A Tale of Two Economies

by David Korten

Have you ever wondered why the Wall Street speculators who brought down the economy are still being rewarded with vast fortunes? Or why teachers, nurses, factory workers, truck drivers, and all the people who do real work are struggling to put food on the table? The pundits talk about a jobless recovery. But how can it be a recovery when jobs remain so scarce and pay so little? And why do so many people find that the harder they work, the more they owe the bank?

Welcome to the phantom wealth economy—designed and managed by Wall Street bankers and corporations. They profit from packaging and selling worthless mortgages, manipulating share prices, and charging usurious interest rates. They thrive on financial bubbles, low wages, foreign sweatshops, tax evasion, and public subsidies. They overcharge us for medicines, tell us we can’t have essential medical treatment, pollute and pillage the environment, corrupt politicians, and get us ever deeper in debt.

When we lose, Wall Street wins. For Wall Street, the current economy is performing splendidly.

But Wall Street’s phantom wealth economy is not our only option. We can have a real wealth Main Street economy, based on goods and services that serve people and restore nature.

Patriots of an earlier time declared their independence from a British king and his corporate monopolies. We too can declare our independence—this time from Wall Street—and build a New Economy based on local control and sound market principles responsive to our values, needs, and interests.

Millions of modern patriots are already doing it.

They’re moving their money to local banks and credit unions and organizing “buy local” campaigns to keep their money circulating in their communities. They’re reducing their dependence on money by practicing voluntary simplicity, establishing home and community gardens, retrofitting their homes for energy conservation, and biking rather than driving.

They are taking back government by organizing New Economy discussion groups to reframe the political choices, running for political office, and demanding new rules that get big money out of politics—and free themselves from rule by Wall Street corporations.

We can have a New Economy that provides meaningful, living wage jobs for all who seek them, favors working people over financial speculators, restores environmental health, and provides our children with hope for a better future. It is ours to choose. We are the ones we’ve been waiting for.

Get the real story and spread the word:
Read Agenda for a New Economy: 
From Phantom Wealth to Real Wealth.
 A Declaration of Independence from Wall Street.

More: http://www.yesmagazine.org/blogs/david-korten/a-tale-of-two-economies?utm_source=wkly20100806&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=titleKorten

********************

We humans have made enormous progress in our technological mastery, but we fall far short in mastery of ourselves and the potential of our human consciousness. Failing to identify the true sources of our happiness and well-being, we worship at the altar of money to the neglect of the altar of life. Failing to distinguish between money and real wealth, we embrace illusion as reality, and enslavement to the institutions of Wall Street as liberty... We are privileged to live at the most exciting moment of creative opportunity in the whole of human experince. Now is the hour. We have the power to turn this world around for the sake of ourselves and our children. We are the ones we have been waiting for. ~ David Korten, from Agenda For a New Economy: From Phantom Wealth to Real Wealth