On The Money; Standard of Living

On The Money;

Economic Advice for the 99%

Standard of Living

 

People make a big deal about our “high standard of living”. Just last week local blogger Eric Kirk invoked the “high standard of living” in western Europe as evidence of the unrivaled superiority of the democratic system, as though democracy were an economic system rather than a political one, and completely ignoring the environmental impacts of the European lifestyle. Apparently, to Kirk, a high standard of living, regardless of how fleeting, or how high the price paid by the rest of the world, is the sole measure of success, but what do we mean by “standard of living”?

When was living standardized? Can’t we customize our lives individually? Do we have standardized tests to measure our standard of living? If so, how much do we “live to the test”, so to speak, just to artificially elevate the results? …and what do we mean by high? I know how high I have to be to reach my standard, but that’s a very personal thing. My partner Amy hardly smokes any pot at all. Does she have a lower standard of living than I do? If so, I think we’d all be better off with more people like Amy and fewer people like me, rather than the reverse.

Amy is a smart attractive woman who takes care of herself, me, two cats, two snails, our home and a few non-psychoactive potted plants that I would never bother with. She takes no drugs, has no interest in mass media, the internet, or fashion. She cherishes her interactions with wild plants and animals, enjoys living close to the earth, and has learned to do so responsibly.

I, on the other hand, am a fat, bald, multi-drug addicted middle aged white guy who spends his time thinking unclean thoughts about Bratz dolls, playing with electronic children’s toys and filling web servers with pointless blog posts about it. I can’t wait to try those new “bath salts” I’ve been hearing so much about, and even though about 80% of my waking thoughts revolve around sex, I still find it easy to blather endlessly on subjects I know nothing about, and I expect everyone to listen. Clearly I exemplify a higher standard of living than does my partner Amy, but who would you rather spend your time around?

While raising our “standard of living” has opened a Pandora’s Box of previously unimaginable new opportunities for fat, bald, sex-obsessed, drug-addled white guys with huge egos, like myself and Eric Kirk to amuse ourselves, those gains have come at tremendous cost to bright, good-looking people who know how to live on this planet without fucking it up, like Amy.  In fact a rising standard of living is always marked by the extirpation of healthy good-looking people who had quietly lived, in the same place where their ancestors lived for tens of thousands of years, without depleting their resource base, and by the rise of fat, bald, white egomaniacs who shamelessly exploit everything, and for whom, sustainability is, at best, an abstract concept.

Fat, bald, white egomaniacs, around the world, all live pretty much the same way. We all want anything we see any other fat, bald, white guy with. We think its great to live in a world where every fat, bald, white guy gets to have anything that any other fat, bald white guy has, so long as he has enough money. That’s what we mean by “high standard of living”.

On the other hand, the people who inhabited this world before this new “high standard of living” all lived differently. They all developed cultures adapted to the peculiarities of the places they lived. Nothing about human culture was standardized, but all of it was sustainable.

In the “high standard of living” world of fat, bald, white sex-obsessed egomaniacs, we have building codes, a general plan, and college educated, taxpayer funded eggheads who are full of advice, but none of it is sustainable.

This is why we should value our “high standard of living” over the rich diversity of our human cultural heritage. For unless we exterminate what remains of human cultural diversity, exploit the Earth’s natural bounty, and sacrifice generations of our own progeny in the name of our “high standard of living” fat, bald, white egomaniacs with money will not be able to use economic extortion to compensate for being so sexually repulsive.

There’s a view of our “high standard of living” that’s On The Money.

On The Money, The Poverty Line

On The Money

Financial Advice for the Working-Class

The Poverty Line

“The poor will always be with us, but it wouldn’t take that long to exterminate the rich.”

WJSHS (What Jesus Should Have Said)

 

We hear about “the poverty line” a lot on the news. The number of children living below the poverty line, the number of families below the poverty line, jobs that pay “below poverty line” wages have all made headlines recently. What does “the poverty line” really mean?

Allegedly, this is how much it costs to get by in this country. “The poverty line” is an official statistic compiled by the OECD.  The poverty line doesn’t take into account things like the cost of housing, food, health care, utilities, transportation.  No, instead, the poverty line is based on 60% of median household income.  Ultimately, it adds up to a pretty good chunk of change.  In 2010 the poverty line for a single adult under 65 was $11,344, a lot more than I made that year.

 

While people need housing, no one needs a landlord. So a lot of the income it takes to reach “the poverty line”, just goes to greedy bloodsuckers bent on taking advantage of us. If we could get rid of greed, I think poverty would evaporate before our eyes. Really, we don’t need a metric to tell us that we are poor, especially if it only tells us that we make less than other people.  We need a metric that tells us when we are being greedy.

I suggest we use the same metric, but call it “the greed line”. Certainly “the poverty line” doesn’t cut it as a gauge of economic hardship. Some people living at the poverty line have miserable lives, while others, like myself, enjoy an enviable lifestyle. Ultimately, income doesn’t have as much to do with how happy you are, as does your health, or how you spend your time. So, we might as well call it “the greed line”, and get some practical use out of it.

 

If we want to know about economic hardship in this country, I suggest another metric all together. Call it “the slavery line” “The slavery line would take into account how much of your time and energy it takes to reach “the greed line”. If you can make “the greed line” income in less than 25 hrs a week, you’re living pretty well. If you have to work 40- 50 hours a week to reach “the poverty line” your life sucks. If you work more than 50 hours a week, at any income, you qualify as a slave. If you earn an income above “the greed line” you are a slave to greed. If you earn below the greed line, you are just a slave. It’s about time we call a slave “a slave” in this country, and it’s about time we abolish slavery in this country as well.

 

In cultures that have survived for tens of thousands of years, greed is considered a very bad thing, at best, a childish thing to be outgrown before adulthood. It’s time we outgrew it too. To outgrow greed, we need to understand it. To understand greed, we need to know where it begins, and greed begins where poverty ends. So, it makes as much sense to call it “The greed line” as “the poverty line”.

 

Actually, both of these terms have too many negative connotations. Both “the greed line” and “the poverty line” make you want to move away from them. You don’t want to be anywhere near “the poverty line”. Heavens no! You want to be well above it, but you don’t want to be accused of crossing “the greed line”. No, you want to stay below that. So, how can you live above “the poverty line” but below “the greed line? You can’t. That’s capitalism’s dirty little secret.

No, we need to call it something else altogether. Let’s just call it “enough”.