Occupy Wall Street and the Age of Peak Oil
Oct. 8th, 2011 04:33 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
halifaxearthtechFirst on Wall Street and then in other places we are seeing a movement in opposition of: The concentration of wealth in the top 1% of the wealthy of the United States, high tuition fees, of joblessness, of mismanagement of funds by the largest American financial institutions, of austerity measures and of predatory mortgage rates and a general situation of poverty and desperation by most Americans.
In discussions on these topics I have yet to see an analysis of the impact of Energy Descent. While I wait for someone to articulate it better than I can, I will write what I can. The Occupy movement has many valid points but the call to end austerity measures and cutbacks looks to me like a tragic waste of energy.
Yes, the Occupy movement should push to redistrubute weath and increase corporate taxes. Clearly levels of inequality in terms of income worldwide are unjust. It has been shown for 30 years that "trickle down economics" does not work. The working class spend more of their income on goods and services than the established classes, who tend to save more. Redistributed money could keep the economy going another 30 years at least and facilitate a transition to the post peak economy. We should plan to take that money out of concentration before it takes the post-peak forms of land ownership, private armies, or whatever forms that concentrated wealth would take in the future.
Yes, we should focus on sustainability. It is heartening to see an emphasis in the crowds on issues of how they would like to take better care of the world in a future that they build. It is clear that the deep changes leading toward right living, within the means of what the Earth can manage, will come from the ground up and not from governments and businesses.
We should not expect an end to austerity measures. We must plan for a future in which we will have to build our own economy, on a basis other than that of mining, oil, and the military industrial complex, which are in long death throes. Asking governments to print more money or go into more debt to create more jobs "just until the recession ends" is not a sustainable approach to job creation. We will not see what was cut back by governments reinstated until a pre-peak tax base is acchieved, and that will simply not occur.
That having been said, countries that try to dig themselves out of the recession hole by becoming export economies are deluded, and measures attempting to invite international investment when every country is also struggling, and not looking to invest, must be resisted.
We will have to build our own currencies, our own local foodsheds, our own systems of welfare for the ill and the struggling, and our own systems of justice and reconciliation ( I will leave it up to the reader to decide if she feels like paying taxes to a government if the community is providing for all her needs). To convert our way of life to operate off of fossil fuels is a monumental feat that will generate hundreds of thousands of jobs. I see the extraordinary solidarity and dialogue opened up by the Occupy movements as a good place to start to initiate these parallel Initiatives.
I am not taking part in Occupy Nova Scotia because conditions are different here: unlike in the United States the majority of working class people are not in imminent risk of homelessness. Movements interested in changing the fundamental basis of how society works, the underpinnings of its generation of wealth, require a majority to win. Joe Blow has to get involved. In the US things are bad enough that this critical mass has been achieved and this is why Wall Street has had such staying power. This is why there is an emphasis on "I am in the 99%".
I want to express solidarity for what New York (and other large American cities) are doing but in a conservative and still relatively well off province I am afraid this will remain a movement of 5% if that. I am prepared to be proven wrong and if I am, I'll go throw my weight in there. As it stands, I see a good audience of people prepared to consider different ideas of living sustainably, and open to learning skills related to growing and preserving food, etc. I'll be teaching some courses at the ONS' freeschool.
In discussions on these topics I have yet to see an analysis of the impact of Energy Descent. While I wait for someone to articulate it better than I can, I will write what I can. The Occupy movement has many valid points but the call to end austerity measures and cutbacks looks to me like a tragic waste of energy.
Yes, the Occupy movement should push to redistrubute weath and increase corporate taxes. Clearly levels of inequality in terms of income worldwide are unjust. It has been shown for 30 years that "trickle down economics" does not work. The working class spend more of their income on goods and services than the established classes, who tend to save more. Redistributed money could keep the economy going another 30 years at least and facilitate a transition to the post peak economy. We should plan to take that money out of concentration before it takes the post-peak forms of land ownership, private armies, or whatever forms that concentrated wealth would take in the future.
Yes, we should focus on sustainability. It is heartening to see an emphasis in the crowds on issues of how they would like to take better care of the world in a future that they build. It is clear that the deep changes leading toward right living, within the means of what the Earth can manage, will come from the ground up and not from governments and businesses.
We should not expect an end to austerity measures. We must plan for a future in which we will have to build our own economy, on a basis other than that of mining, oil, and the military industrial complex, which are in long death throes. Asking governments to print more money or go into more debt to create more jobs "just until the recession ends" is not a sustainable approach to job creation. We will not see what was cut back by governments reinstated until a pre-peak tax base is acchieved, and that will simply not occur.
That having been said, countries that try to dig themselves out of the recession hole by becoming export economies are deluded, and measures attempting to invite international investment when every country is also struggling, and not looking to invest, must be resisted.
We will have to build our own currencies, our own local foodsheds, our own systems of welfare for the ill and the struggling, and our own systems of justice and reconciliation ( I will leave it up to the reader to decide if she feels like paying taxes to a government if the community is providing for all her needs). To convert our way of life to operate off of fossil fuels is a monumental feat that will generate hundreds of thousands of jobs. I see the extraordinary solidarity and dialogue opened up by the Occupy movements as a good place to start to initiate these parallel Initiatives.
I am not taking part in Occupy Nova Scotia because conditions are different here: unlike in the United States the majority of working class people are not in imminent risk of homelessness. Movements interested in changing the fundamental basis of how society works, the underpinnings of its generation of wealth, require a majority to win. Joe Blow has to get involved. In the US things are bad enough that this critical mass has been achieved and this is why Wall Street has had such staying power. This is why there is an emphasis on "I am in the 99%".
I want to express solidarity for what New York (and other large American cities) are doing but in a conservative and still relatively well off province I am afraid this will remain a movement of 5% if that. I am prepared to be proven wrong and if I am, I'll go throw my weight in there. As it stands, I see a good audience of people prepared to consider different ideas of living sustainably, and open to learning skills related to growing and preserving food, etc. I'll be teaching some courses at the ONS' freeschool.
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Date: 2011-10-10 12:28 am (UTC)no subject
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