The Real Value of One Dollar
Written by Claire Madison Chua
For a lot of us, the value of money is equated to the things it can buy. A dollar (or about 50 pesos) can buy a small burger, a handful of pens, or a cheap haircut — and at first glance, that isn’t much. But what if the dollar had a story? What if it was the last of your savings, a day’s worth of work gone? What if it was the first earned in your business, efforts finally bearing fruit?
Two great documentaries show how much more a dollar can become when you consider where it comes from and where it goes in an ever-present socioeconomic context.
Living on One Dollar follows the experience of a couple economic students attempting to do just that for 2 months in rural Guatemala. However, the point of the documentary wasn’t to prove that it was possible to survive on such meager amounts, but to understand the weight of that day to day survival; Because for a billion people all around the world, such a challenge is their everyday reality.
Real Value, on the other hand, shows the perspective of social entrepreneurs in (North Carolina) America, and how the value businesses produce can go beyond the profits it earns. To start a cycle of positive social change, this documentary seeks to take that first step and discusses the impact of our purchases, products, and business practices on the world around us.
Both groups are fighting different battles, but they are part of a bigger war, against common problems like poverty and waste that plague every country to varying degrees.
The vital part community plays in survival
How are they doing this? For starters, in Guatemala, education is one such serious issue — only an estimated 60% of students reach grade 6, with the rest dropping out for various reasons like a necessity for work, an early marriage, or difficulty keeping up with the lessons because of the less-than-optimal environment. Illiteracy too comes with a host of problems, but many offer aid to make their journeys a little easier — having known the pain of walking that very path without. A teacher offers free reading lessons to any and all ages alike; Families share their meals and money; and in many other smaller and bigger ways, a sense of camaraderie and togetherness is fostered through mutual assistance.
In the same way, when people consider entrepreneurship as a strategy for the poor to sustain themselves, I think we forget how business too, affects and helps the surrounding community. When a person in town starts a sari-sari store, greater accessibility to the goods sold is achieved. This is especially important when it sells a variety of food, medical supplies, and other essentials — profits then denote a healthy business, and a healthier, happier neighborhood.
Our responsibility to be better follows our capacity to do so
However, this arrangement still leaves much to improve upon. Their survival/quality of life should never be dependent on their success as capitalistic business owners in the first place; we have a role beyond recognizing our privilege and maintaining the status quo. We must integrate empathy into our enterprises so that tomorrow is filled with opportunity for all.
Having a for-profit business model and making positive impact are not mutually exclusive, and social entrepreneurs straddle the overlap well. Carol Koury, the founder of Sow True Seed, makes her business producing and selling a diverse range of seeds, the preservation of such ensuring the plants’ resistance to unexpected blights. At the same time, she buys her gardening materials locally, donates leftover seeds to community gardens and schools, provides planting lessons to the curious and willing, and established a program that offers seeds for labor — she is in turn loved by the people, and that is the true value in her work.
The ability to affect greater change is not unique to any industry either. The Redwoods Group (an insurance company) uses their aggregated data on the common causes of children getting hurt and notifies businesses on ways to prevent that. Piedmont Biofuels sources their ingredients from oil wastage close by, limiting counter-productive wastage and fuel costs. TS Designs (a T-shirt company) does its part by paying its employees right, giving them multiple benefits, and keeping their negative environmental impact to a minimum.
What will be our legacy?
Although dozens of businesses provide the same services as they do, it is their unique compassion and impact that is truly unparalleled — such changes will carry forward, and endure the test of time. Whenever the future generation is considered, whenever an idea takes on a brighter, scalable quality, we are choosing to invest in a more hopeful future, and in a way, building it ourselves.
I believe the Philippines has great potential for its own future, but that much of it is squandered under societal neglect. Our agricultural sectors have wasted away without the funding and work required to support it; meanwhile, individuals are left unemployed or underemployed because of the over-saturation of multiple industries. There are multiple charity organizations dedicated to collecting and distributing donations, and while their efforts are appreciated, a greater need persists because of the unstable and dependent nature of such aid. To tackle the true root of these issues, value must be created from the ground up: utilizing and maximizing all that these individuals and sectors have to offer.
A dollar’s value changes when you consider how its handling matters. Profit is the lifeblood of a business: it is evidence of its self-sustained success, but success ought to be measured not on the accumulation of wealth, but by how well they make every dollar, every action, and every person count.
So let’s make them count.
Borkowski, J. (Director). (2013). Real Value [Video file]. North Carolina: Nothing Underground Studio. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ez3CWXQrgVo
Temple, C., Ingrasci, Z., Leonard, S., & Christoffersen, R. (Producers). (2013). Living on One Dollar [Video file]. Guatemala: Gravi.
