greentheo

What’s the best way to overthrow the current establisment and bring in a new way of doing things?

Arms?

Force?

Poetry?

Propaganda?

We should know well by now that all of the above will eventually overthrow an establishment with much blood, strife and turmoil.  But it will never bring in a new way of doing things.

Most revolution, war and even personal conflict revolves around one simple thing, wealth.

Side A has the coveted object (land, money, women, etc.) and Side B wants it.  Side B’s desire of the coveted object only reinforces Side A’s love for it.  The dispute grows and eventually the only resolution to the conflict seems to be for Side A and Side B to fight for it to the death or humiliation of the opponent.

But there’s another means of settling the dispute which is often forgotten.  If by some means one could duplicate the coveted object, the wealth, then both parties would have nothing to squable over.  In fact, by duplicating the coveted objected you will have essentially removed it’s value.

The real value in wealth (aside from basic nutrition and clothing) is not the good that it provides for the owner but rather the coveting of the neighbor it brings.  This coveting provides the owner with a sense of identity.   Thus it is the case that while Gold has nearly no practical value it has been the source of death and destruction between human beings for millenia.  To have gold in the middle of the desert means nothing.  To have Gold in society where everyone knows and respects you as the “haver of Gold” is very valuable!

And so it is that most revolutions simply shift wealth around.  Capitalist revolution says that the individual can “own” what they manage to get their hands on by whichever means is socially acceptable.   Socialist revolution takes the individual wealth, and by force spreads it around to others.  Totalitarian/Dictator revolutions are Capitalist revolutions without a broad social concensus to disallow the brutal activities of the dictator.  A Monarchy is also Capitalism mixed with some form of religious belief which helps to keep the king as the owner of all the goods in the society (the God’s deem him the owner… who are we to argue with them?).

What would a truly revolutionary overthrow of the current institutions and powers be then?  It would be the institution of a rule of order in which wealth is created and freely used by all.  It’s not communism… it’s open source ism!  If we are all entitled to profit from the collective resources of the community, but none are entitled to own them then we have a group of people in which identity can not be found in what is owned.  Identity as found in what we own is and has been the rule of the day amongst humans since the dawn of time.

It’s true that some resources are limited, oil will eventually run out.  But oil is not wealth because it has no value by itself unless it provides identity like Gold does.  Rather it is the automobile that is wealth because it can provide a needed service, transportation.

Just imagine if all facets of automotive technology were open source!  Seat belts wouldn’t have taken 40 years to be standard equipment.  We’d have a readily available vehicle that got 500 miles to the gallon of Gasoline.  Everyone would have as many cars as were needed and they’d only cost what the raw input of materials cost.  And since iron and therefore steel is one of the most abundant elements on earth, it wouldn’t be that much.

In other words, we’d have an incredibly wealthy and efficient society.  The downside is that few would be much wealthier than their neighbors.  The only differentiating factor between people in an open source world is each person’s natural gifts and skills.

So you want to start a revolution?  Join the open-source movement.  The more wealth we can create that no one can own the rights to the better!

In standard free market theory wages rise as productivity of the worker rises.

Unfortunately for the standard free market theory, or maybe just for American workers who strongly beleive they work in the free market, the last 30 years of data doesnt’ support it.

Real Output per hour % increase by Non-Farm Business workers[1]:

180%

Real Wages per Week of average Non-Farm worker in 1982 US Dollars[2]

1973 – $331.39

2004 – $277.57

So where’s all the extra output going?

It’s tempting to try and maintain the free market hypothesis by figuring that prices of goods must have deflated in the time period.  But we know that’s not the case.  On average the CPI, the price of a basket of goods has kept a steady 2-3% increase year after year since 1973 (about the same as nominal wages).  Perhaps then because Americans are nearly 80% more productive now then they were, they must be taking more time off (and keeping the overall output the same).  This is unlikely since the 40 hour work week has only increased if anything.

So here we have American workers producing nearly 2 times as much per hour as they were 30 years ago, working more hours, and paying the same price for goods relative to their salary.  How can this be?  Who’s buying up all our goods?

The only solutions can be:

• Significantly more workers (i.e. 2 parents working now) are in the work force
• American workers are going further into debt to soak up the excess production
• The wealthy are spending more of their income to soak up the excess production
• We are shipping more of our goods overseas to foreign consumers, while not seeing any trickle down effect in wages.

Option 3, that the wealthy are soaking up the excess production can’t be true… we know that the top percentile of income earners have only gotten relatively wealthier and now make an astounding 300-500 times the salary of the average worker.

Likewise, we know that the trade deficits between American and every other country have only increased, so option 4 can’t be true either.

So the conclusion is that option 1 and 2 must be true… Americans are working more, and more of them are working while the average debt load has been increasing.  This has soaked up the excess supply in the economy.

These facts – that the average citizen is becoming relatively poorer compared to the wealthier citizen, that the average citizen works more and is in further debt, and that increased productivity does not result in increased wages – can only mean one thing:  that the market is not free and is in fact stacked against the average citizen in favor of the wealthy citizen.  If the markets aren’t free and increased work doesn’t lead to increased reward than there is something seriously wrong with the economic and social structure of our country which is designed to give freedom, protection and the right to pursue happiness to all.

1. http://www.bls.gov/lpc/ [↩]
2. http://www.workinglife.org/wiki/Wages+and+Benefits%3A+Real+Wages+(1964-2004) [↩]