Destroying a Community

The July 23, 2002 issue of the Wall Street Journal gives an example of globalization at work. Elberton, Georgia, a town two hours driving time east of Atlanta, has long been known for its production of gravestones. A vein of granite 6 miles wide and 35 miles long runs beneath the town. There are about 10,000 people in the area and 20% of them work in the granite business. There are about 150 makers of gravestones in the area, most of them small companies. Elberton produces 250,000 granite gravestones each year.  Buyers come to this area to select products and 200 truckloads of tombstones are shipped across the country each week. The town has been producing these gravestones for many years and one can probably find sons of gravestone carvers working in the tradition of their fathers.

The July 23, 2002 issue of the Wall Street Journal reports this all changing in late 2001.  Small Elberton, secure in its traditional industry, was suddenly jolted by the arrival of a newcomer - an economically globalizing newcomer.  

Some months before, Dr. Su Xian, an anesthesiologist from China came to Elberton. She is the wife of Zou Peng, who is one of the owners of a company called the Wanli Stone Group located in the port city of Xiamen in northern China. Her job is to run Sinostone, Inc, the American branch of Wanli Stone Group.  Elberton was picked as the site for the American branch not only because it was a producer of tombstones but, more importantly, a key distribution center.  Generations of high quality products from Elberton resulted in a distribution network that Sinostone wanted to use.

Tombstones are a labor-intensive product. Granite is easily found and relatively inexpensive in Elberton, so  the major part of the manufacturing cost is in the labor, with the secondary cost being that of shipping.  Since Chinese laborers work for a small fraction of the wages of an American, it is easy to produce the grave marker in China and then ship it to Elberton for final cutting of the name and date. The article implies the manufacturing cost for the Chinese product is about half that of the comparable American product.

The article describes how the Chinese tombstones are financed, produced, and then sold, and notes the reaction of the local manufacturers. John Campbell of Dixie Granite is quoted as saying that the Chinese company is re-selling tombstones at prices “that can knock our socks off.” Gene Roberts, of Old South Granite Co, asks Dr Su Xian to stop selling her products at that price.

The article ends by noting that this surge in competition comes when the American companies were hoping to capitalize on mortality rate increases. The last sentence is a quote from John Campbell of Dixie Granite, “Now, instead of having a good time of it, we could all go under.”

The Journal article says nothing about the fate of the 2000 or so people that work in the granite business. Nor is there any comment on the retail and other businesses that support the 2000 workers. Hopefully, Elberton is a happy community. There is probably little league baseball, a high school band, and a swimming pool. Like many small towns, they may have a park, a library and a senior citizen center. What is not mentioned in the Wall Street Journal’s article is the fear and disruption of the population.  Small towns in America know the horror stories of what happens when the main industry leaves town for higher profits elsewhere, with no regard for the former workers. Now we have a new scenario - an industry comes deliberately to a successful town with the intention of being a parasite upon the economic life of the local people.

The Wall Street Journal is a business paper and certainly subscribes to the dog eat dog view of life proposed by scientific economists.  The economists create economic models, which would be called beliefs in a religion, that explain how mankind operates. The economist’s point of view is that every human is fully rational, and rationality consists of always optimizing events for one’s own self interest, regardless of the effects of that process on others.  Presumably, Dr. Su Xian will do her best to optimize the revenues for her and her husband’s company, and productivity will improve somewhere on the globe.  The economist tells me that the “market” (which is some kind of God) will make things equal and that my selfishness will increase productivity so that all benefit. The resulting effects of their success may be layoffs, foreclosures, divorce, lack of funds for education, and a general worsening of the standard of living for the people of Elberton. But someone somewhere else will benefit and, according to the Wall Street Journal that makes this a success story

Dr Su Xian can do this because she is not living in community with the workers of Elberton. She does not care about them; her business model does not allow her to.  Maybe she cares about the workers in China - that’s hard to tell.  But what can be seen is that her personal values include the willingness to cause suffering in Elberton in order to presumably increase happiness in Xiamen.  It is highly ironic that an anesthesiologist, one who’s profession is to relive physical pain, is capable of inflicting other kinds of pain  upon a group of people for her own benefit.  More than likely, she is one of the “new breed of capitalist” that will turn China into a version of America, a country that in the main also does not care about its people and worships the “market”, as evidenced by the growing inequality in this country. (See Gini Index).

Dr. Su Xian’s actions have been legal, but have they been moral?  Does she have any obligation to this town?  Elberton’s history of hard work has resulted in a legacy, a distribution network with which she now feeds her own business.  The result of her business strategy will be a lower quality of life for the citizens of Elberton. 

Elberton, like some village in Vietnam, or Bosnia, or Palestine, or Afghanistan, was peacefully enjoying life. Suddenly economic globalization bombs were dropped smashing the town’s economic life.  Is Dr. Su Xian a soldier?  Is she an assailant, an aggressor, a terrorist? Or is she just a good businesswoman?