Day 211: Labour Flexibility and Equal Money Capitalism

In Zimbabwe, the Reserve Bank has been laying off people as part of desperate cost-cutting measure. The employees that had been retrenched have not received their full retrenchment packages that they are supposed to get.

In the meantime, people are unemployed and are finding it hard to find a new job, with many resorting to work in the informal section. In Third World countries like Zimbabwe, entire families are often dependent on a single person’s income. This leaves many families suddenly without the necessary funds to pay for their medical aid, while kids are not going to school anymore since they can no longer afford to pay the school fees.

Some have gone as far as killing themselves as they succumbed to the stress of unemployment and no retrenchment package in sight.

In the light of all of this, one economist had the following perspective:

“The idea that people are deserving of compensation if their employers can no longer retain them has never been properly justified. The employees’ compensation for their labour was given to them as their wage every month while they were working. Why should compensation continue when their work is no longer needed?” Robertson told IPS.”

This is your typical ‘Free Martketeer’ opinion – where people are no longer considered as being living beings, but are reduced to mere commodities, which one should be able to hire and fire as one pleases. They also have a fancy word for it: “Labour Flexibility”.

Obviously a statement like this will only come from someone whose job is secure and will not find themselves being thrown around by the merciless tides of the labour market any time soon. The Corporation as an entity on its own has gained a superior status than living, breathing, human beings. The corporation is a dead thing – it’s merely an assembled structure. Yet, it’s the corporations who are in the position of ensuring life security to people, and when this is threatened there are consequences:

““The suffering of the retrenched workers is transferred to their families, children and spouses. Tension and stress grows, leading to unwarranted domestic disputes and eventual violence and abuse of children,” Bohwasi told IPS.”

Within Equal Money Capitalism, we get this.

That is why Labour Flexibility within Equal Money Capitalism will take on a whole new dimension. Instead of Labour Flexibility entailing the freedom of the corporation to hire and fire with no restrictions in place – Labour Flexibility will be a principle of understanding that one require to be Flexible with Labour, as it is clear that one will not always be able to occupy the same job position. This may be due to fluctuations in the needs and requirements of the population, the environment or technological innovation. Thus, within this flexibility, the corporation ensures that one can continue employment elsewhere (such as the compassion department), as the corporation understands and realizes that the only capital which matters is the Capital as Life as the employees who bring life into the corpus of the Corporation– and will thus tend to its Capital with the utmost care and respect.

To Read the full article on the Zimbabwe retrenchment disaster, go to: http://www.ipsnews.net/2013/03/zimbabwe-struggling-to-pay-laid-off-workers/

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Day 192: Demand and Flexibility in Equal Money Capitalism

This blog-post is a reply to a comment on the blog Day 172: Retirement and Holidays within Equal Money Capitalism.

What if the products or services of a company won't sell anymore, the demand ends or decreases, when a person is retired? It would affect employees too but they can change jobs.

When a company is unable to cover its cost and pay out its wages, they will receive additional funding from a Fund to which the profits go of companies who make a profit that is larger than required to cover their costs and wages. When such redistribution is required, an intervention takes place where know-how is transferred from effective companies to those who struggle to cover their costs.

When demand simply decreases or ceases to exist, the company can partially or completely re-invent itself in terms of seeing how it can use its experience, expertise and infrastructure towards providing different services and goods in the economy. If such re-direction causes momentary fluctuations in the flow of income, government steps in to provide support for the time being.

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• Day 163: Equal Money Capitalism - Redefining Profit
• Day 172: Retirement and Holidays within Equal Money Capitalism
• Day 175: The Economic Problem and Equal Money Capitalism
• Day 162: EQUAL MONEY CAPITALISM - The Way Forward
• Day 189: Will your Level of Education Determine your Income in EMC?
• Day 188: Simple Solutions in Equal Money Capitalism
• Day 182: Will we be Feeding the Fat Cats in Equal Money Capitalism?
• Day 173: Supply, Demand, Business and Scarcity in Equal Money Capitalism
• Day 165: Equal Profit Share and Equal Money Capitalism
• Day 190: Fairness in the Work Place and Equal Money Capitalism

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Day 189: Will your Level of Education Determine your Income in EMC?

This blog post is in relation to a comment placed on one of our previous blog-posts - you can check out the full comment at http://economistjourneytolife.blogspot.com/2013/02/day-188-simple-solutions-in-equal-money.html

~ Since I am the one who made the comment, I will rebuttal your response also.
First you are comparing green apples to red and saying they are worth the same at the register, which I tend to agree with. But, my comment was based more on someone that had 4 yrs of college or previous experience to someone who dropped out of high school.

We can not dismiss the expense of a higher education, or the value of years of previous experience, by paying say a gas station attendant of fast food server the same as the doctor or technician you spoke of. Indeed a doctor or technician, and even a plumber, electrician, or carpenter are needed just as much in today’s society.

Understand that within Equal Money Capitalism – education will no longer be a point of ‘investment’ from which you are expecting ‘returns’. This is one’s approach currently as the result of our environment which promotes competition and profit for the sake of self-interest where it’s ‘each one on his own’ – and is in essence an approach based within survivalism. There’s not enough jobs for everyone to go around with, and so people chose an education and career according to the prospect of money linked to that education/career. This is not a real decision/choice made within the consideration of one’s passions and interest – but based on a fear of not making it within this world and ending up with nothing. People who’ve currently  gone through a process of education and spent a lot of money and work getting there experience a sense of entitlement towards ‘getting a good pay’ – but only because they have experienced the process they went through as being an unpleasant one. If it wasn’t for the reward as ‘a good pay’ – these people wouldn’t have made the same education and career choices. Studying and working for an extended period of time to do a job you love and care about will be the reward itself. Within that, you are not going to be comparing yourself with what other people are doing and what process they went through – because what you are doing and the decisions you have made are merely the common sense outflows/results of your passion and what it is you like to do within Life. So, you’re not going to receive extra compensation for your perceived suffering, because you will not be going through a process of suffering. One’s approach towards education and careers will thus change completely.

In terms of financial investment, education is a basic human right, and thus will be provided by the government through tax-monies. In other words – you won’t have to pay for it specifically, because it is part of the ‘package’ you receive as part of your basic rights within developing yourself to your utmost potential. So – here, again, you will not be spending more money on an education for a doctor or any other type of education – so, here, again – there will not be a sense of ‘deserving’ a higher pay because one spent more money on study fees or study loans.

But there again we can very well pay someone who just started in the trade and has little knowledge or skills, the same as someone who as invested several years into learning and refining their trade. There are different values to ones experience within their chosen specialty, A company cannot afford to pay the unskilled as much because they aren’t capable of doing the job themselves.

Within Equal Money Capitalism the only value worth valuing is Life. It’s not about who can do what job or who went through what process of Education – it’s merely a point of you are here, you are alive and thus you will be supported to remain Life. The idea that a company cannot afford to pay the unskilled is merely the outflow of having polarized wages. Where those who are considered having a ‘special position’ receive way larger sums of income than those who are considered to be within an ‘average’ work position. Once this polarization is out of the way – there will be enough money to go around to reach everyone. Realise also that within the context of an Equal Money Capitalistic System – there will be no such thing as ‘an unskilled worker’.  Once one has completed one’s primary education,  a person will be multi-skilled and capable of a multitude of tasks due to the broad spectrum of education that will be in place.

If you start demanding that all employees and people are paid the same, then what happens is the less experienced workers begin to loose there jobs and their job opportunities as employers begin to limit their hiring to only skilled and experienced candidates. This creating a less people with experience because they can’t get any, and higher demands on the fortunate few who are working. Not to mention higher costs and shorter supplies of said products.

This will not be the case because in terms of equalizing wages – you will still end up with the same amount of costs in terms of paying out wages (if not less) – and as such there should be no reason why one would hire someone whose “overqualified” so to speak to do a job that someone who is less skilled can do at the same level of effectiveness. In addition, the labour market will not operate according to supply and demand. Providing employment forms part of a company’s social corporate responsibility. And decision-making such as you’ve outlined above would be considered unethical. Whenever a person no longer requires to perform a particular job within a company, the company is responsible to provide it with a different task. For companies to just take away a person’s income, which is a person’s lifeline is unacceptable. With such principles in place, it will be in the company’s best interest to ensure that each worker is trained to the best of their ability and to make appropriate matches between a person’s skill-set and their role in the company.

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Day 185: Students feel fee squeeze

“More matriculants than ever are seeking to enter the tertiary fold owing to an increasing matric pass rate. The pass rate has increased from 60.6% in 2009 to 73.9% for the class of 2012.
The percentage of students who quality for bachelor studies have also increased over the past five years, from 20.1% in 2008 to 26.6% in 2012.
But as university costs increase above inflation every year, students will need deep pockets before they can put on their graduation gowns.
At the University of Cape Town, the average bachelor of commerce degree has increased by about 40% over the past four years.”

“According to Gouws, if your child is born today, you will need to start saving R1 500 a months now for public schooling and a three-year degree and increase that annually to match inflation”.

- Mamello Masote, Money & Careers - Sunday Times, February 3, 2013

If you take into consideration median wage (not the average wage – which stands at about R 16 586 - since income is so unevenly distributed where the bottom 50% takes home less than 8% of the countries income, while the top 10% brings in 60% -- this number is not representative of what the ‘average’ person received as income) which is around R3000 a month – then how they hell is the bulk of the population supposed to support their children in receiving an education?

If 25% of the population is unemployed and where from the other 75% that is employed receive a median income of R3000 (which means 50% of that 75% receives less than R3000!) and you need R1500 per child to provide them with an education that might get them a job – that’s one bleak future for the children of South Africa.

Why are education costs so high for a country trying to battle unemployment? Are they deliberately setting up the market for labour to under produce skilled workers, because there’s simply not enough jobs anyway? So instead of acknowledging that the system doesn’t work, we can simply blame the uneducated population for not being skilled enough to fill in job positions. Because as long as people don’t get to that level of education, then the problem of there not being enough jobs can stay hidden.

In Equal Money Capitalism, Education will be part of one’s Basic Human Rights and thus guaranteed for all. The same goes for Employment as being one’s entry point to securing one’s well being through income. Currently there are not enough jobs because we are only focusing on jobs that will bring in profit. Within Equal Money Capitalism, jobs and job creation will no longer be tied to profit – but tied to Life – and in terms of supporting Life, there’s a lot of work to be done and so enough jobs will be available for all.

Imagine living a world where your Life and your Children’s lives are ensured. Where you do not have to slave away and deprive yourself just to be able to offer your children the slightest chance to a future. The implementation of Equal Money Capitalism will do exactly that.  With a system of Equal Money Capitalism, you can prepare yourself for a worry-free life of financial struggle and focus on what really matters, where more time and resources will be available to enjoy your family and participate in social events, while your children can enjoy high quality education.

For more blogs on Equal Money Capitalism, click here.

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Day 181: Applied Equality in Equal Money Capitalism

Within the current socio-economic system and liberal ideology – human beings are held as being of ‘equal value’. This equality is only held as a form of ‘abstract equality’ where in thought one can think of others as having ‘equal value’, but where in word and deed, this equality is not expressed.

People are thus not equally valued on the premise of Life, but are valued in so far that they have particular talents and skill sets. Since not everyone is born with the same skill sets: not everyone is valued equally, which is exactly how things operate currently, where different people have different values – whether you look at a CEO of a company or the janitor, or even at wages cross-borders, where say an Indian’s life-value is less than that of an American.

Valuing and giving people Life support according to one’s position and skills in this world, is thus not an effective way of practically applying the principle that ‘everyone is of equal value’.

The solution would thus be to go back to the initial point of equality, as you are here, you are Life – I am here, I am Life – thus common sensically, we require to be supported equally.

Within Equal Money Capitalism, access to resources is still granted through employment, and thus employment becomes a guarantee. Within this, each one will receive an equal income which in fact reflects the liberal principle of holding each one as being of equal value.

This will transform the concept of Equality to an actual principle of Integrity rather than the feel-good word with empty promises that it has become today. Living actual equality will reduce stress and depression immensely as one is not constantly put in a position where one is under-valued – each one’s value is recognised equally. This will also bring into effect the aim of individualism as outlined within liberalism, whereby we have constructed a society wherein individuals can flourish and develop and become the best possible version of themselves.

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Day 177: Will there still be Retrenchment in Equal Money Capitalism?

For context, please read:

Amplats should cut costs rather than retrench, says Amcu
http://mg.co.za/article/2013-01-18-00-amplats-should-cut-costs-rather-than-retrench-says-amcu

The Problem

“The Association of Mineworkers and Construction Union has called on government to intervene in Anglo Platinum's plans to retrench 14 000 employees.

It has also called for government to revoke the mining licences of the soon to be mothballed shafts in Rustenburg, possibly even nationalising them.

Amcu has a membership of 26 000 out of Anglo Platinum’s 60 000 employees across all its operations, according to Joseph Matunjwa, the union’s president. Speaking at a press conference in Woodmead on Thursday, Matunjwa said Amcu was not formerly notified of the retrenchments, and learnt about the mining company’s plans through the media.

“This is unacceptable,” Matunjwa said. Given the high rate of unemployment in South Africa, he said the multinational mining company had shown that it did not have the ¬country’s interests at heart.

He said no jobs should be lost and stakeholders should rather engage on a strategy of how to cut unnecessary costs. He also called for the intervention of Mineral Resources Minister Susan Shabangu.

“We call on the minister of mineral resources, for those [mine shafts] on care and maintenance, to withdraw licences and allow interested businesses to mine there,” he said.

Matunjwa said the planned closures could also be an opportunity to see how nationalisation might work on a small scale. “If Anglo insists on closing these mines, it is a window for the government to nationalise the mine and save those jobs,” he said. “

Currently the economy and the businesses that run within it are set up to only care about the bottom-line. There is little to no consideration of what actually constitutes the corporation as all the various workers as contributors within producing a particular product. When looking at companies, we evaluate them according to their profit – we don’t look at the blood, sweat and tears that go into for instance platinum mining. Thus, when a company wants to review its profits (and thus also its losses) and decides to close down some shafts in the name of ‘preserving profit’ – life is not considered valuable and is omitted from the equation of the corporation’s wellbeing – leaving many in a position of unemployment.

The Solution

Within an Equal Money Capitalism, Life is what is valued and supported – and a level of full employment must be maintained at all times. When a company requires to shut down particular departments/sites for whatever reason – the Capital as Life requires to be taken into consideration. Companies won’t be able to ‘fire’ people as this is in breach within Basic Human Rights, as firing someone without ensuring that they are able to continue contributing elsewhere - is severing their access line to income and thus severing their Basic Right to Life.

In cases where some job positions are to be eliminated, new job positions must be identified beforehand or be created within the companies’ Compassion Department.

Corporations will merely be structures of support – here to support Life and the Earth effectively. As such, companies will not be able to own natural resources such as mines, but will only be existent as facilitators – to ensure that all people receive the resources required while at the same time treating the resource with respect within managing it responsibly. 

Reward

Unemployment will cease to exist. This will alleviate a lot of doom and gloom on the minds of youngsters who are no longer faced with a grim future where Life is a gamble. People won’t have to labour their way through college and take out loans without even knowing whether all this effort and debt will ensure them financial security as employment is not guaranteed.

Knowing that Capital as Life is valued, will give each person a sense of respect and integrity - resulting in human beings who care about who they are and what they do. This quality of Life will be reflected in the quality of products produced. Not having to worry about job security, allows for peace of mind resulting in a more efficient and pleasant work sphere.  

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Day 83: Nationalisation and Privatisation

Nationalisation

Nationalisation refers to the transfer of ownership of an industry/sector/company to the government. It then becomes publicly owned. Most 'conservative' economists have a consus that nationalisation most of the time works as a synonym for 'economic failure'. The reasons why will become clearer as we look at the point of Privatisation.

Privatisation

Privatisation refers to the opposite of nationalisation, where the transfer of ownership moves from the publict sector to the private sector.

There are several points economists usually refer to in support of privatisation:

1. Selling off public enterprises to the private sector will give the government an influx of money which they can use towards financing their expenditure or any debts/deficits they may have. This way for instance, instead of using tax money, they could use this 'new money' to finance their expenditure and lower tax rates.

2. The second point refers to the well known 'government is inefficient' opinion, whereby economists always see the private sector as more efficient than the government. Accordingly, it is thought that the government should only involve in those industries where there's little to no profit involved and let the private sector handle the rest.

3. The third point refers to the idea that since government owned enterprises are inefficient, that they run losses and that these losses are an important source of budget deficits and other fiscal related issues.

4. As part of 'government inefficiency' state-owned enterprises are seen as bureaucratic, ineffective, not meeting consumer wishes and a burden to the taxpayer. Due to lack of competition they are also seen as lacking creativity, bad investment decisions, poor financial management, low levels of productivity and a lack of accountability to the public.

5. Since private enterprises are more profit motivated, they will attract foreign direct investment and consequently increase the country's foreign exchange reserves. Additionally, due to increased investment, privately owned enterpises will be more easily able to adapt to the ever rapid changing economic/business environment.

6. Since public enterprises are state-owned, they do not pay any tax. So another reason which gets put forward is that the government can increase its income throught selling off its enterprises as they than become part of the tax base.

7. The money the government receives can be used towards increased spending on hoising, education, health, transport and so on.

There are also some cons which are considered:

1. Enterprises which have been privatised are not necessarily going to find themselves in a more 'competitive' environment, and thus not become more 'efficient'

2. Publicly owned firms usually have to take into account possible external costs or benefits (since they are working with a bigger sphere than just 'the one company' that they own). Privately owned firms won't do this since their 'sphere' is quite limited.

3. Publicly owned firms will usually be more 'public' driven than 'profit' driven -- so they will for instance make sure that there are particular infrastructures in place in poor areas, even though these areas aren't "productive" in the sense that the people who live there have little money to offer. Privately owned firms would not make such 'bad business decisions' and will go where the money is. Since they are 'profit' driven instead of 'people' driven, they will work within those areas where there is money and where people can pay for their services. So either privately owned companies will 'move away' from those areas or 'up the prices' -- both which will affect those with little money in a negative way.

4. Trade unionists are generally against privatization. This is because within the whole 'government is inefficient', how the government employs people is also seen as inefficient. Privately owned enterprises want to 'squeeze the most' out of everyting and so they will try to have the least amount of people employed to do the same amount of work (as this results in higher profits since less wages need to be paid out). As such, when enterprises get privatised, one of the first things that happens is massive job cuts.

Privatization often forms part of one of the basic components of Structural Adjustment Programs. This will be further expanded on in blogs to come.  

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Day 56: Measuring the Performance of the Economy – Part 2

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to value objectives within macroeconomics in terms of evaluating the performance of the economy – which is no way are related to the wellbeing of Life on Earth, but only concerned with the self-preservation of the current economic system

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to have created a world economic system where Life on Earth is placed in the service of the Economic Machine of Greed and Unsustainability – instead of a world economic system which serves Life on Earth

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to have completely missed the point of economics – where I accepted and allowed myself to believe in - and support a system of Hope where few win and the majority lose, where Hope is the only thing keeping the system standing as the majority hope to one day be in a position of the few – while obviously this is not mathematically possible, as the lifestyle of the few is only possible if they remain few – and within that I forgive myself that I haven’t accepted and allowed myself to have created and economic system which actually looks at all the points in the world which require support within sustenance and then unconditionally direct the flow of resources towards all points which require sustenance/support without any form of discrimination which is in fact what the Equal Money System is designed to do

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to value ‘economic growth’ as a macroeconomic objective, and where this objective is valued above all other objectives as the Holy Grail of Success – without seeing and realising that the desire for economic growth is just another way of saying ‘more..More.. MORE, I WANT MORE!!!’, as a spoilt child throwing a tantrum for not getting what it wants – while in the meantime half the world perishes in poverty and starvation and get to be ignored while we economists stare at economic growth like a moth being attracted to a flame - ever hypnotised, never considering the consequences of one’s actions

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to value “how much more stuff has been produced” as the primary marcoeconomic objective

I forgive myself that I haven’t accepted and allowed myself to see and realise that the news today which I can see/hear/read about daily – clearly indicate that there are much more important objectives to consider as the suffering and madness is undeniable, yet I will value ‘producing stuff’ more over ‘making sure everyone’s living a comfortable life’

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to have mindfucked myself into believing that ‘producing stuff’ equals ‘making a better world’

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to justify within myself my evil actions of limited self-interest with the thought that ‘eventually all the stuff/wealth will trickle down to the poor and then they will also be better off!’

I forgive myself that I haven’t accepted and allowed myself to be honest with myself as I know that ‘it will trickle down to the less fortunate’ is a big fat lie – but as long as there are enough of us portraying it to be the truth and teaching it to our children, we can maintain the lie and keep avoiding self-responsibility – and if we put it into pretty sophisticated words in textbooks then it almost sounds true too!

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to have created a world economic system where there can never be full employment – and then at the same time create the system in such a way that everyone is dependent on employment to earn their living, and so not everyone can live

I forgive myself that I haven’t accepted and allowed myself to see and realise that we can just as easily create a system where people don’t have to depend on employment to be able to sustain themselves and where we scale down our industries of entertainment which are only here to benefit the minority – so that there are less jobs to be done and so not everyone has to work all the time for the sake of profit and economic growth – and so we will have more time available to actually live and enjoy ourselves

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to value only those things which relate to the preservation of the current economic system – and so there are no real goals , as all we are doing is timelooping on the same point, which is our current economic system which is Not Best for All

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to place ‘equitable distribution of income’ as one of the objectives of marcoeconomics, but it is really just to appease people, where we pretend that we are giving inequality attention – while we don’t, and then justify our non-consideration on the base that it is a ‘normative’/’subjective’ issue – and that it is not the economist’s place to say anything about this issue, as they are not politicians or sociologists – which is a real easy way out of not taking responsibility – and within that I forgive myself that I haven’t accepted and allowed myself to see and realise that our very economic system as what it currently exists as, is ONLY based on the subjectiveness and normativity – as it is a VALUE SYSTEM which currently only values the HAPPINESS OF A FEW – and so when economists say that they rather do not comment on such a ‘controversial issue’ as ‘unequal income distribution’ – it’s really just the same as saying I LIKE THIS INEQUALITY JUST THE WAY IT IS

I forgive myself that I haven’t accepted and allowed myself to see and realise that it is not about being a ‘politician’ or a ‘sociologist’ or whatever other qualification – as the only thing you require to comment on the current status of inequality within the world is YOU as a HUMAN BEING and the realisation that OTHER HUMAN BEINGS, which are JUST LIKE YOU, are mostly in positions which you would NOT WANT to be in – and within that you either decide to DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT or NOT – and as we have seen, the mainstream economists have decided to NOT do ANYTHING about it as they value their own Life as more valuable than others

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Day 55: Measuring the Performance of the Economy: Macroeconomic Objectives

Within the next few blogs we’ll be looking at how economists currently measure the performance of the economy, and by what criteria they are measuring it by. In this blog we’ll be discussing the macroeconomic objectives. These objectives also give a nice indication of what it is that is being valued within the area of economics.

There are about 5 objectives which are regularly listed when looking at macroeconomic objectives:

1)    Economic growth
2)    Full employment
3)    Price stability
4)    Balance of payments stability ( / external stability)
5)    Equitable distribution of income

1.     Economic Growth

Economic growth is considered to be the most important criterion, and is the one criterion which will be given the most weight when evaluating and comparing economies.

Economic growth sounds like a very big concept, but it really just refers to an increase in the total production of goods and services from one period to the next – usually one year.

So this is quite a ‘vague’ and ‘undefined’ goal – as all it stipulates is that there must be some sort of increase in the total production of goods and services – no matter what these goods or services are, or whether they are beneficial to the whole of society or not. A conventional economist might tell you that the goods and services produced will obviously be that which is required to be produced for the good of society, as what is produced and how much is dependent on supply and demand. And so – if someone were to produce something which is of “no value”, no-one would demand it and the person would soon be going out of business – and within this manner the economy eliminates any and all apparently unnecessary goods and services, and justifies what and the quantities which are being produced: it’s demanded! If people are willing to spend money on it, it means they value it, if they value it, it means it brings them happiness --- so, if we produce what is demanded then we are increasing everyone’s happiness and being a good person!

But now obviously, since the majority of the wealth (= money votes) lies in the hands of the minority, then we are really just producing/providing/catering for a handful of people, and only producing/creating things which they think are important, and so all the needs and wants of the remaining majority aren’t catered for because they do not form part of the ‘demand’. And then we go and measure the ‘performance’ of the economy in terms of how much ‘stuff’ is produced – and the more the better. Measuring the performance of the economy this way, gives you no indication whatsoever in terms of how the whole of society is faring – isn’t that what real performance should be about?

2.     Full Employment

Ideally, a country wants all its factors of productions, and in particular ‘labour’ to be fully employed. In practice however, there’s always unemployment. The main concern with high unemployment rates are political and social stability – as high unemployment might disrupt social and political cohesion which then affects the economy as well. Can’t let that happen! These are considered the ‘social costs’ of unemployment. Personal material and psychological suffering is only a personal cost, and is obviously not that big of a deal – otherwise the economy would not be standing on the principles of supply and demand and the starting point of self-interest.

Full employment should really not be such a ‘major deal’ – the only reason why we are making employment so important is because we’ve accepted and allowed ourselves to create a system which requires you to earn your living. And so, if you do not have a job, you are unable to support yourself, and you are rejected by the system. We then have people working multiple jobs getting barely any sleep just to get by, while others live a life of extravagance, having other people employed to do all the work while they do nothing at all. So you see, there are two extreme polarities – and we can easily balance this out so we can have a world where we do not have to work all the time for the majority of our lives. We will then not have full employment, but it wouldn’t be necessary either. Because you’d for instance go to school while you’re still very young, then you work for a few years – and then after that, it’s up to you whether you want to work or do something else. Doesn’t that sound nice?

3.     Price Stability

Price stability as an objective refers to keeping inflation as low as possible. So prices will still change according to the interaction with supply and demand. To check the movement of prices, the Consumer Price Index is used – which will be explained at a later stage. Inflation is unwanted for distributional, economic and socio-political reason, which we’ll explain when we get to inflation (but simply put, inflation is harmful to the economic status quo – as it creates unrest and the system stops working the way it should be, where those who are supposed to lose now win and vice versa).

4.     Balance of Payments

This concept of ‘Balance of Payments’ refers to the money going in and out of a particular country – within the movement of imports and exports, over a particular amount of time. The Balance of Payments is usually calculated every quarter and every calendar year. In theory, the Balance of Payments should be zero, meaning that what goes out (‘debits’) is balanced by what comes in (‘credits’). In practice however, this barely happens – and so the Balance of Payments can be used so show whether there is a surplus or a deficit and from which area in the economy these unbalances are coming from.

5.     Equitable Distribution of Income

Now we actually get to a worthwhile objective, and then this objective is something economists do not like to discuss because it involves subjective/normative issues – and so they rather not say anything about it, expect that it is ‘controversial’ and then move on to the next topic. Very sad.

When looking at the distribution of income, there’s no mention about ‘everyone deserves access to basic resources’ or things like that, no, no – instead they look at how ‘income inequality’ is a means of stimulating saving and investment which apparently would eventually also benefit the poor (but I mean, if you just give everyone a basic income, then you don’t have poor people in the first place – I mean, it’s really that simple). But then they say, on the other side, inequitable distribution of income, can lead to feelings of injustice and unfairness, which may stir up unrest and then affect the structure and development of the economy. So here you have a ‘pro’ and a ‘contra’ for income equality/inequality – but what is fascinating, is that in each of these statements, it is always the interest of the ‘economy’ as some holy spirit/entity which gets to take center stage, where the preserving of the ‘economy’ is the number one priority – and all the unfairness and suffering is secondary. But what is the point of keeping an economy alive which is not Best for All?

The only reason we currently have middle-class, is so they can be the ‘buffer’ between the rich and the poor which keep everything stable and prevent any ‘unrest’ and ‘instability’ for the sake of the Preservation of the Economy. This concept does way back, all the way to Aristotle who saw just the same.

But this basically implies that, if we as humanity could have gone without the middle-class and have an even wider separation between the rich and the poor without it causing ‘unrest’ – we would have done so.

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