Issues: Economy
There is a difference between wealth and prosperity.
While prosperity can apply to an entire community, great wealth applies to individuals and families and always requires that many others live in poverty.
There is only a certain amount of air and water and mineral resources on the planet.
The amounts are finite and known.
Economic growth and wealth is an illusion.
Only a few can be wealthy while others must bear the consequences and responsibility.
The economy as it is today sets us up for endangerment.
The colorful world map to the right shows the countries in a spectrum from green to red.
Green represents the least disparity between the highest incomes and the lowest incomes, red indicating the countries with greatest disparity.
In the illustration with the red spike, the chart shows the percentages of money held by the percentages of people in the United States in 2001.
Since then the ratio has diverged even more, as reported by the New York Times.
Money is actually a system of symbolic exchange tokens. That's it.
Our society has gotten to a point of gambling where some people consider it a game to see who can get richest.
The soul-grinding poverty of many other people does not touch the super rich.
In an interview on television, a new 'super-rich entrepreneur' said "It's a way of keeping score."
For those in need, of course, it's not a game.
How Dare You!
"You have stolen my dreams, my childhood with your empty words, yet I'm one of the lucky ones. People are suffering. People are dying. Entire ecosystems are collapsing. We are in the beginning of a mass extinction and all you can talk about is money and fairy tales of eternal economic growth." "How Dare You! For more than thirty years the science has been crystal clear. How Dare You continue to look away and come here saying that you are doing enough when the politics and solutions needed are still nowhere in sight?"
"The United States is one of the richest countries in the world (2nd behind Kuwait).
In the United States at the end of 2001, 10% of the population owned 71% of the wealth, and the top 1% controlled 38%.
On the other hand, the bottom 40% owned less than 1% of the nation's wealth."
Moriconi blog
"Only after the last tree has been cut down,
only after the last river has been poisoned,
only after the last fish has been caught,
only then will you find that money cannot be eaten."
Cree Prophecy
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