World Economics, One World Money, and Global Prosperity
It has long been recognized by many, that there is no actual shortage of supply in the world, either of raw materials or of man-made goods. The late Buckminster Fuller, the multi-genius who had over 48 Ph.D.s, once calculated that there are enough man-made goods alone, already in the marketplace globally, to make every last man, woman, and child on the planet a multi-millionaire. And this was two or three decades ago.
The reason, then, that over 80% of the masses have barely enough to survive on, is that there is a problem of distribution, not of supply. A tiny minority have far more than they need, depriving the many. Garry Davis recognizes this:
“. . . multinational business entities manipulate the resources, accounting systems, revenues and even the governments of numerous nations with diverse currencies. Of the world’s 100 largest economic units, almost half are corporations. The annual sales volume of General Motors is larger than the gross national product of 130 developing states. Able to subvert law and circumvent most government controls, the corporate ‘state’ has become the most powerful tool for private profit — at public expense — ever devised.
“. . . Can this be changed? Can multinationals be made accountable? Can economic power be diffused, reducing the gap between the owners of corporate equity — the haves, and the have-nots — the other 95 percent of humanity?“
Now the important point is this: while we recognize that improvements in distribution are the solution, and that it is possible and desirable to make such improvements, it is of paramount importance to understand that by far the best vehicle for this to happen is the decentralized free market. This is the arena of those developing sovereignty consciousness.
A more universally beneficial and equitable redistribution of planetary wealth cannot be mandated or forced. The 80 year experiment in the Soviet Union, which ended in a grand failure, is perfect proof.
Davis addresses the rightness of improved distribution:
“According to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, everyone has a right to a decent standard of living — to food, clothing, medical care, housing, social services, and security against unemployment, sickness, disability, widowhood, and old age (article 25). Each of us also has the right to own property, alone or in association with others (art. 17).”
— Passport to Freedom, Ch. 27
While it is true that it is possible for the entire human population to be supported on the Earth in a decent standard of living, no one has the intrinsic “right” to it if it is at the expense of others. The idea that everyone should have the basics to live in dignity is appreciated, and we would celebrate the achievement of all human beings realizing such a life of abundance and wellness.
The improvement we would make, however, on Garry’s statement, is to define and qualify the word “right”. The notion that “everyone has a right to a decent standard of living” could be interpreted by the parasites of the world to imply that someone else must be forced or coerced to provide that “decent standard“, which is quite absurd.
“Government is the myth whereby half the population tries to live off the other half.“
— Frederick Bastiat
The currently ending dark ages have been a time in which taxes, both obvious and hidden, consumed well over 50% of the income and productivity of the masses — just like mosquitos and other parasites. Likewise, the “public sector” — that segment of the population whose salaries and support comes directly or indirectly from taxes and government resources — has constituted approximately half the adult working population in most countries. When one considers that the public sector produces very little that is life supporting, and much that is destructive, one can easily see the truth in what Frederick Bastiat said.
Thus, the statement “everyone has a right to a decent standard of living” could easily be the motto of the parasitic bureaucrats who leach off the productive part of the population. What might be more accurate is to say, “everyone has a right to the equal opportunity for a decent standard of living“.
Basically, these principles should be followed:
RESPECT ALL INDIVIDUALS, THEIR PROPERTY, AND THEIR FREEDOM.
TAKE ONLY WHAT IS OFFERED. NEVER TAKE WHAT ISN’T OFFERED.
While it may appear inequitable and unfair that giant corporations and super-rich individuals control vastly more than they need, while billions of other people starve, nevertheless the solution to this problem is not found in legislating, mandating, requiring, or trying to force or coerce the rich into sharing with the poor. However uncompassionately they may appear to be using what we all consider to be our collective planetary resources, it would still be a violation of the rights of the rich to do as they wish with their wealth, if they were to be required or forced to distribute it differently. Such efforts have been tried, and they didn’t work.
Morality cannot be legislated.
It is recognized that Garry Davis’s World Government could be celebrated as a hero that brings virtue and integrity into the field of authority, and it may be making major contributions to the good of mankind by inspiring improvements in politics and economics. It is also recognized that gentleness and non-coerciveness are qualities with which Davis is credited.
It is therefore not that any of his principles are “wrong,” so much as that he omits and neglects to mention many of the critical ingredients in how his good intentions will get fulfilled. To be complete, he needs to make crystal clear the realization of the inferiority and ineffectiveness of coercion, and explicitly state that the absolute abandonment of any form of coercion is an essential factor in all of his World Government activities.
Davis correctly identifies the obstacles to healthy economies posed by governments trying to interfere and control prices, production, and so on. In relation to this, someone once said, “If legislation is passed to control buying and selling, the first things that will be bought and sold are legislators.” Davis further points out the fallacy of believing in the “full employment” panacea. Full employment is touted by governments as some kind of worthy goal to solve social economic problems, but Davis correctly observes that even if it were achieved, full employment would still not guarantee sufficient purchasing power or improvement in living conditions.
Thus, he understands well what doesn’t work. But he is very incomplete on what will work. He advocates “democratic ownership,” where “. . . the current automatic flow of most newly formed capital into the hands of the upper 5 percent will have to stop.” His “Mutual Affluence System, the philosophical basis of World Government economics,” would redistribute shares in global industry into the hands of the workers, giving them equity ownership.
Meritorious as this sounds, Davis fails to mention at least very two very important conditions:
1) that such a redistribution be based on natural free market laws, such as actual results of investment savvy and creative productivity, instead of some individual or council merely deciding how much each worker gets . . . and
2) that the property already in the ownership of the upper 5 percent not be taken by force, against their will, to satisfy this redistribution.
In other words, Davis fails to express the wisdom of letting it happen naturally! If you simply take from the rich, like Robin Hood, and distribute it evenly to the lower class, like they tried in Russia, you destroy everything. The rich just leave the country or become less productive, because their incentive has been killed, and the lower classes likewise don’t become more productive, because in such a project, there is nothing given to furnish a logical relationship between individual initiative and results.
