What exactly did I mean by “consumerism bottom feeders” in my last post you may ask? Well, I think Peter Barnes couldn’t say it better. I found and read his free ebook within a few days of my last post and digging through my notes the era of bottom feeders is summed up as…

After the change, we shifted into surplus capitalism, or what I call Capitalism 2.0. In this version, there’s no limit to what corporations can produce; their problem is finding buyers. A sizable chunk of GDP is spent to make people want this unneeded output. And credit is lavishly extended so they can buy it.

Capitalism and Credit is Out Of Control

Sound familiar? It’s what exist now, and why I wrote my last post. It’s upsetting to think about because you know everyone knows this is true, deep down in side, but they don’t want to admit it. I had a couple of very good conversations this July 4th. One of them went the way of defining what the left perceives the right to be and vice versa.

My observation simply is that the right says everyone must pull themselves up by their own bootstraps and the left says everyone needs a little bit of help. I think we can have the best of both worlds and ensuring capitalism have more than one bottom line might be the way. Peter Barnes says “To put it bluntly, the rich are rich because (through corporations) they get the lion’s share of common wealth; the poor are poor because they get very little.”

What’s next for Capitalism?

So, whats the next steps? Another discussion over the 4th boiled down the whole left vs. right issue of pretty much the only thing in common being “good government”. Now, I wont elaborate on “good” other than “good” is an extension of moral and ethical values, which are usually an extension of religion. However, what should “government” be defined as?

Once again I’ll quote Peter “we must have a proper view of government’s role. That role isn’t to run the economy, or even to manage the commons directly; it’s to assign common property rights to trustworthy guardians who will. ” You will need to read his book Capitalism 3.0 to fully understand the depth and breadth of commons, its deep and wide and didn’t I say it was a free book?

Whats next for you and me?

It’s different for everyone. After the last post I had a big wake up call and that wake up call was that this isn’t going to be easy at all. And here I am, many months later posting late as usual. In the spirit of keeping an open mind, it’s important that everyone is on the same page when discussing the matter. I can’t save the world, but we all can.