His order had taken a vow of poverty and discussed the freedom and benefits
that such a life offered him and tried to convince us to join him. He was the most dangerous man I ever met!
If everyone became content with the basics and took a vow of poverty, then we could get used to consuming a WHOLE LOT LESS. Unemployment would soar as there would be no one to buy the BMWs, tequila sunrises and Tivos. It would probably take about 10% of the population or less, to be employed to feed and clothe the other 90%, although what would the other 90% barter with? The only way to make it seem fair would be to not allow anyone use technology developed in the last 200 years and go back to a medieval style life. That way, we could all be kept busy as subsistence farmers.
The economy runs on the principle that, in order for there to be full employment, the average Joe must consume about as much as an average Joe can produce. When you add up the labor gone into your hairdryer, your facial, your bus ride, your japanese chia pet, they should all average out to the amount of stuff you have produced (approximated by your income). Even your savings, if re-invested or re-loaned out by the bank, will end up being spent on labor somewhere. It makes sense. You can only consume in a year what is produced in a year (ignoring a lot of unsustainable craziness going on with credit right now)
As Joe gets more productive, he must also get more consumptive, as otherwise unemployment goes up. As luck would have it, turns out that human nature has a tendency to consume as much as you can afford. So long as the seven deadly sins remain in vogue (particularly vanity, greed, sloth and gluttony) we are all safe. But if the population suddenly comes over all funny and only starts consuming what they need and not according to their ego, then the machine breaks, unemployment soars, and since the unemployed can't afford anything, production itself collapses until we all embrace the welfare state.
As all processes undergo immense automation its getting harder and harder to imagine full employment in the future. As less and less labor go into every device, our consumption of stuff has to grow by orders of magnitude. We have lasted to far since consumption has kept up with production and when people can't buy more of the stuff they need they will buy stuff that makes no sense (e.g. $2,000 sunglasses) in some primeval ritual to create levels inside the societal tribe.
So the race is on. Can consumption keep up with production? I hate to bring up the Luddite argument but it is true that some day in the future we will produce cars, burgers and foot massages with no people involved in the production. Heck, the technology is available today. So what then? And if productivity per person keeps growing rapidly, when does it stop?
Stay tuned over the next 100 years as we see economics reinvented.....
