Author: Administrator

Professor Emeritus of Sustainability Wayne Hayes retired from Ramapo College of New Jersey on July 1, 2015. Wayne's concern merges two of his principle interests: first, capitalism's drive for profit and growth; second, the consequences: inequality, fiscal crisis, exclusion, ecocide, and, looming on the horizon, catastrophic climate change. Capitalism has the upper hand and will not capitulate voluntarily: Aporia, no path through it --- or might there be: Such speculation motivates my work. Join me!

The Passing Parade

As I ponder the themes of this site, I discover relevant current events, listing them in the nascent blog.

People or profit: Which comes first?

Profit rules as the engine of capitalism. Take this example: A Bank of America supervisor pressures employees to come to work in NYC despite the threat of the Covid-19 epidemic and pleas to remain home. The CEO, Brian Moynihan, purports himself as a responsible corporate head committed to CSR, including putting people before profit. Maybe not all senior execs got the memo. Read the NYT article for yourself. Then read how the CEO expresses his choice: the growth of shareholder return, i.e. profit. Of course.

Corporate media, like all media, must be critically assessed. Here the choice of the primacy of profit or people, or nature, becomes a primary ethical norm. Never lose sight of this fundamental ethical choice. Act accordingly as a consumer, investor, citizen, stakeholder. You matter.

Note that if corporations put profit first (what I call the Friedman Doctrine), the notion that capitalism will meet the challenges of CSR is unlikely, if not impossible. The choice is clear:

  • Dark Money will seize its opening on behalf of capitalism, business as usual (BAU). Coalitions within capitalism will prevent any internal threat to its dominance. Wresting away control will be unlikely: See my Statement of Concern.
  • The mirage of CSR will evaporate as hard decisions over people and the planet (literally a broad pro-life agenda) give way to profit.

The call for the USA from the NYT

Today, April 9, 2020, the New York Times published a bold initiative: The America We Need.

The larger project, however, is to increase the resilience of American society. Generations of federal policymakers have prioritized the pursuit of economic growth with scant regard for stability or distribution. This moment demands a restoration of the national commitment to a richer conception of freedom: economic security and equality of opportunity. That

Covid-19 QuickNotes

My contention about capitalism recognizes that historical events can shift the political-economic establishment (PE) rapidly. I will take QuickNotes here. The Covid-19 pits the economy against public health, money interests vs human health — a formidable test case that deserves close attention, as here.

The PE response talks about relief policies including expanding fiscal spending, financial market support (as always), and shared benefits beyond the endogenous financial crisis of 2007-2008. The implementation could be less clumsy, more adaptive, and quicker than anything since the New Deal. The Fed has done their part and the talk from the Oval Office appears pragmatic, less ideological. Much remains to unfold, so watch closely.

Social distancing and hunkering in place has disrupted the way that workers work, and much could stick. The Cloud appears popular, adaptive, and useful. Given that the productivity of the PE has slowed since 2008, this could be a breakthrough. The workers’ quality of life at the workplace could be permanently improved. Watch this emerging trend closely.

Explicit recognition of the plight of working folks could put checks in the mail, or digitally through the Cloud. Promises only so far but since wages have been stagnant since the late 1970s, this could be noteworthy.

I have presented capitalism as a potentially handy kit of tools such as responsive markets and macro-economic acounts (GDP) that tell the truth, fiscal and monetary policies that work for average folks, not just the plutocracy. Certainly, systemic PE dysfunctions shall persist: inequality, fiscal crisis, climate and overall ecological assault, and dispossession around the world, typically within rural areas.

The November elections loom. Cynics worry that Trump could try to postpone the elections if the pandemic persists or, as models suggest, intensify. However, the GOP fear of a massive Blue Wave, may open up popular support that has now been expected. Again, watch closely.

The Covid-19 pandemic could still intensify, with historically significant tragedies. However, a recession appears likely, so the business investment may continue to shrink and federal deficits explode.

Stakeholder capitalism along the lines of the EU could emerge, a potential game-changer. If a recession, or even widespread fear of an economic collapse, can open up such a possibility — but Dark Money will actively work against any threat to the profit of the plutocracy.

Quick Notes

  • See my notes that focus on how flexible is capitalism: people over profits?
  • Totems of shareholder capitalism need to speak out: Starbucks is in. Diamond, Buffet are silent. Cohn and the general Chamber response is “enough, already.”
  • Trump tolerates Fauci, epitomizing health vs corporate pressure.
  • War production nibble over masks.

Davos WEF Update #1.4, 1/19/20

A lone Occupy Wall Street protester sits in front of Federal Hall, across the street from the New York Stock Exchange, in New York June 8, 2012. More than eight months after Occupy Wall Street stormed the global stage, decrying economic inequality and coining the phrase "We are the 99 percent," the movement appears to be losing steam. Donations to the flagship New York chapter have slowed to a trickle. Polls show that public support is rapidly waning. Media attention has dropped precipitously.

WEF claims to do good. Others doubt it.

As the World Economic Forum oligarchs convene in Davos, Switzerland, check out the heart-felt doubts of an Occupy Wall Stree activist invited to Davos, Micah White. The Anonymous guy above reading the China Daily might as well be me, but I am upfront, hardly anonymous.

Klaus Schwab, the WEF founder, would be held in vile contempt by neoliberal champion Milton Friedman. Here’s why:

  • Friedman and orthodox neoliberal ideologues regard unfettered capitalism as Pareto Optimal (best of all possible worlds), meaning that we can’t do any better than that! All this impressive theoretical effort derives from a grand-theory deduction (Tinbergen), not from induction based on data, such as today’s news. And tomorrow’s.
  • Schwab regards corporations as potentially, not yet actually, responsible and transparent social agents accountable to stakeholders. Costco provides a model mission and, yup, Walmart may be heading in that direction. Ray Dalio and even BlackRock, the largest investment corporation, have publicly declared such revision in their mission statements, with results. Corporate Social Responsibility does occasionally happen, so, as economist Kenneth Boulding states: “If it exists, it is possible.” Don’t go crazy yet: Profits provide the engine of capitalism (Shaikh).

Fossil fuels may provide the signal as to which of these models prevail. Divestment in coal is the litmus test for financial behemoths. Watch the coming Aramco IPO for insights about the future of these models of corporate behavior. The Aramco IPO will assess such variables as the adequacy of corporate governance, transparency and integrity, and, critically, the long-term price of a barrel of oil. The Saudi oil powerhouse appears to produce sweet product at the cost of $4/barrel. Their proven reserves appear to be 268 billion barrels and the sunk infrastructure investment is enormous, and vulnerable to sabotage. Do the math. As I write, the market price is about $65/barrel and the IPO has been valued at $1.85 trillion, to the chagrin of the Crown Prince who expected over $2 trillion to support his tottering feudal welfare state. See my notes. The worst event for Aramco: Petroleum reserves become stranded assets as climate destruction takes over.

Micah says:

At the heart of the World Economic Forum is the conviction that decisions are best made when the interests of all stakeholders are served. Explaining this concept in 1971, Schwab wrote:

Why I lost confidence in WordPress.

Because I am locked out of my legacy blog, I am unwilling to again trust WordPress, dirty and vulnerable but powerful and convenient.

  • Even as I write this blog entry, I notice plugins that I did not, and would not, choose.
  • Spam, spam, more spam. Use filters, but must give away data.
  • Few authors, including me, understand the complicated CMS and SQL engine. HTML need not be complicated. I have spent probably twenty hours on this. Should I really be hand-editing PHP and SQL scripts?

Bulletin Board 2020, #1.3

WordPress locked me out since November.

Why the lapse? I am still locked out of my original blog, with my dedicated server support team unable to remedy: lots of my writing has been lost. So, I have lost confidence in WordPress blogging. Here, I keep to work on the fly while I concentrate on HTML5 in my legacy ProfWork.org site, where I have published over a thousand pages without a server hitch, not so WordPress.

What’s on my mind now.

In this blog, I identify long-term, strategic cases and trends worth watching:

  • Does the Aramco IPO provide a tell on energy future: Less than $2 trillion? See my Evernote. Key questions:
    • Will the shale fracking boom continue?
    • US oil demand through 2121: recession or growth slowdown?
  • The World Economic Forum, about to convene at Davos, will focus on global cooperation about what has abruptly topped public opinion concern: climate.
  • The recent media attention to population slowdown, with profound long-term consequences, such as to China and the USA.
  • Will GDP growth slowdown in the USA in the 2020s? The Congressional Budget Office forecasts GDP deceleration and surging federal budgetary deficits. [I will dig out the source.]
  • Attention to hotspots such as the burning alive of the Amazon and of Australia — while their respective governments persist in climate denial.
  • I will not cover the upcoming Presidential election in the USA but comment only if warranted in covering the concerns above.

Enough substance to digest.

Disclaimer

Dear Reader, I am glad that you dropped in. I want you to know what I do here.

No source pays me, and I do not seek remuneration. In retirement, I am busy, content, but fulfill a personal commitment in this project. The mission explains my intention, declared in 2007 as my Statement of Concern, my North Star. My principle concern: I do not wish to neglect household duties and my busy social life, nor to strain my wife’s patience.

My course-driven website supplemented my lectures and course offerings. Here they are:

These pages, perhaps over a thousand, follow the map of the course syllabus and schedule. My Public Policy Cycle offered the main text.

Fortunately, my server indicates that I receive close to one-hundred visits per day, with each visitor engaged for about four minutes. This pleases me. My work does appear in a myriad of college-level courses, parts of are apparantly being translated into Spanish, and permission has been sought for many courses. I am referenced a fair amount.

However, Dear Reader, I write as well for other purposes:

  • I fulfill a commitment that I made to progeny and, well, to Creation and to Being itself. Humanity is making a cataclysmic blunder: Wasting Life on Earth, degrading Nature, and diminishing the human Soul and stripping billions of people of their dignity. I abhor such atrocities and will speak out. This blog allows me to raise my voice, clarify my thoughts, share my words, and, hopefully, offer a unique perspective, a kind of Political Economy or even Political Ecology.
  • I heartily recommend the commonsense handbook ReWork. The book admonishes the reader to pursue their work in her unique way, to cut the falderal, and even to build your own tools. Thanks to the open-source volunteers who have built WordPress, an amazing app that has weaned me from hand-writing my own webpages or using the clunky DreamWeaver, my default editor — which won’t work on the Chromebook that I typically use.
  • My Statement of Concern laid out my mission in 2007. My sense of urgency has intensified. In the curriculum I worked within, environmental scientists handled climate change, so I obliquely referenced the impacts, but had no faith in public policy but trusted civil society, itself in crisis. Needless to say, Ramapo’s business-oriented economics faculty actively rejected the topic of climate change as they engaged their chrematistics, deluding themselves with their own capitalist ideology.
  • I appreciate that the RealPolitik that confronts the collision between capitalisms and climate catastrophe suited me and directed me to my North Star. As I explain later, Aristotle’s notion of Aporia challenged me, still does. This cataclysmic double-theme well suited me. How could I say “No.” Join me in tackling this Aporia, or Aporiae.

K2L Bulletin Board, #1

Welcome to my little project, dubbed “Capitalism to Livelihood.” I am Professor Emeritus of Sustainability from Ramapo College, having retired in July, 2015.

I have continued several themes that emerged from two specific courses, World Sustainability and Ecology, Economics and Ethics. Such daunting challenges required a lot of background, mostly in political economy, perhaps political ecology.

My commitment: Work out the systematic scenario speculation of what might occur between now (early November 2019) and 2030, even 2050 — but the further the time horizon, the vaguer the scenario.

Let me get this out of the way: This effort comes from my concern that Humanity and Nature will be degraded significantly within either time horizon in the default case of business as usual (BAU).

These concerns pertain not to some way distant future, like 2100 (when your kids may wonder where were you when this was going down). I make my point by referencing this morning’s New York Times (I haven’t peeked):

President Trump formally withdraws the US from Paris Accords on climate.

Trump formally withdraws the US from the UN Paris Agreement on climate change. See Secretary of State Pompeo’s Tweet. Thus, the largest economy in the world continues to shred the international order. Uh, neither China nor Russia nor India have joined the Paris Accord. Get the Big Picture? Ain’t happening anyway. This is what Aristotle termed an Aporia: no path through it.

Trump huffed and puffed:

President Trump had long held that the accord would cripple growth and intrude on American sovereignty.

Consumption Trumps Production

For a simple reason: Consumers rule in the capitalist hegemon, the USA, where nearly 70% of the GDP provides private household consumption. No other nation comes close.

As I explored the Livelihood layer of capitalist civilization through volume one of Braudel, I advocated the bolstering of the household as an intermediary between civil society and the highest layer of capitalism, the global — now captured as Neoliberalism.

A seminal source comes from Annie Leonard, now the director of a CSO the powerhouse Greenpeace, the highly informative and entertaining Story of Stuff.

A robust theoretical review from Schnaiburg adds depth to the underlying potential. Barnes captures the neglected significance of the household that, despite its decentralized ubiquity (which can be transformed into a strength) but consumption rests with, well consumers, who can, in effect, vote with their money.

Less direct control over production exists, but indirect means are available, including the market signals emanating from demand. Investors, financial intermediaries, pension funds, sovereigns, however, can exert considerable sway, and do. The withdrawal of financing for new coal-fired electricity plants and nuclear energy (post-Fukishima) have a profound impact through the nerves of capitalism.

Existentially, the decision-makers at the quarternary level live in real-time, with families and with reputations to uphold. Their income suffices. Much potential to guide future investments can result.

I, however, appeal to the consumer to exert leverage that registers and gets results. Cases are needed here. Start with Annie Leonard.

Why Capitalisms, Plural?

Okay, I am a capitalist, probably you too if you are reading this. I have benefitted, sort of like I’m a fish swimming in the ocean of an economy into which I was born (in Jersey City in the propitious month of August 1945). Fish don’t notice water the way that we don’t notice the capitalism that flows all around us. This is changing, however.

The post World War II years were good for me, representing a benign respite from the Great Depression and World War II that intervened in my parents’ biographies (see Mills). “Mutatis mutandis,” say economists: “All things change.”

But I am concerned that capitalisms will collide with climate catastrophe, and maybe I will be around in 2030 — at 85 — so that I can herein speculate as to the outcomes.

I have had the privilege to offer courses around the broad theme of global sustainability, such as Economy, Ecology, and Ethics. I no longer restrict myself to a broad and innovative curriculum, but can transcend into speculation. This is the purpose of this site. So let’s dive into this ocean.

BTW, I am emphatically not a Marxist, so let’s get that out of the way as well. I find Marxism and Marxists stubbornly and rigidly dogmatic. However, I also recognize that capitalism drives for profit, thus requires economic growth, and will not give up its business model or its privilege. Period.

Further, capitalism in the hegemonic US will utilize its citizenship privileges granted by the Roberts Court in its Citizens United holding but will not embrace its civic obligations. The large corporation will likely seek to corrupt the public realm to capture the overall political economy with its prodigious financial resources, while it shamelessly greenwashes with its supportive ideology and propaganda (Korten). My daring to even write these words will inflame many of capitalism’s adherents, who will continue to troll me.

Plural Capitalisms?

So why the plural? For these reasons:

  • Approach capitalisms as cases exist in practice (Gray) in its manifold forms: Scandanavia, US, Brexit, China, Venezuela, Germany, Hong Kong, etc. These targets will not stand still, so pay close attention, now. Tomorrow. Do not give in to determinisms of any kind: You surrender your freedom to see beyond the dilemma.
  • This invites comparative analysis and learning its flexibility and adaptability: Capitalisms’ adaptability must be discovered to find its limits and to . . .
  • Accommodate capitalisms to bend to sustainability (a useful shorthand, explained later). A disclaimer: Although I offered classes in public policy, I do not advocate grand plans such as the Green New Deal: Such futile schemes will be staunchly and effectively repulsed, will be unwieldy in practice, and will ultimately generate a sharp pushback. The private sector can nimbly adapt. Maybe: Got a better idea? Let me know.
  • Spot advantages, innovations, and strategic opportunities when they appear, or anticipate these. Leonard Cohen said it well in his Anthem: “There is a crack in everything, that’s how the light gets in.” Notice my ambivalence to capitalisms, which forces me to resolve my cognitive dissonance. I work this through as I write.
  • Aristotle stated in his magisterial Metaphysics, Volume 7, that the only problem worthy of philosophy was an Aporia (Owen): No known path through the conundrum. This obsessed Martin Heidegger, a situation which do not go well as he descended into Nazism. The coming catastrophe of capitalism and climate is my Aporia, thus I am compelled to discover my journey in this blog. Pity my beloved wife, Kathleen, as she puts up with my obsessive folly.
  • As you set out on this journey, adhere to the more humble road toward decentralization, devolution, community, autonomy, federalism. Below, I will argue from Braudel, Keynes, and Adam Smith that localism trumps globalization. Build on the household, the community, the civic engagement rather than rely on Neoliberalism and unfettered corporate capitalism. Turn toward the tactile, accessible, caring and away from the dominance of the distant, the remote control, the glitz, the unattainable and anti-life of globalization, the ultimate impersonal and dehumanizing. As Hesse said in his Siddhartha, “Do not seek, find.” Go Zen. Think globally, act locally — but strategically, as my old friend and colleague Murray Bookchin said to me a long time ago.
  • Better, nurture Life and reject, defy, struggle against all that defiles, disrupts, diminishes, or degrades Life, Creation, the dignity and potential of the human Soul, and more broadly Nature. Do not tolerate abusive anything, anywhere, anytime (see Jensen). Start now: never stop.
  • But can capitalisms support, rather than plunder, exploit, objectify, commodify all life, matter, and humanity? This reverts back to the Aporia itself.
  • Finally, due to the looming catastrophe of climate collapse on the horizon, I suggest that the answers had prudently be discovered and actually implemented in the coming decade, 2020-2030. I remain quite pessimistic but move forward: Onward! Join me, on your unique path. We will meet along the journey.

How to Approach Capitalisms?

Three books might help:

  • The Making of the by Dudley Dillard. I took a graduate course with the marvelous Professor Dillard at the University of Maryland in the fall of 1963. His magnus opus had just been published. Dillard navigated each turn and development, but also introduced me to . . .
  • Karl Polanyi, The Great Transformation, sharply distinguished formal economics, masquerading as science, an substantive economies, the actual practices, institutions, cultures that comprise the concrete, specific economies that hopefully sustain us.
  • Fernand Braudel opened a potential path as he organized his trilogy.
  • Marx, especially in his three volumes of Capital, to his great credit, identified the tensions and contradictions within capitalism — Marx never used the term capitalism. Thus, capitalisms of all sort must resolve their internal dialectic. Therein might lie a piece of the map, lighting a clearing on the journey.