To expand access to true wealth, for all humanity.
My intent is to point us in a direction, to follow a path of simple logic that reveals to us the FACT that we have MADE IT, in terms of our capacity, our capability to provide a very high standard and quality of life for All humanity.
And as is true with all paradigm shifts, things that seem unsolvable and unconnected and are little recognized and contradictory, suddenly reveal a new reality that resolves the previously un-resolvable.
It sounds good and holy to be constantly going for high employment numbers.
Our major focus is on what I can do to “make money”, “make a living” and not on “What do I love to do?”, “What is in the best interests of all humanity?”, “What is in the best interests of the environment?”, “What is the most efficient way to deliver a particular product or service?”
In his 1981 book “Critical Path”, page 223, R. Buckminster Fuller states: “…60% of all the jobs in the U.S.A. are not producing any real wealth - i.e., real life support”. If this is even half way accurate, then it is quite clear that simply “putting people back to work” is not a genuinely desirable strategy.
The following four declarations are fundamental to this new opportunity/paradigm.
First Declaration.
THE CONDITION ON PLANET EARTH IS ABUNDANCE
WHAT IS ABUNDANCE?
Webster’s Seventh New Collegiate Dictionary, copyright 1972, defines abundance as: “an ample or overflowing quantity.” We should add: “to meet a particular need.“ Abundance is not just an unlimited supply of any and every particular thing. Abundance is a condition or a state in which results can be produced that are sufficient to fulfill all needs, indefinitely. In this state, there is no waste. Everything is recycled. All aspects of the environment are maintained in the most pristine condition possible.
The belief in either scarcity or abundance determines how financial, legal, political and military systems are set up or even exist at all. Scarcity and Abundance are foundational/contextual ideas.
In the U.S. there is the Pez Museum, the Museum of Spam, the Barbed Wire Museum, the Museum of Trash and a registry where one can name a star after someone as a gift. A group of people in The Netherlands spent 8 weeks setting up 4.3 million dominos in order to break 8 world records when knocking them down. If all of these exist, if human beings have the time and resources to engage in these endeavors then clearly the Condition is Abundance, at least for some.
Applying the rules of scarcity in a condition of abundance actually causes scarcity for many people in the midst of abundance for others. It causes undesirable side effects for everyone, such as
It would be far less costly, and more fulfilling, to devote our economic activity toward the success of ALL humanity
The recognition of the true condition (ABUNDANCE) will ease the task of making changes, that will continue increasing everyone’s standard and quality of living, despite population growth.
Second Declaration.
FINANCE IS NOT ECONOMICS
The Universe does require that we observe it’s laws, and these laws don’t change. For example, crops need a certain amount of sunlight, moisture and nutrients to optimize their yield, and airplanes require a specific amount of lift for each ton of cargo. There is constant and recurrent upset in financial matters because it is not fact based. The rules are changed and violated continuously. Among other systems, humans have tried barter, slavery, feudalism, communism, fascism, socialism and capitalism. None of them have nor can work long term. They are all out of sync with nature and therefore obsolete.
DETACHMENT
Monetary systems provide a “medium of exchange” that have become largely detached from the production, distribution & use of goods and services
the cities in which they are located (Detroit and Cleveland, for example). Some of them are vacant because the individual owners didn’t have enough money to pay the mortgage, and they were foreclosed on and forced out. At the same time the U.S. has millions of vacant houses there are millions of homeless or poorly sheltered people. So, there is plenty of supply, and plenty of demand. Any common sense solutions you can come up with?
WHAT IS MONEY AND FINANCE?
If money and finance are not economics, then what are they? Money is a management tool. Finance is a management system. We use them to manage an economy, to manage economic activity. And it is used to determine who gets access to goods and services, and how much access that one is to get.
This tool has become the purpose for and the reason why we do things. Money is the primary goal of most of what humans engage in. If it has no monetary value it is not counted as economic activity. We have almost completely lost awareness of the clear distinction between the tool and the thing being worked on.
Pure Economics starts from a different place entirely. It starts with the premise that the production and distribution processes must have zero, net negative environmental impacts. Pure Economics then asks: “What will use the least amounts of energy and materials and human labor? How much time is available for production and delivery? And finally Pure Economics requires that there is an existing infrastructure to deal with recycling all the materials in the product at the end of their use in this form.
Questions here: how can this method, another tool, not become the main focus, again?
The University of Michigan constantly measures consumer confidence. National economic policy is then set, in part based on consumer confidence. That is the equivalent of me taking you to the airport for a flight. You board the airplane and get comfortable. The pilot taxis out to the runway. Then he gets on the intercom and says: “Ladies and gentlemen, we were planning on flying to New York this morning, but I have no confidence that the laws of physics are working today, therefore I’m canceling this flight”. Flying airplanes doesn’t depend on confidence in the laws of physics, it depends on obeying the laws of physics. Disobey them and the airplane doesn’t fly, obey them and the airplane flies. The same requirement holds true for all activities. Confidence is a useless measure when used in this way. ???
But far and away the most destructive use of money is when it is used for control. Once most everyone is convinced “it takes money to live”, those who control the money control people, on both the societal
and…
FINANCE SUPPRESSES ABUNDANCE, DELIBERATELY
Humanity produces enough food to feed everyone. This is a purely economic function. Economics allows us to produce abundance. Finance values scarcity. When a thing gets too abundant, we cut the supply, in order to keep the price up.
COST OF A CLEAN ENVIRONMENT?
the “cost” of cleaning up the environment or the “cost” of not polluting in the first place. This is absolutely nonsensical when one understands that the
environment is the economy. The very idea that there is a “cost” in having a pristine environment is proof positive that finance has been confused with economics.
this almost sounds like a pitch for economy over finance… I know this is not the reason but it might be side tracking attention or intent
TECHNOLOGY VS. THE ENVIRONMENT?only appropriate measure of the economy is: “sustaining access to an equal standard and quality of living for ALL human beings”.
Economic progress is measured by increases in efficiency and in the capacity to transcend limits, for example: communications satellites are more efficient than copper cables, and: flying enabled us to transcend travel limits in both time and distance.
Once again, this sounds like the structure will override and limit the natural capacity of human creativity
Nonetheless, is the structure pointing at something that already is -as you said- and once this has been accomplished the structure becomes obsolete, like the cocoon to the butterfly?
This opportunity is truly about everyone benefiting.
How?
Ludicrous, isn’t it? No farmer in his right mind would do it. Why? Because the farmer, and you and I, understand, intuitively, that the Universe is a “pre-pay” system. The result comes after the seeds are planted, they are watered and given nutrients, they receive sunlight and warmth, and they mature over a period of time. Everything in the Universe works this way. The result comes after the crude oil is refined, the parts are assembled for the television and the airplane or the road is paved.
??
Third Declaration.
YOU AND I AND EVERY HUMAN HAVE EQUAL VALUE
Education is one way that developed societies, actually, already demonstrate the equal value of everyone. We strive to give everyone, equally, an education to specific standards. AND, we have found that this is so valuable to society as a whole, that we not only give it we also require that everyone receive a minimum amount of it. The most advanced societies make the highest education available for no cost. This is the perfect model to duplicate for all the other aspects of life support and sustenance and quality.
I would have to say that education is not meeting the need in that it does nothing to value or promote the development of spiritual knowing in the individual. Once the mind is engaged in the thinking process it will want to use its capacity and thus technology etc. but the ability to find the human element with god, that is, with the wisdom to see how the big picture and the small picture are one (as you have described so well here in making the distinction between economics and finance), these capabilities are not invested in-because they don’t make money. Thus, how would the educational system look if it did not cater to the prolonging of the dysfunction which you have pointed out.?
Fourth Declaration.
ALL HUMANITY IS IN THIS TOGETHER
money is a motivator, a strong one.
What happens, what does it feel like when this changes?
William I couldn't get this on to the sandbox forum, so here it is. It were my notes so I began by simply copying things that felt important somehow, then i changed to using color for my questions. Please do keep in mind that I have had time limits and if my reading was not thorought, pls. excuse.
The Story of a New Economy
