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Little Free Press #73 - Solving our problems
Little Free Press, 2714 1st Ave. S., Minneapolis, MN 55408 USA
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#73 "food for thought since 1969" Copying Permissible FREE
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P. E. S.
SOLVING OUR PROBLEMS
If we take another look at our most serious problems, we may
discover they have something in common. If so, we may be able to focus
on a solution that will cure all the problems with one remedy.
Environment
Our life-support system is being damaged and destroyed. Industry
pollutes the air, rivers, seas and land with its wastes. The result-
ing Greenhouse Effect may be harmful to little children and other
living things. Both the production processes and the end products
often pollute. More profit is made by polluting than by reclaiming and
recycling wastes.
Profit is made from disposable containers and the planned
deterioration of products. These products have created the need for
landfills and waste burner plants. Landfills create profits. Both
incinerator construction and maintenance, contribute profit to
builders and suppliers. The trucking industry also gets in on the
profits. Disposable containers are costing us far more than their
original prices indicated.
Farmers are polluting the soil and water with poison chemicals to
make more profit.
Nuclear War
The threat of a Nuclear War makes people fearful and dependent on
government to protect them. Scared people allow their government to
buy more "defense" material and continually raise taxes. Large
profits are made on defense contracts.
Wars and Revolutions
Wars and revolutions are killing and hurting men, women and
children. Warfare destroys property and crops. They don't start by
themselves. Someone starts deprivation and unrest and then wars. Huge
profits are made when war materials are sold to governments and
revolutionaries.
When the international people, who control the Multi-National
Conglomerates, wish to get commercial control or more control in a
small country, they have the U.S. Government buy arms from their
Conglomerate at high prices and give the arms to revolutionary groups
in the target country. U.S. taxpayers foot the bill. Sometimes they
have the U.S. Government send advisors and/or troops into the target
country to help their puppets win. This gives the conglomerate agents
a chance to grab control of the resources and establish their own
tax-free subsidiaries. After the conglomerate gets control of the
properties, industries and people it wants, the citizens are allowed
to vote and elect one of the conglomerate's local puppets to rule
them.
98.6% of the U.S. population in 1980, made less than $50,000
adjusted gross income. .0018% (4,112 individuals) made over a million
dollars adjusted gross income1. Which group had the expertise, time, money and motivation to get rev and wars started?
Malnutrition & Starvation
Because much of the world's best land is being used for cash
crops to make profit, the local people can't use it to grow their own
food. Much land is being held, unused and off the market, for
speculators to eventually obtain enormous profits.
Stealing and Murder
Products are sold to make a profit. People without jobs or money,
often steal and must sometimes murder to get money to live. 94% of the
people in prisons and jails are in for stealing.2
Contractors make extra large profits when they build or remodel
prisons for governments. Suppliers make immense profits when they sell
governments the supplies and equipment to keep prisons, staff and
inmates going.
Governments Are Corrupt
The more inefficient, wasteful, corrupt and costly government is,
the more money it spends. The more it spends, the more profit business
and industry make from it. Governments are not cost effective but are
obsolete and expendable.
Governments Are Abusive
Governments cause fear by abusing, victimizing and humiliating
people. Frightening rumors are spread through the mass media. Scared
people are easier to manipulate and tax.
Job Dissatisfaction
Not as much profit would be made if employers gave their workers
good working conditions, let them work at a reasonable pace and paid
them a fair share of their productivity. The champion exploiter of the
U.S. workers productivity in 1984 was Mesa Petroleum Corporation. They
made a Net Profit of $398,400 from each of their 700 employees.3
Compulsory Schooling
Tremendous profits are made on the buildings, equipment, office
machines, fuel, power, furnishings and maintenance supplies that are
sold to the government for schools and universities. There is also
profit on all related items, like; buses, gasoline, tires, lawn
mowers, floor cleaners, etc. Profit is also made from the school
supplies, school clothes and transportation sold to students and
teachers.
Higher Education
Higher education costs more than the majority can afford. Higher
education is limited to the children of the affluent and to a small
number who are willing to expend the extra energy to earn the tuition
fees. With high tuition fees (tuition fees are taxes), the government
gains more money to give to profiteers. Expensive tuition excludes
most poor people, thus assuring an endless supply of cheap labor.
People with more education are not as easy to tyrannize and over-tax
and are more likely to rebel against low wages.
____________________
1 World Almanac, 1983.
2 Statistical Abstract of the U.S., 1985; American Prisons & Jails,
1980, Vol. 3.
3 Fortune or Forbes Magazine, April 29, 1985.
"Make-work" Projects
Government jobs of this kind consume time, labor and resources.
They are another way that government squanders money. That money is
spent by the "make-work" employees and ends up as profits.
Planned Obsolescence
Planned obsolescence and planned deterioration waste labor and
resources. They also create more profit.
Planned Scarcity
Monopolies, trusts and cartels create scarcities by under-
producing. This invites higher prices which yield more profit.
SOLUTION
Even though the Elites' (those high income individuals who are a
part of the upper .0018% of the population) decisions are closely
related to our world problems, they are just the scapegoats. We put
the blame on them. But, they are just the lucky winners in the
Pay/Profit (PP) Game that we Five Billion are all playing. The Elite
are more talented in the PP Game than the rest of us, so they are
naturally the winners. The Elite couldn't play the Game without us. We
are not very smart, if we continue playing the Game with them -- that
we can't win. Bucky Fuller once said that we should be playing a Game
where everyone is a winner.
The common cause of the world's leading problems is PROFIT.
Profit is a vital part of the present economic system. Random House
Dictionary (1980) defines "economics" as: "The science treating of
production, distribution and consumption of goods and services." The
cause of our major world problems resides in economics (the "Big
Game" we're all playing), not in politics, religion or lack of love.
We have been working for change in the wrong areas; that is why we
haven't succeeded in the past two thousand years.
We need an economic system (a Game) that does not require a
Profit. In all existing economies people take pay or profit for their
work and must pay for the products. "When people take pay -- they must
obey."
Priceless Econmic System
People's labor and ideas produce all products and services. Money
produces no goods or services. People discovered the minerals;
invented and built the tools and machines. People built the buildings
and factories. People run the machines. People invented automatic and
robotic machines and computers. People supervise them.
----------------------------------------------------------------------
If everyone stops taking pay for their work, there will be no
monetary cost of production. All goods and services can then be free
of charge. Thus; people will have no need for money, so they can work
without pay. That makes a completed circle.
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The people who now claim they own the raw materials will then
have no need for money, because everything will be free for everyone.
Regardless of their claimed "ownership" of the Earth's resources,
their employees will be distributing the raw materials free of charge,
as will all employees in all industry and on farms. Stockholders will
have no need for money, nor any more worries about inflation,
depression or stock market ulcers. To prevent the possibility of takeover by individuals or a groupvital in a new system to
implant preventatives in its basic foundation. The following list is a
beginning:
Basic Guidelines
1. No money, credit cards, barter or work credits.
a) These items can be accumulated and enable monopolies, trusts
and cartels to form which create Power and raise prices and
profits.
b) With accumulated wealth, people can buy, hire or enslave
people to carry guns for them and enforce their will on the
rest.
2. No representatives.
a) A representative is given some power. Power corrupts. Why
ask for trouble?
b) Make your own decisions based on the best facts available.
3. No government.
a) They have always been corrupt.
b) Everything they do, we can do cheaper and better.
c) Never efficient.
4. No army.
a) Set up a world wide system that all people enjoy and there
will be no need for an army.
5. No laws, except the Golden Rule: "Do to others as you want them
to do to you."
a) People soon learn how to behave with others, in order to get
the good response they desire.
b) Laws only tempt people to disobey.
c) Eliminates the need for lawyers.
6. No pay.
a) Giving is more fun than selling.
b) Volunteers have control of the; how, when, who, where, why
and what of their work.
7. All products and services, free of charge.
a) Eliminates resale value.
b) Removes status value.
c) Discards the incentive to create a demand for products.
d) Clarifies intrinsic value and utility.
This economic system could be called the "Priceless Economic
System" (PES). Not dealing with money, credit or barter; will liberate
human kind from a tremendous amount of non life-supportive work.
The following fields will then become unnecessary:
1. advertising
2. banking
3. credit
4. insurance
5. legal & tax
6. much accounting
7. much administration
8. payrolls
9. sales
10. security
After these unnecessary departments are abolished, we can stop
producing the supplies they had been consuming, i.e., this will
greatly reduce the demand for:
1. delivery
2. electricity
3. factories
4. fixtures
5. fuel
6. furniture
7. office buildings
8. office machines
9. supplies
This will save billions of human work hours and billions of tons of
raw materials. The savings in checkout clerks, cashiers and cash
registers alone, will be fantastic.
Everything will be free, so there will be no reason to steal.
This will almost empty the prisons and jails. 94% of the inmates are
in for stealing. In this area the PES will free over two million
people (counting the guards and others associated with law
enforcement) to assist with needed work.
There will no longer be a profit in war, so the 4 million or more
active military personnel, direct hire civilians and defense related
workers can quit and begin to benefit humankind by attending to
essential work.
When the other unnecessary departments of government are
terminated we will have another 15 million or more people to serve in
life-supportive work. Working hours will then be shortened and more
shifts created. More people will then have a chance to secure work in
desirable production.
When the 38 million people now engaged in all the above mentioned
non-essential jobs enter useful employment, they will greatly reduce
the working hours for everyone. They may expand certain fields, such
as; research and development, reclamation of factory waste products,
cleaning up the environment, working on organic farms and the space
program. People may decide to slow down the pace of all work to have
more time to enjoy the journey through life.
With no monetary cost for labor, materials, rent, energy and
machines, the space program can be expanded and accelerated. It will
then become feasible to reclaim and reprocess all factory waste
materials and use them to restock supplies for production -- instead
of polluting the environment.
Abundance
Buckminister Fuller, with his "World Game," inventoried the
world's unused and reusable resources. He discovered that an
abundance of resources exists for an even larger population than the
world now has. Artificial scarcities are created to keep prices high
on easily controlled production. He said, "About 90% of all USA
employment is engaged in tasks producing no life-supportive wealth."4
In the priceless system everyone will have equal access to all
goods and services. It will not profit anyone to take too much, be-
cause when we produce abundance and everything is free, there is no
resale value and no status value in free products. Having too much of
anything then becomes a burden.
____________________
4 Critical Path, Buckminister Fuller.
Greed
Greed is a natural human trait. People hoard extra goods if they
are fearful of future shortages, as they were in WWII. When there is
abundance most people don't hoard. Who hoards sand -- who lives in the
desert?
Work Motivation
We will be like volunteers. People must like volunteering. In
1980 there were 84 million volunteers.5 Everything that we want will
be free, so we won't be forced to work. Coordinators and employees
will treat each other with respect and friendship. Jobs will have to
be made interesting and enjoyable to attract new recruits. Boring and
dangerous functions can be programmed to automatics and robots. This
itself will be interesting and challenging work for inventive people.
With good tools, machines and computers to work with, (and shorter
hours) we will be able to find enjoyment, challenge and satisfaction
in our work.
Work will be more interesting and efficient for everyone when
inventors are cooperating to invent the most efficient and beautiful
products. Then people can be proud of the products they make. It will
then be logical to; "Do the most -- with the least." Progress will be
faster when companies cooperate to design and produce only the best of
goods. When they compete there is much waste in duplication of
efforts.
There will be tremendous savings in material, labor and time when
industry produces to "fill the demand" instead of attempting to
"create the demand."
Vocational Guidance
Free access to vocational guidance testing will help people
recognize their abilities, aptitudes, attitudes and potentials. These
findings will make it easier to choose an occupation that is pleasing.
People will no longer select their job by how much it pays.
Instead of "forced" schooling for 12 to 20 years, we may choose
free on-the-job training from experts, and produce while we learn. The
old apprenticeship training worked well for thousands of years.
Schooling may evolve to "home-schooling" with computers. They can
have hook-ups with world-wide data banks and live teachers, to use
when more information or human help is needed. This technology is
already available but it is not free. Computers allow people to learn
what interests them and learn at their own speed, if they can afford
them.
Fear Conditioning
The above thirteen world problems will dissolve when there is no
longer a Profit in their continuance. But to build a better Game to
get rid of Profit is going to require a lot of work. If you would like
to have the courage to help, you may need to stop absorbing the
Pay/Profit Game's fear and anger conditioning in the mass media. TVs
and VCRs are eating up your time (your Life); get rid of them. Don't
waste your precious time on newspapers either. You can keep up on the
"System's" latest bungling by occasionally glancing at the headlines.
You can endure a spike of fear or anger once in a while; like the
headline: "U.S. Invades Panama!" But to get hit with those adrenalin
spikes every day incapacitates bravery.
____________________
5 Christian Science Monitor, March 30, 1982.
J. Krishnamurti, tells us that we are living in a corrupt and stupid society. He says that our ive education system teaches
us to fear and that fear warps, twists and dulls our days.6
Time is all that we really have. "We use it -- or lose it!"
1. We can use our time (our lives) to suck up their subtle and
subliminal7 fear/anger programing and be paralyzed and afraid to
help.
2. We can waste our free time living vicariously, while we read
novels or watch TV or movies.
3. We can focus our free time on helping to build a Utopia.
We each make our own choice. Why not establish a wonderful place for
us, our children and our grandchildren to live and grow --here and
now?
After you get out from under the mass media's influence, i.e.,
the media hypnosis trance -- in a little while you will start
recovering your natural courage. You will be spurred on by your
stronger feelings of integrity and of learning that you don't have to
be a slave any longer.
Of course you must have first become aware of the fact that you
are a slave. "When you take pay -- you must obey." If you don't
believe you are a slave, try telling your boss, "Go to Hell!" the next
time you are given an order at work. Chances are high, that you'll be
looking for another job the next week. "Slavery" is and always was --
"being forced to obey."
CHANGE-OVER
If the PES is a valid volunteer system, there must be a means to
convert to it; in a friendly and peaceable way. To use force to make
the conversion would be contradictory to the basic principles of
volunteerism and freedom for the individual. Force thus exerted -- by
its very nature and presence, would give Power to the few.
Publicize
The way to implement this Priceless Economic System (PES), is to
first; publicize it. Now, for the first time in history, we have the
means to publicize good ideas locally by using copy shops, instant
printers, etc. and on a worldwide scale by both audio and video
communication systems. By way of satellites this is nearly inst-
antaneous. We have people in the U.S. from almost all the world's
countries who still speak their native tongue. We are living in a
unique country which has a mixture of people from different
countries, many who have interbred, producing hybrids. It is a unique
era, that has the means to create a Utopian World for us all, if we
"go for it" before the Conglomerate Dictatorship matures. After
sufficient publication and time for people to argue the PES
thoroughly; we can call for a world-wide vote. If it passes, we can
all agree to stop taking pay, the next week, and begin giving all
products and services, free of charge. Then -- there it will be! The
____________________
6 Freedom from the Known, Harper & Row, Publishers. (This man certain-
ly shares valuable incites into life, but is he purposefully vague and
mystifying about his "ultimate truth" -- like computer software
manuals -- to entice us to take classes and/or buy more of his books?)
7 Subliminal Seduction, Wilson Bryan Key, Signet.
Priceless Economic System will be our new frontier, with plenty of experiments in creativity needed ct it.
Prevent Chaos
To prevent chaos and assure a continuous flow of goods and
services, we need to agree to remain with our present jobs. We can im-
prove our job and/or train a replacement. If the demand for our
product or service ends with the ending of advertising, we can take a
job we like better and get on-the-job training, if we need it.
It will not be necessary to hire a government committee to
"study" this idea for two years and 2 million dollars. There will be
no profit in delaying the changeover. We may as well stop polluting
and fighting and start enjoying Utopia right away.
There will be no need to have a revolution. Just an agreement of
the world's workers (who compose about 99% of the world's population)
to stop taking pay and begin giving all products and services free of
charge. It is the very essence of simplicity. All people will be far
better off with the priceless system.
No one can prevent the change-over to the priceless system, once
people see that they will all be better off with it. The security
guards, police, soldiers and other types of henchmen are all part of
the 99%, who will be better off with the priceless system. Even the 1%
will actually be better off, because: "A slave chain has two ends."
Some people are already giving their work for free and are
realizing how much more fun it is, than when they sold their time.
There is something about "giving" that produces good feelings in both
the "giver" and the "receiver." Givers discover what freedom is all
about. Freedom starts at ones work place. "When you take pay -- you
must obey."
Look Here!
I hope that people who are better at writing than I am, will
rewrite these ideas under their own name or pen name and distribute
many copies. I do not pretend to own these ideas. The American
Indians, the South Sea Islanders and the Eskimos and many other
peoples lived these ideas long ago, until they were invaded and their
Utopias destroyed. The histories about these ancient Utopias were
written and distorted by the conquerors to justify their conquest
(barbarianism). As more writers express their views on the PES it
will gain more creditability.
My mailing list is really small. This Utopia is not going to get
started unless you publicize this idea too. At the rate our President
is going, he may soon provoke WWIII. Do you want that? We've all got
to take a hand in the promotion, if the priceless system is to become
known. You can do it your own way or you can make copies of this
article and give or mail them to people you know and/or respect.
Just imagine how many people we will contact, if each reader
makes several copies and distributes them -- and these people also
make copies, etc. Then the Multiple Progression of Numbers begins to
help us in fantastic leaps and it won't cost any one of us very much
money.
Purpose
To help create total freedom for each individual on Planet Earth
and free access to its abundance.
1/2/90 Ernest Mann
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(612) 871-4949 Reprinting Permissible FREE
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Free Subscriptions: Just send some postage. No Donations
Catalog sheet of still inprint LFP's available free of charge.
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Little Free Press, 2714 1st Ave. S., Minneapolis, MN 55408 USA
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