Austerity Is Bad for You and It’s No Fun

[marmar]

Austerity Is Bad for You and It’s No Fun: James Livingston
By James Livingston Nov 28, 2011 7:00 PM ET


(Bloomberg) The subject is consumption versus production and these are the questions we begin with: Does consumption remove us from material reality, or from rational activity with others?

Is production better for us in either sense? Is consumption all that is passive, silent and selfish? Is work the true habitat of the genuine self, as almost every philosopher since Martin Luther has claimed, so that it must be the site of any attempt at social change or individual redemption?

My uniform answer to all of the above is, “No, goddamn it,” and I say this loudly, “in thunder” as Herman Melville heard Nathaniel Hawthorne’s voice in the wilderness. The work that nourishes our souls is almost always a form of consumption or sacrifice we indulge when at our leisure: It’s not the work we do for wages, for the boss, for the person with the paycheck; it’s what we do in our free time.

.........(snip).........

And we have at last reached the point in human civilization where we can afford to do so. When we can put aside the Protestant work ethic that has informed our lives, when we understand that consuming goods is better for us than producing them and when we understand that the profit motive is a prehensile anachronism, an anal compulsion, a disgusting morbidity, we’ll be able to understand that a redistribution of income away from profits and toward wages will prevent another Great Recession. What is more important, we’ll be able to navigate and map a new ethical environment. ............(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-11-29/livingston-austerity-is-bad-for-us-and-no-fun-pt-2-.html

[no_hypocrisy]

1. Austerity, frugality, and thrift on a large-scale basis can starve an economy based on consumerism

(like ours). Unfortunately our economy is based on upon people perpetually buying "stuff" that other countries make.

[Nuclear Unicorn]

3. What would our society look like if all we did was work towards necessities?

Once you had a home, clothes, food and health care, then what?

[redqueen]

5. The Shire?

:shrug:

[Nuclear Unicorn]

10. Before or after the orcs?

[no_hypocrisy]

7. That's the point: unless you have land to live off, you're dependent

upon the goods and services of others. And without a dependable economy, imagine shortages because food products aren't processed and transported to your stores and you go hungry. Your shoes wear out and you have difficulty replacing them. Heat (if you can afford it) is sporadic. Stuff you take for granted now becomes akin to luxury items.

[Nuclear Unicorn]

9. Well, we can't turn 7 billion people into subsistence farmers, and really, who would want to?

If the people who design, manufacture, distribute, operate, interpret and maintain mammograms want to buy XBox 360's for their kids as part of their compensation for their services I'm OK with that.

[no_hypocrisy]

12. You're correct. The economy would need to be reorganized where

barter of services and goods would be an integral part of it.

[Nuclear Unicorn]

13. With 7 billion people we won't barter goods, we use a medium of exchange.

It makes sense.

[Javaman]

2. There was a cadre of people here on DU cheering on

a depression a few weeks ago.

It's truly amazing what kind of logic clueless people will wrap themselves in to "fix" things.

Letting things fail, supporting austerity measures, etc, is usually supported by people who 1) never were poor 2) have zero concept of what real poverty is 3) believe it won't effect them 4) are part of the 1% 5) have this belief that if things fail completely that rebuilding everything after that will be just sooooooo easy and 6) by somehow letting it all collapse will teach the people of this nation a "lesson".

So fucking bizarre.

[TheKentuckian]

4. The Pro to austerity tolerant seem to be the most invested in the status quo

to me.

I think you are conflating two groups of people with different aims and beliefs into one set of beliefs.

Hell, I say the austerity programs fuel the let it fail mentality since once implemented, the system fails all but those on top of the shit pile anyway.

You might argue that this is where anarchists and authoritarians meet in reality, if not in intent. That makes sense but the schools of thought are quite divergent.

[redqueen]

6. LOL... teach someone a lesson?

We apparently didn't learn it last time, so why would things be any different this time?

All a crash would do is allow those at the top to obtain more for themselves, at bargain basement prices. (Which it seems to me is how this game is intended to be played.)

[Yavin4]

8. Austerity Is A Nice Word for Economic Repression

The true goal of austerity is to lower the living standards for the masses while the 1% continue to enjoy their dominance.

Entitlement programs like Medicare, Medicaid, SS, unemployment insurance, etc. are not what is driving the debt.

What is driving the debt are massive tax cuts and wars.

[redqueen]

11. Succinct and well put.

:thumbsup:

[Yavin4]

14. Some Folks Don't Learn from History

Social insurance programs like Medicare, Single payer health care, pensions, SS, etc. were put into place so that capitalism could survive.

These measures gave the masses some protections against the wild boom and bust swings of capitalism. Live high on the hog in the 20s and nearly starve to death in the 30s.

Without these measures, the masses would go to the extremes like facism or communism, as they did in Germany and Russia.

[Starry Messenger]

15. It's not that I disagree about austerity, but who is this "we" he keeps referring to

"We" don't pursue the profit motive, we *produce* the profits with our "free" labor.