© 2016 Michael Swickard, Ph.D. "Achieving
the highest possible return on human capital must be every manager's goal." Brian Tracy People in business know the value of human capital, but do we citizens? Brian Tracy writes about the value of good employees. I was thinking about the human capital of our citizens, as a whole, in our country. Some of that valuable human capital is being lost. And we are not attending to our losses.
We spend lots of money educating all
children. Billions of dollars are being used in public education and colleges.
We get doctors, lawyers and engineers along with people in the trades who keep
our country functioning. We, as a country, are only as good as all of our
citizens.
However, a third of all children
drop out of a free education and often end up in jail. America loses when people
who could have invented something useful or who would have raised children well
are put in prison for non-violent crimes. America needs those Americans, but our
leaders have a political need to ruin lives.
The New Mexico Legislature leaders
are talking for this session about getting tougher on crime. As if this country
has not being doing that for decades. That sounds nice in political speeches but
our country is either a Police State right now or very close to it.
I do realize that violent crimes
must be dealt with harshly. No, I am talking about non-violent crimes that have
filled our prisons to capacity and more. We have allowed police units to become
a military of their own.
Everywhere I go I am under the
watchful eye and firearm of the police. Every action I take is monitored by a
government agency. Not just me, every American. Yes, the NSA said they were
going to stop spying on Americans. They are such liars.
Here's the problem: progressives
from both parties over the last one hundred years have used any excuse to make
government bigger and bigger. The War on Drugs
for the last seventy years has just been an excuse to turn our country into a de facto Police State. Sadly, drugs are
just as plentiful today as when they started.
America's incarceration rates are
far beyond any other free country and now the New Mexico Legislature wants to
toughen up the laws, which means incarcerate more New Mexicans. These are just
numbers to the politicians and leaders. But they are flesh and blood humans.
And we are losing their potentials. When
we incarcerate them then all of their talents are lost and often lost forever. Some
convicts do come out of prison and restart their lives. And that is the lesson.
We really lose when we keep people incarcerated their entire lives.
In the last year I have gotten to
know someone who five years ago was in prison. I think his violations were drug
related. When he got out all he could get was a janitor's job. But amazingly he
was the best janitor that company had ever seen. He is naturally clever without
any college.
Over a couple of years he first became
assistant manager and then a store manager. I am being vague because I do not
have permission to identify this person. I have owned several businesses and
run others. This person's store reflects his great managerial skills. So do his
employees. Even when he is not in his store I see him in every one of his
employees.
He is changing lives by leadership. Years
ago he was in prison and only by the fortune of a company taking a chance on
him do we see the potential of his human capital. How much value are we losing
when we send so many to prison?
Becoming a Police State benefits politicians
and unions by having many more people employed in police departments, courts
and prisons. It is a vast ever-growing industrial complex that knows no bounds.
New Mexico is getting tougher on crime for more political benefits. And we all
lose the human capital from our society.
America thought their way to the
moon. Can we readjust our legal system so as to not lose all of this human
capital? Perhaps.
Email: drswickard@comcast.net
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