Economic meaning

Many people have been drawing up conclusions that economic development is the path to empowerment and autonomy for communities - specifically First Nation communities. To some degree, I agree with this.

However, one must ask, what does economic development even mean? What does progress look like?

For starters, here in North America, we live under an economic system that is dominated by "new classical" economic philosophy and the culture of consumerism, materialism, and mass production. As Indigenous nations begins to build their own economies and strive to break free of the shackles of opression and poverty, it is important to ask the questions above and answer to what type of economic system is desired?

The prevelence of new classical and the predessors, "free market" and  neo-classical, greatly concerns me because it is essentially based, at least partly, on the following principles:

• That currency has actual meaning
• Infinite accumulation of profit is the highest goal to be pursued at any cost
• Immediate profit gains equate to progress and success
• Supply and Demand are the greatest drivers of what society needs and wants
• Government has no place in regulating or interferring with the economy

All of our current top business magazines and university courses continually drive these messages into the brains of anyone with entrepreneurial ambitions. In turn, media, marketing and business that have bought into this system preach the messages of consumerism and materialism to the general public, shaping and forming what society is supposed to want.

While there have been some definite positives that have come out, we often forget to ask "at what price?" and "to who's benefit?"

With the first principle listed above, currency has meaning, we have lost the very meaning of work and life. Currency, was never inteded to have value in and of itself. It was, in its original use, intended to facilitate efficiency in trade between people and groups.

What I mean by this is that suppose you were skilled in making clothing. I might require some clothing and since, for example, I have a garden of vegetables, I come to you to offer a trade with the excess of the vegetables I have for some clothing. If you were in need of vegetables, great, we have a deal. But if you were not, then I would need to inquire what you are looking to trade for and find someone to trade vegetables with in order to get the trade items I need to meet your needs. Obviously that could lead to a long chain of trades. This is where currency simplifies things. Dollars represent, not value in and of themselves, but a representation of either a service rendered or a good produced. Hence, trade is simplified between us and we have no need for a long complicated chain of intermediate trades.

Thinking of things like this, work done in one country will carry an equal value in any other country - exactly as one would fairly expect. Unfortunately, this is not the reality. I can do the same amount of work here in Canada as someone in Congo, let's say, and my work will carry many times the value. What is the reason for this?!?

We have allowed banks and the financial sector to change their roles from safe storehouses of our representative symbols of goods and services (currency/money) into regulators and definers of what the symbols mean and what are their value. It is precisely this issue that gave rise to the current recession and near global economic collapse. It is precisely this enormous power we have allowed the financial sector to take that enabled them to manipulate the value of our goods and services - our very skills.

Placing an artificial value on an otherwise meaningless item (a dollar), gives rise to the pursuit of infinite profit. With the goal of infinite profit, little or no thought is given to environmental sustainability, future generations, ecological impact, fair benefits for local people, fair wages for workers, etc. So many examples of this could be given - oil spills, strip mining operations and toxic deposits left behind, mercury piosoning of Grassy Narrows, nuclear waste poisoning by nuclear projects, clear cutting of forests, pollution of water ways and lakes, sweat shops, human trafficking, slave labour and/or incredibly unfair wage rates, etc.

While profit is not a 'dirty' word in and of itself, when it becomes the driving principle, it loses its purpose. Progress should not be measured by the accumulation of endless profit. There is no reason why a business or corporation needs to strive for infinite profit. Yet in our current system, this is what shareholders demand so that they in turn can receive maximum gains for their investments. In our current system, our stock traders and financiers all demand infinite profit that they may siphon off their cut.

As a mini case study, why does Wal-Mart need to be a global empire with more buying power than nearly every country in the world? Why does CEO of this empire get to profit 587 of times more than the average worker [Wal-Mart Stores Inc. Definitive Proxy Statement (Form DEF-14A) filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission on April 20, 2009, p. 36]? Does he do thousands of times more work? Not likely.

In a recent article (http://www.businessweek.com/news/2010-10-08/wal-mart-to-end-employee-profit-sharing-in-february.html), Wal-Mart anounced that they plan to end their employee profit sharing program by February 2011. Why? Why is it that this empire needs to pocket even more of the share of the pie? This is precisely the problem with the pursuit of infinite profit to the exclusion of all else. Virtually every ranking system we have counts profit and growth as the supreme indicators of success. Even leaders, CEOs, Managers are all judged in their resumes with these very false indicators.

To draw an analogy, this is like slaughtering an entire herd of bison to trade its fur or horns, rather than hunting the one or two individual bison required to feed your family. It is like clear cutting an entire forest (gone forever) to become rich trading all the wood, rather than cutting only the few trees you need to build a home.

Obviously, as my third listed principle states, this is prioritizing immediate gain at the ignorance of future loss. Who cares that our processes are polluting the world with plastic? Who cares if I am creating a nation of poverty among workers? Who cares if I am crushing the livelihoods of local businesses? As long as I get immediate gains and profits, my resume and accomplishments will look good.

The fourth principle I have listed, that of supply and demand being the best indicators of the will of the people, is rather deceptive. On the one hand, people may reason, "if people didn't like it, they wouldn't buy it. Hence they support the product and its practices." Although, what is often forgotten is the fact that supply and demand are manipulated by media/marketing and by the selective exclusion/inclusion of choices in communities. Will my quality of life truly be lower if I do not buy the latest 70" flatscreen 3D HD LCD television? Suppose you have an appliance that runs perfectly fine except for one single part that you need. Good luck finding it. It is in th best interests of companies to stop supplying such a product so that you will have to throw away the appliance and buy a new one.

Companies have purposefully stopped making high quality items (like the cars or tv's of 40 years ago that are still running in near perfect condition), because they cannot pursue infinite profit if a customer has no need for another product for 40 or 50 years. So items are now produced with a much shorter lifespan. Who cares what damage that will have to our environment with burgeoning garbage dumps?

Supply and demand? Supply mixed with skillful propaganda (marketing) is the driver and demand is the dependent in reality.

Finally, we come to the role of Government. What is government? The representation of the will of the people (ideally... but politics is another topic entirely). Naturally, it is in the best interests of a company pursuing infinite profit to have little or no regulation. This way, they operate however they wish to maximize their profits without those pesky human rights and corporate responsibility concepts. If government has no power or influence or control over the parameters by which business operates, what voice or hope do the people have?

Who is there to stop a business from bumping toxic waste into the fishing lake? Or leaving toxic deposits behind on the land where run-off guides the toxins into the playgrounds and school yards of children?

All of these thoughts are simply that, my thoughts. I do not claim to be some infallible authority on the subject by any means. However, I will offer some closing thoughts.

Whether or not the economic system, nationally (or even globally) as a whole can be fixed, changed or altered, I am not sure. However, I do believe that local economies within communities can strive to be different and build a system that is more balanced and conducive to the human element. This can only happen if people begin to question what "economy" truly means and what is it they wish to see in their communities. Who should benefit from their work and by how much? Should the manager of a local IT shop make 10 times the amount of the technician who actually does the work? Is that the system desired? Who determines the value of specific occupations? Is sheer profit the goal? Or is it that a business is built to supply the needs of the community, not only in what it produces, but in what and how it compensates those involved?