Small And Poor May Get Out Of The Recession

We like to think big and rich in this country. This is what Americans do. Our country is the country of endless possibilities, and we like to make our mark. The stimulus ideas of President Obama ideas are all big and rich. I have no real problem with funding big projects for our nation’s communities. My hometown, back in Wisconsin, has a junior high school and an athletic field that were built by the Work Projects Administration. I have no doubt that the building of these facilities kept many people fed. They have continued to be a source of community pride for about 70 years. There are, no doubt, many such projects around the country, and I would like to take the conservatives in our country who are poo-pooing these plans on a tour of all of them. They also seem to forget that the interstate system was a massive government employment project and no doubt helped keep the recession of the late 1950s from getting worse. The Internet was also a government project and it helped fuel the economic growth of the 1980s and 1990s.
I would like the president to think small and poor. I have no idea why we do not have a Grameen Bank in this country. The original Grameen Bank has helped stave off grinding poverty in one of the poorest of the poorest countries, Bangladesh. The Grameen Bank lends money to those who have no resources. I have a bad feeling that we will have many more such people before the current recession runs through the year. The bank lends money to those who have no collateral, who then use it as a means to establish their own enterprises or to assist them in getting a job. The creditors are made responsible to each other and default rates are close to zero. Let us have a portion of the stimulus package go to establishing Grameen Banks in trial areas. Let us see if the small and poor can help us, where the big and rich have failed us. I still have no doubt that some of the plans for big projects will work, they have in the past and probably will in the future. We like big and rich in this country. We also like rooting for the little guy, and gal. We need to see if they can lead us out of the recessions. Give us a chance to grow this country from the ground up.