Category: Economy & Values

We might live in a time that’s prizing independence above all else, but in so many ways all our lives are interconnected. Socially as much as economically we’re all part of the same systems; all our choices and actions impacting others in both big and little ways. With all that serving to make up the realities of our lives, perhaps independence is a strange kind of illusion.

Of course, we’re essentially independent actors, free to make our own decisions. That’s seemingly the thinking of the West: bringing everything down to the individual, to their free choices within the systems surrounding them (see Notes One). Much of the recent change within society seems, in a way, a heightening of that atomisation and isolation through the applications of technology.

It’s a very specific philosophy of life, this individualisation. Historically, people were generally tied into more communal relationships: bonds of obligation, security, trust, cooperation, and support of various kinds. Our interdependence was evident, known, and perhaps appreciated for the value it brought to community (Notes Two).

And it’s interesting to think that those ties were once more tangible, more consciously lived and known; because now it seems everything comes down to money. Our relationships, security and power can generally be reduced to financial terms; with personal economic realities often the product of early life and the position we find ourselves in.

So, while the West has admirable aims of rendering everyone more equal and free through its social and economic systems, is it partly obscuring the fact all life is based on relationship? You can make people systemically more independent, those relationships more coldly transactional, but the web of our interconnectedness remains.

We’re still humans existing within natural, social, and international relationships. Overlaying that, systems of politics, trade and culture might give us shared interests and concerns; but beneath it lie these highly complex connections of action, meaning, intention, and accumulated consequences on every level (Notes Three).

While the nature and extent of those ties might be more complicated than anything humans have encountered before, they’re still the same kinds of realities: practical needs essential to life; social or emotional ties that give lives meaning; ideological perspectives that guide our choices. All that might be working itself out through virtual channels, but it’s just as ‘real’.

I’m not really sure anyone fully understands the systems we’re now living within: these free-flowing, fast-moving waves, trends and patterns of behaviour. Everything’s related, but moving at such a pace it’s impossible to pin down the causality of it all. We might turn to original notions of sovereignty, self-sufficiency, and social structure but there’s perhaps not such great correlation with what we’re seeing around us.

Our world of ideas, relationship and responsibility has transcended national boundaries in beautiful ways that cannot be wound back. And, within that, our independent choices surely matter – the relationships we forge, intentions we carry, and impacts we have – but maybe it’s worth becoming more aware of how exactly it’s all coming together?

Notes and References:

Note 1: The conversation of society
Note 1: Concerns over how we’re living
Note 2: Economy & Humanity
Note 2: Obligations and contributions
Note 2: What holds it all together
Note 3: Does anything exist in isolation?
Note 3: All that’s going on around us

Many aspects of modern living seem merely transactional: we trade money, or something akin to it, for these experiences and products that make up our lives. Of course, we can always craft arguments whereby everything comes down to money; but is this really the only way?

On so many levels, we’re reduced to numbers; economic calculations standing in the place of human estimations as we judge someone’s worth and the weight of their opinion based on financial rather than intrinsic concerns. It’s as if there’s this dual voice within our language about the value of life.

And while that’s not new, it’s certainly becoming quite predominant within the conversation of how we’re living (see Notes One). Money seems to be stepping into the structures of society and human activity, making many relationships simply economic: everything has a price, can be traded and made to stand against anything else. Money as this equaliser in a way; making things quantifiable and relatable.

We might add up our cost – all we’ve spent or invested in education, image, lifestyle, and countless other categories – and label ourselves with those figures. Every life could conceivably be presented as this balance sheet of incomings, outgoings, and conclusions around the financial outcome of their existence.

Many parties seem to be performing such evaluations and treating people accordingly. Social media reach and other projections having made our “power” much more tangible, there’s presumably an actual sum making someone’s voice worth listening to? Technology’s effectively made our lives quantifiable through data, making it possible to reduce our presence on earth to finite calculations.

That now often being the measure of us – economic power and online presence – it’s seemingly becoming how we judge and approach one another. I’m wondering if this thinking’s not changing our relationships and ways of being in the world? As social and intelligent creatures, we’re inevitably reading our environment and responding to it; our attitudes, behaviour, and values adapting to modern realities.

Much of government policy seems purely financial: calculations around the costliness of our lives; attempts to incentivise or discourage courses of action; little tweaks to make society more viable as an economic enterprise. And don’t get me wrong, I understand that’s one very important way of analysing life and planning it wisely; but it’s not the only way.

Life being equated with money just troubles me, as it seems any other voice struggles to be heard in the face of it (Notes Two). So often, people seem to pursue something they truly believe in – careers, business endeavours, interests – only to have the life sucked out of it by mathematical calculations that are swamping every other way of approaching things.

As humans, we stand in relation to one another. Some might’ve inherited greater power or opportunity by the nature of our social systems, but, essentially, we’re all the same. Money equalises in the sense of meaning anything can be exchanged within our marketplaces, but it has limits and surely can’t account for our worth as people?

Notes and References:

Note 1: Language and values
Note 1: Obligations and contributions
Note 1: Economy & Humanity
Note 1: Morality and modern thought
Note 2: I am not just a sum
Note 2: Intrinsic worth over social identity
Note 2: How it is / Selling out
Note 2: Worthless, or priceless?

Something I find interesting to consider is the extent to which modern society attempts to create our problems as much as solve them. This way in which economic realities are characterised mainly in terms of supply and demand, so it’s logical we might generate needs in order to justify the existence of products. This circular reasoning where we’re pumping lots of energy into deflating the human psyche as a source of fuel.

Of course, humans have genuine needs. As individuals or societies, we have these requirements for shelter, food, clothing, security, and the infrastructure essential for living as a human community. Those overlays of organisation, social etiquette, and the cohesive qualities of a cultural life offering us bonds of meaning and belonging (see Notes One). There’s this sense in which humans have problems: logistical challenges we need to overcome.

And I’m not entirely sure where in the arc of modern civilisation we abandoned the fulfilment of merely essential needs and began wandering off into other territories in search of profit, but it seems to have happened somewhere along the line. Rather than simply pursuing progress, innovation, knowledge, and the dissemination of those fundamental requirements we’ve clearly taken some quite different paths.

Maybe the justification is that we followed an economic model capable of generating both the funds and the competition needed to drive innovation. Money essentially becoming this driving force to motivate people toward developing the ingenuity and expertise to keep pushing humanity forward. This highly effective carrot and stick approach of personal reward through social status and greater economic freedom.

Human motivation’s an interesting question. Do we participate in society because of its threats and incentives, or because we believe in it and hope to contribute toward the collective human community? It’s a slightly different, though not unrelated, question that must conceivably wend its way out through education into the underpinnings of social structures themselves (Notes Two).

Returning closer to the point though, why is it we now have a system that seemingly relies on highlighting more problems? Is that progress, or is it an active chipping away at natural human insecurities to create markets ripe for exploitation? What is all this built upon? Surely its built upon some fanciful combination of human nature and nature itself: psychological patterning alongside finite natural resources (Notes Three).

But then, industry presumably cannot ever truly solve the problems it claims to be there to address if, in doing so, it’s putting itself out of business. Almost by design commercial activity has to create an insatiable desire for more, as a secure customer base must be the ideal. Secure in the sense of being insecure; unstable; incomplete; chasing these illusory answers to every problem.

This sense of designing a system that feeds off human nature seems such a contortion of the ideal of meeting our needs. As individuals seeking belonging, meaning, purpose in life, it seems we’re directed toward this self-perpetuating activity we can never escape. Is that really the only way forward?

Notes and References:

Note 1: Human nature and community life
Note 1: Economy & Humanity
Note 1: Culture selling us meaning
Note 2: Obligations and contributions
Note 2: Respect, rebellion & renovation
Note 2: Fear or coercion as motivators
Note 3: Is sustainable design an impossibility?
Note 3: Life and money, seamlessly interwoven
Note 3: The motivation of money
Note 3: At what cost, for humans & for nature

We might talk of cost and convenience, but is it ever clear how those calculations are playing out? We might pay more for the convenience of locally available products, but what’s the ultimate cost of that consumer behaviour? We might celebrate low prices, but who’s actually paying the cost for them? It might be convenient and enjoyable to buy essentially disposable items, but what’s the real cost of doing so?

Presumably every item does have both a cost and a price for which it’s deemed worthwhile letting it go. Whether that price is a reflection of its true cost or more a calculation around the value of shifting the market in some way is another matter. Getting people used to convenience creates a demand, I suppose, while also driving out less well-stocked or competitively-priced alternatives.

As I’ve said before, I’m not an economist; but the way goods are being delivered, produced and priced conceivably affects us all in countless fundamentally important ways (see Note One). Afterall, we’re all now effectively plugged into the same system: methods of production, savings offered by shipping that elsewhere, and the related human or environmental costs all paint a picture on the global scale.

What if our “convenience” is coming at the cost of too much? Outsourcing commercial functions seems to often be taking advantage of other countries’ lower costs and/or relative environmental riches; possibly destroying the diversity of local activities while commodifying the lives and landscapes of those living there. We might dress that up as development, but it’s clearly reshaping many peoples’ livelihoods.

In terms of the longer-term outcomes of our relatively short-term consumer decisions, does this not raise a lot of questions? Why are we being encouraged to seek immediate satisfaction while disregarding the bigger picture? If our choices are destroying environments, communities and traditional industries while distorting markets so only the most ‘competitive’ survive, what future are we setting up?

We might enjoy the streams of novelty in all its forms, but surely there’s going to be very real costs to that? We’re generating an insane amount of waste on scales the world’s never before known. If we’re treating others unfairly, might there be justifiable backlash? Then, the psychological cost to keeping up with it all and filtering marketing chatter out of our visual, cultural and media channels. (Notes Two)

Of course, understanding the intricate inter-relationships of modern, global marketplaces is incredibly difficult. And, evidently, it’s a way of operating that’s fostered rapid progress and international cooperation across the field of human endeavour. I’m aware many people embrace that dynamic quality, praising how it’s freed us from past limitations and enabled vast leaps forward.

But still, at what cost? What exactly are we leaving behind us by living this way? Beyond the mountains of waste, relentless white-noise of advertising, strings of broken industries and lost richness of countries we’ve wrung dry for our own gain, what are we going to be left with? And, how might we be judged for that?

Notes and References:

For an interesting, insightful and very human perspective on this, see the documentary “Chris Packham: In Search of the Lost Girl” (BBC, UK), 2018.

Note 1: What is economical
Note 2: Waste and consumer choices
Note 2: Living in luxury, on what grounds?
Note 2: At what cost, for humans & for nature
Note 2: Will novelty ever wear off?

Approaching this from other angles, the insights of Schumacher and Huxley were considered in “Small is Beautiful” & “Brave New World Revisited”.

In a way, markets can be seen as these nebulous, undefined, hypothetical spaces full of offerings, attempts to influence, and promises of how well our needs are going to be met. Until, that is, a decision is made and a deal’s been done. Then, things become very real.

It’s an interesting thought, I think. Clearly people invest a lot into that early phase: developing ideas; investigating how best to bring them to life; maybe setting up complex, international systems of production and distribution; looking at how to convince us to buy into things, what the right sales pitch might be etc. This vast system of inter-connected, mutually beneficial commercial activities that make up ‘the economy’.

And obviously it’s important stuff. It’s the kind of activity that gives rise to a need for workers to fulfil those functions; creating employment, revenue, and taxation streams that fund our individual requirements and collective infrastructures (see Notes One). Also, the same activity that’s giving rise to many of the ‘costs of living’ as we act in our capacity as consumers to choose from all that’s on offer (Notes Two).

Possibly a somewhat simplistic manhandling of complex economic realities, but it’ll probably suffice. Getting back to my point – how all that’s quite ‘imaginary’ until someone agrees to a transaction – there’s conceivably this sense in which everything hinges round our agreement. That’s the point where things get tangible as money changes hands, profit happens, and people potentially get used to things.

If we couldn’t be persuaded to buy, all that other stuff theoretically serves no purpose. It’s these moments of decision-making that make it something real, as individual and collective patterns of behaviour form these income streams around which everything else is built. Our points of commitment then becoming as these constellations of impending realities.

Why might that matter? Where within it all does power lie? Our lives clearly depend, in many ways, on what’s happening in the global marketplace: the stability of that world in turn becomes our stability, or otherwise. Yet it’s also very much dependent upon us, on our choices and the extent to which they can be anticipated, influenced, met, and possibly controlled (Notes Three).

Really, it must be a very integrated relationship. Our lives to such a great extent are defined, shaped, and assisted by economic realities. And the outworking of those realities generally revolves around the ins and outs of our lives. This complex, convoluted, contagious system of needs that’s serving us as much as the commercial entities effectively at the helm of it all.

That might be far too much to condense down into simplistic solutions for the state of modern society, but my essential point is that we’re the ones who decide. It’s something we, of course, tend to be aware of: keeping abreast of developments so as to make the most informed, intelligent decisions possible likely takes up a fair chunk of our free time. But I do wonder how consciously we evaluate all we’re agreeing to.

Notes and References:

Note 1: Obligations and contributions
Note 1: Business defining human life
Note 2: Tell me why I should
Note 2: Right to question and decide
Note 2: What we bring to life
Note 3: How we feel about society
Note 3: Cycles of mind & matter

Words tend to carry history. Whether linguistically or culturally, they bring with them the context in which they arose plus the accumulated sense of how they’ve been applied over time and ways they’ve worked themselves into society now. Sometimes that might be helpful, adding richness to our lives, or it might be a little confusing as layers of meaning blur the realities of what’s actually going on.

The fact language can be applied in different ways, maybe deliberately calling to mind age-old notions or drawing misleading comparisons with present-day ideas, is one of many fascinating aspects of communication (see Notes One). Seeing beyond the terminology to the reality of what we’re agreeing to, creating, sustaining with our actions seems one of life’s quirky little challenges.

One example being the world of money. Looking to the roots of words such as “contribution” or “obligation”, we find ideas around ‘bestowing with, bringing together, adding’ and ‘binding by oath’ overlaid with connotations of “liege” and the relationship between feudal superiors and their vassals (those holding land in return for that allegiance).

Meanings that trace back through Latin, French, Germanic, English and Celtic times, and branch out into many other complex and beautiful notions around human coexistence and cooperation. “Bestow” bringing with it a history of ‘conferring or presenting an honour, gift or right’ or placing something in (hopefully) the right hands. “Tribute” carrying thoughts of either gratitude and respect or dependence.

All these words, having arisen through complex experiences, paint some interesting pictures around the ideas or principles underpinning Western society. We have these fairly ancient social arrangements working their way through the intricacies of the Middle Ages then emerging into the light of more modern-day civilisations.

It’s bringing in ideas of lords and masters; the protection afforded through community and other allegiances; and the often precarious realities that led to such ‘transactional relationships’ being seen as truly valuable. There’s this whole world of history that’s grown into the more abstract reinterpretations of modern life. Some aspects may be similar, but the nature of the relationships and risks is also a little different.

Within all that, where do we stand? Do we owe a debt of gratitude to the past and all the ways it’s passed over wealth, knowledge, mastery into our hands? Does history bind us to accept the paths it’s taken and modern forms its ideas created? Is it ungrateful if we seek improvements to how values of freedom, equality or respect are manifested in our times? Or is society still, as ever, a living thing we serve to sustain and perfect? (Notes Two)

It brings to mind the thoughts of the late Wayne Dyer, who once spoke of government as society’s servant – asking why it then turned around and began speaking as the master, making greater demands to fulfil its own agendas. It may not be a perfect analogy, but does raise that essential question around the nature of all these relationships of power and money that govern our lives.

Notes and References:

“Four Pathways to Success” (Audio) by Dr Wayne W. Dyer, (Hay House), 2004.

Note 1: Language and values
Note 1: Worthless, or priceless?
Note 2: Right to question and decide
Note 2: Responsibility in shaping this reality
Note 2: What holds it all together

At times I can become quite philosophical here, wondering at what’s going on beneath the surface of life and our interactions with it (see Notes One). Because it seems to me that there is meaning behind how we’re living, there is something being ‘said’ by the picture we’re painting with our actions. And, often, money seems the point where that’s appearing most clearly.

The degree to which economic realities have always been part of life and ways our current take on that might actually be quite different may be questions for another day, but it’s interesting to think what these things ‘mean’ and what they create socially, personally or environmentally (Notes Two). We might tell ourselves it’s forever been this way, but arguably the scale and intensity of modern ways are something very unusual.

In those posts and others within the theme of Economy & Values, I’ve talked of economic activity claiming to meet needs while simultaneously acting to create such demand by tapping into the delicate realms of human psychology: our desire to belong, feel good about ourselves and also emotionally or socially secure apparently having become valuable assets within the field of marketing.

Across the whole of life, there’s now this constantly rolling narrative saying precisely why we’re never enough: age, gender, appearance, image, style, health, social connections, life choices, communication, relationships, views, interests, everything’s now repackaged into this commercial conversation about how best to be.

As humans we clearly live within that reality, attempting to find our bearings within it: looking around us then trying to make sense of the world, of society, of what all these symbols, codes and conventions mean in terms of status, approval, and so forth. We’re essentially – at least in part – social creatures who seek to participate within community, culture, and other shared constructs.

And there’s a certain logic, I suppose, to adverts fabricating needs to create demands and markets; a circular reasoning that ties up cause and effect, providing reasons for its own existence. It’s also an interesting picture in that it’s plugging the fathomless demands of the human psyche into the rather limited world of natural resources.

It seems cultural participation, social status and personal worth often now come down to this economic scenario we’ve created where everything deemed valuable has been given a price tag. This sense of markets needing to tap into human culture and psychology to fuel growth – our search for meaning and fundamental insecurities dovetailed neatly into economic thinking.

How can that be sustainable ecologically, or even socially? Will we ever be satisfied by the pursuit of ‘goods’ or just kept in this never-ending state of anxiety, where even our economic stability as a society is built upon foundations of human inadequacy or worthlessness? (Notes Three)

The sense of it all, and the surety of using this formula as the basis for society, seems so questionable; it’s appearing to be this convoluted consumption of self, meaning and natural resources almost entirely in the pursuit of wealth.

Notes and References:

Note 1: What is real?
Note 1: Power in what we believe
Note 2: Business defining human life
Note 2: Culture selling us meaning
Note 3: “Small is Beautiful”
Note 3: “Paradox of Choice”

Thinking more of ways forward from darker takes on life, Responsibility in shaping this reality looked at our roles in finding other paths.

Thinking about “life”, in a way it’s just this limited span of time filled with interests and activities; the choices we make, things we pursue, and relationships we form within the world around us. With that, we can go with the flow or decide to chart our own paths through the options available and what that journey might ultimately mean.

And, these days, those options and their meanings seem to be frequently shaped by business, money, and the economics of life. So much is framed in those terms: image, personal branding, industries we support, all we choose to put ourselves behind and construct our identities around. It seems to just be how things are, what modern life’s about, the form perennial human activities are now taking (see Notes One).

Which is what it is: humans have these basic needs for shelter, belonging, security, and whatever else for them is now seen as essential. We each live our lives as best we’re able, contributing towards and drawing from our communities in various ways. That’s simply life, as we make our way from youth through to older age.

Along that path we leave our mark, letting others know what they mean to us as we relate ourselves to them socially, emotionally, economically etc. We’re all leading these lives, this dance of interaction as we effectively communicate which people, opportunities, structures matter to us and how much we care about them. Choices that fit together into this complex, often slightly fractured, picture of life.

And, within that, there’s industry. All these commercial entities that take a look at society, decide what to offer it, then spin stories around how our lives will be better if we buy into what they’re saying. Often, stories that seek to undermine us so we feel that psychological need; chipping away at our humanity, in countless ways, until we’re increasingly dependent on products, services and brands to feel good about ourselves.

It’s strange how human industry and economic activity now seems to feed off us – creating addictions, imbalances, and insecurity – in order to secure a stable customer base. Also, how so many valuable and worthwhile areas of human society, civilisation and culture are apparently seen as fair game in that pursuit of profit (Notes Two).

Maybe modern society ‘is’ built on such things – the profits and companies this sustains fuelling employment and contributing funds through taxation – but at what cost? What does it mean for humanity if these are the activities, principles, values at its foundation? What does it mean if our lives are enveloped by products, the ways of thinking that accompany them, and social or environmental costs they entail? (Notes Three).

Of course, it’s how life is and large sections of our societies are organised around approaching the practical challenges of existence this way. But, surely, the question of what life’s really about and who should get to define, shape, and set the standards we wish to live by are slightly different – and essentially human – concerns.

Notes and References:

Note 1: Money as a pivot of matter & intention
Note 1: Can we overcome purely economic thinking?
Note 2: Privacy and our online existence
Note 2: Culture selling us meaning
Note 2: Language and values
Note 3: At what cost, for humans & for nature?
Note 3: Created a system we seek to escape?

Whether asking such questions might ever lead to meaningful change was explored in Right to question and decide.

In some fairly obvious ways, money’s a powerful force in shaping our lives and reshaping the world we’re sharing: costs, prices, taxes all acting as incentives or deterrents, encouraging certain standards or behaviours within society and further afield. And with that, it must raise questions around whether those forces are ultimately serving our best interests.

Economic realities effectively create personal, social and business motivations that then appear to carry a moral weight; with choices being seen as praiseworthy, acceptable, or stupid purely based on the logic of money. It’s as if something being ‘economical’ is enough for it to be considered ‘wise’ and therefore a good course of action.

It’s an interesting idea, as it’s wandering into territory where we might try to make ‘other values’ stand up against that compelling logic of the marketplace (see Notes One). I’ve often ‘argued’ there’s more to life than money, that it shouldn’t be the standard against which all things are measured; it’s a way of reasoning that seems to lead us into no end of trouble in a lot of areas.

Because, when it comes down to it, where does it lead? If we’re looking mainly in terms of money, what might we not be taking fully into account? What gets pushed to the side lines, downplayed, disregarded, in the pursuit of profit or securing a market? What is ‘all the stuff’ on the other side of the scale while we’re just looking at the bottom line?

As an example, what does it mean if local government creates additional charges for the removal of green waste? From one side, it’s presumably an effort to cut costs by passing them onto citizens. Maybe gardeners have been identified as the kind of people who’d bear that burden out of devotion to nature. But then it must act as a driver, discouraging us from tending plants if there’s further cost and inconvenience attached.

It’s one, small example but surely it all counts if we’re thinking of the kind of world we’re trying to create, sustain and cultivate together? Budgets may be this way of identifying likely sources of revenue and encouraging the patterns of behaviour that are deemed ‘right’ in some sense, but how well does that integrate with the bigger picture?

In terms of how to motivate people one way or another, money’s often a popular or convenient option (Notes Two). Provided we’re creating some degree of systemic sustainability or predictability, that seems more important than the sense of what we’re actually rewarding or punishing on the level of individual or collective motivation to ‘do the right thing’ for environment or community (Notes Three).

Of course, it’s not simple at all: everything’s so interconnected and funds have to be found ‘somewhere’ to keep things running. But the question of the ‘right’ approach to such decisions and how that might best combine with human intentions and values is also important. If we accept money as this powerful reality, what’s the best way to approach it?

Notes and References:

Note 1: Language and values
Note 1: Does it all balance out?
Note 2: The motivation of money
Note 2: Fear or coercion as motivators
Note 2: Tell me why I should
Note 3: Life and money, seamlessly interwoven
Note 3: What we bring to life

Sometimes language contains deep truths, showing us things we mightn’t be quite aware of through the words we’ve chosen. The very act of talking can lead to revelation in that way, if we reflect upon the true meaning of what we may’ve said. In that, I’m thinking more on the personal level; but musings over language’s social meaning suggest the same logic might serve us there as well.

It’s an intriguing thought how so many terms have either an economic or a human meaning: trust; concern; bond; risk; security; responsibility; profit; contribution; return; provision; liability; worth. The human side often being very human, based around qualities of character and personal significance; the economic side more calculating in a different sense.

Obviously it’s just a thought, but it does seem to highlight ways society’s changed and how that echoes through our use of language. How we live our lives, what we prioritise and value, the criteria we use to guide our decisions – all this is reflected within the words we employ and what we mean by them. The relationship of language to reality, both in representing it and shaping it, is surely incredibly fascinating.

And it seems few would deny that economic concerns really do lead modern society with quite a strong hand (see Notes One), seeking to define our priorities in fields of life where we might have argued it has no place (Notes Two). All of which is interesting and more than a little troubling, although that’s not really my focus here.

If language reflects our understanding of life, then what does it mean if we’re shifting towards this economic perspective? Language is a human function: it’s how we represent the world, form our ideas, relate ourselves to it, and share in that with others. It can be seen as this web of meaning we create and partake in; making sense of life, society, and our roles and relationships within it all.

What does it mean then if our conversations and decisions are so largely defined by money, rather than humanity? Clearly there comes a point where finance and individuals meet, where it becomes a factor in our lives and we have to decide how to proceed (Notes Three). But, beyond that, how do we stand in relation to others?

Because my point is that we stand as people within society; society as this community organised for the collective benefit of its members. Within that, presumably, we have a shared understanding of human worth and the behaviours serving to strengthen rather than weaken this grouping of individuals. Culture and education may help with that, but more often it seems the economics of life are speaking more loudly.

To my mind, we talk about money or about people. Economy may be vital to meeting societal and individual needs, but when we equate that with human worth and make it a means for assessing value and assigning respect for another’s participation in society it seems something to be deeply concerned about.

Notes and References:

Note 1: Values and the economic
Note 1: Life and money, seamlessly interwoven
Note 1: Economy & Humanity
Note 2: Culture selling us meaning
Note 2: Why listen to media that exists to profit?
Note 2: Economics and the task of education
Note 3: I am not just a sum
Note 3: The business of spiritual ideas
Note 3: How it is / Selling out

These ideas are echoed in The worth of each life, looking there from a more personal standpoint.