Cash Implosion!

Cash Explosion is a sorta phony local TV production that doles out money to minor lottery winners.  Imagine Cash Implosion, which punishes losers by taking money from them - and not just chump change.

I've railed incomprehensibly in the past about marketplace factors that are going to make achieving low-cost supply chain solutions more difficult in the future.  We may be hurtling there at something approaching warp speed.

The in-your-face between-the-eyes news was Wal-Mart's announced plan to raise its internal minimum wage to $9/hour.  That was followed in a mere two days by the TJX bombshell of going to $9 in year One, then moving to $10/hour in Year Two.

What do you suppose this means for competitive wages in logistics operations?  Right!  More cost, unhappy customers, frustrated bosses.  Inevitably, some loose executive cannon will decide that layoffs are the only sane way to cut costs.  How insane is that?

Plus, fuel is a wild card.  Effective risk management will require significant investment, especially in an era of global terror.  technology solutions to reduce labor will get really popular, really fast - but their business cases will be challenges and the CapEx demands could cause hernias in the C-suites.

In the bigger picture, it is one thing to face workers who will  move to another role in another industry vertical for a buck or two (small, you think, but a huge percentage of the base starting point.  But, are we going to risk further diminishing the attractiveness of our profession, reducing the talent and skills pipeline to a smaller diameter than even today's insufficient capacity?

Hang on; things are getting interesting.