Customer Service in the 21st Century=what it is and where it is going.

Customer Service in the 21st Century=what it is and where it is going.

Introduction

The Business of the 21st Century more and more money, as much as we liked, without it being tied to any actual, hard, real value. This shift away from reality opened the gates for the biggest economic boom in history. Over the next three and a half decades, the American middle class exploded. As the dollar devalued and the on-the-books value of real estate and other assets inflated, ordinary people became millionaires. Suddenly credit was available to anyone, anytime, anywhere, and credit cards began popping up like mushrooms after a spring rain. To pay off those credit cards, Americans started using their homes as ATMs, refinancing and borrowing, borrowing and refinancing. After all, real estate always keeps going up in value, right? Wrong.

Discussion

By 2007 USA had pumped as much hot air into this financial balloon as it could take—and the fantasy came crashing down to earth again. And it wasn't just Lehman Brothers and Bear Stearns that collapsed. Millions lost their 401(k)s, their pensions, and their jobs. The number of people who areworking beyond the age of 65 is increasing. In the 1950s, when General Motors was the most powerful corporation in America, the press picked up a statement by GM's president and turned it into aslogan that carried for decades: “As GM goes, so goes the nation.” Well, that may not be all good news, because where GM went in 2009 was into bankruptcy, and by that same summer, the state of California was paying its bills with IOUs instead of cash. Savings accounts are smaller, if they exist at all, and family debt is greater. The number of people living officially below the poverty line ...