Re: [Pen-l] Remember, the recession isn't all bad

["Jim Devine" <jdevine03@xxxxxxxxx>]

Doug Henwood wrote:
> Or, as Andrew Mellon said after the 1929 crash, a depression will help us
> lead more moral lives.

It's true that "money doesn't mean happiness" (i.e., that increases in
real pecuniary income lead to increases in measured subjective
well-being but then the latter rise tapers off and stops somewhere at
a lower-middle class income, according the USC's Richard Easterlin).
Mellon's own life suggests that having money doesn't imply morality.

But _not_ having money does not lead to happiness or morality. The
grass is still greener on the other side of the income fence, while
some abandon morality in order to survive.

Of course van Gelder and Pibel are talking about the morality of
society as a whole. But collective poverty simply leaves people
looking back enviously at the golden age of bubbles, SUVs, and
large-screen TVs. If we want a society that is ecologically moral,
etc., it's got to be a voluntary, democratic, and collective decision,
not the result of disaster.
-- 
Jim Devine / "Segui il tuo corso, e lascia dir le genti." (Go your own
way and let people talk.) -- Karl, paraphrasing Dante.
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