It aint consumption thats bad in and of itself, it’s when your only commodity is a bundled instrument of debt and you’ve managed to make labor and local business a pejorative that it becomes a dead end.

The geniuses in our beloved Federal District seem to have only boned up on the Cliff Notes Version of Keyne’s Played Out Vein of Consumption Economics, the one that just says “spend”…or, bomb and strafe….or preferably both .”Pretend that fair is foul and foul is fair”………I was not previously aware that penury could be so artfully arranged. Perhaps the Big Game of Keynesian Post Office will come to an end and we can finish this epic little Mexican Standoff we’re having. Then we can return to the Fair is fair and foul, foul reality normally associated with rational behavior.

I highly recommend you listen to episode #140 here – it is the most profound analysis of the Growth Imperative I’ve ever heard:

http://c-realmpodcast.podomatic.com/

The gist of it starts @ 6:30 and stops about 2/3ds of the way thru, with a musical interlude you may want to fast-forward. Thomas Homer-Dixon makes a convincing case that the Growth Imperative is intimately tied to the fierce determination of post-WWII economists and other elites to forestall conditions that would give rise to Fascism and another Holocaust. Seen in this light, their impulse is not ignoble. However, this does not change the fact that Perpetual Growth lives on Man’s vices rather than his virtues…and that it is rapidly depleting and destroying Man’s home planet.

Check my posting “End of Consumption” here:

http://entropicjournal.blogspot.com/2009/02/end-of-consumption.html

Of course perpetual growth is not possible on a finite planet, and for millennia wise men and women have known that greed and gluttony are not good for the human soul. Duh.

But here is the trap: thanks to centuries of mechanization and automation, most people depend on employment that has NOTHING to do with fundamental human needs. So when people “go thrifty” – MASSIVE unemployment ensues. This is why our elites are freaking out. THey turn the interest rate knob to zero; they print and throw trillions into banks…and nothing happens!

But blaming the guys on the top is a waste of time; they are nothing more than PERFECT reflections of us.

We-the-consumers demand the lowest prices.

We-the-business owners demand the lowest costs.

We-the-investors demand the highest rates of return.

Thus we embrace virtually every new productivity improvement which reduces human labor per unit output of good or service. And what about the labor-destructive aspect of this wondrous “creative destruction”? What about NEEDING each other? Oh, that’s not my responsibility! A growing economy will create better jobs.

Oh. Like making houses three times larger than we need rather than only twice too big. Like making 3 ton armored personnel carriers to haul our children to school and soccer practice. Like producing vast excesses of junk food. Like making fossil-fueled toys for people to play on. Like making hugh numbers of sophisticated weapons and exporting them to places that are seen as “unstable”.

The cognative disconnect takes one’s breath away.

Unfortunately, this “growth” game may have to completely collapse before the human race becomes willing to try something else. Like living sustainably.

Mark T. Mitchell
James Madison Program
83 Prospect Ave.
Princeton University
Princeton NJ, 08540

Thanks again.

I am the author of a book devoted to this topic that I think you may find very interesting. It advances a new economic theory that explains how further population growth beyond some “optimum” level actually becomes cancerous; while it enhances the macroeconomy, it steadily raises unemployment and poverty and erodes the microeconomies of individuals. Since you have a great blog that obviously has a good following, I’d be very pleased to provide you with a complimentary copy if you would just E-mail me with a shipping address. No strings attached.

Pete Murphy
Author, “Five Short Blasts”

You make some very persuasive arguments for thrift and an end to consumerism. I also believe that you have hinted in an earlier post (What our hands have wrought) a need for more production in the USA and less services (indirectly due to more people producing making less available to produce services). You mention that the economy is currently bad and there may not be a quick fix as increase spending is not going to get us out of recessions/depressions every time (though it may this time). Your point being the economies cannot grow forever.

Personally I agree with you but I do have some questions that tickle at the back of my mind and one thought on economies expanding that you did not mention. The area of expanding economy that you did not mention is that the population of the world is growing as well as the population in the USA. This leads to new customers. These new customers can grow the economy without necessitating the need for an increase in per capita spending. The principle being I do not need to go from 10 people with $10 each to 10 people with $11 each to grow the economy if I go from 10 to 11 people with $10 each. As the world population grows it creates the need for the economy to grow as well. I would even suggest that if the world/national economy is not keeping up with the world/national population growth that there are people who are moving backwards financially.

Now for the questions that are in my mind:
1. Is there in our corporations around the world the idea of “Planned Obsolescence” to increase consumerism?
2. How do we decide if a GDP is actually growing or not with inflation and other ideas taken into account? If I produced 10 corns at $10 last year and now have 11 corns at $9 has the GDP grown or shrunk? I believe it will result in a 1 % shrinkage even though production is up.
3. Do we actually believe that it is good to be reactive to changes in the economy versus being proactive? Does the dog wag the tail or the other way around?
4. Is there a way to have a growing economy and not have vice? Does thrift actually lead to virtue or is thrift the virtue? I noticed that you listed thrift as a virtue.
5. If I grow my own food in my backyard does that help or hurt the GDP? It seems that it would hurt the GDP but actually is beneficial to the real economy of the country.
6. In today’s society is not my ordering from the $1 menu (no names mentioned to avoid lawsuits) thrifty? I am not sure that poisoning my body is a virtue.
7. Do lawsuits add to the GDP?

Finally spending as if there is no tomorrow does not makes any sense. I believe that while thrift has a technical definition it means many different things to many different people. I believe that the thrift you are referring to here may need to have a better definition in order for the “virtue” to be better understood.