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Riches, devious ploys and responsibility
FRANKLIN JOHNSTON
Friday, May 14, 2010
AS a people we are ambivalent about riches. We love riches but won't admit it! Riches are surpluses beyond survival needs and enable those who have them to develop and immortalise their nation. We know a lot about ancient Egypt and little about Europe or sub-Saharan Africa because rich Egypt left plenty; the others were poor. Productive people create surpluses, the state does not; but it can take away surpluses by taxation. By work, ingenuity and sacrifice we create surplus; sadly, few do - we live, we die we leave nothing; were we even here? Jesus worked miracles when people had surplus - a fish, bread, wine - and was buried in a rich man's tomb. He did not conjure things out of thin air. If you have surplus, expect a miracle; if none, go produce a surplus! The hard work of productive, rich Jamaicans should inspire us to copy their example.
Some of our citizens are less rich by over $100b as they lost income to the JDX. Do the math: 100,000 of us could be millionaires each year! Mr Lee Chin endows museums and gives multi-millions to good causes; but what do our faceless rich do with the money? Where are our private zoos, libraries, parks and museums? Do they have any responsibility to the nation? The Ponzi schemes show us the breed of money we have here. Most of our icons: Ward Theatre, Wolmer's, etc, were endowed by rich people of old. Where are our new zoos, museums, libraries, theatres, parks, galleries? Is life just shopping malls? Where is the quality? Few who look rich are rich and many who do not are. It's not safe to enjoy riches here - too much "isms, schisms" and "red eye". The rich can do much more but fear abounds. If we reduce fear we increase jobs.
The Ward Theatre
The Ward Theatre
1/1 
The rich are not like us, neither are the poor. Poverty is life's default mode. Do nothing and voila, poverty! Riches require effort, hard work! Poverty is no virtue, work is virtue! We say the rich use people and get richer but in the process many get jobs, a start and some get rich too. So why don't we like rich people? Grudgeful? Politics? How rich is rich anyhow? Let's now "faas in odder peple bizniz" and check their riches!
The UK 2010 rich list shows the 1000 richest people grew their wealth by £77b - a bad year. Top is Lakshmi Mittal with £22b. The rising star is a Mr Dunkerton who started with a market stall and at 45 has £180m. On the sports rich list, Beckham second, has £125m, Lennox Lewis fourth, £95m and the other top 10 are in motor racing. Lewis Hamilton 15th has £35m; Sol Campbell, Rooney and Rio have £33m each, 17th. The highest salary in global football is Ronaldo on £12m then Eto'o and Messi on £9m each - Messi earns £30m a year from endorsements. The top-paid UK-based player is Man City's Adebayor on £8m; Beckham, £5m. What does a footballer, aged 26, spend $150m a month on? Capello, the richest manager has £34m. Andy Murray, the youngest rich guy, has £15m; golf, Nick Faldo £32m; snooker, Steve Hendry £12m. Most of the sport top 100 are footballers, with a few in golf, rugby, tennis, boxing, basketball, motor racing and jockeys - no cricketers. Tiger Woods is the world's richest in sports, over US$1b; Schumacher second, US$700m. Beckham is top in football; Federer, £120m. Tendulkar tops cricket at £100m and the top 10 is mainly Indian and there is no West Indian. Usain Bolt earns about US$1m for 3 meets and if he sets his next record after the move to Nike his income should skyrocket. He will be our richest in sport. Oh for a second life!
We are not in the top 10 rich (per capita GDP) Caribbean islands. Our rich people work hard and could help the nation but politics shuts them out. For 48 years we employ politicians who learn on the job and fail miserably, yet we snub men with proven ability. We tried the losers, what do we lose by using the winners? Do we hate them because they are successful? Or because we are not? Here's the thing: Cabinet says they are better than the last lot - maybe so; but the oversight of a Clarke, Orane, Stewart, Issa, Matalon, Rawle, Marks, Facey or others who run big business can achieve much. Rich people deliver. It's hard to manipulate them - a car, a million dollars mean little - as they are driven by a mission. What reason can Cabinet have not to use proven men to assist key ministries in this our time of need?
Appointing Butch Stewart as JAMPRO chairman is a cynical ploy to use his global cachet to defuse our looming crisis with the US. I fear for him and us as our reputation is out there and the right-wing media and senators can screw anyone who relies on the US market. He would make Minister Samuda look good, but JAMPRO is not the highest and best use of his time.
His forte is the big picture, the long game; building productive teams, juggling the corporate ball; making deals to drive big performance year-on-year across many functions - not bureaucracy. He is our most trusted Jamaican; came from zero and his FX was here when politicians were sending theirs abroad. Politicians come and go, but good men of substance are a national treasure. Give him a local challenge which will not tarnish his global credentials as he can tap the best people, ideas and materiel to apply to a problem. Use big guns on our big problem. Let him oversee national security. We would exhale and investors would come! The UK appoints Lord Sainsbury and Sir Alan Sugar to portfolios and party leaders Nick Clegg and David Cameron (the new PM) are also millionaires. There are no rich fools!
Wealth is manure, spread it liberally and everyone grows. More rich people, better for us. I need riches too. I don't need a yacht, but my projects require money. Let the PM give me an inner-city school district and watch the quality of schools and community rise - everything is possible! The rich and successful have more to lose, will extract less and work harder - let's use them to oversee key public portfolios. Stay conscious, my friend!
Brawta: My friend Oliver Cox (Shankland Cox Ltd) architect, painter, historian, "Mr Port Royal" has died. He arrived with wife Jean in the1960s to work on inner-city housing, fell in love with Port Royal and was at it until last week. His North London home was a chapel of Jamaicana. He donated his drawings to our National Library, his Main Street sketch "is immortalised on our $500 bill" and his muse, architect Peter Francis should continue his work. Oliver lived to create and conserve. He died well!
Dr Franklin Johnston is an international project manager with Teape-Johnston Consultants, currently on assignment in the UK.
franklinjohnston@hotmail.com
http://www.jamaicaobserver.com/colum...bility_7610021
FRANKLIN JOHNSTON
Friday, May 14, 2010AS a people we are ambivalent about riches. We love riches but won't admit it! Riches are surpluses beyond survival needs and enable those who have them to develop and immortalise their nation. We know a lot about ancient Egypt and little about Europe or sub-Saharan Africa because rich Egypt left plenty; the others were poor. Productive people create surpluses, the state does not; but it can take away surpluses by taxation. By work, ingenuity and sacrifice we create surplus; sadly, few do - we live, we die we leave nothing; were we even here? Jesus worked miracles when people had surplus - a fish, bread, wine - and was buried in a rich man's tomb. He did not conjure things out of thin air. If you have surplus, expect a miracle; if none, go produce a surplus! The hard work of productive, rich Jamaicans should inspire us to copy their example.
Some of our citizens are less rich by over $100b as they lost income to the JDX. Do the math: 100,000 of us could be millionaires each year! Mr Lee Chin endows museums and gives multi-millions to good causes; but what do our faceless rich do with the money? Where are our private zoos, libraries, parks and museums? Do they have any responsibility to the nation? The Ponzi schemes show us the breed of money we have here. Most of our icons: Ward Theatre, Wolmer's, etc, were endowed by rich people of old. Where are our new zoos, museums, libraries, theatres, parks, galleries? Is life just shopping malls? Where is the quality? Few who look rich are rich and many who do not are. It's not safe to enjoy riches here - too much "isms, schisms" and "red eye". The rich can do much more but fear abounds. If we reduce fear we increase jobs.
The Ward Theatre
The Ward Theatre 1/1 The UK 2010 rich list shows the 1000 richest people grew their wealth by £77b - a bad year. Top is Lakshmi Mittal with £22b. The rising star is a Mr Dunkerton who started with a market stall and at 45 has £180m. On the sports rich list, Beckham second, has £125m, Lennox Lewis fourth, £95m and the other top 10 are in motor racing. Lewis Hamilton 15th has £35m; Sol Campbell, Rooney and Rio have £33m each, 17th. The highest salary in global football is Ronaldo on £12m then Eto'o and Messi on £9m each - Messi earns £30m a year from endorsements. The top-paid UK-based player is Man City's Adebayor on £8m; Beckham, £5m. What does a footballer, aged 26, spend $150m a month on? Capello, the richest manager has £34m. Andy Murray, the youngest rich guy, has £15m; golf, Nick Faldo £32m; snooker, Steve Hendry £12m. Most of the sport top 100 are footballers, with a few in golf, rugby, tennis, boxing, basketball, motor racing and jockeys - no cricketers. Tiger Woods is the world's richest in sports, over US$1b; Schumacher second, US$700m. Beckham is top in football; Federer, £120m. Tendulkar tops cricket at £100m and the top 10 is mainly Indian and there is no West Indian. Usain Bolt earns about US$1m for 3 meets and if he sets his next record after the move to Nike his income should skyrocket. He will be our richest in sport. Oh for a second life!
We are not in the top 10 rich (per capita GDP) Caribbean islands. Our rich people work hard and could help the nation but politics shuts them out. For 48 years we employ politicians who learn on the job and fail miserably, yet we snub men with proven ability. We tried the losers, what do we lose by using the winners? Do we hate them because they are successful? Or because we are not? Here's the thing: Cabinet says they are better than the last lot - maybe so; but the oversight of a Clarke, Orane, Stewart, Issa, Matalon, Rawle, Marks, Facey or others who run big business can achieve much. Rich people deliver. It's hard to manipulate them - a car, a million dollars mean little - as they are driven by a mission. What reason can Cabinet have not to use proven men to assist key ministries in this our time of need?
Appointing Butch Stewart as JAMPRO chairman is a cynical ploy to use his global cachet to defuse our looming crisis with the US. I fear for him and us as our reputation is out there and the right-wing media and senators can screw anyone who relies on the US market. He would make Minister Samuda look good, but JAMPRO is not the highest and best use of his time.
His forte is the big picture, the long game; building productive teams, juggling the corporate ball; making deals to drive big performance year-on-year across many functions - not bureaucracy. He is our most trusted Jamaican; came from zero and his FX was here when politicians were sending theirs abroad. Politicians come and go, but good men of substance are a national treasure. Give him a local challenge which will not tarnish his global credentials as he can tap the best people, ideas and materiel to apply to a problem. Use big guns on our big problem. Let him oversee national security. We would exhale and investors would come! The UK appoints Lord Sainsbury and Sir Alan Sugar to portfolios and party leaders Nick Clegg and David Cameron (the new PM) are also millionaires. There are no rich fools!
Wealth is manure, spread it liberally and everyone grows. More rich people, better for us. I need riches too. I don't need a yacht, but my projects require money. Let the PM give me an inner-city school district and watch the quality of schools and community rise - everything is possible! The rich and successful have more to lose, will extract less and work harder - let's use them to oversee key public portfolios. Stay conscious, my friend!
Brawta: My friend Oliver Cox (Shankland Cox Ltd) architect, painter, historian, "Mr Port Royal" has died. He arrived with wife Jean in the1960s to work on inner-city housing, fell in love with Port Royal and was at it until last week. His North London home was a chapel of Jamaicana. He donated his drawings to our National Library, his Main Street sketch "is immortalised on our $500 bill" and his muse, architect Peter Francis should continue his work. Oliver lived to create and conserve. He died well!
Dr Franklin Johnston is an international project manager with Teape-Johnston Consultants, currently on assignment in the UK.
franklinjohnston@hotmail.com
http://www.jamaicaobserver.com/colum...bility_7610021