Steady State Revolution » Politics & Public Policy

Mr President, Put Solar On The White House

Joshua — Mon, 12 Jul 2010 03:45:47 +0000

Lead By Example, Symbols Are Powerful

Symbols are important. The Statue of Liberty, the Eiffel Tower, the Pyramids, the Great Wall are all examples of important cultural symbols. But even small symbols are important, in fact I would venture that smaller, local symbols are even more important on a day-to-day basis – the example of a father, the blessing of a ship, the courtesy of a door held open.

In order for the United States to survive the coming few decades as a society it will need to invest in something called resilience. This term has devoid from our lives for the past 50-100 years in part because of our belief that we will forever have cheap energy. The truth of the matter is that oil is peaking, and will run out soon.

Even before it runs out completely, it will get super expensive. This might not seem like a big deal to some, but to many this will increase the costs of everything we do, because nearly all of it relies on oil. Electricity, supermarket food, pencils, transportation, fresh water, lawn mowers, sewer, medical supplies, and waste water systems – everything either requires oil directly or indirectly.

Therefore, in order to increase our society’s resilience, we need to be able to take the shock of post-peak oil in stride. This means, among many other things, having readily available renewable energy. We should take advantage of our cheap(er) oil now to build the structures that will sustain a more resilient society after the peak. Once the shocks come it will likely be too late to make any proper transition to a renewable energy-powered society without hardship.

Back to symbols – we need a strong leader in this venture towards a sustainable society. President Obama has a great opportunity to provide a great symbol of our commitment on top of his house – for free! The Glõbama Campaign is provide a means for us to send a message to the president that he should do just that – put solar panels on the white house!

Check it out here.

Points of Progress

Joshua — Wed, 30 Jun 2010 17:22:39 +0000

This semi-regular report includes things happening in our world, policies, articles and practices in-line with the steady state economy or transitioning to it, that are worth some time to read about - the good news, the promising results. They are all exciting things happening I just don’t have time to post about each in-depth.

Here are some cool things happening in the world:

Peter Victor Lecture in Toronto

For those of you in the great Canadian wilderness of Toronto, or nearby, Peter Victor will be lecturing at the Center for Inquiry this Friday, July 2nd at 7pm. More than just a man with two first names, Peter Victor is the famous Canadian author of Managing Without Growth and a professor in environmental studies at York University.

Victor’s book is the result of an economic simulation devised to study the Canadian economy if it turned away from growth as its main policy goal, shifting to a sustainable, steady state economy. Results from his simulation suggest that it is possible to have full employment, eradicate poverty, reduce greenhouse gas emissions and maintain fiscal balance without economic growth. If you’re able to attend his lecture, please take notes and let me know how it goes!

Tales From The Steady State Conference

Just a few weeks ago a gathering of minds took place in the town of Leeds, UK. A blogger friend of mine, Jeremy Williams of Make Wealth History was there, along with writer and activist Lucy Glynn. Lucy is the first to write a report back from the conference, though I hope to be featuring a guest post soon from Jeremy and/or Rob Dietz with CASSE, who help host the event.

The conference included great workshops and featured keynote speakers including Peter Victor, mentioned above; Andrew Simms, Policy Director at nef; Dan O’Neill, European Director of CASSE; and Tim Jackson, author of Prosperity Without Growth and professor of sustainable development, University of Surrey.

Take a look at Lucy’s post at the nef triple crunch blog here.

Pacific Coast States Band Together To Ban Offshore Oil

As we transition to a steady state economy we will need to leave behind the unsustainable, destructive ways of our previous growth-driven economy. Foremost in my mind is the unbelievably harmful extraction, production and consumption of fossil fuels. We’re nearly out of oil. This is ever apparent in the lengths to which we now go to find more oil: oil shale, Alaskan oil, deepwater drilling, et cetera.

Happy news for my home the Pacific Northwest: All three pacific states have come together to ban offshore oil. Each state has banned it off their coasts and are now working together to remove it from the federal waters that extend outside of the state’s coastal jurisdiction. I hope this passes through out congress and the western states can live happily in the knowledge that the Gulf spill won’t be repeated here.

Taxing The Bads

Joshua — Tue, 22 Jun 2010 14:59:28 +0000

Taxation is an interesting facet of our society. Economists view taxes as a disincentive in a free market, and rightly so. Taxes increase the price of a product or service, making it less desirable. Yet, when you think about what we tax in this country, it’s mostly things we desire more of – income, profits, sales, et cetera. This odd behavior should be questioned, even more so today when every budget (state, city, federal) seems to be facing seriously tenuous times.

I took the train down to Oregon this last weekend to see my sister graduate from college. While there I stayed with Rob Dietz, Executive Director of CASSE and a good friend of mine. He handed me a very modest looking magazine called Sockeye. I am sure I will be drawing material from this one issue for some time (check it out, amazing articles). For now I want to talk about tax shifting, as mentioned in the article by Alan Durning and Amy Chan, “Making Prices Tell The Truth: Shifting Taxes from Bads to Goods.” (pdf)

The Imbalance of the Free Market

Taxes have the power of acting as a means of balancing what are called “market inefficiencies,” things in the free market system that generate negative externalities. These are unwanted side effects that are not taken into account in a product, service or activity. A great example of this is any fossil fuel, let’s take Coal for instance.

Let’s imagine a coal power plant starts leeching mercury into a watershed and a city water planet down river takes it in (coal accounts for most of the mercury in our waterways). The coal power plant is not paying to filter this mercury out, nor is it paying for all the damage that could occur from the toxin leeching into the ecosystems. Because the producer does not pay for the negative externalities it is left out of the decision to pursue coal power.

If these externalities were eliminated by charging or compensating for them, then they could be factored into the decision making process. This is especially important as all too often these become costs placed upon the society instead of the producer (e.g. the city water plant in the above example has to filter out the mercury from its water source). If these prices were added into coal’s price they would eventually make coal production to costly to be worthwhile.

One of the best ways to internalize these negatives into our free market is to increase their expense with taxes to help offset costs like oil spill clean ups, health care or water treatment.

More Taxes, Less Cuts

Instead of cutting important, meaningful services like education, health care, welfare, police and fire departments we should be looking at new sources of income. No one is looking forward to more taxes, so this leads us to the need to consider something – I know when I say it, politicians everywhere will wince – out of the box. The conventional isn’t working, hasn’t worked and only seems to make things worse as we go forward into the future.

Here are some of the tax/income ideas that I think have great potential:

Tax Pollution – We have the systems to monitor pollutants, so we should tax everything on a global warming potential basis. Carbon costs $1 per unit, so methane (which has a GWP of 12 times that of CO2) would cost $12 per unit.
Toll Roads – If we want to be serious about transitioning to sustainable means of travel, we need to start tolling more roads here in the states. These funds should go directly into funding more transit, maintenance, et cetera and keeping state transit workers employed.
Tax Gasoline/Propane/Diesel – Here I have the same sentiment as the last point. The “true cost” of gasoline, when you add in all the externalities that can be priced, is around $12 per gallon. Now, a $12 gallon of gasoline would take a while to work up too – but it shouldn’t be seen as ridiculous (Europeans pay over $7 per gallon), especially since it will get there eventually on its own. However, if we start now we gain a better reward and help fight climate change along the way.
Tax Resource Extraction – If you harvest anything unsustainably, it should be taxed. This goes doubly so for non-renewable resources like oil, natural gas and coal.
Tax Advertising – This is a blight on human psyches and generally accepted by most as a nuisance. Personally, I think we should ake São Paulo’s route and outlaw advertising in public spaces. All others should be taxed as the public nuisance they are!
Tax Banks – Banking is screwed up. Private banks and their CEOs make exorbitant amounts of money doing something provides comparably little service to society. As the current state of economic affairs is a great example of, banking is actually more detrimental to society than we thought just a few years ago. We need a small percentage tax on all banking transactions. This “Robin Hood Tax” could raise billions to fund education, social services, climate mitigation and aid in eliminating poverty and hunger.
Tax Corporations - If anyone is to blame for most of the worlds problems, I could surely name more large corporations than individual people. Why don’t we tax them when they get “too big to fail”?
Fuel Efficiency “Feebates” – A feebate is a combination of fee and rebate, often proposed as a means to improve fuel efficiency in vehicles. It works rather simply: for every mpg below the average on a new car purchase you pay a fee. For every mpg above the average on a new car purchase you get a rebate. This creates an incentive for both consumer and manufacturer to purchase/make more fuel efficient vehicles, thereby increasing the average. A study done at UC Berkeley showed that a $70 per mpg feebate would increase fuel efficiency about 1 mpg per year.
Tax the Rich – People making more than 20 times the average wage should be taxed on their income. They are promoting inequality, which have been linked to a range of social and economic problems. Take this a few steps further, increase the taxes the further away you get from the average national income and subsidize the income of those 20 times below the average. This is more Robin Hood than the bank tax even: it supports equality and actually lifts people out of poverty. Basically, this could be a feebate for wage equality.

That’s all I got for now, though I am sure we could come up with a few more ways to generate income. All of these taxes could be instituted in small levels, gradually increased as we deem appropriate, and eventually should lead to the elimination of taxes on median-level incomes, profits and sales. This levy on taxing the goods would help offset the trickle-down of price increases that would likely occur with instituting this new types of taxes. Plus, we get a double-whammy: income for our ailing budgets and discouraging bad behavior.

Ethical Banking Systems

Joshua — Wed, 09 Jun 2010 16:35:43 +0000

Banks should protect our money, not fleece us for their profit

Our money is loaned into existence and then must be paid back, plus interest. This interest can only come by earning (taking) money from other loans in the system, thereby installing inherit competition and scarcity in our society. Could you imagine a society in which we didn’t have to compete for a scarce amount of funds? How could this alter our communities or the way we treat each other?

An ethical banking system is one that upholds the value of the people who use it. Instead of a institution that values only profit, an ethical bank would value the people that support it. This really shouldn’t be too crazy of an idea, but our banks today do everything in their power to leverage greater profits. The recent economic crash being a prime example. We should support and create banks that support our societal and economic well being, not their CEO bonus checks.

The Reason We Need It

It seems like second nature to me that systems we create as a society should function with the ethics we value, but there is obvious room for improvement. When a lot of our organizations and industries started the room for growth seemed limitless, so it was much easier to gain advantage in the market and grow without sacrificing ethics. Like many things in this era, we’ve run out of that room and the only way to make a higher market share this year and next year is to start finding ethically gray (or black areas) for expansion (e.g. derivatives).

Paper exchanging for paper is now 20 times greater than exchanges of paper for real commodities. This distortion of value from real wealth to phantom wealth encourages a financially dependent system, driving up debt and down real value. Eventually those claims on wealth will be exchanged for actual wealth – even if there are no longer enough. An ethical banking system supports a more realistic approach to real wealth and the money that represents it – as well as environmental concerns with investment and social justice.

An Ethical Banking System is one that encourages stable and equal amounts of material wealth. If you haven’t clued into it yet, our current banking organizations do not function in an ethical way. Our banking system encourages debt, competition, scarcity, and unequal distributions of wealth. What if we created a bank in line with our values? One that supported the people, community, and real wealth?

An Ethical Banking System

A society is created by every part within it, big or small. In a democratic country we are supposed to each have an equal power in deciding the way our nation functions. Governments are no longer meant to rule over us (as in medieval times), but instead aid us in our development – protect us from harm and ensure we have the capability to flourish (remember our pursuit of life, liberty, and happiness?).

Part of our capability to flourish is encouraged or hampered by our material wealth (part, not all). If our society decides to give each of us the means to have more material wealth than necessary than we should each be able to flourish in this aspect of our lives with room to spare. If our society decides to create less than we need, or go a step further and saddle us with debt, then our ability to flourish is hampered. Obviously the Goldilocks spot is the desired goal.

Here are Herman Daly’s recommendations for creating more realistic banking, wealth, and monetary systems:

Limit the range of inequality in income distribution—a minimum income and a maximum income. Without aggregate growth poverty reduction requires redistribution. Complete equality is unfair; unlimited inequality is unfair. Seek fair limits to inequality.
Free up the length of the working day, week, and year—allow greater option for leisure or personal work. Full-time external employment for all is hard to provide without growth.
Re-regulate international commerce—move away from free trade, free capital mobility and globalization, adopt compensating tariffs to protect efficient national policies of cost internalization from standards-lowering competition from other countries.
Downgrade the IMF-WB-WTO to something like Keynes’ plan for a multilateral payments clearing union, charging penalty rates on surplus as well as deficit balances—seek balance on current account, avoid large capital transfers and foreign debts.
Move to 100% reserve requirements instead of fractional reserve banking. Put control of money supply and seigniorage in hands of the government rather than private banks.

Common Good Finance

And here is another great idea, there are many different types of alternative banking systems, I like this one:

(For my feed readers who can’t view this video it is available here)

What do you think? Do you have any recommendations for a more realistic banking and monetary system?

Image Credit: Flickr Creative Commons

The Earth Bleeds Out

Joshua — Wed, 02 Jun 2010 19:30:27 +0000

If only the words “back from whence ye came” could really have magical powers and plug the mortal wound we have inflicted upon the Gulf of Mexico (and soon her bigger cousin, the Atlantic Ocean and Eastern Coastline). Whilst our human brains convince us over and over again that we are above nature, can outsmart her, or take over her services, she shows us again and again the error in our ways. From Katrina, to Taiwan, to Haiti and many more, Mother Nature is an unrelenting and all-powerful presence in our lives. This shouldn’t be seen as an unwelcomed presence – far too often we seem to run away from nature, when we are, in fact, of nature and in nature.

I have been avoiding writing about the Gulf Disaster because it seems pretty well covered: it’s everywhere, whether you read it, watch it, or listen to it. However, I couldn’t resist promoting this incredibly moving image tool: Ifitwasmyhome.com. What would the oil disaster look like if it was centered over your home? Check it out for me here in Seattle: (Thanks to nef’s Triple Crunch Blog for first showing me this site)

Gush Forth! Oh, Mighty Earth!

Imagine this were true: the largest populated area in the Pacific Northwest would be almost entirely covered in oil, even up over the Canadian border. They’re our allies, but I can’t imagine they’d be happy with that type of sharing. All of the Olympic Rainforest and National Park would be dripping wet with crude. Lake Chelan would be filled with black gold. As far south as Centralia and stretching over the many islands of the Puget Sound – all wiped out by BP’s greed for a fossil fuel. Good-bye Orcas! good-bye Salmon! Audios watersheds, fisheries, and my beautiful hometown.

They seem completely incapable of stopping the leak (some wonder if they won’t be able to do it or it might wait until Christmas). Personally, I think it is motivation to sell your car, ride your bike, and vote for a constitutional amendment outlawing corporate personhood (had this occurred prior to 1886, the government could have liquidated BP’s assets to cover everything and thrown everyone involved in jail).

All of this is the direct result of our lust for oil. We are destroying the largest fishery in the US (something like 70% of our shellfish and 30% of all our seafood comes from the Gulf), destroying priceless natural capital. For what? BP’s giant profits. This won’t finish them unless we take them to court, and even that is doubtful to have a large, positive result within a decade. At least the local economy will get a bump in GDP while everyone rushes down there to clean it up, right?

What do you think of the developments down there?

Points of Progress

Joshua — Sat, 29 May 2010 16:36:50 +0000

Here are some cool things happening in the world:

Plenitude: The Economics of True Wealth

Juliet Schor is a co-founder of the Center for a New American Dream and a well-resumed author. She has partnered in the past with the likes of Tim Jackson and Bill McKibben on various tasks. A personable, well-spoken women from Boston College, Juliet has a new vision for the economy: plenitude. Her new book, Plenitude: The Economics of True Wealth, attempts to answer an important question: How do we create a society that provides prosperity to us all without relying on continued economic expansion?

Plenitude offers not only a great argument against economic growth as we’ve known it, but a vision for a rethinking productivity and innovation for our future. It is uses an integrated approach to set out a vision to work on all these fronts to see a new way of living that is low-footprint and puts people back to work that creates new forms of wealth and well-being. Read my article on Post Growth and check out the video of her recent talk at Town Hall Seattle on Vimeo here.

The Gulf Oil Spill

As odd as it sounds, I think the gigantic BP oil spill in the gulf is acting as a wake up call to many: this is the future of fossil fuels. It’s only going to get harder and more dangerous. Meanwhile, the largest fishery in the US is being destroyed in the pursuit of a unsustainable fuel source. Hopefully this will open our eyes to the fact that BP really doesn’t have our interests in mind, only its profits. That is what corporations do: go for profits, not for people.

Read Scott’s recent article about this on Post Growth.

The Great Tax Parachute

Its hard for me to keep up with all the amazing things coming out of the new economics foundation (nef). This report was released late last month after lots of news that the UK government (as well as others during this time of economic hardship) announced cuts in programs and government employment will be necessary. However, as nef outlines, there are many progressive taxes we can introduce that can balance the budget and keep those programs.

This proposal is in-line with one of the coming shifts: the great tax shift (working on a post about this, actually). In order to create a sustainable society we must stop subsidizing fossil fuels and intensive, destructive farming but instead tax resource extraction and pollution and institute new subsidies on renewable energy.

Points of Progress

Joshua — Mon, 05 Apr 2010 16:24:58 +0000

Here are some cool things happening in the world:

The 3/50 Project: Uniting Small Business With Local Citizen Action

In an effort to support local businesses and local economies and new campaign called the 3/50 Project asks you to pick your 3 favorite local businesses and donate $50 a month to each. From there website, “If have the employed population spent $50 in a locally owned business, it would generate more than $42.6 billion in revenue…. For every $100 spent in locally owned independent stores, $68 returns to the community.”

Even though the site’s founder is likely a growth-support, the concept is in-line with steady state economics: local economy is the core. If you want a more secure, just economy, starting local is the only way to go. Your money speaks louder than your words nowadays, so spend it wisely. It is simple campaigns like this one that inspire me to be hopeful, as the simple ones are usually more successful.

UK Post Bank Campaign

The campaign for a “post bank” in the UK isn’t exactly breaking news, but the progress and concept are noteworthy nonetheless. Just recently Ed Miliband, the British energy and climate secretary, put his support behind the post bank as well. To quote Miliband in the article, “It speaks to people’s sense of community – and frankly, banks have let down low-income consumers, and others as well. It is part of a new deal for the low paid around the banking industry.” (He isn’t the first to bank this idea, see here)

A post bank would be a public-owned bank run through the post office. It would be an readily available, community bank – allowing the people access to bank accounts without dealing with the fat-cat, big banks that dominate the landscape today. This institution would help small businesses, people of low incomes, and could restore public faith in the banking system (as well as create a banking system deserving of that trust).

Co-op profits surge as customers desert UK’s bigger banks

Right in line with the last bit, here is some news that points towards a more promising future: co-ops over big banks. Co-op groups reported a 38 percent increase in new accounts. Credit unions and co-ops internalize a lot of their risk, tend to lend more responsibly, and keep their profits in the community. In case you weren’t reading the above parts about how important the local economy and community really are, read my posts on the subject (“The New Economy Starts Here” & “Local Currency & Bartering“)

So, news that the co-ops are seeing a profit serge as UK citizens leave the bigger banks is a good trend for two reasons: (1) hopefully this is a sign we have learned not to trust in the big, greed banks that caused our most recent “Great Recession,” and (2) we’re pushing towards a steady state economy with action – which speaks louder than, well, words.

Obama Announces Degrowth, Wins Republican Support

Joshua — Thu, 01 Apr 2010 23:46:15 +0000

"We Must Forge A Sustainable Nation For All"

In a surprising turn of events, President Barack Obama announced in a press conference today that economic growth could no longer continue as we know it. As a prominent New York magazine quoted, “the press room went silent and after a tension-filled moment, erupted in applause!”

As numerous environmental groups, ecological economists, and people with common sense have been trying for decades to gain political ground on the issue, a left-field bipartisan bill was drafted late last night and rushed through both the House and Senate. News of the conflict between growing the economy and maintaining an environment that can sustain human life was a shock to many in congress. However, conscience and prudence won the day, prompting late-night legislative sessions.

Tomorrow President Obama will sign into law the American Development and Reorientation Act, a comprehensive bill that will overhaul the financial sector, incorporate well-being into national accounts, end fossil fuel subsidies, tax pollution, cap greenhouse gas emissions, remove rights of person-hood from corporations, and provide minimum incomes and cap gaps in wealth – all to provide a more stable and just economic system that focuses on developing our society instead of expanding the size of our economy.

As the President said during the conference,

“By recommitting ourselves to the founding ideals of this great nation, focusing on our possibilities and liberating ourselves from failed ideas and institutions, together we can create a stronger, better nation that secures a fulfilling life for every person and honors the premise of the Declaration of Independence that every individual is endowed with an unalienable right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.”

This amazing turn-about in public policy not only represents the needs of the America people, but ensures a long, prosperous future for our society on this planet. This will go down in history as the first major (gigantic) step towards a sustainable world for all! Well done, Mr President!

**Happy April 1st everyone!**