Brad’s Take

Just words.

Over the past couple of weeks I have learned a couple of things, learned while responding to John Michael Greer’s Archdruid Report articles on Peak Oil, the economic decline and speculation on the coming post-industrial society/culture. JMG refers to the current changes in America as “becoming a third world nation.”

1. Affluence. This is the distance between a person and rote labor.
2. Efficiency. This is the elimination of waste that affects return on investment, almost always measured in currency, and taken from the perspective of the owner/investor in a commercial or industrial venture.

The Archdruid Report.

JMG uses the term household economy to describe the production, exchange, and consumption of goods and services amongst the home and family, that doesn’t involve a cash flow. This is somewhat akin to Sharon Astyk’s informal economy, which I prefer. Setting an informal economy in relationship to a formal, cash-based economy makes the distinctions easy to label and to comprehend. The term informal economy has the additional benefit of identifying why it is disparaged by those involved in maximizing profits for employers, investors, and tracking cash flow for governments.

Can there be affluence in an informal economy? Yep. If affluence is avoiding the need to perform physical labor, then have kids. As the children mature, put them to work. Presto. Work gets done that Mom and Dad don’t have to do – affluence.

Today JMG advocates many families re-evaluate the cost of that second income. He points out that, in pure cash terms, it makes sense for many families to abandon that second income, and keep one adult at home. Reduce paid child care and housekeeping costs, qualify for a lower income tax bracket, and garden and cook from scratch instead of ready-to-eat dishes and meals.

And JMG laments that no one will take this eminently sensible advice.

Affluence.

There have been people in recorded history that turned from a cash-based affluence to lead a “simpler” life. Others refuse to leave enlisted ranks in the military, or advance into supervisory or management roles, because they prefer the craft and skills they exhibit every day, to the affluence and isolation of a strategic, rather than a tactical, definition of their work life.

But most people are driven to accumulate more assets than they consume this week. The taste of “running out” or sometimes lessons from elders that survived shortages of food, water, shelter, and other necessities of life, warns us that in bad times, we may need to rely on things saved in better times, when more assets were available.

Formal economy forces turn this cultural drive to conservation into . . ambition.

Ambition.

Ambition comes in many forms. Ambition is the need to build up the pantry, so that low-cost food is available when needed. Ambition is investing in a growing business, so that more money is generated for later times. Ambition is a community or business recognizing that good managers and supervisors are able to increase the efficiency (rate of cash return to the investor) of an organization. And convincing people that they are worth more to the community and business in advanced levels of responsibility and authority – and thus ambition has come to be a societal imperative to advance one’s career. To improve the efficiency of the company. For more efficient returns of cash to the investor, the owner.

A change in perspective.

A couple of points JMG overlooked, in advocating single-family incomes. While he acknowledges derision about becoming a house-husband or house-wife, he only recognizes that choosing to abandon outside-the-home income is a sacrifice. That is, choosing to live with less cash and greater home autonomy now because the need is coming soon anyway, and getting a head start while society still provides lots of options while gathering tools and implements to better survive coming harsh times just makes sense.

At the same time JMG describes his household economy he doesn’t make plain that it is described in different terms than the formal, commercial and industrial cash economy. Sharon’s informal economy, however, makes fairly plain that the services and goods are evaluated on a barter system, on an ad hoc basis. Applying my own, new word – I would contend that affluence, avoiding rote work, is present in the formal economy by hiring or buying necessities. What affluence there is in the informal economy is expressed by doing work one enjoys, or that can be traded for what is desired.

A different affluence.

What JMG suggests – reducing unemployment, reducing the clutter and waste of pre-packaged, pre-prepared foods and goods, reducing out-of-home costs by choosing one partner to function at home, is nothing less than redefining affluence from dollar terms, to a more fundamental “distance from rote labor” – and recognizing that we aren’t really all that affluent today.

Thoughts?