, I can now better appreciate the personal reflection and inner strength needed to take such a dramatic step to follow ones ideals against the political establishment.
As Senator Jeffords described the separation from the major parties due to the extreme polarity and the need for more middle ground. In this case it had a lot to do with a battle between tax cuts promised by the Republican President and a personal commitment toward education funding. I now find more in common with the Senator than I ever had. I am finding it hard to identify with a single party and struggle to find any common ground with the more extreme elements within the political parties, finding more in common with the moderates of both groups. Somehow we need to reconstruct the middle ground within congress and within our country as a whole.
As the crisis appears to be finally coming to an end, it will be important that we all learn from this experience and continue to let our representatives know where we stand on these critical issues. By passing legislation solely by political advantage instead of meaningful dialogue, a willingness to listen at opposing views, and at times formulate meaningful compromises, we can avoid continually shifting between the control of opposing parties after each election. We still have a lot of work to resolve many of the challenges still facing this country, but solving these issues while maintaining the current polarity will not be possible.
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