Plenitude: a new economic model

[Gardenarian]

This is a short video on Center for a New American Dream:

http://www.newdream.org/resources/2011-07-new-dream-mini-views-visualizing-a-plenitude-economy

Simple and good.

[catherine]

That is a really cute video... and makes sense.

I guess I am not real optimistic in American ability to embrace the benefits of Plentitude. One of the best books I read on American consumerism was An All-Consuming Century by Columbia professor Gary Cross. It's $83 on Amazon, but you can download it for free:

http://www.ebooksdownloadfree.com/Business-Finance-Jobs/An-All-Consuming-Century-BI22235.html

It was extremely compelling in explaining why we're such uber-consumers, and why we are not likely to give it up. He actually did a study on people who SAID that they would trade off a working day for more time off but when push came to shove, the same people opted for overtime. I'm sure that has a lot to do with the fact that the entire structure of society would have to be supportive of that kind of change, but still...

At the end, you could tell he WANTED to be able to recommend how to change the consumerist culture, but he couldn't. From a historical point of view, all the hippies go yuppie, and the choice to work outweighs the choice for leisure time.

The counterculture (us) will always be there, but I fear it will take a seismic shift to make "Enough" mainstream.

[Zigzagman]

I really enjoyed the video and agree with most of it but I also think that Catherine is right, most people simply cannot accept the idea of leisure over work - it is indoctrinated in our culture from birth.

As a semi-young retiree (retired at 52) I can definitely relate to the mental battle between work vs leisure or maybe income vs freedom. Because our economy and culture is based upon constantly consuming it is really a challenge to even accept the "enough" theory of living. As I am now 60 and have seen quite a bit of change since retiring I still sometimes think of "what if"? What if I had worked till now, how much could I have saved, how much more money would I have accumulated, how will my decisions impact my future?

I can say this - I think my life is far better than my best days of work and the economic sacrifices as really meaningless because actually when you realize that you do have enough then the rest is all social pressure.

I would love to see everyone take the Plenitude approach simply for the peace of mind but like I said it is a cultural shock for many people to even consider that these days.

Debt-free, living simply, enjoying life everyday - that is what life is really all about but it is definitely not the norm.

One person's simple living can sometimes be someone else's nightmare.

BTW - Thanks for the download - can't wait to read it.

Peace

[CathyA]

I'm not sure people are really into work. They are into all the things that money buys.
It would be very hard to convince the masses that they could be happier without all these material things.