Do What You Love: Help the GMH Become a Real Thing

Jos? Antonio Vanderhorst Silverio, PhD
Organic Seed of the GMH

The GMH aims to a very small segment of the Dominican and Haitian populations that is determined to "do what they love." According to Daniel H. Pink, op-ed contributor to the New York Times (today's edition), that's the advice given by commencement speakers. We need "a labor market that increasingly confers an economic advantage on the activities that people do out of a sence of intrinsic satisfaction - designing cool things, telling stories and helping others." That is what Mr. Pink is telling the class of 2005. In addition, he says that "'Do what you love' is no longer a soft-hearted sentiment. It is also a hard-headed strategy."

Mr. Pink says that there are three powerful forces at work: automation, jobs going overseas, and prosperity. He concludes that "In other words, to make it in the emergent economy, we will have to do things that software can't do faster and that overseas knowledge workers can't do more cheaply. In addition, what we produce must also satisfy the growing consumer demand for products and services infused with emotion, spirituality and artistry... Look, it's a rough world out there. There's only one way to survive. Do what you love."

My humble contribution is that DR-CAFTA is a two way street. GMH has been thought for Hispaniola "do what you love" people. That is what I have been doing all my life. That was what I taught all along to my INTEC students. That is what I have been telling all along in this blog. That is why I call myself a seed. Don't be dependent, or just independent; become interdependent. Don't be followers, be leaders: develop your ethics, your vision, your reality, and your courage. In summary, do what you love, and help the GMH become a real thing.

Perceptions and GMH

Mirador said:

Sounds like the old neoliberal proposition with a cute twist (..."do what they love."): privatize, privatize and privatize; let the market take care of it; the less government the better...

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Thanks Mirador for a perceptive look at GMH. What you have seen relates mostly to the electric power privatization, because that is what I have mostly worked on. My conclusions on the need to liberalize the retail markets of electricity does not have to do with a dogmatic view of the world. Other sectors of the economy can perfectly work with more goverment: let the experts of those fields suggest the approach. However, I believe that the development of multinationals of Dominican Republic and Haiti in this century is the key to the sucessful development of Hispaniola. That is why I call myself the organic seed of the GMH, because I probably will not see it through.

My conviction of the need to liberalize retail markets of electricity comes from my research. I learned that electricity can be differentiated with respect to the shortage sensibility of the customer. This means that by charging every customer on a given class an average rate, those with low shortage sensistivity subsidize those with high sensitivity in the system. What I have found out is that there is a market in which the little guy can sell supply security to sensitive customers. In addition, shortage sensitiviy is perceived by the customer, leading to the development retail marketing by companies. I also claim that the Dominican Republic electricity crisis is inextrically linked to great opportunities for research, development, and demostration projects leading to a strategic turn-around opportunity.

I also found out that there is a sistemic risk in the electricity sector of the Dominican Republic. I think it is a text book example of electricity risk. If you are interested you can look at the presentation I delivered in Atlanta, Georgia, at the Spring 2005 PLMA Conference. You can see that the market enabling tool is called Demand Response technology.