A better economic model ... implementation

You would think that people, when presented with a better alternative, would jump up and grab it. But when you've spent your life following one path, it's hard if not impossible to think of trekking through the underbush to reach another.. Like Moses when reaching the promised land, he waited for the new generation to grow up before occupying that land. Also, I've learned the hard way that it's not what you say but how you say it that wins the day.

By "implementation", I want to be clear that I don't want to impose my own solution onto society. I do want to expose society to the problem and to the need to resolve the problem. I want us to work together to find solutions to the problem. I start the ball rolling, I hope, by presenting a beginning solution that can either be improved upon or that can provide a stepping stone to a better solution.

The first step is to expose this model to as many people as possible with the hope that the idea can take root and be of benefit:

Simplify the core concepts down to a few effective statements.
Create a simple, attractive, informative, online presentation, which can be then viewed and copied, and responded to.
Create a video (on Youtube) to attractively present the model.
Contact (by email, or other mechanisms) key people in the economic world that can test and provide constructive feedback to me and could hopefully use the ideas in the model to actually address and resolve our economic problems.

The next major step is to implement such a new model. Assuming that the economic life cycle would change and follow my new economic model:

Use the existing fiscal cycle (government budget exercise, for example).
Gather statistics. Take a closer look at what our social needs are and how to label and measure them. Select one or two main needs to start with.
Use the quantification/measurement approach proposed by this model (see table) to test existing and proposed projects and activities related to meeting these needs.
Adjust whatever parameters as required so that the activities can best improve our quality of life - their ability to satisfy the one or two needs initially specified.
Audit the result.
Expand the scope of the model with each fiscal cycle.

Simplify

Present

Video

Contact

Gather information

The success of my proposed model will be based in a large part on accuracy of measurement; on gathering information from the people.

I’m thinking of statistics. We have a mechanism, and thousands of people, involved in gathering statistics of all kinds about everything in our lives. Governments use demographics to be able to plan and justify. Companies use statistics to create, market, sell products. We have statistics and processes for gathering them.

And as we, as individuals, look at these statistics, it’s not difficult to extract information, and numbers, that we can collectively believe relate to our quality of life. So we need to select some of these statistics, maybe think of some others, and formalize and audit the way in which such statistics are gathered and presented to distill - and make into law - what we need to ensure our quality of life. We would start with the obvious important elements.

We should also accept that this process of determining and measurement – of statistics that relate to quality of life – is an ongoing process that will continue to evolve with time.

So we have a basis. We need a society-wide consensus on the way we identify and measure these elements. This consensus can become wider and more socially specific for each nation/ethnic unit and finally the whole world.

Links

The following list connects people and other efforts that support or otherwise contribute to my attempt at improving our economy and quality of life:

http://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/rogoff88/English
Rethinking the Growth Imperative by Kenneth Rogoff, seemingly first published 2 Jan 2012 in the Project Syndicate (a World of Ideas) online publication. I came across this article while reading Al Jazeera online English (http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/opinion/2012/01/20121312591520271.html) on Sun 8 Jan 2012.
TimeBanks USA
Their mission is to nurture and expand a movement that promotes equality and builds caring community economies through inclusive exchange of time and talent. The people involved are working with TimeBanks leaders across the US and internationally to strengthen and rebuild community, and use TimeBanks to achieve wide-ranging goals such as social justice, bridges between diverse communities, and local ecological sustainability. The idea is to engage people to volunteer their time and talent to help those that need what you can offer, but also to measure the time and effort made - to bank that effort like a currency. Then, later on, you can "spend" what you have banked by engaging time and talent from other people. Although this is an effort-tracking system, the measurement fulfils the same function as does real money.

Acknowledgements

This page, and the other 4 associated pages contain graphics that have been taken directly from pictures posted on the Internet. I thank those who have originated the pictures and assure them that as soon as I am able, I will drawn my own images and remove theirs from my site.

This page is written by myself, Peter Vasdi; this page first published and posted on the Internet on Sunday 25 October 2011.