Economic – Open Empire Foundation

February 1, 2018

Yet more evidence capitalism will fail to achieve sustainability

More than a decade ago, maybe as much as 2 decades ago I heard of some European automobile manufacturers taking responsibility for the materials used in their vehicles, by way of recalling all end of life vehicles and recycling every single component. Now I don’t know how accurate the story was, as it was second hand information at best when I received it, and I can’t even remember where I heard it. But it gave me an idea.

More than 5 years ago I started suggesting ( and publishing ) the idea that manufacturers should be made to show technical cause for the use of any and all non-biodegradable and/or toxic materials — ie: they should be required to show that materials are chosen for technical not economic reasons, so that the best materials for the job are used, even if something else is cheaper, where those cheaper options are toxic and/or non-biodegradable — as this would ensure the maximisation of materials innovation for biodegradable and non-toxic options.

Continue reading “Yet more evidence capitalism will fail to achieve sustainability”

January 26, 2018

Strategic transition vs. uncontrolled collapse

Many people advocate for the immediate collapse of the status quo of capitalism, without regard to the consequences of that collapse, so I want to go over the reasons why this is not a good idea.

In brief: we currently have organisations that are in control of such things as biological, chemical, and nuclear hazards;

— so ask yourself this:

IF wages cease being paid tomorrow because capitalism collapses;
THEN whom will turn up to work to decommission these hazards?

Continue reading “Strategic transition vs. uncontrolled collapse”

January 21, 2018

Poverty is a full-time job

I’m disappointed in my fellow humans that after everything we’ve seen over the past few decades — and all the history that came before — that what I’m writing about here still needs to be explained to some people … I cannot fathom how anyone could actually genuinely be stupid enough not to get it, without actually suffering from some kind of serious brain damage, birth defect of mental retardation — or perhaps brainwashing … and that’s it, isn’t it … people are indeed brainwashed.

Continue reading “Poverty is a full-time job”

November 21, 2017

Entertainment and Hospitality industries in an Open Empire

As you should be aware – if you’ve read enough of this site – industries don’t just disappear in the vision I propose, but simply the motivations for them and agendas they pursue will change … hospitality is no different. So I was thinking that perhaps some of you might be wondering:

“will I still be able to go to a cafe / restaurant, or see a live band perform, if capitalism collapses and is replaced by a non-property/trade/currency-based economic paradigm?”

… the answer is most definitely yes, and I’ll explain how it would most likely work.

Continue reading “Entertainment and Hospitality industries in an Open Empire”

November 20, 2017

Input efficieny: consumption per unit of consumption

If we were to make a generic unit of resource, such that all units of energy, matter, space, and time could be converted to this standard unit, we could more easily analyse how efficient our processes are. I’ve written a couple of articles over the last few weeks about this ( just have a look back through the blog roll ), but I want to in this article discuss the general concept of efficiency itself from an input resource perspective.

Continue reading “Input efficieny: consumption per unit of consumption”

November 18, 2017November 18, 2017

Business transition to the Open Empire framework

Imagine you have a successful business within the capitalist economic system, but at the same time this new paradigm has been up and running for a while, and so you decide you’d like to experiment with a single project run via this new framework to see how it will go by comparison to the usual way of doing things. Or perhaps you want to know where your skills will be of use in a post transition Resources Based Economy.

This article is a hypothetical scenario of how that might play out for a few different circumstances ( both during and after transition ), just to give you an idea.

Continue reading “Business transition to the Open Empire framework”

November 18, 2017November 18, 2017

5 elements of systemic scarcity: objectives, process, resources, temporal, and spatial

This article originally came to me as an idea about how to simply distinguish the differences between property/trade/currency vs. non-property/trade/currency based economic systems – being that the former manufactures scarcity, while the latter removes it ( where possible ). Which in turn was inspired by a debate on social media about whether or not the world is over populated, what we mean by that, and how/why we justify such a statement.

It then occurred to me that for people to understand these issues, they must first understand what scarcity is, and how it occurs – ironically, the people who understand this the least are often the ones who should understand it the best ( economists ), and yet it’s quite apparent that many of them haven’t a clue. The reason for that being, scarcity is an ecological issue, but not an economic one within the confines of the capitalist economic paradigm ( though it should be ).

So let’s start at the beginning and look at what scarcity actually is.

Continue reading “5 elements of systemic scarcity: objectives, process, resources, temporal, and spatial”

November 15, 2017

What happens to greed?

There’s a lot of valid questions I’ve been asked about my work and the vision it expresses, although these questions are usually asked in a very poor – even invalid – format, so I have to reinterpret the question, in order to help the querent understand their own question, and therefore understand the answer.
Continue reading “What happens to greed?”

November 7, 2017November 7, 2017

Unexpected evidence

If you design a system based on the correct interpretation of valid data, there’s a thing you should experience at some stage, and which validates the development track you’re on, and I have experienced this thing at least a few dozen times … it goes something like this ( to provide the most recent example ): Continue reading “Unexpected evidence”

November 4, 2017November 4, 2017

The “Leaf Blower vs. Broom” analogy

People often argue that capitalism is efficient, and that it strives for efficiency, but even a cursory glance at the reality around you should tell you otherwise. There are countless other examples of the inefficiency of capitalism, but I want to provide you with one detailed example first.

I was walking up the road from my house when I saw a man using one of my most hated devices, the leaf blower, a device which is a very common and typical example of the failures of capitalism … let’s take a look at exactly how redundant and wasteful this device is. Continue reading “The “Leaf Blower vs. Broom” analogy”