Productivity again

Our average productivity in Australia is very high. I know this because for the average person only a very, very small fraction of their working time is required to earn enough for subsistence. And I know this because near my office in Surry Hills there are a number of homeless-people hostels. It is apparent to me that in Australia, in order to subsist, that you don’t even have to work at all.

And yet there are people who work full time and produce nothing of true value; for example, a good slab of the public service and the corporate world. How is this possible? Where does the underlying wealth and productivity come from?

The answer is that we are surfing on the efforts of three centuries of technology gains, unsustainable consumption of both energy and resources, and also third-world serfdom. If I need to explain that to you then you won’t understand anyway.

No wonder so many people behave as though they don’t deserve their good fortune. And this also explains the filthy greed that many have in regards to stockpiling wealth; not feeling worthy they fear that it may all be taken off them.