Editorial
A Failure toImagine
When Cayman Net News published its findingsconcerning the outrageous condition that exists in connectionwith the number of people who are unemployed a few weeks ago,we got the stick from, as expected, Government officialsas well as detractors who insist on labeling us as rumour mongersand gloom and doom promoters.
Like so many of our reports, which havegone over the heads of many without as much as an acknowledgmentthat we are indeed wired into this community, and by getting thereal facts where others fail, without our press the whole storyabout whether or not there is indeed an employment crisis in theCayman Islands would have gone on without warning in the entirecommunity.
The failure to recognise the dire situationin Cayman's job market was not a failure of administrative intelligenceor coordination. It was a failure of imagination. Even if allthe raw data, starting with the lame population census reportconcerning unemployment had been shared among the Government andprivate sector leaders up to two years ago, we are convinced thatwe may not be in the unemployment mess we are in today.
Who would have imagined that the CaymanIslands with its repeated boasts of over employment morejobs than there are people - could ever become a reality?
Imagining growing concern of this magnitudeof employment, which exists 10 percent, as agreed by officialsassociated with the Labour Ministry and suggested by othersto be closer to 15 20 percent!
Registering for a job simply does not comenaturally to the Caymanian character, which is why, even afterwe are repeatedly confronted with it, we keep reverting to ournatural, naïvely optimistic selves. Because our closed societyis so much based on trust, and that trust is so hard-wired intothe Caymanian character and citizenry, we can't get rid of it- even when we so obviously should.
So someone from overseas who is employedwith one of the financial industry firms in town or in Governmentleaves their post - and we still do not really protect that positionfor a citizen by conducting a thorough search in the local oroverseas market for Caymanians.
During the political heyday of the lateJim Bodden, this was an option and many who returned home becauseof those efforts are today in high paying responsible positionsin the private and public sectors
The increasingly lethal nature of ignoringthe truth is beginning to have its effects. We are going to haveto adapt and face the music of failing to plan, or plan to fail.
We do not have to blame the present or pastGovernment administrations for their failure to imagine our economycould get to this ill state. We blame them for something muchworse: their failure to imagine it could happen.
We blame them for squandering all the positivefeelings in Cayman, particularly among those who have come tolive and work among us, who want so badly to become a contributorto the economic and social strength of our country in some lastingway.
There is no way we can be successful inthis war of unemployment without partners, and there is no wayCayman will have lasting partners, especially in these days. Andthe best way to start conveying that would be by reducing ourpropensity to instill unnecessary fear with the denial of freespeech and the tenets of human rights.
We and our kids are going to regret thisera. Because a war on unemployment that is fought only by wordsand further committee reports, will ultimately be unsatisfying.This war on employment is important, but it can never be definitivelywon, if we do not accept it as the worse it has ever been.
With some imagination, more broadly definedby focusing on the domestic front instead of the sessions takingplace overseas, could make the Cayman Islands economically healthier.
By declaring war on Cayman's present unemployment,there could be some assurance that there will be a resurgenceof the prosperity we once knew.