SOUTHERN BUSINESS CLIMATE SUNNIER 

When an employee and employer disagree, the opportunity to discuss and settle the perceived problem usually exists. If the service provided by the worker does not meet company criteria, it must be corrected or the worker usually has to go.

A similar condition exists when a company or a local or federal government cannot or will not change, adapt nor modify conditions necessary for successful operation of businesses that pay the taxes that allows the public sector to exist. Something has to yield or gates close.

As it is easy to see from daily announcements across the land, both in numbers of business bankruptcies and staff reductions, that something (perhaps many things) is drastically wrong. The difference between what happens to big business and to small business isn't that great in principle or ultimate effect.

For years I have been selling my columns, after they appear in this publication, in book form. Not in the usual print format, but in the post-Gutenberg computer disc form. Demand has been steadily increasing. Naturally, because of the 10-times-larger population of the U.S., American sales have been creeping up to a higher percentage of the total than Canadian sales. Production costs, for even such simple items as computer discs containing software, are higher in Canada than in the U.S.

The discs themselves cost almost double the price in Canada. Although there is no duty on imported discs, there is GST, customs brokerage, freight, etc., PLUS the paperwork hassle of dealing with a bureaucracy that doesn't appreciate or understand how modern business works... bureaucracy that has no "sense of urgency", when fast service is essential to obtaining and holding customers.

I have moved production for my American sales to Bellingham, Washington, where the cost of sub-contracting is much less than here. My sub-contractor who has more than adequate facilities for both his own and my business pays $150 a month rent! For double the space I have in Vancouver. That is one-sixth of what I pay, and I own my own building! Another big advantage is the greatly reduced cost of postage -- and lack of postal and other strikes -- a major factor with today's just-in-time delivery system for manufacturing. American postal delivery time appears to be about one-third that required by Canada Post.

And in the U.S., if you do manage to make a profit, state and federal income taxes are much lower.

Supplies purchased can be delivered to the sub-contractor within 48 hours from eastern U.S for a $3 charge, and he then produces the disc books, fills and mails the orders.

Savings in time and money are substantial. It is more cost effective to produce the disc books in Bellingham and deliver them to anywhere in Canada than to operate production from Vancouver. It is no secret that tens of thousands of Canadians are crossing the border daily to shop in the U.S., sometimes just for gas, milk, cheese and butter. They are voting with their feet. Now businessmen and women are making similar decisions. Nationalism and patriotism can be fatal to one's personal economic health!

The software business, the manufacturer with today's communications tools that can send voice, words, illustrations or pictures the speed of light, can operate from anywhere. Canada is no longer the shining light it was in the past.

Later, I pointed out the importance of providing superior service any employee who expected to stay and advance in any business operation. Governments have to start providing quality service to tax-payers, who provide the money that pays the salaries in these bloated bureaucracies. Otherwise, business has no alternative but to move. For accelerating sunrise industries, relocating anywhere is not usually a problem. The 17 American states now maintaining offices in Toronto have seen the labor policies of the Ontario government and clearly understand many businesses will not be able to survive under proposed legislation that mandates union membership and prevents replacement of striking workers. What investor is going to risk financial disaster under such weighted rules?

Many are moving even before such rules fall into place.

The results are already painfully apparent. "Between 400 and 700 Canadian businesses have set up shop in Buffalo", according to the Wall Street Journal. Southam News also reports that Canadian Finance Minister Michael Wilson has the gall to include the dollar value of equipment shipped out of the country by those moving south businesses as a Canadian export! And, this is to only one American city!

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