After Capitalism - part two

PART TWO - REVISING THE SYSTEM


DEFINING SOME IDEALS

It is very easy with a little clarity of thought to criticise the existing, modern capitalist free market system. Finding a meaningful alternative has been perhaps a harder task. Left wing alternatives such as Marxism or Communism have never really been tried - regimes in China and the Soviet Union, where key Government figures lived in splendour whilst the populace existed in a climate of fear and state micro-management, were more akin to fascist super-states than any socialist ideal, the 'Communist' tag simply being used as a flag of convenience by leaders in both East and West. Anarchy (in a true meaning of the word) certainly hasn't been attempted, and modern First World education and social conditioning would currently make a wholesale change to an ungoverned lifestyle unworkable - the sad fact is that humanity is unready for such real freedom, or real responsibility, having been shackled for so many generations to the harness of selfishness and slavery which free market capitalism forces onto the average person.

One major issue affecting any alterations to the existing system is the general public's unwillingness to accept change. As already mentioned, the power holders keep the populace in a combination of just enough material comfort to avoid revolt and enough social conditioning to maintain apathy. A majority of the public are somewhat dissatisfied with their 'lot' in life... BUT, are just about able to cope with it. However, any significant change for the worse will in the average person's eyes, make their 'lot' intolerable. This balance is an important weapon in the power holders' arsenal, allowing them to scaremonger any attempt at big change as a threat to people's barely tolerable existence, and thus hope to ensure that the public play safe and reject the change on the grounds that it may make things worse for them. It may be better, of course... but any possibility of their lives being worse is enough for the populace to stick to the drudgery they know. As a consequence, alternative systems such as Communism, Anarchism, or anything else requiring a big step-change in lifestyle are doomed to never be implemented in one fell swoop as many of their supporters would like - the rigid walls of people's consciousness, reinforced constantly by the power holders' propaganda machine, ensure this failure.

Change, of course, is possible - BUT it requires a long term will, not only on the part of the populace but also (and perhaps even more vitally) on the part of the system's leaders. Here in the UK racism, sexism and homophobia have been systematically - and dramatically - reduced since the 1970's. The process is by no means complete yet, and some of the methods which the shapers of it tried to use (all-black or all-women shortlists for certain jobs or political positions, for example) may have been misguided, or even counter-productive at times... but a concentrated application of will for 40-plus years, led by those in power and supported by a majority of society, has resulted in national attitudes profoundly different from those of four decades ago. Such a sea change shows that radical revision can be brought about in society.

In fact, in any governed society the will of the power holders to change is more important than the will of the populace they control. In reality, there are only two ways to achieve real change to the system of society: with the blessing of the power holders, or by revolution. And even revolution is often carried out by a small group, who if successful install themselves as the new power centre and life for the masses often carries on little changed from before. A true, peaceful people's revolution is a rare thing - perhaps unfortunately. But if real, positive change for the masses can be achieved peacefully, it is much easier to achieve if the power holders are not completely opposed to it. Now, many anti-authoritarian commentators or movements claim that the power holders hate the general populace - this may be true in some individuals, but I feel it is more accurate to say that the power holders as a group feel little in the way of love or hate, fondness or contempt, for the masses - the populace are simply commodities to be used to service the power holders' preferred system.

So if we were to attempt to define some ideals for a better society and system, we might choose as a starting point the following criteria:

Any change should be gradual, and so clearly in most people's favour that the power-holders cannot use fear of worsening the average person's 'lot' to bully the populace into disagreement with it.

As such, it should allow people to have 'easier' lives - less working hours and more disposable income would be a good starting point.                    

As a natural offshoot from the above mentioned point of gradual change, any development of society will be unlikely to involve a radical departure in lifestyle choices for most people.

As any significant change in society tends to require at least some approval from its leaders, any changes should not be to the obvious detriment of those leaders, making any disapproval on their part both less likely and - perhaps more importantly - less credible.


AN INITIAL PROPOSAL

To achieve the above criteria, let us examine some possible 'first steps' in the journey towards a kinder, easier and fairer society:

- Make extra currency available and supply each person with additional income.

- Introduce a 'price control' on common and/or essential products.

- Allow luxury and/or non-essential, or specialist, products to 'find their own level' on price.

- supply businesses with employees additional monies to compensate in the event of workers taking shorter working hours.

- Possibly reduce property values to a more sensible level, and compensate current owners accordingly, also with finances to non-property owners. 'Property values' could also include rental charges for private and business properties.

- Look at education in schools etc. regarding a reduction in the emphasis on the inevitable negative human traits fostered by the old free-market floating price capitalism.



The term 'price control' would mean either price freezing or annual increases at a controlled rate. 'Inflation' in the accepted sense would not exist as a free-floating number dictated by market price or economic policy, as it would be controlled to a great extent by the price control policy, thus you could not use 'the rate of inflation' as a price control indicator. Common and/or essential products would include things like:


House prices and rental costs

Energy bills and fuel prices where possible

New car prices

Costs of machinery and trucks

Costs of raw materials, either natural or man-made

Foodstuffs where possible

Government levies such as taxation, VAT, rates etc.

Electrical/electronic goods

Insurances

Communications/I.T.

Banking charges and fees

Legal fees

Public transport

Medical and pharmaceutical costs where possible


It can be seen from the above that this concept to a great extent divorces the relationship between employee earnings and product prices. This is a crucial step in the move towards a fairer and easier society, as it allows the potential for fewer employee working hours without a reduction in income, and increased income for the same productivity without an increase in product price. And it still allows for creativity and original thinking to power increased productivity, individual wealth and/or fulfilment.


MORE DETAIL

So let us examine each part of the proposal in a little more detail:

- Make extra currency available and supply each person with additional income.

An initial figure to start the process could be in the UK an extra 1000 per month, or 12,000 per year. This would make a huge difference to low wage earners, doubling many people's salaries. The benefit would still be great for average wage earners (27,600 pa was the average UK wage in early 2016), and would get progressively less of a percentage increase the higher up the pay scale one is... but it would still apply to everyone, and benefit everyone. I would expect this extra money to not be subject to income tax.

Part-time workers can be paid extra income on a pro-rata basis, based on the average working hours per week for a full-time worker. The unemployed I would actually suggest do not receive any extra income - at present some people are 'trapped' in unemployment inasmuch as their household bills (paid for by the welfare system) are far greater than they could actually earn in a full time job. By leaving the unemployed with their bills paid as they are now, but with the lure of the extra income available to workers, there should be a greater incentive for them to try to work and be a productive member of society.

This proposed figure is an initial sum, once the system is running steadily it is envisaged that this amount can and will be gradually increased to provide further flexibility in people's lives.

- Introduce a 'price control' on common and/or essential products.

This is to avoid the inevitable inflation that would come from increased wealth in a free market, floating price system, which would result in a devaluation of the currency and no real increase in people's standard of living, or profits made by businesses. A list of possible products and services is given in the initial proposal.

Insurances may not be feasible to treat with the same 'increase in line with inflation' path as some of the others due to volume of claims etc., however a 'watching brief' may need to be kept to avoid rises due to excess greed on the part of companies or brokers.

The communications and I.T. industry may also be a special case of common/essential product providers, as the prices in this industry often tend to go down over time in real terms. It may be that this industry is included in the price control structure anyway, as this decrease in real term price could still happen in what will still be a competitive market. In fact, all markets will still be competitive; the drive for increased efficiency and profitability will not necessarily stop simply because end user prices are controlled. They may even increase as the expedient of raising prices to a free-market 'ceiling' and maximise profits that way will no longer be an option.

A key item on the above list is the control of prices of raw materials, particularly 'natural' ones such as oil, gas, mined items like metal ores, etc. As the price of any physical product is based on the cost of materials plus the cost of labour plus profit, to control the raw material costs removes the main (under our extra money system) requirement for price rises. The labour costs will remain constant - workers' wages will maintain their value by the price control on all essential goods, and as mentioned in point (1) can be gradually increased by a rise in the 'top up' money paid to each employed person as time goes by. This leaves extra profit as the sole reason for a price rise, and as our system is one of price control, rather than the current system of charging as much as one can get away with, that control can if necessary be exercised to maintain sensible levels of profit increase.

It is quite understandable that as and when natural commodities become scarce, and so require more investment and work to harvest, the cost of producing those particular raw materials will go up. This of course needs to be allowed for within the price control management. At the same time, a major program of research into maximising renewable energy and our ability to recycle resources would also be a cornerstone of our evolved society.

Non-physical services such as banking and legal work have only wages costs and profit as their price pressures (their only real physical overhead is office space and maybe company cars, and both property prices and new car prices are part of the price control structure). As such, and with stable wage costs under our extra money system, their price rise pressure is entirely profit based. Again, this can be controlled to a stable and sensible level.

- Allow luxury and/or non-essential, or specialist, products to 'find their own level' on price.

It is not feasible to introduce and monitor price control on every single product or service available, so the proposal is to control prices on essential products to avoid cost inflation, and subsequent value deflation of people's money. Then, the non-essential, specialist and luxury products and services can find their own price level based on traditional free market economics. As above, the drive for efficiency and market share will not stop simply because of an increase in disposable income. Remember that sole traders and small business owners will still receive their extra income along with all other employed people, and so will be equally better off under the new system without raising any prices.

One thing to point out is that most 'essential' goods and services are provided by very large companies, which makes the application of control somewhat easier as one is dealing with fewer separate entities when setting prices. Most small businesses deal much more with individual jobs and one-off type work (i.e. small builders, plumbers, decorators, mechanics, accountants etc.), which will not be subject to official price control and so we will avoid trying to set prices with such a wide variation in business types, geographic areas, numbers of separate practitioners and so on.

- Supply businesses with employees additional monies to compensate in the event of workers taking shorter working hours.          

This is the other half of the' extra income/shorter working hours' equation. It is quite possible that some people will choose to 'use' their extra income to reduce their working hours. In this event, employers would need to either employ extra workers, or accept a downturn in profits. This should be compensated for to preserve employers' wealth status. So for example if a worker reduces their hours by six hours per week, their employer should be compensated for six hours per week profit on that employee. If an existing employee cuts their hours in half, and the employer adds another part-time worker to 'make up' one full-time position, naturally the compensation would not be paid - it would only be paid to compensate employers for a reduction in overall productivity caused by shorter employee working hours.

As mentioned under point (3), the self-employed will also receive the 1000 per month extra income, and can then either reduce working hours or not depending on their preference, exactly the same as an employed worker.

- Possibly reduce property values to a more sensible level, and compensate current owners accordingly, also with finances to non-property owners.

It would be nice to realign house prices so the average mortgage cost as a percentage of wages went back to its value of 40 years ago, further freeing up disposable income. This would lead to an approximate 6% reduction in property prices across the board given current interest rates. However, one would need to look at land values relative to building costs, it is more likely that the reduction would actually be in land value. The possible effects of this would need to be examined. If this is done, and the compensation for loss of land value/property price is paid to property owners, there should also be a matching compensation paid to those renting property, to avoid a 'two tier' compensation programme. It is generally not the fault of people renting property that they are not property owners, so they should not be punished for it. As a corollary to this, rental costs for housing or business properties could also be realigned to a similar percentage of wages as it was 40 years ago.

It may be that an actual reduction is unfeasible to effect. An alternative is to control rising property prices very tightly (essentially freezing them) until wages rise to a level where the cost of mortgage and rental payments return to a similar percentage of wages as they were 40 years ago - an approximate increase in average wages of 16% with no increase in property values. As the mortgage/rental payments-to-wages ratio is dependent on the interest rates charged by lenders, any increase in interest rates (and thus higher mortgage or rent payments) should lead to a longer 'freeze' period to achieve the desired property costs-to-wages ratio.

It is also possible that the extra income will in itself create enough comfort and security for the average person to leave property prices alone and simply control price rises in the same way as all other essential products and services. Given that house prices in and around London, UK have risen around 20% in two years (2014-16), it seems clear that this control on property prices is both sensible, and essential for the average person's financial comfort.

- Look at education in schools etc. regarding a reduction in the emphasis on the inevitable negative human traits fostered by the old free-market floating price capitalism.

This is an important part of the drive towards a fairer and kinder society. Education is supposed to prepare children and young people for their future life. At present, this inevitably means (at least in part) the ability to further oneself at the expense of others, and concentrates on the power of grasping money above almost everything else. We have seen in the UK's long-term attack on racism, sexism and homophobia that attitudes can be changed over time, and that education of the masses is a crucial part of this attitude change.

The increasing release of the link between individual wealth and product price allows a change in attitude away from the hard-bitten, narrow competitiveness mandatory for success in a free market capitalist system, and allows potential for a more relaxed and laid-back lifestyle. If this alternative is introduced at school level it will help shape the fairer and kinder society much more freely in future generations, as the educative process becomes recognised as a means to gaining individual fulfilment rather than gaining a position in the harsh rat-race of traditional free market capitalism.


POTENTIAL RESISTANCE AND CRITICISM

The benefits of this proposed system can be easily envisaged. As an alternative to the established system which serves the power holders so well, it can also be seen that these proposals will meet with resistance from those who both control and benefit from the current system. As they cannot hope to criticize the new system for not concentrating its benefits mainly on them (i.e. being fairer to the majority) and expect any sympathy, much of their resistance may well be spun in terms of how the new system will worsen the lot of sections of mainstream society. So where possible, potential criticisms need to be forecast and addressed. Some examples are listed below.


Will some business owners simply cut wages to employees once the extra income is on stream, negating the positive effect on employees and simply increasing their own profits?

This is a possibility... although if only a few do it, they will lose out on staff due to paying much lower wages than other companies in the same field. But there would probably need to be some safeguard to stop unscrupulous businesses from doing this. There would be no need, for example, for an existing business to cut its employees' wages as the company's profitability will not be affected. Therefore, a law demanding that companies do not cut employee wages beyond a minimal percentage could be implemented without affecting existing companies. Then, new businesses starting up will have to compete in their wage payments with these existing companies, and an equilibrium will be achieved approximately around the existing levels of pay for any given industry.


The self-employed wishing to use the extra income to cut working hours will not be able to cut as much as an employee, due to their charged-out hourly rate being higher than their actual earnings.

Correct. For example, an employee earning 15 per hour could use all their 1000 per month extra income to reduce their working hours, and so do 1000/15 or 66.6 hours less work per month for the same gross income. A self-employed person charging 40 per hour for their services, but whose business 'swallows' 25 of that hourly rate in expenses (so leaving a wage of 15 per hour) could actually only cut by 1000/40 or 25 hours per month for the same gross profit.

At the same time, the self-employed could put the extra income into their businesses to try to increase profits and therefore earnings. So there would still be pros and cons to being self-employed - exactly as there are now. The difference is that the 'con' created by the new system is actually just a smaller 'pro' even in the worst case.


The extra income is likely to produce a demand for some goods and services which would outstrip the current supply. This could lead to shortages or, on goods and services not within the price control structure, higher prices.

An increase in demand is most likely to take place in the luxury and non-essential markets. The demand for price controlled items like food, property, insurances etc. will in the main not change significantly. Other price controlled items like electrical goods, I.T. products, cars etc. may see some rise in demand, however unlike 'Black Friday' type sales with a very limited timescale, as this extra income is a long-term addition to regular work income there is no rush for everyone to purchase at the same time. Some people will want to purchase extra items straight away, others will be saving for more major purchases later on, so the extra demand on price-controlled products should be more gradual. Some people will also still wait for 'sales' to buy their desired major purchases at the best price, thus also spreading out any rush of consumerism.

Non-essential or luxury goods and services outside the price control structure could well see some increase in prices due to people's higher disposable income. Having said that, in the medium and long term it is envisaged that some of the overgrown 'busy-work' industries mentioned in Part One of this article will be shrunk to a more realistic level, with employees in these areas gravitating into alternative or self-employment as more small businesses spring up to cater for the bigger markets in these areas, and the competition will naturally put some ceiling on luxury good prices. So the medium term picture is likely to be a slight but not extreme rise in demand for price controlled products, and some rise in both demand and price on some luxury goods. The average person, however, will still be significantly better off in terms of purchasing power and financial security than they currently are.


Given this projected rise in purchasing of products, the environmental impact of increased productivity could be harmful.

This is something to be watched out for. The actual rise in consumption is an unknown and is unlikely to be huge enough to cause major problems, however as we are to a great extent divorcing money flow from product price it is quite feasible to allocate extra resources to minimizing any environmental impact from businesses without adding to inflation (or the devaluation of currency). If the new system is adopted in other industrialised countries, manufacturing centres such as China, India and the Far East (which at present do not always have the best environmental records) could in fact reduce their emissions considerably even if productivity goes up, helping to balance an increase in emissions in other parts of the world. A watching brief would need to be kept.


Could there be catastrophic effects on banks, currencies and stock markets?

As the value and profitability of businesses should either remain the same or go up, share prices should not suffer. Stock markets are notoriously nervous and volatile, and there may well be a short-term drop in the markets as the new system is planned and initially implemented, whether this is a logical reaction or not. However, once the new system is up and running the markets should settle down and recover. Stock and financial markets may well see the sort of sharp fall followed by gradual recovery that happened after the UK voted to leave the EU - and much of that movement was caused by investors who had made the wrong decision on how that vote would go, then scrabbling to either maximise profit or minimise loss on their interests.

The banking situation is more complex. There will likely be an initial small rise in savings, and a small fall in borrowing, as the new system comes into practice. Banks will therefore in theory lose out as the higher profits made from credit card and mortgage repayments will be reduced in quantity, and may not be offset by the rise in available investment money from savings. It is very likely that the banking system will need to change, to become more streamlined, and yes probably eventually make cuts as their influence and necessity become somewhat reduced. There should be growth in other areas of business - leisure and conservation being two prime examples. Given the likelihood of a percentage of workers in other industries taking advantage of the extra income to reduce their working hours, jobs and retraining will in all probability be quite available.

Having said that, the banking sector over many years has been an epitome of the worst of capitalism's deficiencies; an essential, private monopoly which has been considered too important to the economy to be allowed to fail. The result at all but ground-floor level at local branches has been an inefficient, slow colossus where decisions sometimes seem to be made without apparent logic, sometimes by obviously incompetent people or systems. Spokespeople often complain about 'too much regulation' as if leaving them entirely to their own narrowly focussed devices will make a great improvement, then the system as a whole makes long-term glaring errors of human judgement resulting in huge yet avoidable losses by banks which are then gifted vast sums of public money to bail them out. The banking and financial sector is likely to be one of the biggest resistors to the new system as it represents both change and a potential reduction in their influence - in fact, as extra money becomes available to both workers and businesses in the form of the non-repayable sums envisaged under the new system, the whole banking, stock and currency markets will end up making changes due to a reduction in their influence and importance. But the changes which will be required to the financial sector for it to fit our new system are also likely to benefit society as a whole due to a reduction in necessary loans and consequent interest charges.

One other thing to bear in mind is that, whilst we as a financial society will still need to 'balance the books', the way in which that balance is achieved will be completely different. Instead of controlling money flow and inflation by things like interest rates and having to do the best job possible with a limited amount of money, we will be able to make money available where necessary and control inflation by price control of essentials.

One of the results of this is that 'austerity' as a means of money management can become a thing of the past. Our inflation management system of essential price control removes any need to strangle money flow to the populace in order to re-balance mistakes made by the banking and financial system. The banking system becomes much more streamlined and unobtrusive: loans and mortgages will still be necessary, at least in the short to medium term, and things like card payments and bank transfers as means of payment will naturally still be as common as they are now. But national and international banking will no longer be the directors of economic policy, as specialist and arcane movements of money to manage a free market capitalist system will become unnecessary. 'Economic policy' actually becomes much more simplified, consisting mainly of regulating essential prices and the amount of extra money distributed to working people. These tasks are taken on by elected Government, not by unelected, anonymous and unreachable banking elites.


If this system works as well as stated, any country adopting it could be faced with huge scale immigration from people seeking this better life. In the UK that could cause problems with housing, etc. in our already heavily populated country.

One obvious way of dealing with this potential issue is to only pay the extra income to UK citizens, so if someone comes into the UK to live and work, they do not receive the extra income until and unless they go through the naturalization channels, which takes a few years to complete. Many welfare and benefit payments already work in exactly this way. This would avoid those coming to the UK wishing to simply 'make a quick buck'.

There would still quite likely be some increase in interest from overseas people in wishing to settle long-term in the UK. Now that the UK has voted to leave the EU, it remains to be seen what the immigration laws will be for EU citizens, but the above restriction on receiving extra income until naturalization (and of course being in employment) should mitigate against a large surge in immigration from any nation, particularly as if and when the UK becomes separated from the EU it should be able to set its own immigration laws for any overseas citizen seeking to live in the UK.

If the new system is as successful as hoped - for employees, the self-employed, and business owners - then it is not beyond the bounds of possibility that other countries will adopt a similar system... leading to a possible reduction in migration, as more people will be content with their own lives and not be so keen to try to 'escape' to a perceived better one.


FURTHER STEPS

We mentioned earlier in part two that any change should be gradual, and the initial proposal outlined above would lead to easier, more secure lives for the general populace without making major changes to their lives. Whilst this would be a pleasing outcome as a final result, it could also mark the start of an on-going series of further changes in the future. The implementation of a more broad-based and less money-focussed education in schools should lead to gradual attitude changes amongst the populace in much the same way that the UK's long-term approach to reducing racism and sexism did. It should also open peoples' eyes to a more open minded and laid back approach to their lives, opposed to the frenetic and stressful existences promoted by society today.

Whilst there will, as outlined above, be a rise in consumer purchasing in the short and medium term, the extra security afforded by the additional income should also lead people to think in different ways, to expand their thought processes away from the current almost-all-consuming battle for 'survival' in the sense of paying bills and keeping home and body maintained. Currently the power holders abhor this idea of thought change as their system relies on this almost total self-centred distraction of the exploited populace to help maintain the elite's position at the top of the free market capitalist pyramid. Once that exploitation is reduced, the stress of survival is reduced, and the rat-race promotion in education is reduced, thought can and will be freed to pursue a more varied set of paths.

Leisure activities and hobbies are likely to become more in the forefront of more people's lives. More people will be in a position to 'work to live' rather than 'live to work'. Fulfilment, or the affirmation of one's worth, will no longer have to revolve so heavily around one's career or job. And whilst some people's hobbies or leisure interests will be materialistic, some will not... but all will be a product of people's enthusiasm rather than a product of necessity. And this extra ability to pursue one's enthusiasm will lead to a wider (and more attainable) interest in leisure, and correspondingly less emphasis on an all-consuming work life - plus in all likelihood, a more satisfied, fulfilled and happy populace.

Because we have essentially divorced people's income from the prices they will pay for goods and services, and thus divorced the amount of money within the economy from inflation, additional money supply can be made available by government Treasuries for many different things. It is envisaged that areas such as technical research and development, health care, education and renewable energy can and will be properly funded in order to improve both quality of life and protection of our planet's resources. Much of the land area of our planet is under-used due to the difficult conditions found in those areas - much of Northern Africa and inland Australia for example are fairly arid desert - but one of the main barriers to improving a farming yield from these areas is that it is financially 'unprofitable' in our free market, self-centred monetarist system to do so. As our new system values people and enables as much money as necessary to be used to help those people, we can undertake comprehensive research and experimentation programmes to investigate making more of our planet's land area fit for food production. Fresh water supply, purification and irrigation would be a major area of development. Research and investment in renewable energy sources such as wind and particularly solar power (perhaps the only truly renewable energy source currently being developed) would be another priority. Recycling of materials should also be maximised - not for profitable reasons but for maximum preservation of the world's natural assets. Our extra money, controlled price system enables all these good things to be developed unfettered by a limited money supply and the constraints of 'profitability'.


From this, as technological advances further aid the production of goods and services, so working hours will become shorter, eventually to the point where instead of a business having x number of full-time employees, they may have 2x number of part-time workers to achieve the same productivity. The policy of extra supplied income and price control will allow this part-time work without either impoverishing the worker or impacting the profitability of the business, freeing people from a 40 plus hour week to around a 20 hour, or 2.5-3 day, working week with the financial security to both live comfortably and pursue whatever leisure interests they may have. This process could conceivably be extended until people work and average of 1 or 2 days per week yet enjoy comfortable lifestyles.

The widening of thought processes should also lead people to live more varied lifestyles. The emphasis in education on a more laid-back and leisurely lifestyle will eventually lead to more people eschewing a life of avaricious materialism and leading more contemplative or creative lives. Overall consumerism may not reduce but may not increase either, as those pursuing materialistic lifestyles and hobbies will be balanced by those whose interests are more cerebral.


THE LONG-TERM FUTURE

If this system is adopted internationally or globally, even greater benefits will accrue. Most wars are fought at least in part on grounds of either a selfish desire for exploitation or a resentment of exploitation by others - whatever the 'official' reason. Free market, floating price capitalism which keeps the vast majority relatively poor whilst the elite power holders grow ever wealthier inevitably fosters both the sense of rat-race selfishness, and the resentment of others perceived as having 'more'. The reduction of such innate feelings of selfishness and resentment should reduce the drive for war. Less war allows more emphasis on constructive action by individuals, movements and governments, improving the overall quality of life for the citizens of all countries. There will always likely be some disparity in ideologies, whether it is religious, political or philosophical. But a more comfortable lifestyle for a majority of any population will always result in less stress, less frustration, and less conflict.

One long-term question which will probably need to be addressed at some point in our future is: how large a human population can be comfortably supported by an efficiently organised, sustainable, and need-focussed use of the planet's resources? One of the issues that as a global race we may in the longer term need to look at (actually, whether our new socio-economic system is adopted or not) is that of human population numbers. Rather similarly to the finite quantity of money in the free market capitalist system, a finite amount of resources available from our one and only planet means that - beyond a certain point - more and more people will mean less and less resources available for each person. It is quite likely that we as a race will eventually need to look at controlling or limiting the human population of the world to preserve both a comfortable standard of living, and the Earth's natural resources.

The rate of population growth is relevant to humanity's future direction, as we would also expect scientific research and development to grow in all sorts of different areas. One of these could be in the field of interplanetary travel. Already we can build quite complex orbiting manned space stations and send small spacecraft to other planets in our solar system. There has been some talk of a manned trip to Mars. There could be several options open in the future. Larger manned space stations as permanent living accommodation would only take a small number of people relative to the rate of increase in world population. But a large, orbiting space station used to construct a much larger interplanetary craft - built with workers and components 'ferried' from Earth to the space station - is actually a more feasible proposition. This craft could then journey to (say) Mars with a fairly large crew plus the necessary items to construct a habitation on the Martian surface, and begin an on-going process of colonisation. In the fullness of time, this could potentially become a 'second Earth' if activities such as terra-forming were undertaken on a sufficiently large scale.

And who knows what scientific advancements will be made in the future if our system is adopted successfully worldwide and knowledge can be pursued without the fetters of limited money supply? Interstellar travel - journeying to other stars with similar planets to Earth - remains an intriguing concept.

Or it may be that humanity will eventually mature into a secure, stress-free, leisure-oriented and peaceful race which will be on the whole quite happy to average out at two children per couple and our world's population will stabilize around a certain, manageable number. Whatever the future holds, if our controlled price, extra money system is adopted around the world we will, as individuals and as a race, tend to lead much happier lives within it.

A world in which the average person is able to work as little as perhaps 2 days per week if they wish, enjoys a comfortable, fulfilling and richly varied lifestyle, within a society of tolerance and peace, in a world with little conflict and proper husbandry for future generations, seems a far cry from the stress-filled mess of a 'system' under which we labour today. And yet it is possible. It can be done. It is even practical to achieve. It simply needs the will to change... the will of the people to commend a change to the power holders of the world, the will of those power holders to implement it, and the understanding that such change benefits everybody, not just the few.