there may be trouble ahead....
Excellent thoughts around the current financial meltdown and ting this week by Charles and Neil.
What are things going to look like when we come out of the other side?
I've been checking out E.F. Schumacher's classic essay on buddhist economics. More and more it's starting to resonate - not as a dusty piece of history, but as a way ahead.
quote:
'For the modern economist this is very difficult to understand. He is used to measuring the 'standard of living' by the amount of annual consumption, assuming all the time that a man who consumes more is 'better off' than a man who consumes less. A Buddhist economist would consider this approach excessively irrational: since consumption is merely a means to human well-being, the aim should be to obtain the maximum of well-being with the minimum of consumption.'
Charles says:
'One thing is for sure I'm sick to death of the word growth being used as if it's a sign of success.'
Marketing and economics are subject the law of impermanence - ie they pass through the following stages: birth, growth, maturity and death - just as humans are.
If we agree that innovation is often the outcome of 'conflicts' - the bigger the conflict ergo the bigger the innovation.
Like the fella once said 'if you don't like change you'll like irrelevence even less'
No-one's gonna argue we're not in the midst of a pretty major conflict at the moment so I'm looking forward to what's round the corner...
