http://iisd1.iisd.ca/pcdf/1997/money.htm
Money as a Social Disease
A PCDForum Paper Release Date May 20, 1997
by David C. Korten
"In the history of capitalism's long expansionary cycles, it is
finance capital that usually rules in the final stage,
displacing the inventors and industrialists who launched the
era, eclipsing the power of governments to manage the course of
economic events. ...Since returns on capital are rising faster
than the productive output that must pay them, the process
imposes greater and greater burdens on commerce and societies."
William Greider, One World Ready or Not, p. 227.
What is this madness? The economy is booming. The stock market is setting
new records. The U.S. is again heralded as the world's most competitive
economy. We are assured that we richer than ever before and getting
richer by the day. Yet we are also told there is no longer enough money
to provide an adequate education for our children, health care and safety
nets for the poor, protection for the environment, parks, a living wage
for working people, public funding for the arts and public radio, or
adequate pensions for the elderly. By the official wisdom, even though
richer, we can no longer afford what we once took for granted. How is it
possible? What's gone wrong?
A quick hint. The problem is most definitely not a lack of money. The
world is awash in it. The world's 450 billionaires alone have combined
financial assets greater than the combined annual incomes of half of
humanity.
The problem is this: a predatory global financial system, driven by the
single imperative of making ever more money for those who already have
lots of it, is rapidly depleting the real capital—the human, social,
natural, and even physical capital—on which our well- being depends.
.... snip .....
The complete document is about 28K
http://iisd1.iisd.ca/pcdf/1997/money.htm
_______________
David C. Korten is president of the People-Centered Development Forum and
author of When Corporations Rule the World. This is an expanded version
of an article that originally appeared in Yes! A Journal of Positive
Futures, #2, April 1997. Subscriptions $24 per year. P.O. Box 10818,
Bainbridge Island, WA 98110-0818, or phone (1-800) 937- 4451 or (1-206)
842-0126; Fax (1-206) 842-5208; e-mail: <[log in to unmask]>.
(1) William Greider, One World, Ready or Not (New York: Simon and
Schuster, 1997), p. 232.
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Bob Olsen, Toronto [log in to unmask]
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