Toward a human economics ... cont

First 5 additions to yesterdays critique of economics...

1) Economics does not measure that which is naturally given. Thus sunshine, oxygen, rainfall, growth, sunsets, natural beauty etc. All these have fundamental value yet it is not measured very well in economics. People may pay to enter a national park or a zoo to wonder at natural beauty and form but "nature" gets no payment so who does this money belong to? Nature does not charge us for its services. Thus we do not pay for the pleasure of having an "eye" for example. This type of fundamental value is not currently measured, only the relative value of exchange. Thus I might exchange my eye for a new kidney altho the value of each is unique and personal.

This I see links directly with the discussion on measuring before. One cannot measure absolutes only hold one things against another and compare quantitatively. Obviously money as a measure of value will only ever compare things.

2) The analysis of the mechanisms was money flow were not made clear enough. The physical mechanism of money transfer and the availability of money themselves have important impacts on the value of things. As I will expand below money is not a simple ballot system to find which is most valuable.

3) The issue of built in obsolescence has slipped from these pages. The absurd feature of commersialism that it is better to produce cheaper products that break than to produce more expensive ones that last a lifetime. It is absurd because it creates unnecessary work for no gain, and it is absurd because it results in far greater cycling of raw materials and environmental degredation than is necessary for the same products.

4) The divison of private and company time. When for example we phone customer services to gain a refund on an error we have to work for free while the company funds the customer services out of the company profits. Thus the cost of products is higher to compensate and we effectively end up paying for our own customer services. We pay twice. This is another example of a type of work that is not measured by the prevailing economics.

5) Just to recap there is the fantastic feature of economics that not only must we work to create the products that we need, but we must buy the things we don't need to create jobs. This puts the cart far before the horse and creates work and environmental degredation where none is needed.

The Prevailing System.
Continuing the argument from the last blog the benefits of the current system can be seen.

On the principal that each person has equal rights and needs we distribute equal voting tokens to each person (say £100/person/week). They then purchase in the normal way and the money accumulated by each company represents their relative value in the market place. This way exchange value can be determined and non productive companies will be closed. The government collects these tokens and redistributes them. Thus circumenting an unequal salary system.

This is extremely naive and reveals the logic of the rest of the system.

Suppose that an individual like myself does not spend very much. In other words I start to accumulate voting tokens. Gradually the number of tokens in the system will reduce. People will be given progressively less than the opening £100 and correspondingly will be prepard to spend less and prices will fall. As my stash increases my spending power will grow doubly and if I form a cartel we can end up in a position where we can buy anything completely skewing the system. This is worse than what happens now.

If the government claimed all tokens back at the end of each cycle and regarded the unspent ones as a vote for "nothing" this would encourage people to buy things anyway. This is exactly aspect 5 above to be avoided!

If on the other hand the government recycled the tokens but continued to acknowledge your continual ownership then we have the fractional banking system which is also to be avoided and massive inflation as the limited money supply gets reused many times.

Work?
This is just the markets. The next problem is work. If we all got identical tokens by right of living then wouldn't we shop instead of work? Where is the incentive to make things?

The original reason to make thinge was that we did not have them and to get them we must make them. This is reflected in the current system that we must work before we receive the products of that work. Except that our work is exchanged for money and we exchange our money for goods.

This represents the simple personal situation perfectly. But in reality it is never like this. 10 people hunt a deer, 10 people build a house, 10 people farm crops. One person by himself does not get very far. So actually it is 10 people who earn the wages and 10 people who spend them. So what relation does each person have to the community? Under what circumstances do we say that someone is taking more out than they put in? Add to this the problem that occurs when technology increases the productivity of the group, or even makes certain jobs and skills redundant. The group can exchange its products on the market for money but how does the group then decide how to exchange that money.

The current solution is to reduce it to the individual situation. We each market ourselves. If one group offers us a higher share than another then we can change groups. But other non economic factors like enjoying the people of one group more than another may affect our decision.

In the current system "group" refers to legally registered company which is based upon a financial loan and an owner of that capital. Of course a "group" pays back the investment so in theory the group owns the group. But this is not the Capitalism model. There are rewards for risk and also property rights involved. Certainly an entrepreneur takes a risk that employees do not take. But in reality groups are abitrary and it is worth considering the group of all human beings. This group works together and produces products for itself. It is the highest level of human super organism. Strange that few people think at this level which is every bit as real as a registered company. Above this lies the greater groups of ecology, but these do not exchange their goods and "labour" on an exchange and are not measured.

While I brainstorm here to consider the bee. Famously contrasted to the archetect by Marx. But both do provide an exchangeable product. Honey is exchangeable for money as are building plans. The difference though is that the archetect expects to be paid for his "labour" while the "bee" gets given a one off payment of a hive and is expected to do the rest itself. The bee keeper by contrast might be expected to be paid per hour for his labour in collecting honey. Arguments have been created to show that the bee does not work because work requires conscious intention.

I don't think the markets care whether it was conscious intention that made something or a bee or a machine. The product is exchanged as what it is. The money raised by that is then distributed within the group who created the product. If the product is not very valuable but requires huge amounts of manhours (like for example counting the grains of sand on a beach) no one will accept that wage and that product won't be made. If on the other hand a pin factory can buy a machine which requires 1 operator to produce £1000 worth of pins a day then it becomes viable. The idea of our "time" being paid is a myth. We simply get a share of what has been made.

Just arguing this out loud I see the link between time by money is not only a myth but is also highly dangerous. When products are produced per hour rather than per product then the whole nature of work is changed. Workers agreeing to a wage per hour leads industrialists to require products per hour and neither us nor the product determines the work.

Per hour of course is also an inhumane constract.

A share of the exchanged value seems to be the logical way to distribute wages.

I've no more time here but the brief further argument was that to get people to work we might need to either qualify them for shopping tokens only if they work or make work compulsory which is exactly what we have.

Crudely then the reasons for the current system are laid out and the requirements for the new system also.