I'd like to toss out an inflammatory, derisive invective against our governor. He certainly deserves it. But what good would it do? He, and many others in positions of power, have a good many people in this nation believing in the cult of the bottom line.
Economics has become an end rather than a means.
Even those who would embrace social reform or more progressive measures look upon their goals as ends to be reached rather than tools, these days. Everyone has fallen prey to those who wanted to structure the argument in terms of finance and money. It's all we ever talk about. And because we only talk about things in terms of their monetary and fiscal outcomes we have allowed our thinking to become shaped in such a way as to put all other concerns secondary to those concerns.
This is not to say we should not be worried about money or economics; anything but! Rather, that we have allowed this beast -Mammon- to become our God and He is choking us by our long, heavy, golden chains of interest, thought, and desire.
I think the only solution is to start a backlash against this thinking in all that we say and do.
Your garden is a great example! The bottom line, there, is what you produce but in terms of so many things: not just the economic. Can it be described that way? Certainly. But that's not what you get out of it.
Perhaps we need to get everyone thinking more about multiple "bottom lines" and that money -economics- is not the only framework by which we should view the world. Our business and political leaders don't have the final say in our lives, certainly not our religous leaders either, so we should craft our community leaders in this image. Maybe, then, we can craft an alternative to this stifling scenario.
no subject
Economics has become an end rather than a means.
Even those who would embrace social reform or more progressive measures look upon their goals as ends to be reached rather than tools, these days. Everyone has fallen prey to those who wanted to structure the argument in terms of finance and money. It's all we ever talk about. And because we only talk about things in terms of their monetary and fiscal outcomes we have allowed our thinking to become shaped in such a way as to put all other concerns secondary to those concerns.
This is not to say we should not be worried about money or economics; anything but! Rather, that we have allowed this beast -Mammon- to become our God and He is choking us by our long, heavy, golden chains of interest, thought, and desire.
I think the only solution is to start a backlash against this thinking in all that we say and do.
Your garden is a great example! The bottom line, there, is what you produce but in terms of so many things: not just the economic. Can it be described that way? Certainly. But that's not what you get out of it.
Perhaps we need to get everyone thinking more about multiple "bottom lines" and that money -economics- is not the only framework by which we should view the world. Our business and political leaders don't have the final say in our lives, certainly not our religous leaders either, so we should craft our community leaders in this image. Maybe, then, we can craft an alternative to this stifling scenario.
What do you think?
Yours,
Dave