Throw-away society is gross mismanagement

I like to say that people don’t care who the Bosses are, so long as the Bosses are managing the store correctly.

But Gross Mismanagement is something people start noticing. The radical, yet predictable, Boom and Bust cycles. It’s like they keep playing the same practical joke on us, over and over again.

A very obvious example of gross mismanagement is the throwaway society.

The most important thing to understand about the throwaway society is that another way is possible. It’s not a force of Nature; rather, it is part of the magic potion of the financial boom and bust wizards, juggling excesses and shortages, not just of commodities but of jobs, of desirable living spaces, of quality of life itself.

Attack one tentacle, and you can get others. The throwaway society is a big one, it Funds the Game, and they Play the Game. And we’re Played. Take away the throwaway society, and the economic growth will be slowed but it will smooth out.

Things are getting very bad economically, of course. There will be a motivation to attack the throwaway society. We definitely need to stop using plastic. One Pacific Garbage Patch is enough. Wood and porcelain can last decades at least.

I have a 60 year old Maytag wringer washer that I picked up for the cost of hauling it away. It was left next to a dumpster. This thing is more like a sink and counter, with a tub and agitator and wringer. This washing machine lasts generations, not years.

That washing machine will remind grown grandchildren, of thier grandmothers from years before. It will be the same machine, with all the same contours and scratches. Sometimes a motor needs to be repaired or a rubber hose replaced, but it’s like the family’s kitchen sink rather than some sheet metal box kept in the basement.

A trolleybus lasts decades. A car goes from the mine to the junkyard in what, 10 – 15 years?

The cycle of Boom and Bust, with its periodic “financial manias,” the Bipolar Economy, needs to go on lithium.

We should use materials of wood, glass, metal, clay, and other natural materials but not plastic. The ocean can digest wood. It can rust metal. But it can’t digest plastic.

The Boom and Bust Wizards gave us the Pacific Garbage Patch. We can’t dislodge them, but we can go after their throwaway society. We sure got a good reason.