Starbucks CEO Issues Open Letter, Calls For Job Creation

Not often does a billionaire chief executive of a prominent American brand assert that our system is effectively broken. Yet this is what Howard Schultz, chief executive officer of Starbucks, essentially told me this week when we sat down to discuss the open letter he was about to address to the nation.

A few weeks earlier, he had been absorbing a dispiriting run of news -- the prospect of another round of perilous brinkmanship over lifting the nation's debt ceiling, and a presidential campaign that seems disconnected from the crisis of joblessness -- when it occurred to him that Independence Day was approaching. He imagined the traditional fireworks and celebratory banter. It seemed wrong.

"It's a false celebration," Schultz told me. "I question the promise of America today."

This is the genesis of the letter he plans to serve up in coming days via full-page advertisements in national publications, including the Wall Street Journal and The New York Times. In strikingly direct terms, the man who added frappuccino to the American lexicon decries what has been happening -- or not happening -- within these nominally United States. He assails the political dysfunction that invariably suffocates attempts at improving national fortunes. He calls on Americans to take matters into our own hands, fashioning local solutions to problems left unaddressed by a leadership void in Washington.

"Millions of Americans are out of work," Schultz declares in his letter. "Many more are working tirelessly yet still unable to adequately care for their families. Our veterans are not being welcomed home with the level of support they deserve. Meanwhile, in our nation's capital, our elected leaders are continuing to put ideology over real solutions. I love America, but we all know there is something wrong, and that we are better than this. The deficits this country must reconcile are much more than financial. Our inability to solve our own problems is sapping our national spirit."


http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/06/29/starbucks-ceo-issues-open_n_1632674.html?1340983336&ncid=edlinkusaolp00000009