Jim,
Your message from which I snipped the following included some good points
which I cannot answer. However, I think the following question is
extremely important and that I can answer it.
> Do "personal consumption expenditures" at the very top of the
> consumption pyramid correspond to the dramatic costs in "natural
capital" that
> you seem to *assume* are in that upper one percentile; or do personal
> consumption expenditures of the rich and famous tend more toward the
$200 weekly
> massage and other services? I don't see much data to support the
> assumption that "liquidating class" purchases *necessarily* use up
> more resources than those of the lower class. After all, a coat is a
> coat; and so what's the difference in natural capital costs of a coat
bought
> for 50 dollars at K-Mart versus a coat bought for $50,000 at Saks Fifth
> Avenue?
The purchase of the $50,000 Saks coat liquidates more than the purchase
of the $50 Walmart coat because of what had to transpire in order for the
$50K to be generated. As Adam Smith pointed out, it was agricultural
surplus that enabled the division of labor that made money a meaningful
concept. So, at the base of the financial system lies the
agricultural/extractive sector, which is analogous to the producer
trophic level in the economy of nature (i.e., plants). The integrated
economy doesn’t grow except for the growth of the base. The liquidating
freak who spent $50K took orders of magnitude more natural capital away
from the grandkids than did the Walmart-shopping steady stater.
Brian Czech
www.steadystate.org
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