Keith Hudson wrote:
>Well said. The "modern" debate about free trade, globalisation and so forth
>is merely today's equivalent of the debate about usury that went on for a
>thousand years in the Middle Ages (and before that in Greek and Chinese
>times). Every time free trade resumes and prosperity revives, some
>authoritarian body wants to lay their hands on the profits -- the Church,
>principalities, guilds, more latterly nation-states -- and so they start to
>impose restrictions on trade by taxing it. This succeeds for a while but
>inevitably fails as the general population sinks into increasing poverty.
>
The problem with free trade is not prosperity, although some few are
becoming enormously prosperous, but in fact impoverishment of the majority,
and of the planet itself. The GNP is a poor measure of prosperity, for while
billionaires are being created in unprecedented numbers, the numbers in
poverty are also increasing apace, as is the depth of poverty and its
attendant ills. However, the hugely disproportionate amount of wealth owned
by these few dangerously skews the data, leading to the perception that
society itself is becoming more prosperous through free trade and the global
economy.
Frances Moore Lappe and Joseph Collins state the case very well in "World
Hunger: Twelve Myths," (New York: Grove, Weidenfeld, 1986), in which they
show how concentration of wealth and resources is detrimental to the economy
and the environment.
We are seeing with globalization of trade a rapid increase in the gap
between rich and poor. And as Richard Wilkinson explains, with exhaustive
evidence, in "Unhealthy Societies," it is the gap itself which causes social
incohesion, stress, and ill health -- none of which are measurable by GNP,
and all of whic are inconsistent with any but the most narrow concepts of
"prosperity."
If you happen to be benefitting from the current situation, it's difficult
to imagine anyone who isn't. Perhaps Bath isn't the place to do it, but have
a look around you, Keith, at the increasing numbers of beggars on the
streets. They didn't appear because we are more prosperous.
