Localising capitalism
Simon Collins reports from the `Beyond Capitalism' conference
>From City Voice, Wellington NZ
FULLTIME jobs for all who want them, at wages sufficient to sustain a
family. Or a "post-job economy" where only a few do fulltime paid work but
their income is shared with the community. Those were the two broad pictures
of our future at a conference grandly titled `Beyond Capitalism', held at St
John's Church, Willis St, on Friday (2 Oct). A surprising 150 people
attended. Both sides of the argument agreed that our current form of
capitalism is unfair, with the super-rich growing richer while those unable
to get paid work, or reliant on occasional or casual work, sink into
poverty.
Auckland economics professor Tim Hazledine argued for fulltime jobs for all.
He advocated going "beyond rationalism" - beyond the view that people make
economic decisions out of narrow, "rational" self-interest. In his book
Taking NZ Seriously, he argues that every New Zealander who wanted a job in
the 1950s and 60s had one because there was a shared "sympathy" for one
another. Employers felt duty bound to find jobs for people, and the
unemployed felt a duty to seek work.
Sympathy
That sympathy has been lost as the country has opened up to the world.
Multinational companies, which now own most of our big corporates, have no
sympathy for the unemployed. And joblessness has become so widespread that
the unemployed have lost hope of finding work.
Hazledine advocates:
* Keynesian monetary policy, using interest and exchange rates to promote
employment, not just to contain inflation. When there is unemployment, as
there is now, the Reserve Bank would push interest and exchange rates down
to encourage more borrowing and investment, and to boost local production
and jobs by making imports dearer.
* "Moderate tariffs" - in a discussion group he suggested 5% - and "perhaps
some control of foreign direct investment". Our regulations used to allow
foreign takeovers of NZ companies only if the foreigner brought expertise or
access to markets; otherwise there was a presumption that foreign owners
would have less sympathy for NZ workers.
* "Re-legitimise the union movement." Unions are seen as vital to ensuring
that wages are sufficient to feed a family, giving couples the choice of
having one parent stay home to look after the children.
* "Re-regulate the pay and perks of chief executives." Hazledine would
outlaw incentive payments because they lead to under-achieving other goals
for which no incentives are offered. He would put two `Kiwi Share' directors
on every public company board, and require that they help set executive pay.
* Abolish welfare. "We have to ask whether beneficiaryism has gone too far,"
he said. In his book, he advocates abolishing all benefits to put pressure
both on employers to provide jobs and on the unemployed to take them.
Home
In the book, Hazledine digs at Anne Else's book False Economy by suggesting
that many mothers would be keen to stay home with the kids if they could
afford it. "The unsympathetic reader (which I am not) might wish to subtitle
False Economy: `Middle-class mothers moan about their lives'," he wrote.
Anne Else hit back on Friday, saying she considered calling her talk,
`Middle-aged male academics fantasise about perfect wives'. She said
Hazledine was still bound up in the "romance of capitalism" - the idea that
men should work hard, even at the cost of their health, to support their
families. In fact, she said: "There is no evidence that capitalist
production will ever again conjure up enough jobs... to provide anything
like what we have come to see as a decent standard of living for all - let
alone put back the social pattern of the `family wage-earner'."
Women
She said women had never been caught up in the capitalist romance, because
capitalism ignored most of their work - which was unpaid. "Unpaid work
represents one of the few genuine challenges to capitalist logic." Ideally,
Anne Else would pay everyone a basic income. People could then find their
own useful work to do, without having to worry about paid jobs to feed the
family. More immediately, like Hazledine, she would strengthen labour laws
to make sure that paid work is at least paid well and with flexible hours,
so that it can be fitted in around family responsibilities.
Other speakers at the conference tended towards Else's view. Australian Paul
Wildman advocated developing local economies using networked community
credit unions, operating in parallel with the world economy. He also
favoured a basic minimum income. A workshop led by Anne Else came up with a
list of local initiatives which exist already: green dollar and `bartercard'
schemes, the Women's Loan Fund, the Hokianga Health Trust and the People's
Resource Centre which provide free health care to members. But another
workshop led by Tim Hazledine advocated "a highway to full employment" with
import duties and controls on foreign investment.
Independence
In some ways, the two views are similar. Both propose more local economic
independence, with local banks or credit unions and local currencies. Anne
Else would go along with lowering interest and exchange rates to make more
local paid work viable. But presumably she doesn't share Hazledine's (and
my) belief that pushing rates low enough would produce enough paid jobs for
all, if employers and workers agree not to cancel out the resulting gain in
competitiveness through general inflation. Else rightly objects to
Hazledine's proposal to abolish welfare. Even if everyone who wants paid
work can get it, there will be many sole parents and others who should be
able to opt out and still earn a decent living from the rest of us for the
unpaid work they do.
I don't know what Else thinks about controls on imports and foreign
investment, but personally I think Hazledine is wrong on this score. We
should foster "sympathy" in all our trading relationships, not only with New
Zealanders. In my view the key distinction in ownership is not between New
Zealanders and foreigners, but between the workers and/or the community on
one hand and private investors ("capitalists") on the other. I believe
workers would be much happier if they could run their own cooperatives in
all industries, not just in a few areas like health. How we should progress
"beyond capitalism" is a key debate of our time. It's worth taking
seriously.
