Have a beautiful day.

Today is a blissful soft windy day where I live. The sun is magnificent. Nothing can compare to the exciting feeling of starting something new. Not just given the expected value of producing new material for further media documentaries (which is my personal standard challenge with this saga); but also because each new theme in our reading journey for 2020 is a motivation to cultivate us. Our minds always appreciate our quest for learning. And I am inspired to teach you about this topic.

The saga “The Fallacy of the Middle Class: Overcoming social resentment” was conceptually originated in my mind last year,  during the process of writing another epic “Entrepreneurs without money”. But I left this idea inside my desk. Now it comes at a time in which the World Bank has estimated that the Coronavirus Pandemic will put down into poverty to a vulnerable population who were fighting to leave it. At the beginning of March, the World Bank calculated that 70 million people were going to return to extreme poverty after this year, but last week this entity reviewed the numbers, and now they are talking about 170 million people instead.

But what is to leave poverty? Mainly it is a journey of integral transformation,  in which those who have been affected by lack of basics or those who have scarce resources of living, begin to depart that status and commence to experience and savor better living standards.  This journey is a step by step process. It can´t happen automatically, sometimes it takes more than one generation (in certain countries), and there are no short-cuts on it. Someone who aspires better conditions of life, can´t go from living US$1.90/day to US$300/dayor US$200,000 salary/year automatically. It takes several years (decades), a lot of work, plenty of education, and loads of systemic opportunities to adjust and evolve from low class to middle class and finally to the upper class (the high-end segment of societies).

The reason why we are obligated to study the middle class is crucial. Those of us who have been born in this crowd, require to know our reference gathering. Those who aspire to leave poverty and become the new kid on the block at the next social scale, the Middle-class, need a mandatory course on that specific aspirational arrival group, so they can understand where are they going to. Those who are leading the social-economic systems (the movers and shakers of any particular country), given their high-end wealthy status, are responsible to care not just for their own companies and production arrangements, but also for all the people living in their territories, and permeate their social-political-economic interactions with the Middle-class, daily. History has shown to the wealthiest that they can´t continue building powerful economic empires, without attending for their middle and poor economic groups, otherwise, the inequality gap ceases their own economic richness at the sound of a snap (either by social or fierce political revolts or by destructive civil wars) or at a cold-war expanse. Unsatisfied resented people without the faith and hope of economic improvement are the causes of future country failures.

The middle class is one of the most suffered groups of people in the world. Their enduring lifestyle has multiple difficulties, a lot of travails, and straining conditions. It is one of the most speculative groups in which only one decision making mistake or an external/exogenous fault is capable to innocently barren or erase the economic/social improvements of its belonging. To belong to the Middle-class is like walking in a thin rope or wireline in between two cliffs. One wrong move and we can fell down to the abysm. To dwell in the middle-class, for some, is a blessing and a curse. To exist in the middle class is a desideratum, something that is needed, and urgently wanted to end the inequality. For democracies to function, the well-being, cultivated (educated), abundant, and satisfied Middle class is their most solid foundation.

My hypothesis for this saga. Those societies with growing, successful and ample middle-classes are right now the smartest most flourishing, happiest, balanced, and wealthy societies on earth (not just economically but also intellectually, socially, and politically). Meanwhile, those kingdoms or incipient democracies with higher inequalities, with huge gaps between the rich and the poor (and of course with fragile and reduced middle-classes), are societies without any future, in which the inner discontent of their people is simply hidden at sous vide, or baking at low temperature in the oven, boom!, waiting to explode at any time, putting in danger not just all the achievements of the existing middle class, but also suggesting the rise of populism, or the emerging of new Venezuelas or what is worst new tyrannical authoritarian dictatorships.

The outline of this saga is now being revealed. Print these 2 pages in PDF, so you will have a roadmap of the material that we will study during the next 3 months.

About this saga-keeping rules. As usual, I will try to stick my publications with a frequency of twice a week (Tuesdays and Fridays). I expect to produce 25 episodes until December 31st, 2020; the same number of individual broadcast sessions as an American usual period for TV series. Each written episode or post will come with a new watercolor painting from the collection “Adorable Baby Animals” or another newest collection. As a rule of thumb, I will provide the photo reference of the photographer for my art when these paintings rely on third-party pictures. But I will try more and more to don´t use others´ photos. I promise you, that as of 2021, I won´t use other photographers’ work for inspiration to my art for this blog.

Selling my watercolor art to finance Eleonora Escalante Strategy. I painted 50 watercolors (size 5 inches x 7 inches) between March to September 2020, and these are on sale at US$500/each (with frame and shipping included). All the sources of funds collected will be utilized to improve the quality of this platform, including the production of my own videos, paying for the photo-databases rights for my art; to compensate for the annual usage of academic and excellent information databases much needed for the deepest strategic analysis, that I can naturally perform. Until today, I have been writing in a simple general mood, but be aware that I can go much further, and fully immersed in details, analyzing profound complex issues only if I have the appropriate or suitable information on my hands. I can also hire other analysts who may help me to gather my own information databases, and become a productive fountain of jobs for others. I also do not want to depend on my parents anymore: I expect to rise by my own hard work and efforts, with honesty and the usual transparency that I have coined through these hardships of years. Always through these publications and strategic reflections or pearls of wisdom from philosophy.

Well beautiful audience, this is it for today. Wishing you a lovely rest of the week. I hope your expectations of this material can be overpassed. I hope this material becomes proof that I can write anything of relevance for future documentaries with organizations as DW, BBC, or France 24. See you again this Friday.

Disclaimer: Illustrations in Watercolor are painted by Eleonora Escalante. Other types of illustrations or videos (which are not mine) are used for educational purposes ONLY.  Nevertheless, the majority of the pictures, images, or videos shown on this blog are not mine.  I do not own any of the lovely photos or images posted unless otherwise stated.

Published by eleonoraescalantestrategy

Corporate Strategy Artist, San Salvador, El Salvador View all posts by eleonoraescalantestrategy