Entrepreneurship as Alternative to Protest
Economic opportunities offer young people today a viable outlet for addressing social problems.
Picture the scene.
Race and class-based protests sweep across major American cities, stirring up intense political debate in a presidential election year. Anger and frustration over lack of economic opportunities and justice system iniquities lead to heated partisan rhetoric and, in the worst of cases, street-level violence. Citizens increasingly define their best interests according to rigid identity groups.
To any unsuspecting observer, America seems a divided place right now. More often than not, the conversation itself focuses on doom and gloom, pointing fingers at culprits across the ideological spectrum.
But what if it all misses the point? Perhaps the answer to our discontent lies not in playing the blame game or pushing to change the political process, but instead in one of the often most underappreciated aspects of the American character: our capacity for entrepreneurship.
A Challenge to the American Millennial
We’ve all heard the ominous facts and figures about young people today. Large numbers still living at home, buried under mountains of college debt, and strapped with high unemployment. But we are told the salvation of the Millennials is their entrepreneurial spark.
Turns out that might be a popular myth.
Despite the legends of Zuckerberg-esque young folks changing the world with their startup mentality, the overall share of people under 30 who own a business is at its lowest rate in decades. According to a report last year in The Wall Street Journal only 3.6% of households headed by a Millennial own a stake in a private company, down from 6.1% in 2010 and 10.6% in 1989.
While these numbers bode poorly for future growth of the American economy, the trends aren’t set in stone just yet. Given the easy accessibility of groundbreaking technology and the explosion of international opportunities available to anyone, young people coming of age today are in a historically advantageous position to make big waves.
No one stands to gain more from embracing entrepreneurship than women, racial minorities and other traditionally underserved social classes. But it will take commitment to embracing new ideas and a focus on business through a global set of eyes.
How Small Business Favors Minorities
Think about it. Entrepreneurship is a critical component of job growth in this country and is especially important to our diverse population, since small businesses tend to employ talent that gets overlooked by more conventional, stodgier corporations. The typical problems of a white male dominated “good ol’ boy system” are less acute in startups, where decisions are made locally and rapidly, favoring best-person-for-the-job thinking over a like-minded people mentality.
Entrepreneurs tend to be consumer-oriented and quick to respond to market demand — they have to be, or else they fail. To be a successful entrepreneur requires using the skills and insights of individuals that share similar interests with their target demographic and long-tail customer segments.
This translates to more employment opportunities for minority groups in our country, but more importantly leads to opportunities for people that may not have gone to the “right school” or have the “right degree.” Instead, this kind of system works well for folks that have a set of unique skills that may otherwise be overlooked by the resume-scanning algorithms of “Corporate America.”
Not only does the world of small and medium business offer more opportunities to minorities, but it also presents people with more choice and flexibility on how to create and manage their career paths and take their goals into their own hands.
Increased independence gives young entrepreneurs more confidence in their ideas, leading to a surplus of inventiveness and commitment to fresh ideas — as opposed to the untold potential that gets tied up or disappeared in the vast machinery of corporate red tape.
Applying an Economic Salve to Social Wounds
For these reasons, the growth of small business is truly the elixir that can heal many of our nation’s economic ailments. Entrepreneurship gets people working and off the street or the couch where they are not contributing anything to the success of America.
While protesting is a democratic right, if a large portion of today’s protestors spent more time creating new products and solutions and less time marching, we might see a lot more social and economic good spread around America. Politicians and media already spend too much time arguing over racial bigotry perpetrated by misanthropes, when society should instead be debating economic policies and how to get more young citizens working.
More specifically, we need to create ways to get adults under 30 participating in entrepreneurial efforts. Much attention is given to the over-educated and under-employed liberal arts majors, and the need to shift academic focus to STEM degrees (science, technology, engineering, mathematics). Clearly, STEM degrees are important due to the abundance of technology throughout the global economy and the short-term return on investment in those disciplines.
But both STEM and liberal arts studies should be supplemented with marketing and travel. And for those without degrees, a careful dedication to self-study and some real life experience on the road may offer lessons that cannot be bought with tuition payments.
Just to apply one real world example, let’s look at Africa. African countries are among the world’s most enterprising and have some of the highest rates of self-employment. But African countries lack access to capital and young, educated people who can launch and grow the businesses their people crave. How many Black Lives Matter protestors would find common ground between their social awareness goals and the opportunities to help a growing Africa? These protestors might consider the benefits of an extended trip to Africa where they can help themselves and help a continent.
Tying Marketing Principles to Opportunities
If you scoff at the idea of going overseas to explore entrepreneurial options, keep in mind that you don’t need a fancy business degree or an expensive study abroad program to do it. Most business knowledge can be gained through used books purchased online for a few dollars. An enriching world travel experience can also be achieved on the cheap.
The concept of marketing is easy to understand, and getting young people to become good marketers, whether art majors or engineering majors, is critical to the success of the United States in terms of our country’s economic growth and competitiveness.
Marketing, as defined by Dr. Philip Kotler of Northwestern University, identifies unfulfilled needs and desires. Individuals that have this skill will always be sought after in the job market, and will have the opportunity to choose the entrepreneurial path if they so desire.
Now more than ever, the unfulfilled needs and desires of human beings on this planet are enormous, and opportunities are abundant. Thanks to the IT revolution, the world is smaller than ever before, and as a result, millennials have more opportunities than any other generation before them.
But they will have to work harder than the competition — much of which comes from outside the U.S. — and they will need to acquire a spirit of adventure, ingenuity and opportunism.
American Millennials Should Lead the Charge
The rise of middle-class consumers across the planet presents a pivotal opportunity for American Millennials. The middle class around the world will more than double in size from 2 billion people today to almost 5 billion by 2030. Asia alone will account for more than 40% of global consumption with the explosion of demand from China, India, Indonesia, Vietnam, Thailand, Malaysia and Philippines.
Who is going to create the next generation of products and services that will fill the needs and desires of these billions of humans?
Young Americans must travel and get to know foreign lands and their cultures so that they can be adept at fulfilling the needs of all mankind. It is our patriotic duty as Americans to educate ourselves and maintain curiosity about the world. This will not only serve to enrich our own country through commercial and economic interest, but will also facilitate our ability to solve the world’s most pressing problems, ranging from disease to environmental degradation of the planet.
These problems are too big for Americans to solve alone. We must collaborate and engage with the best minds from around the world. Best of all, if more young people accept this challenge, we can finally start changing the daily media narrative of class and racial division into one of harmony, cooperation and prosperity.
Photo courtesy of Flickr user Gerry Lauzon.
