Focus on Life™

We focus on growth—it’s everything. Our current economy is based on the ever-expanding growth paradigm. It does not work without it. Our monetary base grows every year. Valuations need to grow, as well as profits and revenues. The society is driven by this growth mania.

And how do we do this? By producing and consuming more, or should I say evermore, ever-expanding. And by consuming more we feed more needs to expand the business and acquire new resources to fulfil the needs of the growth. And so the cycle goes on and on—but not forever. Sole expansion is not natural, it pairs with contraction, in nature that is.

Seldom we start to question the basis of the assumptions and thinking underneath. What is the purpose of the growth and why is it needed? Some would say that it is because of money. And in many ways they are right. The fiat money system is built upon a hypothesis of ever-expanding promises of debt that are not paid back but rolled over. It requires more units of money to survive. As a result of this there are only raising prices and continuous inflation (expansion). For example US dollar has lost over 95% of its value since 1913 when the Federal Reserve was established. Does this create wealth for all the citizens using the legal tender?

But coming back to the question why the growth and what’s the purpose of it. More money does not answer the question; it only explains the way the current system is working. Actually money has nothing do with the real issue—it’s only a poor middleman that is often misunderstood to be the purpose when it can only be the means for something else. Money is used to obtain goods, services, or intangible needs such as security. We would not consume more simply because our monetary system requires so. There is something else underneath that feeds the requirements and keeps the wheels turning. And once again we are getting back to each and every one of us, individually. No company consume, buy, sell, manufacture, or invest—only people do. Structures are mere tools and vehicles for our purposes, ignore them long enough and they disappear. There is no one to blame but us. It’s not the economy, stupid—it’s us, the people!

We have bought the idea and assume that more is better. More money means something better, more consumption provides with something more and so on. Having more is the key and this having is the cause of the ever-expansion in our needs. But if you never consider why you need to have more you will never approach the real issue, you simply will act to gain more of something—forever and ever more.

Wanting is easy. Also having more is relatively easy, even though it takes its toll. But being happy has nothing to do with wanting or having. Confucius once said: “they must often change who would be constant in happiness or wisdom.” It looks that buying happiness does not seem to work despite all the consumption and material well-being. Maybe it is time to reconsider our assumptions and beliefs that define our current growth paradigm, individually?

Back from holiday. It was great to chill out and learn to ‘do nothing’ for a while. Also doing sports seems to give some good kicks…

Beside reading some Donald Ducks I found Jeremy Rifkin’s: The End of Work as a pretty good eye-opener. The book gives a good overview of the recent few hundred years of industrial revolution and its effects for the labour force. In the past the unemployed workers could find work from other areas of economy after the productivity increases made them redundant. The case has always been the same - it’s more cost effective to invest for capital goods than hire new people.

The scary part is that the cycle has come to an end. There is no more sectors and new ones are not created that will absorb the amount of unskilled, skilled and even middle management people who have lost their jobs. Previously the agriculture, manufacturing, services and the government as the employer of the final resort kept people busy. Unfortunately this is not the case anymore. The economical law used to be that the supply will create the demand and the consumption will increase the economy. Henry Ford raised the salaries for his employees in order to boost his own sales by noting that he needs customers. How about those 7-20 % of the population who are unemployed in developed nations? They do not afford to spend lavishly and they also eat the consumption power of the working population thanks to higher taxes. Not even talking about the demographics: in 2050 almost every second citizen is 65 or more of age…Every second!

The book suggested that the third sector will be the answer for the increased free time. I agree but still I could not be without thinking even further. Today our whole society is built and based on the fact of consumption. ‘ You are what you earn and what you do for living’. But how about a time when the basic needs are satisfied and the basic goods are not the issue anymore. Also working is becoming less important since so many people simply do not have that much to do. Machines and IT takes care of the routines. Already now some 85 % of all work tasks are just some routine processes. What are we going to doing in the future and how are we going to measure our success?