In honor of Ray's return, I'm posting the following commentary from Juliet Schor, posted earlier this evening to her Plenitude blog:
http://www.julietschor.org/2010/06/solving-unemployment-through-new-uses-of-time/ > > > The events of the past few years—financial meltdown of 2008, the failed > Copenhagen talks and increasing climate destabilization, the BP oil disaster, > and the financial crises in the Eurozone—make it clear that the > business-as-usual economy is both wreaking havoc on the planet and failing on > its own terms. But so far, the conversation about how to transform this > economic model has been stuck in neutral. Traveling around North America > discussing my new book, Plenitude, I am increasingly convinced that a key > obstacle to moving forward is a lack of confidence that there is another way. > To gain that confidence, we need to articulate a model of how a sustainable > economy could work. > > The core insight of my model is the need to transform how people spend their > time. Its first principle is to reverse the increased in time devoted to the > market that has occurred in recent decades. (The US, most of the global South > and some OECD countries have experienced rising hours.) In the US, annual > hours of work rose more than 200 from 1973 to 2006. Longer hours raise the > ecological footprint, both because of more production, and because > time-stressed households have higher-impact lifestyles. Getting to > sustainability will require slowing down the pace of life, which means > working less. > > Shorter hours are also key to solving the unemployment crisis. In the US, it > will require 11 million new jobs to return to pre-crash levels. That breaks > down to 500,000 new jobs a month for almost two years. That’s an unrealistic > number, unless we address hours of work. In comparison to Western European > countries, where hours are much shorter, the U.S. has to generate between 6 > and 20% more in Gross Domestic Production to create each new job. > > The recession has gotten us started down this road. When it began the > workweek stood at 34.1 hours, but by April of 2010 it was 33.3. A rising > workweek is a strong desiderata of recovery for mainstream economists, but > they fail to see that it makes job creation harder, contributes to stress > among employees, and exacerbates ecological degradation. Declining hours > could re-balance the labor market and free up time for people to engage in > low-impact, self-providing activities that reduce their dependence on the > market. These include growing food, generating energy, building housing, and > making small-scale manufactured goods, such as apparel and household items. > > This do-it-yourself activity is highly satisfying for people, because it > helps them learn new skills and allows them to be creative. It also turns out > to be the catalyst for start-up businesses and second careers as people take > their newfound skills and passions and earn money with them. Freeing up time > from the formal market is one condition for incubating a green, small > business sector. Self-providing is also part of how we can construct more > economic interdependence. As people begin to do more self-providing, they > barter, trade, and share on a local level. This builds wealth in social > capital, which enhances well-being and security. > > Finally, the fourth principle of plenitude is that people will consume > differently. With more time and less disposable income, they’ll shift to > buying fewer new products, and prefer goods that are longer lasting and > repairable. They’ll also participate more in economies of re-sale and > exchange. I call that “true materialism,” a consumer practice that respects > the materiality of the earth. > > Perhaps the most important dimension of plenitude, in contrast to the > dominant discourse on sustainability, is that it is not a techno-fix. We do > need to change the technologies we use, especially in the energy sector. But > this model shows us that we can move a long way toward sustainability by > focusing on how we spend our time and organize our economic lives. Shifting > to slow, small-scale, low impact ways of living and producing can yield > dramatic reductions in footprint, even without new technological systems. -- Sandwichman _______________________________________________ Futurework mailing list [email protected] https://lists.uwaterloo.ca/mailman/listinfo/futurework
