Moral Philosophy on Money.

Kia-ora

Somebody who puts it much better than I can.
Alistair McIntyre on money.
“MacIntyre maintains, however, that the system must be understood in terms of its vices—in particular debt. The owners and managers of capital always want to keep wages and other costs as low as possible. “But, insofar as they succeed, they create a recurrent problem for themselves. For workers are also consumers and capitalism requires consumers with the purchasing power to buy its products. So there is tension between the need to keep wages low and the need to keep consumption high.” Capitalism has solved this dilemma, MacIntyre says, by bringing future consumption into the present by dramatic extensions of credit.
This expansion of credit, he goes on, has been accompanied by a distribution of risk that exposed to ruin millions of people who were unaware of their exposure. So when capitalism once again overextended itself, massive credit was transformed into even more massive debt, “into loss of jobs and loss of wages, into bankruptcies of firms and foreclosures of homes, into one sort of ruin for Ireland, another for Iceland, and a third for California and Illinois.” Not only does capitalism impose the costs of growth or lack of it on those least able to bear them, but much of that debt is unjust. And the “engineers of this debt,” who had already benefited disproportionately, “have been allowed to exempt themselves from the consequences of their delinquent actions.” The imposition of unjust debt is a symptom of the “moral condition of the economic system of advanced modernity, and is in its most basic forms an expression of the vices of intemperateness, and injustice, and imprudence.”

When it comes to the money-men, MacIntyre applies his metaphysical approach with unrelenting rigour. There are skills, he argues, like being a good burglar, that are inimical to the virtues. Those engaged in finance—particularly money trading—are, in MacIntyre’s view, like good burglars. Teaching ethics to traders is as pointless as reading Aristotle to your dog. The better the trader, the more morally despicable.

Solutions. Discussing money.

Kia-ora

Currency does not have to be based on anything. 98% of money now is fiat currency issued by private banks.
Its issue is too important to be left to banks instead of being under democratic control.
There are well known problems with resource based currencies and no real reason why a currency should be resource based to be credible.
All currency is a token of labour productivity, present or future.
The trillions of US$ debt at present exceeds any possible future US productivity many times.
For a sustainable economy we need to return to the idea of money as a medium of exchange, not as a commodity which can be magically increased in a computer unsupported by work.
The central bank should be the only issuer of money and the whole concept of interest and charges on the economy by the financial sector needs to be revisited.
Their share of GDP has grown rapidly since the withdrawal of restrictions on them since the 70′s (80′s in NZ) without any corresponding benefits to society as a whole.
Instead we are all supposed to have austerity imposed on us to pay their gambling losses.

The madness continues.

Kia-ora

Meanwhile, as the neo-liberal circus carries on, China is spending as much of their US dollars as possible in buying concrete assets and resources before the $US becomes as valueless as blankets and beads.

New Zealand continues to invest pension and other funds in $US investments (Money market gambling)..
Without the productive capacity and income within NZ to support pensioners and other investors in future it does not matter how much is saved. Re-introducing money into an economy which does not have the capacity to absorb it simply inflates that money to the degree the goods and services are not available.

The money would be better invested now in NZ  in infrastructure, education (For useful jobs such as the trades and engineering) and sustainable energy efficient production to ensure our kids have a future. And so the can keep us in old age.

That is if the US$ has not inflated to be almost valueless because there are already more dollars floating around than can ever be redeemed by future US productivity.

More solutions. The First Light Passive Solar House.

Kia-ora

First Light. House

Designed by Kiwi's for a US competition.



The Kiwi bach as an energy saving dwelling.

The end gme in Britain.

Kia-ora

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article26743.htm

"This is not to say Parliamentary politics is meaningless. They have one meaning now: the replacement of democracy by a business plan for every human activity, every dream, every decency, every hope, every child born".

"Where Britain goes, We will follow".

South America has broken from the Neo-Lib path.

Kia-ora

http://www.cepr.net/index.php/op-eds-&-columns/op-eds-&-columns/how-argentina-jump-started-its-economy

Despite the predictions of disaster they are doing well since they turfed the IMF prescription.

Five Zombie Economic Ideas That Refuse to Die - By John Quiggin | Foreign Policy

Five Zombie Economic Ideas That Refuse to Die - By John Quiggin | Foreign Policy

Kia-ora

The ideas that ruined the Western World.

Five Zombie Ideas.


"Trickle-down economics was conclusively refuted by the experience of the postwar economic golden age. During this "Great Compression," massive reductions in inequality brought about by strong unions and progressive taxes coexisted with full employment and sustained economic growth".

mars 2 earth: living well - a Bolivian view

mars 2 earth: living well - a Bolivian view

Kia-ora

"Living Well means living within a community, a brotherhood, and particularly completing each other, without exploiters or exploited, without people being excluded or people who exclude, without people being segregated or people who segregate.

Lying, stealing, destroying nature possibly will allow us to live better, but that is not Living Well. On the contrary, Living Well rather means complementing one another and not competing against each other, sharing, not taking advantage of one’s neighbor, living in harmony among people and with nature. It is the basis of the defense of nature, of life itself and of all humanity, it’s the basis to save humanity from the dangers of an individualistic and highly aggressive, racist and warmongering minority."

Energy and the Economy.

Kia-ora

Copy of my comment on Frogblog on energy.
http://blog.greens.org.nz/2010/09/23/dams-sustainable-and-permanent/#comment-159237


“We have so many good options in NZ or renewable power that compared to most countries we are spoiled for choice.


Unless we are invaded for energy, food and living space which would be a strong possibility. I do not see the people who happily murder just to become richer sitting put and starving while countries like NZ and Australia are available.


I agree with Kevin. Apart from bigger schemes that work on already degraded areas like Stockton. Reducing demand with green buildings, energy efficient transport and lower energy technology is one strand.
Renewable energy. Distributive generation, bio-mass solar water heating, wind, geothermal, solar tidal and run of the river hydro are the other.

I gave an example above of how the timber industry. (To build Green houses) can produce all its own renewable energy from the waste stream.


These are only very approximate numbers to get the idea. I have some, but do not have the time to wade through all my papers at the moment. Orders of magnitude are close enough to show the theory. Changes in technology may mean more or less contribution. Bio fuels from sewerage are now looking more promising than first thought. Especially for farming which produces lots of it. . Those tractors will be run on bio-methane produced on site.


Electric urban transport. (Trains and cars). Reduce transport fossil fuel demand by 50%. 100 PJ saved. Green buildings in California reduce demand by 15% 20 PJ saved.
All houses with solar heating. 40 PJ saved.
Ships and trains for long distance transport another 50 PJ saved.
Distributed generation by households on a smart grid. 50 PJ.
Council woody waste 4PJ. Bio-mass (Sewage plants) 10 PJ.
Forestry waste stream. 9 PJ short term. Up to 20 medium term.


It will require a lot of work and commitment, but I do not see why we cannot be 100% renewable in electricity and 50% in transport fuels by 2020 if we started now. Good for employment too.
Get the idea. New Zealanders are well placed to have a good life style with our current resources and technology.


There will likely even be some surplus for exports to pay for things which it is not sensible to produce locally. The French and Russians will sell us all the weapons we may need.



The caveats are. We need to start NOW.
WE NEED TO CHANGE TO AN ECONOMY WHICH SUPPORTS A DECREASING USE OF RESOURCES”.



We cannot afford to wait until politicians, who have too much invested in the current system, do something.


Carrying on as we are is not an option. Niether is a reversal to some agrarian horse drawn utopia.
This requires a change from the bottom up. Real democracy.

Values.

Kia-ora

“People with strong intrinsic values must cease to be embarrassed by them. We should argue for the policies we want not on the grounds of expediency but on the grounds that they are empathetic and kind; and against others on the grounds that they are selfish and cruel. In asserting our values we become the change we want to see.”
George Monbiot

We should fight those who  are destroying our society with self interest and greed..