Exceeding planetary boundaries

Job seekers per opening

Nominal wage growth in decline

Green growth? failure to decouple

the importance of working hours for the new

economics

WORKING HOURS IN SELECTED COUNTRIES, 1870-1973

Working Hours in Selected Countries, 1973-2007

Household data show 40 years of rising hours

The flip side of overwork: underwork

• Long term rise in involuntary part-timers

• Weekly hours: 2001 3.3 m 2011 8.6 m• average hours of invol PT: 22.5 per week •  low hours are a cause of poverty and

exacerbate inequality

Working hours and theories of the labor market

THE MARXIAN LABOR MARKET

wage

Level of employment

The US labor market: 25 million still lack adequate work

Major declines in employment

Youth unemployment rate, US

  

June 2012 study of H.S. grads who did not go to college

2009-2011 graduates16 % employed full time33% unemployed 15% working part time. 17% out of the labor force

2006-2008 graduates37% employed full time. Source: June 2012 study by John J. Heldrich Center for

Workforce Development at Rutgers University.

Unemployment rate for college grads

How can we respond to this deterioration?

Group exercise: what are “new economics” approaches related to the labor market that can address the growing oversupply of labor and worsening condition of workers in the labor market?

De-commodifying Labor

• The goals of new economics (democracy, equity, and ecological limits) require de-commodification of labor

• Threat of job loss has been key to reproduction of the economic system and to the growth imperative

• worker coops• other publically owned assets• hours reductions• expansion of low/no cost access to goods and

services/HTSP• public provisioning—“hyper-efficient public goods”

(energy, transport, food, other?) • income streams from new assets (cap and dividend)

The challenges ahead

Drastically reduce ecological impact in a short period of timeSolve the unemployment crisisBe fair: improve the distributions of assets and incomeCreate wealth and well-being (enhance productivity)Avoid top-down, inefficient or elitist solutions: i.e., meet people’s needsCreate a politics to make this happen

PLENITUDE: an integrated approach working on all these fronts

Plenitude: the economic model

Green tech shift: to a closed loop/clean production and consumption systemEco-knowledge: open source transmission and ecological skill diffusionReduce hours in BAU jobs, build time wealthA growing green sector of small scale enterprises; new property formsInvest in social capital and common propertyRevamp the consumer sector

Rising Output &Consumption

EcologicalImpact

From Productivity Growth to Ecological Impact: when hours do

not fall SCALE EFFECT

Productivity Growth

TechnologyChange

Less Growth in Output

EcologicalImpact

Reducing Ecological Impact: achieve sustainability in ways that

enhance well-being

Productivity Growth

TechnologyChange

Reduced Hours of Work

Changes in Household Behavior: Composition

Effect• Households have

both time and income budgets. If low-impact activities are more time consuming, reductions in working hours can lead to reduced household impacts

The multiple dividend of shorter hours

• Benefit #1: shorter hours lead to lower unemployment and more job creation; they partially de-commodify labor

• Benefit #2: shorter hours reduce ecological and carbon footprints

• Benefit #3: shorter hours give people more free time, reduce stress, enhance family life and community, enable political activity, and enable self-provisioning and lower cost lifestyles

HIGH TECH SELF PROVIDING & GREEN ENTREPRENEURSHIP

Hours released from the BAU economy get deployed to “self-providing” and green entrepreneurship

reduces market dependence and reliance on large corporations

builds a small-scale, low-impact sector of enterprises

builds self-reliance and local resilience helps individuals acquire skills, thereby

improving the wage distributionenhances community

Permaculture and urban agriculture: green production and

self-reliance

Micro-generation of energy

DIY home building

:fabrication technology

Why self-provisioning is savvy economics

High-productivity: high-tech, high in knowledge, esp eco-

knowledgeSmall scale

Low financial barriers to entryInsurance against adverse events (climate or financial

disruption)Can build social capital

Factor e Farm: a self-sufficient, high-tech, replicable, open source

communityPlenitude in action

Eco-restorationPermacultureAll DIY

Post industrial peasant economics

Transitional policies and pathways

• Vision: Frithjof Bergman’s New Work System; nef’s 21 hours

• New hires at 80%• Work Sharing as part of UI system• Voluntary time/income tradeoffs for high

income workers• Income and consumption provision for

low hours workers• Short hours for new businesses

Session 2. new consumer regimes

Interrogating growth by thinking materially

Unsustainable Consumption:Apparel Accumulation in the USA

Apparel Discard:Used apparel exports from US to Rest of

World 1991-2004

Source: UN Commodity Trade Statistics Database

Material consumption per capita and day

Reducing the costs of reproduction through

sharing

thredUP: the Netflix of Clothing

Consumers at the cutting edge: innovations in sustainable consumption

•

9.1 million items a year on freecycle

http://clrn.dmlhub.net/

http://www.newdream.org/resources/2011-07-new-dream-mini-views-visualizing-a-plenitude-economy