We all know the economy can’t grow enough to pull us out of
the mess we’re in. But economic growth
has been the solution for so long that we assume that it’s the solution now. It's time to explore alternatives to economic growth.
We’ve taught ourselves that the value of anything can be
measured in dollars. Corollaries:1. With enough money, you can have everything/anything you want
2. Money is power.
What this means is that people with lots of money are
powerful. And so it’s no wonder that
things are the way they are. People with
lots of money are literally vested in the economy. It is in their best interest to maintain the
idea that money and power are equivalent.
In our world today, the connection between money and power
is not an illusion: it is real. But it doesn’t have to be. The key to getting out of the current crisis
is decoupling money from power. The rich
and powerful won’t lead us out of this wilderness. We must help ourselves, and then we must help
those around us. The goal is to reduce
our reliance in the money economy. The
money economy has its place, but it shouldn’t control our lives and dictate
every move we make. Our economy is
gravely ill, and yet we rely on it for everything. Decreasing our reliance on it may help it
recover. But, sadly, the almost universally
accepted solution is to make everyone more
reliant on the economy.
There’s a limit to personal satisfaction
We use money to gain satisfaction. The value of something is related to the perceived
amount of satisfaction we gain from having/using/consuming/giving it. But satisfaction requires attention. And each person has a finite amount of
attention. So there’s a limit to the
amount of satisfaction we can experience.
Therefore we don’t need an unlimited amount of money; the key is to
appreciate what we have. Once we no
longer have enough attention to appreciate all the things we already have, it’s
time to stop accumulating possessions. Enough
is enough!
This idea is radical heresy to economic orthodoxy, which
states that economic growth is imperative to our collective survival. Growing the economy requires increasing
production, which requires increasing consumption. So the idea of individuals self-limiting
consumption is a grave threat to the economy. If the economy were everything, self-limiting
of consumption would be a bad thing. But
the economy isn’t everything.
[To be continued...]
