Michael Moore`s documentary “Roger and Me” depicted very well the
devastating effect of a relatively small society centered about one business, in this case
General Motors production plant in Flint, Michigan.
GM`s CEO, Roger Smith, estimated that a good and profitable thing for GM to do was
to shut down 11 production plants all over USA, among others the one in Flint, and open
new plants abroad, where labor is much cheaper. Needless to say, that ticked a lot of people
of, namely citizens of Flint, especially Mr. Moore in particular.
The effect of this move was tragically hilarious. People that were laid off were forced
to find other jobs and they found them in weirdest places imaginable. A woman started
selling rabbits for pets or food, eating them herself and even making clothes out of rabbits`
furs. Now that is absurd.
I must say that this movie reminded me a lot of my country. Situation is strikingly
similar, except we didn`t even have such a big source of money in the fist place for quite
some time. The absurdity of the economical situation is just about equal. People in Serbia
don`t exactly sell rabbits for food, but they sure do weird things to survive, such as building
houses on rooftops of buildings and skyscrapers and such. The point Reagan made over his
pizza party with 12 senior citizens in which he proposed that people should leave Flint
and thus solve their economical problems is exactly what`s happening in my county on a
higher level. Stay and starve or leave and have a nice life. Hmmmmm….tough choice!
The ripple effect of the factory closing is obvious. The way of living of the whole
community before and after the closing is nothing short of being diametrically different. The
whole microeconomics suffered terribly, they tried new things such as tourism but it was
obvious that such an experiment was doomed to failure. Some members of the community
started committing minor crimes because of their inability to feed their families or pay
the rent.
General Motors sure didn`t make it too easy on the government. They took away a big
source of money for American citizens and government itself, in form of taxes, and moved
the factories abroad. Not only that but now a lot of people were forced to request welfare,
which also had to be paid from the government pocket. A very non-patriotic decision, some
might say. But was it a good one ?
Sure it was. GM still continued making money and
made even more of it without raising
prices, because cost of labor was greatly diminished. Was it a moral, compassionate,
good-hearted decision ? No. but was a decision like that ever expected from a big,
successful, profit-hunting, multinational magnate such as General Motors? Of course not!A corporation of that strength and reputation
could not be expected to make decisions with labor workers in mind. The entrepreneurs have
to make the moves that will make them stand good on the market and that will let them
continue producing widgets (in this case cars) of even higher quality for a lower price.
This movie gave a very witty insight on what absurdities could happen if the only economical
pillar of a community collapses. People were left wondering what they`re going to do.
Generations after generations ware predestined to work in that factory. After it was gone,
people just didn`t know what to do. I guess they never really considered the option of the
factory ever getting closed. The results of such oblivion are so tragic they`re humorous.
Long live the corporate America and their voluntary slaves. May they make us laugh in many
years to come. I`m pretty sure they will.
Roger & Me - An Economical Insight