Hard Times For Main Street
 

http://www.nbcnews.com/business/pers...rs-say-n177746



I guess the Walmart wage paradigm hurts everyone.

The greed of the rich is killing the goose that lays the golden eggs.

And when it's finally dead, they will blame Obama and the Democrats.

They are already doing that as part of the process.

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Companies are ever relocating/outsourcing so as not to pay decent wages.

Moreover States are in a downward spiral of competition offering the no-union, no taxes incentive.

The end result is there are not sufficient workers with the disposable income to light up Main Street.

I notice my mayor De Blasio in the thick of things. :D

Lower wages decreases cash flow. Bad business methinks.

Of course it does, where's the broad market without the means to participate. A lowered wage scale only serves a few, and so-called free-market libertarians only serve these few by "carrying their water".

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Dp, nt.

That's where we are here on Topeka. Average wage keeps decreasing, high end stores like Macy's just cannot survive, while they keep building more Wall Marts, four now, in a city of 125,000 people that cannot even support a Macy's.

The Kansas art commissioner asked me earlier this year why I no longer involve myself in local art fairs. I told her it's because this is a wall mart town and wall mart people don't buy art that isn't from China.

And since taxes on the middle class keep rising and rising while they eliminate taxes on the rich, Kansas has no where to go but down.

Maybe the art market is better at the very high end where the 1% shop.

They've been doing real well lately.

Do you have a shop that sells Piscasso originals?

In Brooklyn here we keep Wall Mart out so that Mom and Pop stores can survive.

Well God bless Brooklyn....

When wall mart is the only place to shop in the rest of the country, you'll have an oasis....

I'm making my escape plans to just such a place.

Santa Fe should be at the top of your list.

I love Santa Fe...but it's in the wrong direction. My kids live in Charleston.

You can say that again!

Now, if they could just get the Dodgers back everything would be right with the world again!

http://i843.photobucket.com/albums/z...d08443276b.jpg

Wouldn't Taos be better?

Taos is really nice too. COL of both places is higher than I'd like.... and it's in the wrong direction.

Ironically both art artists meccas, but how artists can afford to live there is beyond me.

Sante Fe has more art galleries for a town its size than probably any city in the world. Here's a list with 176 of them.

Ain't gonna happen. The Los Angeles Dodgers are here to stay. :cool:

I'm not much into art, but I wanna go there for the scenery. It looks awesome in pictures.

The last time I was in New Mexico was passing through in 1962.

I did see a "This Old House" piece on PBS on Santa Fe and their architectural code is pretty cool.

Going to New Mexico and spending some time there is on my bucket list.

My brother and his family live outside Sante Fe. It's a very cool place, chock full of restaurants, bars, galleries, etc. It's so pretty, well-preserved and culturally interesting that it can come off as a bit Disneyfied at times.

http://i837.photobucket.com/albums/z...ow/santafe.jpg

The issue with art colonies, and this happens over and over again, is the artists start these colonies and make them hip and cool, then the money moves in because it's hip and cool to live there, and the money builds big houses and does restorations and they put in fancy restaurants and galleries and such, then the artists can no longer afford to live there so they have to move out.

I bet I've been in every one of these galleries. I bought a wonderful Michael Parke's giclee "Eternity" at the Chalk farm Gallery. It's surrealists.

My sister in law from Missouri took one look at it and went WTF is that :)


http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature...&v=YQt1NNd0nQg

http://theworldofmichaelparkes.com/L...e_Fullsize.jpg

Classy, did she vote for Gov. Brownstreak?

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She's in Missouri......

I have very eclectic tastes. I have a pair of matching golds stained glass lamps from the early 1900s. They have bead trim. She thinks they are hideous even though they are perfect in the room.

Her house is fill of mauve knit Kleenex holders covered in plastic flowers.... wall to wall Chinese crap it that tells you anything.