Resource based economy – utopian nirvana or eco-fascism?

At my local trail centre there are 250000 visits annually to ride the trails. The number of volunteers to build and maintain trails? 8.

If people won’t even volunteer to do something fun which mostly benefits themselves I can’t see this working.

Of course there are lots of people volunteering to go on social media to complain about the state of the trails and they all think other volunteers should fix them…

Good luck!

@Boris- if people aren’t working 40 hours a week just to put a roof above their heads and make someone else rich, it’ll be easier to convince them to give a little back.

ninfan – Member

outing himself as a full on Pol Pot style dystopian nightmareinnocently using the word re-education

FTFY. You do realise we massively indoctrinate our kids as it is? Most of the faults you see in this daft system exist in our current daft system.

So your example of shipping, instead of people with families being away from home doing it, there would be people with a sense of adventure and who like travelling by sea doing it.

Yeah but that only works if there are ENOUGH people who want to do it. There won’t be.

Yeah but that only works if there are ENOUGH people who want to do it. There won’t be.

[citation needed]

Lol.. Supporters of this idea aren’t in a position to start demanding citations 🙂

What’s the difference between this and the pre-agricultural hunter-gatherer world?

Lol.. Supporters of this idea aren’t in a position to start demanding citations

I’m not even remotely a fan of the idea but it does seem that some of the arguments for it not working are just “it won’t work”. Which, whilst probably true, is not very helpful.

Anyhow, there are plenty of small scale communities that try to organise themselves along these lines – some of them very successfully, if dazh is looking for ways that it could come to pass I’d suggest starting with them and trying to build up.

I don’t think anyone is suggesting it’s a fully workable plan, but really if you’re going to shoot down a strategy for overhauling the global economy so that we don’t use up all the planet’s resources and cause our own demise then you should be able to come up with something better than ‘there won’t be enough ship pilots’. And I’ll say again, is it any more ridiculous than having a system which is built around the concept of infinite growth on a finite planet?

Ofcourse the current system is heading for a big bang at some point, probably with a massive loss of life to control the population rather than a more nicer natural gradual decline, but I don’t think there is problem with incentivisation of risk / reward. The problem is with in correct pricing of resources. They are not correctly priced to take into account scarcity, damage to the environment e.t.c. We are so dependant on the broken pricing structure.

Dazh, there’s no question that we need to do something. However this plan isn’t really anything. It’s a fantasy, and not a very good one at that tbh.

you should be able to come up with something better than ‘there won’t be enough ship pilots’

We have, it was a far broader question than anything about ships,

I) how do you incentivise people to work at all when all their potential needs will be fulfilled regardless (In theory at least)?

Ii) how do you incentivise people to take on especially arduous or dangerous tasks that need to be done and can’t be mechanised?

So far the only answer that’s been put forward involves compelling them to do it, which is incompatible with the ethos as written, as if people are forced to do something against their will in return for inclusion as part of that society then you’ve created nothing but a return to serfdom.

Of course it’s a fantasy. But it does have some non-fantastical aspects: doing away with planned obsolescence, using technology to reduce waste and increase recreational time, changes to the social support, education and health systems to promote wellbeing instead of simply churning out workers and taxpayers, properly accounting for natural resources, reducing individual ownership etc. These are all things that could be put in place either entirely or in part without resorting to some sort of eco-dictatorship ruled by computer models and big data.

What’s the difference between this and the pre-agricultural hunter-gatherer world?

That’s a bad thing? There’s a huge body of research which suggests that hunter gatherer societies were some of the most successful, peaceful and contented societies to have ever existed. Still, if you prefer the crime, pollution, stress, inequality, immorality and corruption of the current system then you probably have a point.

Dazh I think you are being overly cynical when considering the current system. For example, I don’t think planned obselescence is the norm or even widespread. And there are already a lot of people working towards the goals you mention.

That’s a bad thing?

YES!

I would not want to live in hunter gatherer times. Mainly because of the lack of opportunity to be anything other than a hunter or a gatherer, or do anything other than hunt or gather. But also because almost everything that enriches our lives – access to progressive literature, art, music, and just about every life experience that I value comes from the fact that people invented a system of tokens to exchange in lieu of services – ie money.

Money in its basic form allows me to specialize in a trade or skill, and get good at it. Something that is not related to food production, but I can still eat because I can exchange my services or products for tokens that I can then exchange for food. This means I can get good at making things, inventing internets, playing music, inventing antibiotics etc etc.

And in spite of all that I still have the choice – I can go and live in the wild if I want – I am just not forced to.

Never mind women’s liberation – what about everyone’s liberation?

Still, if you prefer the crime, pollution, stress, inequality, immorality and corruption

I’ve never seen such rose tinted specs. Crime? What about when the neighbouring tribe marched over and slaughtered all our women and kids and nicked our cattle? Was that not a crime?

What’s the difference between this and the pre-agricultural hunter-gatherer world?

Pretty much everything?

YES!

You’re being silly now. I wasn’t suggesting for a second that we take society back to the stone age, I too wouldn’t want that for obvious reasons. I was pointing out, in an admittedly obtuse way, that the similarities between a system based on equality in a modern, technological resource based economy and hunter gatherer societies would appear to be those of happiness, contentment and peace borne from a cooperative and collective outlook on life rather than a narrow focus on individual gain.

What about when the neighbouring tribe marched over and slaughtered all our women and kids and nicked our cattle?

That happens today on an industrial scale. You just happen to be on the right side of the fence. Amusing that you conveniently ignore this yet accuse me of wearing rose tinted specs 🙂