Success is privilege

Today I got to thinking: my official job title is “Economic Development Facilitator”. In other words, I’m supposed to facilitate economic development (just in case that’s not clear).

Earlier this morning, I sat with one of the 4 small business owners in my community. She has a “Bazaar”, which is kind of like a Hallmark-type store. She sells gifts, cards, small toys, candy, stationary, school supplies, and some clothes and shoes. She has, by far, the most successful business in the community. She has a big purple sign in front of her store with a cute slogan, and she says that people from outside of the community come in to buy stuff – which, considering the poor quality of roads here, says a lot. Interestingly, she was born in a bigger city, and long-story-short, she found herself here in the campo.

What I learned from this entrepreneur is that she is in a lot of debt, but more importantly, she a) makes profit, and b) KNOWS she makes profit. And she pays off her debt, poco a poco.

What I also learned from her is that she wants to open up a miniature supermarket (‘mini supers’), a popular business model in Costa Rica. But, she told me, she isn’t jumping out of her skin to do it, because another guy down the road has a pulpería (picture a miniature supermarket, then imagine it shrinking 90%, closing the door, and putting a person behind a big window where you ask for your stuff) and he told her that if she did, he wouldn’t survive. And he’s right. She would CRUSH him. She would also crush the 3 other small businesses in town.

Why? I blame 3 things:

1. She graduated high school
2. She has exposure to more “urban” businesses
3. Her older siblings have jobs, and one even went to college

I’m not saying that if you didn’t graduate high school, don’t have any exposure to “urban”-style businesses, and you don’t have successful siblings as role models, then you CAN’T have a successful business…but I am saying that those things make it a lot easier. I’m pretty sure that is an irrefutable statement, but if you would like to debate this, please email me, because I don’t feel like writing out my justification.

Drumroll…

The moral of the story is the following:

1. Most people who live here were unable to graduate high school because they either had to help their parents on their farms or help their parents raise the younger siblings
2. Most people who live here were born either here or in a nearby community, and have never had the money to live in a bigger city (by city, I don’t mean ‘NYC-scale’; I just mean ‘paved roads’)
3. Points 1 and 2 also apply to the siblings of most people who live her
4. Having the entrepreneurial skills that will crush smaller businesses comes from being born into privileged conditions

But, out of community spirit and respect for others, this savvy entrepreneur is most likely choosing not to follow the ‘mini super path’, because she knows she will crush the others and doesn’t want to do that…

…which led to the following realization: the only way my community will ever be considered “economically developed” is if some rich entity (be it person or corporation) comes along and buys it. Just like that…just buys it, and builds stuff on it, and pushes the people who live here off to some other invisible land.

After meeting with the savvy entrepreneur, I spent the rest of the day laying in my hammock and reading about poverty policy in the United States. So now I want to get a law degree, because I don’t have enough education debt yet (insert sarcasm here).

And of course, like a good blogger, I’ll post some fun pictures: