Then We’ll Build A New Economy

by Ross Hunter on March 10, 2009

Nobody in the financial discussion seems to have grasped the urgency of the planet’s message to us. We’re thinking that we just need to get back to the same consumerism we’ve built into our culture as a way of life, and I have the feeling that something will happen to interrupt this thinking. Some event on a planetary scale will occur, and change the game forever, and redirect attention permanently to the key fundamental of our broken economy, which is this: based as it is on the destruction and non-replacement of finite materials, this economy could never last, and always had to end, probably in pain.

Our economy is in the meltdown it is precisely because there are no cheap ways to re-energize it. We are out of resources to take from the planet. The economy of plunder is running into its most obvious limit: there’s nothing left to take for free. See how Ray Anderson explains to us the economy of plunder.

This is the way we need to rebuild our economy. We’ll all be slumdogs, recycling waste – among other things. We’ll also be growing and creating new materials of course. There is plenty of wealth being held above the ground by people who desperately need to invest in new wealth that provides a return in current income. The forty trillion dollars or thereabouts swilling around the world in toxic derivatives can only have a destiny of being written down over time.

And then where will the rich get their money? Wealth always needs income, which is why investment occurs. Rich people and institutions may have plenty of wealth, but they rarely have enough actual cash income. Investor funds have to start coming into green initiatives. The only question is, how to attract that wealth to invest into the new-wealth creation of sustainable business?

This is where I’m going. More soon.

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The Third Economy
November 25, 2009 at 5:22 pm

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1 Sue Rostvold March 12, 2009 at 11:19 pm

Wow Ross. Great post! And what a powerful video. Wow. I just twittered a link to this story. You’re so right, there is no quick fix, no cheap way out, and I’m glad of that. Look what cheap fixes have done to our planet.

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