Productivity; Oh really?

This short missive (rant) is a response to the New Your Times article 'Let's Be Less Productive' and resultant Facebook shenanigans . . .

We must not confine our thinking to conventional capitalist arguments at the you-and-me level. Micro economics is like looking at the back of a cart to determine what is pulling it. Western Capitalism is like the SMS Titanic; its practitioners have fallen for their own rhetoric and are blithely overconfident as a largely hidden natural phenomenon threatens disaster.

The whole point of 'Let's Be Less Productive' is to critique the paradigm that accepts increasing productivity as a good thing. The more we earn, the more we produce, the more we consume, the more frenetic, wasteful and meaningless a human life becomes. I think we need to question the economic theories that underlie our beliefs and practices, because in these times, evidence is accumulating exponentially that there are fatal flaws in the human endeavour. To flourish, even survive, we need to think outside the constructs set by a system that is failing us.

Capitalism as we know it is not sustainable because it is a crude and inefficient arbiter of limited resources, which include human productivity. It is utterly dependent upon winners and losers. It has only worked in our lifetimes because the First World has been able to rip the heart out of the Third World. It has only worked because we accept our own domestic Third World; the underclass of poor, disadvantaged and disenfranchised.

The capitalist economic model is based on input costs reduced to dollar values offset against revenue from product. Responsibility for decisions about allocation of wealth and resources is deferred to the dynamics of supply and demand as articulated in the market place. Vital factors are completely ignored or poorly accounted for; what it means to have or lose a job, environmental impacts, the true costs of waste, the value of wilderness, security, satisfaction, anxiety, instability, social capital (a few examples from a huge list). In fact, it relies on so many assumptions and waivers that it cannot reliably predict the outcomes of real-world interactions.

This is why the market is not free and never was. It is manipulated, sometimes with benign intentions, but more often to serve the needs of vested interests.

Despite these inherent flaws in the most basic mechanisms of capitalism, it is still widely accepted as a given, the only way forward for a democratic society.

There is more to concern us. Capitalist management ethos openly discourages leadership decisions based on humane ethics and higher motivations like; friendship, loyalty, support, mentoring and guardianship. It encourages egocentric short-term thinking – the so called individualism; what's in it for me? It creates forums for unprincipled and ruthless practices, like that weird construct called the financial market. Weird? Just ponder the reasons given for share and currency fluctuations; then try to make sense of the futures market. Capitalist witchcraft? You betcha!

Now quality. Capitalism emphasises the socio-economic (class) distinction associated with quality goods primarily as a marketing device, over and above any inherent advantages like longevity, reliability and aesthetic value. Materially affluent people are able to pay high retail prices for exclusive (quality) products to display their superior status as winners in the system. Meanwhile, many (the patronisingly labeled battlers) are only able to afford lower quality products with inbuilt redundancy that facilitates high turnover. In our consumer society, quality is all about branding lifestyle. It is NOT about quality of life.

We need to rethink what constitutes quality, value and wealth, and how to more equitably manage and distribute limited resources in a sustainable way, not just in terms of our species, but the whole biosphere.

Productivity accepted as an unquestioned principle is a dangerous cul-de-sac.