Jim Tantillo writes:
>I'm leery of any such attempt to generalize about whole classes of people
>without making any distinctions. I worry that such crude sociological
>categorizations are little better than tendentious stereotypes. For
>example, if we substituted "rich Jews" for your category, "the liquidating
>class," think of how offensive that would be. Or if instead of persecuting
>the top one percent of personal consumption expenditures, you advocated
>persecuting the bottom one percentile in personal consumption expenditures.
>I think there are real risks inherent in your generalizations.
I think Jim that you should go to Brians web site at www.steadystaters.org
and read one of the chapters of his book called the "Shoveling Fuel for a
Runaway Train Errant Economists, Shameful Spenders, and a Plan to Stop them
All", Brian Czech, Phd. It is published by the Univ. of California press.
Brian is critiquing neoclassical economics which assumes that there is "no
limits to economic growth" in consumption.
There is one chapter you can read at his website. It is very good, and I am
going to buy a copy. The term "liquidator class" refers to all those people
in the US whom consume natural capital in a wasteful manner. The person who
eats a 16 ounce Porterhouse steak "liquidates" with his stomach, just as
much as various software excutives "liquate" scare natural resources by
building their "cathedral" style McMansions - as Brian writes. The term
"castigate" is used in moral sense, and that term is valid in the way that
Brian is applying it. He is not suggesting that there are in fact a class of
people who should have their assets destroyed in the book because they are
liquadating natural capital at an unsustainable rate, but rather he says
that the problem of excess consumption [luxury consumption] is more a result
of "ignorance" than immorality. The emphasis to me appears to be in
education of the liquidating class regarding the unsustainable consumption
habits of Americans, rather than the utilization of force or undemocratic
means. So I don't know how you, Jim, can leap to the conclusion that the
Brian is suggesting anything like you refer to in your above statement, ie.
demonizing.
Brian is a conservation biologist and I think based on the chapter in his
book that his attitude and knowledge is considerable. He is making a plea
for people to consume far less than they do now on the basis of facts. For
instance, he notes that the average American consumes 4000 barrels of oil
per year. Why? and why does a family of 4 or 5 need a 10,000 square food
home made of redwood, cedar, and a two car carport with a pool? Why do the
super rich need wall sized video screens, and Ferrari's? What about the
Grandkids? what will be left for them when all the natural gas is burned up
heating those McMansions, which perhaps there are estimated to be about 1
million in the US?
john foster
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