Taking the Pulse: Small is Possible
By: BJ Lawson
Many folks I encounter on the campaign trail share my concerns about the economy and our financial system. In light of our challenges, I’m often asked why I’m so cheerful and optimistic about the future.
The reason I’m excited about the future is that I’ve come to appreciate that we actually do live in a world of abundance. The economic trials we’re experiencing, if handled properly, will ultimately reveal our potential to again prosper as a free society, a strengthened constitutional republic, with strong communities knitted together by the contributions of many.
Why do I believe in such an optimistic outcome?
Because more and more people are questioning the status quo. For us and our family, the questioning started as soon as we started having children — and when we started buying toys. The average lifespan of our imported plastic toys was 6 months from Wal-Mart to landfill. It took us a while, but we now understand that the toy industry is a farce and that we don’t need to worry about lead paint from China — since we don’t buy toys that might as well go straight into the recycle bin anyway. Finely crafted hardwood marble racers? Now those are a blast — and they’ll likely be around for our grandchildren, as well.
How about food? In an age of rising fuel prices, even folks who shop at the supermarket understand the difference between fragrant, fresh South Carolina peaches at $0.99 per pound versus unripe peach-colored baseballs from California for $2.99 per pound. For those who venture outside the supermarket, the variety of local produce and meats available in our local farmers’ markets is truly stunning.
As we shift our attention from the made-for-TV luxuries of a mass-produced consumer culture to the truly visceral pleasures of fantastic local food, high-quality artisanal craftsmanship, and personal attention from committed entrepreneurs to who own their own businesses and truly care about their clients, the world looks much different, and much brighter.
In today’s uncertain times, is it possible to reinvigorate a free market of free people, and stimulate local economic growth at the grassroots?
If Lyle Estill’s Abundance Foundation is any indication, the answer is yes. As part of Taking the Pulse, I had the opportunity to interview Lyle and discuss his new book, Small is Possible: Life in a Local Economy:
It’s a great book, a great discussion, and a great message: we need to encourage hometown security, instead of mindlessly funding homeland security.
Don’t get me wrong — I’m a firm believer in free trade and free markets. But the benefits of free market capitalism require a foundation of Constitutional money and honest banking. Right now, we have neither — and since our government ignores the Constitution and answers to corporate lobbyists instead of the people, we live in a world of unrestrained corporatism that turns a world of natural abundance into a world of artificial scarcity.
It’s time to reinvigorate our local communities, and local economies, in the face of our looming economic crisis and likely banking system “bailout” at our collective expense. How? As I mentioned in my prior post:
Here’s the bottom line: we may or may not be able to prevent a misguided bailout. Ultimately, however, self-sufficient communities are the only lasting antidote to the current crisis. There is one thing that Congress could do to provide a safety net that would empower individuals to build self-sufficient communities:
Congress must unambiguously affirm that all voluntary barter transactions between individuals are tax-free.
What do I mean by “barter transactions”? They may be transactions exchanging time for time, time for goods, goods for goods, time for dollars or private barter currencies (paper or specie), or goods for dollars or private barter currencies. The key point is that human individuals (not corporations or other creatures of the legal system) need to be free to create wealth in their communities.If the banks get bailed out, the people need to be bailed out. People must again have the ability to serve each other as individuals to recreate the wealth that is being destroyed all around us.
It’s time to restore the unalienable individual rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.
September 21st, 2008 at 8:14 pm
[...] I just assumed my book would influence those running for Congress. [...]
September 22nd, 2008 at 2:02 am
BJ,
You really are a man after my own heart. I will pray that you get to Washington and ad another voice of reason and sanity to the halls of Congress. Building up our local economy through true self government / reliance is the only solution to the current crisis that is just getting started
September 22nd, 2008 at 8:08 am
Dr. Lawson, I have to say that I love your emphasis on localism. Like you, it is the reason I am excited about the future. Have you read any of Bill Kauffman’s books? Or Robert Nisbet’s Quest for Community? I read Ain’t My America this summer (I couldn’t put it down) and its commentary on militarism’s destruction of the American community was really inspiring. I’ve always felt that individualism and community can be reconciled. It seems you feel the same way, and that is very encouraging.
September 22nd, 2008 at 9:05 am
Matt, I would also add EF Schumacher’s Small is Beautiful or any of Wendell Berry’s many non-fiction works to your reading list in the near future.
September 23rd, 2008 at 3:43 pm
With all this talk about biofuels, it’s important to emphasize the difference between the Piedmont Biofuels sustainability mindset, and other biofuels folks who are only out to exploit a government subsidy.
I am not in favor of subsidies for biofuels that distort economics and turn food into fuel, thus exacerbating global famine and raising food prices at home.
However, the work that the Piedmont Biofuels is doing is sustainable biofuels — they are making 1 million gallons of diesel per year out of the renderings from chicken processing — basically, chicken fat. So they’re recovering chicken fat out of the processors’ waste stream and turning it into fuel. There is a market for the chicken fat, but competing uses are things like soap and cosmetics — not food. I consider their work to be important because it is economically viable, sustainable, and socially just.
Likewise for the Piedmont Biofuels coop — they are recycling waste vegetable oil that would otherwise go into a waste processing facility. Again, sustainable, socially just, and not competing with food.
Blanket government subsidies for alternative energy erase the distinction between “good” and “bad” — which means that the “bad” stuff gets funded. That’s gotta change!
September 24th, 2008 at 3:15 pm
Speaking of biofuels, there was a recent development in biodiesel processing that I found particularly encouraging. The “McGyan process” uses a catalyst to create biodiesel from pretty much any kind of fats or oils, in a very small reactor that only needs to be heated to about 500 degrees.
Amazingly, this breakthrough was achieved without any government funding.
Here’s their web site:
http://www.evercatfuels.com/
-jcr