A Lecture from the Haves to the Have Nots

I'm always amazed how people who have so much love to go around lecturing those who have very little that "we" all need to "tighten our belts". Here's Thomas L. Friedman in his latest op-ed in the NY Times telling us that we have to learn to live with an economy that just won't produce as much in the future...

What if the crisis of 2008 represents something much more fundamental than a deep recession? What if it’s telling us that the whole growth model we created over the last 50 years is simply unsustainable economically and ecologically and that 2008 was when we hit the wall — when Mother Nature and the market both said: “No more.”

...

“Just as a few lonely economists warned us we were living beyond our financial means and overdrawing our financial assets, scientists are warning us that we’re living beyond our ecological means and overdrawing our natural assets,” argues Glenn Prickett, senior vice president at Conservation International. But, he cautioned, as environmentalists have pointed out: “Mother Nature doesn’t do bailouts.”

This is a lot like the barons of the Middle Ages feasting at the high table looking out at the thin-as-rails servants and serfs and announcing that "everybody has to go on a diet". And what makes it so bittersweet is that of course the baron considers a diet where he gives up the butter tart in favour of the chocolate cake, but the serfs & servants are expected to give up one of their bowls of gruel each day and make do with only one.

The rich are excellent at telling everybody else that they "have too much" or that they need to "diet". But the just never seem to apply these wonderous notions to themselves.

The truth is that the economy will recover. Growth will come back. It won't be by penny pinching or cutting back that more will be made available to those without. It will be done by new technology that permits us to get more from less and that lowers costs so the poor can enjoy the good life as well. You won't get there by listening to fat cats telling you to tighten your belt. Friedman must think we are fools. His path is one that keeps the rich very rich and makes the poor much much poorer.