April, 2010 update on E2M Developments

One of the rules of blogging is to be consistent in posting, have a number of posts written in advance, and stay active. I have broken all these rules as is evident; thus an update is in order.

During the past year and a quarter, our focus has been to finalize all of the elements of the E2M infrastructure in a manner that enables them to be replicated anywhere in the country very quickly. We have finalized all of the policies and procedures necessary to enable any group to form, incorporate, and operate an E2M Regional Council. This information will be posted on the website in due time.

E2M.org has applied for and been granted 501 (c)(3) non-profit status by the IRS and  may now act as a fiscal agent to any organization interested in forming an E2M Economic Community in their region.  Acting as your fiscal agent, we enable your organization to realize the same benefits as a federally recognized charitable organization. This means that your organization can operate without paying income taxes and can accept donations that can be recorded as charitable donations for Federal tax purposes by your donors.

We have also defined a vision for an industrial manufacturing base on which the new sustainable economy can be built. This base will be disclosed in detail during the next few months, but it can be described as a system to create renewable fuels that can be used to power indoor Cityfarms that can grow nutrient dense, organic foods in highly controlled indoor environments in inner city buildings employing inner city residents at living wages with benefits and profit sharing. The fuels will be created using feedstocks of waste agricultural biomass, municipal paper wastes, and other waste streams. Outputs will be gaseous and liquid fuels as well as biochar. These will be carbon negative industrial biofuel manufacturing facilities.

The associated food growing facilities will pay from $16 to $20 per hour to local employees and youth as young as 13 years old. Crops will be grown in soils rather than hydroponic chemical soups and will enable the production of significant amounts of organic, nutrient dense crops available at prices similar to non-organic crops. The final partnering companies in this venture have been identified and will soon begin operations. Each of these renewable biofuel production facilities and Cityfarms will produce sales income in the several millions of dollars and will serve as seed businesses upon which regional E2M Communities can grow.

We have also determined that E2M’s future cannot be focused exclusively here in Western Massachusetts. Although WMass was the best place to plant the seeds, the real economic pain being experienced is outside of this Valley in areas being much more disrupted by the current economic system.

Here in the Valley we have an atypical economy supported by more than 50,000 students paying from $20,000 to $60,000 and more per year for educations at more than 20 local colleges and universities. Considering that 60% of this billion dollar cash flow is spent as wages to professors and workers at these schools and is spent locally, we are not experiencing the types of disruptions you see in Flint or Pontiac, Michigan or other rural and urban regions in the heartlands of America. Complacency is not the substance that provides the most fertile soil for the growth of E2M. Pain, suffering, loss of homes, job losses, and fear of an unknown future are economic characteristics that are much more conducive to change and action that will drive people to take the steps necessary to finally say “Enough is enough” and consider starting a new system that works for them.

That being said, it is important to get the E2M message out beyond Western Mass; thus I decided to write a book that can be more widely distributed to areas with more spiritually inclined communities that have the power to move mountains. That book is now written, is in final editing, and will be released within months.

Although we are expanding our efforts beyond Western Mass, we have been growing our local sales of E2M Community Coffee, have been working to develop an E2M ice cream, and have assisted in the formation and growth of other local E2M affiliated companies in the Western Mass region.

Thus, this past period of silence has not been one of inactivity. Much is happening and you will soon see the results in our local region, in areas beyond our horizon, and in your ability to start an E2M Economic Community in your own region.

Finally in the midst of much positive effort and work, I am sorry to inform you of the passing of one of the most dedicated, intelligent, and caring individuals to embrace the E2M mission and to grace our Board of Directors. Professor Julie Graham, a world renown geographer and economist unexpected passed away on Sunday, April 4. There were few like her and she will be sorely missed as we move along and take advantage of her contributions to the E2M mission for a more sustainable and just economy.

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How E2M was born

My 40 year history as an inventor enabled me to earn nine worldwide patents on advanced light emitting technologies, associated solid state power supplies, as well as other technologies.  During the mid 80’s I invented and patented the precursor to today’s compact fluorescent light bulbs, 3/8th inch thick glass plates of light that could last 50 years. However, these could not compete with cheaper fluorescent tubes and incandescent bulbs so instead of creating glass plates where the full face glowed, I incorporated graphics into the technology to create plates of glowing images. The technology, Plateglass Neon was acclaimed by the world’s most respected sign journal as the most significant advance in the fabrication of neon signs since they were first invented by Georges Claude in Paris in 1912.  During the mid 80’s and 90’s, my company, Neon Technology, sold these around the world to major corporations in partnership, during some of that time, with the Japanese company ITOCHU , listed in 1992 as the world’s largest company.  When the Asian economy collapsed in 1998 to 1999, my partnership with ITOCHU was impacted because of the effect of the collapse on them. They could no longer spend time on tangential technologies and returned to their core business. My company could not find investors to replace the financial backing we had with ITOCHU because no one was investing in manufacturers in 1999, they were all drawn into the dot com frenzy. So we spent a year trying to bootstrap oiur way through the problem and finally concluded, along with many of my advisers and employees, that we could not go on.  After acquiring all of my employees jobs at a friend’s newly formed company, we closed the doors of Neon Technology. Thus no one lost a job — except me.

On Monday, August 30, 1999 at 12 noon, I turned the keys of the Neon Technology factory over to my banker, as is standard when liquidating a property with lienholders, took one last walk around the factory, then walked out the door for the last time.  As I was walking down the hall, is remember thinking  “God, I never want to invent another object, I want to invent an idea. No more weight, mass, freight or factories. I want an idea, something that can travel around the world in an instant.” I left the request open ended.

During the next five months I experienced what I have referred to as a “fog” composed of flashes of inspiration, a flurry of philosophical fragments, hints and hunches – all dancing within my mind. This “fog” finally coalesced into a vision of something astounding to me. I then began to understood it. It all made sense to me. The idea was a sustainable economic system and network that could embrace the planet, help to eliminate poverty, counterbalance inequities of wealth, reduce consumption, begin to heal the environment, help throttle back the current economic paradigm which has an insatiable appetite for profits and growth, and create a sustainable society where communities were as powerful as corporations and people were more valued than profits. That process was documented in my writings from the very first day I put the pen to the paper on January 1, 2000 at 11AM in the studio building at my home. That is how E2M was born. That is why I say E2M was not my idea. I found it. It is a gift to be passed on. I hope you like it.

Michael Garjian

President-elect Obama

Amazing!  I am happy my children and all children will be able to experience the feelings and hope I remember from my youth before 1968.  I am happy that many more of us will get to relive it.  The institution of E2M will help transform hope into real opportunities for many who will now seek them.  There is not much more to say until this all sinks in.

Moving Ahead

If you read the dates on the preceeding entries you’ll see that I could do a better job of keeping current. I have to admit that, being a farmboy, I was always more focused on getting things done than reading or writing about what has been or could be.  Now that so much has been done and the E2M infrastructure is established in Western Massachusetts, I will do my best to keep the reader informed about the E2M vision and accomplishments.

If you’ve read the previous material, you know that E2M is an alternative economic system that was born on January 1, 2000.  Much of what I wrote starting on that cold but sunny morning on the first day of the new millennium is coming to pass. A number of people have recently called to tell me I’ve been vindicated due to the recent meltdown of our financial system.  Of course, I do not consider it a meltdown yet, because there is more to come. This is just the beginning as evidenced in the mortgage markets.  We still have the crash of the credit card, pension fund, insurance industry, municipal bonds, and other lesser elements waiting on the sidelines for their turn at the headlines.

Fortunately, E2M is here as a solution to the problem.

It will not save this system, especially since the system is not worth saving nor can it be saved. In just the past three weeks, we’ve thrown close to 3 Trillion dollars at it in the form of the “bailout fund” plus another 2 Trillion in bank guarantees.  This does not count the amount that the US gov will invest buying equity in banks. So 4 Trillion dollars total not counting interest payments has been committed so far with more to come. If this cannot keep this monster afloat, it certainly isn’t for the lack of money. It’s not a money problem. Just as we can’t drill our way out of the energy problem, we can’t buy our way out of the economic problem. Let the monster go. There is a better way.  I will keep you posted as to what is happening to me and E2M as a result of real things that are happening in our first E2M Region here in Western Mass.

Michael

E2M Plenary Talk – Pioneer Valley Relocalization Conference

This talk was presented by e2m.org founder Michael Garjian at a conference on relocalization sponsored by the Massachusetts Coalition for Healthy Communities on September 30, 2007 in Northampton, Massachusetts. It describes how one root cause creates so many other problems in today’s world and lays out a vision of what a society could look like upon eliminating the root cause.

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=2104309346408346908

E2M Video – Boston Social Forum and PV Relocalization Conference

Our current economic system is unsustainable because its success depends on increasing levels of consumer purchases, household debt, poverty, resource consumption, environmental degradation, and other undesirable elements. This system is now unraveling, resulting in much of today’s social, economic, and environmental malaise. It is a Titanic and we can sing the same old tune with the band or we can launch the lifeboats to a bright, sustainable future for all. This video about E2M, an Economic Movement for Millennium 2000, filmed at the Boston Social Forum on July 25, 2004 and the Pioneer Valley Relocalization Conference on September 30, 2007, will make the situation very clear.

For a short E2M vision talk at the 2007 Relocalization Conference, Northampton, MA go to:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DbJ2NxI9Qf0&feature=youtu.be

For a longer lecture detailing how E2M works, go to:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-5e232g-91k&feature=youtu.be

For more info visit http://www.e2m.org

E2M Economic Movement for Millennium 2000- Community Conscious Capitalism

E2M is a new economic model of community capitalism that can lead to a sustainable future largely devoid of social, economic, environmental, and corporate injustice.

Our current capitalist model is controlled by individuals and corporations seeking to achieve maximum profit and maximum growth for themselves or their relatively few investors. It has strayed considerably from the original intent of capitalism- to create a fair and sustainable relationship between landowners, entrepreneurs, the state, and the working class. The E2M model places us back on that original track while working compatibly within the current system. Its intent is to transform, not to disrupt the current model.

In the E2M economic model, regional communities, as entities, use the tool of capitalism to create enormous amounts of wealth for themselves just as individuals and corporations have been doing for centuries. The Regional Economic Council, a non-governmental group of citizens formed to administer the regional model, uses this wealth to benefit the region, its citizens and other E2M regional communities around the nation and globe. Although these regional communities are independent, they can act collectively to create a new economic global network based on caring, sharing, spirituality, and connectedness. Using E2M Community Capitalism, communities can become as economically powerful as large corporations and use their wealth to create a bright and sustainable future for all.

E2M is not just a theory or idea. We have already established the first E2M Economic Community and the E2M Regional Economic Council of Western Massachusetts (E2M-REC) which now has the support of local and federal elected officials, educators, entrepreneurs, students, labor leaders, investors, and community members.

If you think we are on the wrong track as a society and you are ready for a completely new, caring, sharing free market approach to a bright future, then visit:

http://www.e2m.org