On how we get to enough

        Rather than give you a complete summary of How much is enough?, Robert and Edward Skidelsky's new book, I'd like to zero in on a few of their more salient points. In chapter seven, "Exits from the rat race", they suggest adjustments in social policy and start with a short list: 1) basic income 2) reducing the pressure to consume, and 3) reducing advertising.
        Ideas of basic income have been around for a long time, sometimes called guaranteed income, sometimes called negative income tax, as promoted by Milton Friedman. Whatever the source, bringing this to reality seems unrealistic. In fact, in 1966 Robert Theobald wrote extensively about it in Guaranteed income: freedom or chaos? He characterized the difficulty of bringing it to fruition by going to the root of our ingrained thinking.

The shift from a psychology of scarcity to that of abundance is one of the most important steps in human development. A psychology of scarcity produces anxiety, envy, egotism (to be seen most drastically in peasant cultures all over the world). A psychology of abundance produces initiative, faith in life, solidarity. The fact is that most men are still geared psychologically to the economic facts of scarcity, when the industrial world is in the process of entering a new era of economic abundance. But because of this psychological "lag" many people cannot even understand new ideas as presented in the concept of a guaranteed income, because traditional  ideas are usually determined by feelings that originated in previous forms of social existence.
 

The last sentence of this quote reminds me of Einstein's: We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking we used when we created them.         And so, while I love this idea, I think I am not willing to wait for this "lag" as Theobald calls it, to catch up to us in this highly productive era we live in, especially given that those who have created all this incredible productivity are not the ones taking advantage of it. I don't expect the owners of empire to be loosening their grip on capital any time soon.

        The next one, however, has fascinating historical roots. Ever heard of sumptuary laws? As a way to curtail the pressure to consume, there were once laws that restricted extravagance. Can you believe luxury was a moral evil, because it implied that economic resources were being diverted from productive uses? When these laws were abolished spending on luxuries previously confined to the rich soon became a feature of everyone's desired way of expenditure. Unfortunately, prohibition and taxation of particular goods is ineffectual. Skidelsky suggests a general consumption tax as a way to reinstate the use and value of sumptuary laws.  
        The third one on the list, reduce advertising, seems like a no brainer. It would introduce tax reform so that businesses could no longer write off advertising costs as an expense. Ten percent or more of the price of goods represents the cost of advertising them. If this cost had to be absorbed by  business rather than consumers, we'd experience quite a distinguishing shift between necessities and luxury goods. Presumably those products with the weakest link to needs would have reduced sales, and the cost of essential products which need little or no advertising would stabilize and potentially decrease. Again, this idea has been in circulation for a long time. In 1997, Cecile Andrews mentioned it in her work The circle of simplicity.
        Outside of economic reform suggestions, the Skidelskys' book accurately describes the inadequate ways we've defined the good life. Chapter four even addresses the problems inherent in measuring happiness in connection to levels of material well-being. As much as I appreciated this book, it felt like territory that has been covered before in similar ways. However, just as it was about to end, in fact, on the very last page....

stay tuned