If only Kenya were one giant supermarket

Shoppers jostling for subsidised maize flour at a supermarket in Nakuru last month. [Harun Wathari, Standard]

One of the most orderly places in Kenya is a supermarket.

We shop quietly, full of joy, fill our carts while smiling and finally queue to pay. We rarely jump queues. Customers are a mix of colour, race, socio-economic class, gender and all measures of diversity.

Contrast that with the workplace - we skip work, backstab one another, do shoddy work, cheat, malinger and do anything to avoid work.

We even sack people unfairly and employ relatives or people from our tribes. Curiously, everyone takes part in spending in supermarkets, even children.

We rarely take children to our workplaces. We even have age limits for employment. Back in the day, children worked and made economic contributions, and it was not considered child labour.

There is clearly a disconnect between earning and spending money. In Kenya, we focus too much on money, not how it's earned.

Despite 59 years of independence and 127 years since we became a British protectorate, we have never imbibed the ethos of capitalism that you can't get something out of nothing, which is why corruption has thrived.

When you get money pooled together as tax or Sacco money, we rarely think of the sweat that went into it.

We think it's free money. We see pooled money as free even when taken as a loan. Look no further than banks' or Saccos' non-performing loans. Taking such money is considered heroism.

We get paid salaries or wages not because it's the end of the month, but because we have worked for it.

And that work is visible in terms of what have you manufactured, repaired or the number of citizens served. Maybe, I am biased, but many would love to get paid without working.

Many get paid for underworking. One motivation for further studies is that one expects to work less and get paid more after acquiring more certificates.

Trade unions

A more curious debate is what should be the basis of a salary or wage rise. It should be based on productivity - doing more with less.

Can you produce more items in a factory and serve more citizens? Trade unions rarely focus on productivity when demanding a pay rise. It's not hard to guess why.

Technology has always made us more productive but with a twist. We mistakenly think it kills jobs.

But history has shown that technological advances create more jobs than they destroy. Why else do developed countries have lower unemployment rates than developing ones?

It does not matter which sector you look at, technology is a job creator. The more advanced technology is, the higher quality jobs it creates.

Think of jobs created by computer science or genetic engineering. Even low-level technology creates jobs.

Think of the jobs created by boda bodas despite causing school dropouts. What of M-Pesa?

Back to the supermarket. We are never taught how to spend, it's almost an instinct. Learning to earn money is hard.

Courses in entrepreneurship focus more on money made and not the sweat or patience that goes into it.

I doubt if any economics textbook uses the words sweat, patience or attitudes. Economists - the high priests of social sciences - avoid what they can't model.

But reality is forcing them to shift to behaviour. Spending is instantaneous, just give the money to the cashier!

Even children and those who have never been to school know how to spend. Earning takes a long time. You must go to school, set up a factory, work long hours, get tired, travel, take risks and much more.

Curiously, religion and traditional wisdom emphasis the pride derived from earning from the sweat of our brows. When did we deviate from these noble ways?

Yet as we become more capitalist in Kenya, we seem to conveniently forget the link between earning and spending.

Extra money

Does the policeman who takes Sh50 from a matatu driver wonder where it came from? Does the person who inflates a tender care where the extra money will come from or who sweated for it?

We should start teaching our children early the connection between earning and spending.

I once told a child I had no money to buy something. She asked me: "Why don't you go to an ATM?"

I had to explain to her how the money gets into the ATM, M-Pesa or pocket.

That disconnect between earning and spending has been our soft underbelly. It's time to address it soberly. Think about that connection the next time you go to the supermarket, mall or even a kiosk.

Hopefully, the next regime will bring back the pride of working, something akin to America's protestant work ethic. Didn't we borrow from their constitution?