Is this the end of an era? I think it is. My view on the matter is that the era of economic growth is over, kaput, finished. If you stop for a minute to think about it, you must admit that we live on a finite planet, that we are rapidly using up the available resources, that we are adding ever more pollution to our air, water and land, and that the distance (in time) between the end of the production line and regional dump is growing ever shorter. This cannot continue. Nature shows us that nothing grows forever. What would it be like if children never stopped growing? What happens as insect or animal populations grow? They either level off or experience a catastrophic collapse.
A contribution by credit commons pioneer Thomas Greco:
“Many people today are in a quandary about their personal savings and investments. The conventional advice has it that every family should have three to six months’ living expenses squirreled away. But that begs another question which is, in what form should that ‘nest egg’ be held?
Is it safe and prudent to leave it in a bank? Should I buy bonds, or stocks, or real estate, or commodity futures? How can I balance risk with income and capital appreciation? These are questions that are difficult to answer even in “normal” times, but the present situation seems especially uncertain. The near financial meltdown of a couple of years ago coupled with the ongoing stream of bad economic news leads one to wonder, along with billionaire George Soros, is this the end of an era?
I think it is. My view on the matter is that the era of economic growth is over, kaput, finished. If you stop for a minute to think about it, you must admit that we live on a finite planet, that we are rapidly using up the available resources, that we are adding ever more pollution to our air, water and land, and that the distance (in time) between the end of the production line and regional dump is growing ever shorter. This cannot continue. Nature shows us that nothing grows forever. What would it be like if children never stopped growing? What happens as insect or animal populations grow? They either level off or experience a catastrophic collapse.
So, if we cannot expect the economy to return to what has been “normal” in our past, what can we expect? I believe that we must, and in fact are right now transitioning toward a steady-state economy, one in which overall quantitative growth is supplanted by qualitative development, i.e., an improvement in the conditions of life that really matter,
This is a transition that I compare to the metamorphosis of the caterpillar into the butterfly. The caterpillar’s role is to eat and to grow, i.e., to accumulate the resources that will be used during the chrysalis stage by the emergent butterfly as it assembles itself into a new and different creature. The butterfly behavior contrasts sharply with that of the caterpillar. While the caterpillar can be very destructive as it devours plants, the butterfly helps to pollinate them as it sips nectar from their blossoms.
So, if this is an apt description of what is going on, we ought to withdraw our resources from Wall Street investments that perpetuate “the Caterpillar economy” of endless consumption and despoliation, and start investing in “the Butterfly economy,” which is more equitable, sustainable and restorative of the environment upon which our lives ultimately depend.
This can be achieved through
* the Localization of Production,
* on a Human Scale,
* for Local Consumption,
* using Locally Available Inputs.
As our communities become more self-reliant, we become more secure, providing for ourselves more of our food, energy, housing and other necessities of life.
Right now, the economy is in a depression because in the wake of the last bubble-bust cycle the private productive sector is being starved for credit while the wasteful government-military-industrial-financial sector is appropriating ever more resources to keep itself alive. There is not much we can do about that since the political power is mainly in the hands of those interests. But we can use our own resources in our own communities to secure a better future for ourselves and our descendants.
In a depression “cash is king” because many people don’t have enough of it to cover ordinary living expenses. At the same time, the money powers are inflating the currency at unheard of rates, so ultimately fixed-dollar securities, including bank deposits, will be eaten up by rising prices.
If savers and small investors can buy into local enterprises that provide returns as a share of their actual product, they can achieve some measure of security (in food and energy, for example) while transforming depreciating dollars into something (like food, or alcohol for fuel to replace gasoline) that will become increasingly valuable as time goes on. Use value is becoming more important than market value, and personal responsibility and local cooperation are becoming more important than reliance upon declining institutions and structures.”
(written by request of author and alternative financial consultant, Susan Boskey ([email protected])
The opportunity in this, as I see it, is that after the collapse (omega phase) we finally have a chance to reorient ourselves from a competitive economy (r phase and K phase) to a cooperative one (alpha phase).
I don’t think we can fall back to strictly local enterprises and locally sources products and services because this isn’t necessarily the most efficient use of limited resources. Global sharing of resources and ideas (and global repairing of ecosystems) is necessary to avoid dropping into a very dark place and is more secure for everyone involved.
In this regards I think the P2P and collaborative consumption models are essential, but I also think that we need a way to tie our concept of value intrinsically to planetary ecosystems.
A resource for storing and transmitting this value could be documented global warming preventive activities.
These have four essential qualities:
1. They represent a real and common economic and survival need of everyone on the planet;
2. They have a measurable physical basis with universal standards of accounting signed off on my the UN and all governments;
3. They are democratically accessible to nearly everyone;
4. They are an indicator of goodwill because the have a non-discriminatory benefit.
This value can be captured through locally issued ‘Emissions Reduction Currency’ provided that the well established IPCC and ISO accounting practices are adhered to. There is no need to engage the political process in establishing them. They can be self funding through inclusion of advertising on notes. While being issued locally they can be exchanged globally on the basis of the quantity of CO2-equivalent global warming prevention that they represent. They can start small and ‘scale’ up organically as liquidity and acceptance in the economy increases. They can provide a certainty of revenue in areas that lack access to other items of value to the general economy and can be used in this way as an adaptive measure and safety net for otherwise impoverished communities.
Thomas Greco: “the era of economic growth is over, kaput, finished.”
Jct: No, when money is fixed and all resources are then diverted to production and not finance, the era of economic growth of industrial power, not financial power, will deliver maximum employment at the fastest rate, maximum industrial efficient power.