Looking for little signs that mark the way to post consumerism.

As observation and positive feedback is rarely a bad thing, I am always looking for large and small signs that we are emerging from the economic doldrums in the direction I have predicted.

When I was much, much younger, I learned that you find interesting things when you turn over rocks and logs in the woods. I rarely look for the obvious with my head up.

Today is June 26, Hands Across the Sands Day. Saying no to continued offshore oil drilling and yes to renewable energy sources. The oil spill disaster in the Gulf of Mexico might have awakened us. The former Shell Oil executive John Hofmeister’s book Why We Hate the Oil Companies, is a good example of a rock to turn over.

Mr. Hofmeister makes no bones, that extracting oil is a nasty dirty business, that most of us do NOT want to know about how it is done. We want our cars and heat and light, but we do not want to know where it comes from. The oil spill in the Gulf is forcing us to to take a hard look at our addiction to oil. Mr Hofmeister states that while many oil companies are interested in renewable sources for fuel for the personal mobility industry (cars), it is up to Government to make the hard decisions, (forced by we the people, my comment) and set the policies that will take us towards renewable energy.

We just might be seeing the start of a small shift in the government in reaction to our changing outlook.

In a past blog, I predicted that everything will become local again. That also means that we will see changes locally first.

In my small home town of a few thousand souls, we hold a few touristy type “fairs” each year. I attended one last weekend. The turn out was as good as ever, and the number of vendors seemed to be stable from years past. Those would be signs of a stable local economy. However under the surface I noticed something different.

Fewer non essential type vendors, more clothes sales, utility items, more “green” items, more cash sales, with fewer vendors accepting credit cards. I asked a few vendors, if they had used credit in the past and they said they had. I asked why they didn’t now. COST and return. They believed that the cost of offering the credit was greater than the return. So these smaller than small entrepreneurs have returned to a cash basis economy (they did accept checks).

The most recent indications to me that we are inching away from a credit and consumer based economy.

• An awakening about the fossil fuel economy.
• A change towards thoughtful purchase of useful items rather than impulse no need consumption.
• Fewer credit card purchases.

 

The end of “Extraction Capitalism”

Don’t get me wrong. I believe in regulated capitalism as a means of betterment for all. However, “Extraction Capitalism” is a means of betterment of the few at the expense of the many.

There is an evident fact that the mining and other “extraction” industries move away when the mineral resources is depleted.

But where do extraction capitalists go when they have wrung the last cent out of the many? They become extinct!

Let me step back and define “extraction capitalism”. Extraction capitalism is not about making products, or improving society, or about making jobs. Its not even about making money. Its about moving wealth from one class of citizens to another. In our present case its about extracting wealth from the poor, the working poor, and the former middle class. The “extracted” wealth is then moved to the media/governing/banking class. I do not use that class term lightly. The media class is dependent on the governing  class for something to do  and the governing class is dependent on the banking class for financing its survival..

How does the media/government/banking class reallocate your wealth. Its simple, every time there is a monetary transaction on the planet the banks “extract” a share of the transaction. Because the banks “extract” a fee from your grocery store for credit card and debit transaction, all groceries are more expensive. The banks “extracts” wealth from you when you buy groceries. They extract wealth  from you whenever you buy goods and services. They extract wealth from you when your put money in even the safest “savings” accounts. They extract wealth if you invest in stocks and bonds. They extract wealth from you when the government “borrows” money to keep the media/governing/banking class operating.  I even pay a fee to pay my taxes with a credit card.

How can it be that the banks had their best year ever last year, when everyone on Main Street “lost” a significant segment of their wealth. Most of your wealth was not “lost” it was transferred to the media/government/banking class,

I watch the “Tea Party” movement and on TV, they are mostly middle aged and older and white, and I ask myself, how  much of their wealth are they willing to give to Fox News, Sarah Palin and their bankers before they realize that the “other  side”-the bad guys, the young and diverse are in the same peril of giving their wealth to the same media/government/banking class from the opposite direction. Either way the wealth, has been, and continues to move away from Main Street.

The bright side is that, like all “extraction” industries, extraction capitalism will just go away when the resource has been depleted. So when the money is gone from Main Street and there is no where for the “extraction” capitalist to look for wealth, the “Tea Party” members and the “Left Wing Socialists” on Main Street might just have to sit down together and figure out where we would like “capitalism” to go in the future.

Who is that man behind the curtain?

Pay no attention to that man behind the curtain… says the mighty OZ to Dorothy.

Who is that man behind the curtain? By now everyone who is not a member of the media/government class knows there is no one behind the curtain and we are on our own. Rationalizing your life style is not what corporations want. They want you to spend and buy in a credit less economy.

Banks are making money and its almost impossible to get a loan for a home. How is this possible?

This morning I did get a home loan, but as an investor not as a homeowner. I wasn’t exactly planning to buy as an investment, I was trying to buy a smaller home to move down.

I found a home that needed to be gutted and rebuilt, but that fit our near and far term needs better than our present larger and more expensive home. This morning I discovered that moving down market is considered an INVESTMENT move and not subject to the tax credits you get for moving to a new home, which only apply when moving up in price. In addition the term rates and down payments etc are higher for investment mortgages than owner occupant purchases.

I am pretty sure that I won’t get to buy this gut and remodel unit because of other bidders, but who knows? Now I have credit to buy another property in the near future if we find one that suits our needs.

The point of the matter is that everything the government, banks, financial institution and wall street are doing is an effort to rebuild a “consumer” economy.

I am pretty certain that without credit, consumer capitalism is dead in the water, so don’t count on either the Mighty Oz or the man behind the curtain, neither of them have a clue whats going on on Main Street..

American Capitalism Is Not Designed to Create Jobs

American capitalism is designed to MAXIMIZE SHARE HOLDER WEALTH not to create jobs.

Never in the history of the world has so much wealth been transferred to so few for so little work, and the amazing thing is it continues.

Yes, we are having a recovery, but by the evil genius design of our system is that livable wage jobs will not become part of that equation. 

During the years leading up to the CRASH of 08’ the financial industry set up a system (intended or not) to redistribute wealth to the banking class elite from the working classes. They succeeded in transferring massive amounts of wealth and then driving the system into shambles that put EIGHT MILLION families out of work. The wall street geniuses then convinced the governmental class that the fault and damage should be laid on Main Street leading to the bailout of the banking elite class. Over a year later little if any help has arrived on my Main Street. We are being subtly blamed for the crash and punished for our wrong doing.

This is CLASS WARFARE in its most insidious disguise.  The U.S. citizenry has been complicit in the largest and quickest transfer of wealth in the history of the planet. Jobs will not be coming back any time soon as our system is meant to reduce costs and increase profit not make jobs.

So if you can make l=oodles of money with no employees why hire the pests? U.S. financial institutions are again wealthy enough to hand out massive bonuses, while families struggle against their own economic self interest to stay in their homes, borrowing against hope and destroying their financial futures.

Low wage, no benefit jobs will become the norm. Healthcare, if it is not fixed now, will become a privilege for the rich and all others will die early and hard.

Profit over people is NOT a sustainable governance method.

One doesn’t have to look too far back to see what happens when the government no longer serves the people. When the USSR unraveled, the USSR central government lost its credibility because it could not serve even the basic food and shelter needs of the masses. Orders were given and bureaucrats, soldiers and police refused because their mothers, fathers and brothers were in the crosshairs. The undoing of the USSR was a civil disobedience action that rivals the one led by Mohandas Gandhi in India.

Government unraveling can happen here in the United States. It will be assured if more livable wage jobs are not forthcoming, but our system is not made to make jobs but to transfer wealth and that’s its fatal flaw, that we must fix. How do we convince our lawmakers to take a hard look. They usually just react when crisis cannot be avoided. So maybe when bands of highly educated, unemployed, undernourished and drug addled young citizens take to the streets we might have some change, or at least some fun.

PS I am not without hope. I formed another LLC yesterday, but as a small business owner I guess that I might be making maybe one part-time no-benefit  job for a friend or relative.

High-Speed Trading, the final blow to your 401K and the end to disposable income.

High-Speed Trading,  The legal replacement for derivatives in stealing the wealth of a nation.

As simply put as possible, your friendly hedge fund manager Mr. Friendly, leases space for his computer in the same building that the NYSE has its computers.

Your computer is on your desk hooked up by modem to one in Des Moines Iowa (or Dhaka Bangladesh) which is then hooked up to the NYSE via a complex route that takes time..

You and others like you see a trend for Acme Products and offer to buy. Your friendly hedge fund manager sees this also. Mr. Friendly buys, his exchange is an nanoseconds, yours take one second. In that second minus a nano-second Mr. Friendly has driven up the price of Acme Products and your profits are diminished (or losses increased).

Every time you trade you lose. The more you trade the more you lose and the more Mr. Friendly wins. Eventually you are tapped out, because Mr. Friendly has deep pockets. and you are in Ocean Park, Washington.

If the mavens of Wall Street and our government agents in Washington want the consumer boom to re-ignite, they need to make sure more money flows down to Main Street, and so far I see the money going one way. Straight into the hands of the 1% enters.

Henry Ford knew that to have sustainable consumer growth, employees must be able to afford the products they made, and the time to use what they bought. Hence, Ford's paid better wages than others and made sure his workers had time to use the product up. (enough wages to buy a model T, and the forty hour week to drive it into uselessness). Ford also sensed that more than 40 hours per week diminished productivity and also decreased the number of potential buyers for his product. Once you bought your Model T he didn't have anything else to sell you with your overtime pay, so that money went to hire more workers. (of which there was a steadily increased supply).

That's as simple as it gets. Wall Street wants and has all our disposable income and if you let them have your meager savings, they will eat the rest and leave you nothing.

The inevitable outcome of unregulated capitalism, is the transfer of all wealth to a few.

For the Wall Street investment bankers and politicians, read some history of the French revolution and the Bolshevik revolution  and you might see why it could be a good thing to let a little wealth trickle down.

I'm betting that I am right, and in future postings, I will be musing about paradigm shifts and trends rather than causes.  I will keep my eyes open for new ways that the system will re-allocate your wealth. 

When we get through this mess, we will not be worrying about fashions and ipod upgrades but more fundamentally useful things like friends and family and a shared common wealth (good).

Indicators of change to post consumerism society.

New indicators of a change in consumerism towards post consumerism.

Main stream media government and “wall street” keep telling us to buy stuff as the recession “has ended”. What a crock. At the same time they are bemoaning consumer spending they are saying look out for more job loses next year. You can’t have it both ways: If we are rightfully fearful of our future employment options why should we buy into their self serving demands.

This week, as your ever watchful post consumerist, I plucked these tidbits:

• Condé Nast looses big and closes four publications.

Condé Nast will be down $1 Billion in advertising revenue this year and will close four magazines and 200 staff are to lose their jobs:

• Gourmet,
• Elegant Bride,
• Modern Bride
• Cookie  

Will added stress from these loses decrease the cost of weddings (another blog opportunity) or raise the rates of bridal suicides. On the upside Bon Apetit and Brides magazines will continue to publish, so we won’t be completely bereft of very glossy very consumerist offerings in this area.


• JD Powers find Gen Y to have negative attitudes to car ownership

Mark Zimmerman of the LA Times reported that according to JD Powers and Associates (the perennial toastmaster of the auto industry) Gen Y teens and early careerists have shifted their perceptions (negatively) towards cars ownership and the auto industry. (Japan is showing “decline” in car ownership).

"The negative perceptions of the automotive industry that teens and early careerists hold could have implications on future vehicle sales," Chance Parker, vice president and general manager of J.D. Power's Web Intelligence division, said in a news release. (LA Times)

What implication?  Less car sales I think, or is it: “If I hate your product and have found a way to live without it, you will still find a way to sell it to me. Think again auto execs. A silver lining: the Chinese are wild about buying cars, and that’s a big market if you consider China has two nations (one the size of the US who are rich consumerists and the rest of their country that is illiterate an poor).

• America’s Top Chef show acknowledges people are entertaining home in latest episode. 

Bravo’s show Top Chef acknowledged that in these difficult economic times more people will be having dinner parties at home. I have found that to be a change in my personal life. Although we are not big on eating out except when travelling and as an occasional luxury, we have found ourselves at more and more backyard diner parties (we live in AZ and on the Washington coast so al fresco is then norm). We have probably held twice the number at our homes that we have in past years. Check out the Bravo episode of Top Chef and see how ten chefs in one home kitchen can really make a mess.

• Live music in our back yards.

Two weeks ago, I spent my Sunday afternoon in a friend’s back yard with fifty folks listening to one of the widest types of music you could imagine. From 16th century harpsichord, to Tom Lehrer’s satires from teh 60's to Gershwin to Joan Osborn. Flagstaff’s long time troubadour Jimmy Deblois.(see his YouTube hit) has teamed up with classical pianist Charles Spinning. They have performed at a variety of community venues and are planning more “backyard’ concerts. The highlight of the afternoon, was Groucho Marx’s ditty “Everyone says, I love you” from “Horsefeathers” sung for the wonderful young couple (and their gracious family) who were having there wedding reception next door, and never called the police

The Effluence of Affluence.

From The WiseGeek

According to the Environmental Protection Agency, the average American produces about 4.4 pounds (2 kg) of garbage a day, or a total of 29 pounds (13 kg) per week and 1,600 pounds (726 kg) a year. This only takes into consideration the average household member and does not count industrial waste or commercial trash.

If this sounds like a staggering number, you would be surprised to know that Americans are not the number one producers of garbage in the world. In Mexico, the average household produces 30 percent more garbage than in America.

http://www.wisegeek.com/how-much-garbage-does-a-person-create-in-one-year.htm

I think the reason that Mexico has more waste than we do is that they get almost all of our junk that doesn't end up endlessly recycled through "garage sales". The ultimate resolution of Reagan era "trickle down " economics.

My search for "garage sales" on Bing resulted in 30,7000,000 hits. Searching "yard sales" added another 20,600,000. There are approximately 110,000,000 households in the United Sates, then for every 2.05 household in the U.S. there is one "garage sale" or "yard sale" website.

One of the more interesting hits was the Henrik Bering review called "Royal Yard Sale" of The Sale of the Late King's Goods: Charles I and His Art Collection by Jerry Brotton.

The book and review describe the disposition of the art collection of Charles 1 of England. Who, it appears, acquired a lot of his work at a variety of distressed "yard sales" of his fellow monarchs.

When Charles fell on "hard times" he fell hard, culminating with his revolt against Parliament and his beheading on January 29, 1649. Parliament decided to pay for some important things with Charles art so the first recorded Anglo-Saxon yard sale took place. (I am sure there were earlier prototype but this is a good one)

• The sale commenced in October 1649. Things did not get off to a great start. By releasing enormous quantities of art all at once, they flooded the market. Some former royalists were naturally hesitant about the idea of buying their late king's possessions, while Puritans were not supposed to harbor such aesthetic desires. This did not prevent three enterprising colonels, acting on behalf of international buyers, from making excellent buys, snatching up some of the best pieces. Others just sat back and waited for prices to fall............ The sale petered out when Oliver Cromwell was installed as Lord Protector of the Commonwealth of England, Scotland, and Ireland in 1653. Cromwell was no fool. .......

http://www.hoover.org/publications/policyreview/4884421.html

The royal yard sale netted $26,500 pound (1649) a large sum but my guess is the appreciated value of some for this art in 350 years is staggering.

Another interesting hit was the Interior Design Institute of British Columbia they held a garage sale on June 20, 2009 http://www.salari.com/node/296. it was to benefit "Habitat for Humanity", but the idea struck me as interesting and I bet there were some very chic and over priced tchochkes on the tables.

I couldn't find any "institute", "organization" or other national or international agency for "garage sales" . The closest thing would be eBay but that's on-line and not "live performance" so there is a window of opportunity for a wise Post Consumerism Blog follower.

Another item I think deeply about, could we pay off the national debt by collecting taxes on garage sales. Would we tax the sale price or the "value price. (more on that later) I am not alone here

At a recent Longmont (Colorado) City Council meeting, councilwoman Sarah Levison was so concerned a local estate sale was not collecting sales tax that she called authorities to "go out there and figure out what was going on."

Levison voiced her concerns during a Tuesday's City Council meeting, which was exposed on the Longmont Advocate blog written by local activist Chris Rodriguez.

The councilwoman's words say it all.

"I noticed that they were not collecting taxes for the city of Longmont," said Levison. "I wonder if there is any system to check on when there are professionally run estate sales to ensure that we are collecting taxes. I hate to think that we might have lost several hundred dollars of tax income that day. I'm also wondering whether or not we could connect with the state to find out if they reported the amount of state sales tax and if we could go back and try to collect it. We need every dime we can get these
days."

http://facethestate.com/buzz/17184-longmonts-levison-digs-deep-tax-revenue

In my neck of the summer woods, in the Pacific Northwest we hold a 28 mile long Memorial Day wekend community garage sale. Lets say 5% of the community takes part or 150 homes. If each sale nets $1,000 and the tax rate is 8% that's $12K lost sales tax to the state.

If there are 110,000,000 home in the United States and 5% have annual garage sales that's 5.5 M homes times $80 tax or $440,000,000 lost revenue. Not enough to make a dent in our problem, but it's still spending money for government.

Back to the sale price or the value price issue.

Neither I, nor my wife, are garage or yard sales shoppers. We do buy most of our clothing and shoes on-line from trusted discount retailers with attractive return polices, like free shipping of return items. My wife sometimes orders two sizes and then returns ones that don't fit. She also likes to shop at second hand stores, and we both shop at the discount clothiers, but we don't normally do yard sales.

That said, I had decided to punish myself this summer (a very early American idea) after getting a $268 speeding ticket, by forgoing a new gas barbeque grill.

Our charcoal grill of 20 plus years is still hale and hardy due to an obvious manufacturing defect that made the steel too thick, to either rust out or burn through.

The other night, we were talking to our neighbors, who are wonderful and frugal folks. Amoung their recent yard sales purchases were two motor scooters with 160 kilometers on them, helmets included for $1000 (for both). Retail sale new about $2200. We were impressed. We mentioned that we might be buying a gas grill at a yard sale deferred until "next summer" due to my punishment.

A few days later they stopped by to say a yard sale down the street had a decent grill for $20 with a tank. Tanks retail for about $33 (plus tax) at your local home and yard store, so the grill was actually thrown in for free. I went down a few blocks and the price had been reduced to $15 and the tank was at least half full and the igniter still worked. The retail for this grill and tank is about $135 plus sales tax. My price at yard sale is about a 90% discount. I did have to power wash it though.

I must have the bug, but I will be careful. Saturday I was dropping my considerably less than 29 lbs of weekly garbage off at our compactor/transfer station and spied a really dirty outdoor chair in the "Freebie" area. Upon closer observation it was completely coated with dirt that a good power washing would resolve. Now I am the proud owner of a $15 lawn chair, perfectly good and clean.

My question is should I list this as income on my federal tax returns next year?

The BIGGEST POTLACH of all time.

Poltach is a ceremony or a series of ceremonies from Pacific Northwest Indigenous Peoples . During the ceremonial gathering, a family or hereditary leader hosts guests in his family's house and holds a feast for invited guests. The main purpose of the potlatch is the re-distribution and reciprocity of wealth.The host and his relatives lavishly distribute gifts to guests, who were expected to accept any gifts offered with the understanding that at a future time they were to reciprocate in kind.

Items ready for Potlach in the 1880's

Potlatching was made illegal in Canada in 1885 and the United States in the late nineteenth century, largely at the urging of missionaries and government agents who considered it "a worse than useless custom" that was seen as wasteful, unproductive which was not part of "civilized" values. The US ban was lifted in 1951, which means it was still going on underground well into the second half of the last century.

Potlach is still practiced by indigenous peoples today, as well as by registered Lobbyists and Congressional staffers. The Potlachs are planned in Washington DC and held at a variety of resorts worldwide.

If it was illegal due to morality issues, why did the United States just engage in the granddaddy of all Potlach. During the great depression we redistributed wealth to the poor, in the 2008/09 US Potlach wealth has been redistributed from the poor to the wealthiest corporations (shareholders and executives) on earth.

I recently heard a news report (unverified) that my portion of the Potlach to Citi Bank and others was $10,000. The politician, making the report, asked if I felt wealthier because of this redistribution of my wealth. My answer was, of course I don't, but the bankers probably think so.

A traditional Potlach between rival groups might involve extravagant or competitive giving and destruction, by the host, of valued items as a display of superior wealth. He who burns the most stuff must be the richest and most powerful. Based on that, the executives at Chrysler,GM, AIG, BofA, CitiGroup etc. must be pretty powerful to burn the wealth of a generation. Lets see, if AIG burned $80B of our wealth and GM burnt only $18B which of these executives should get the highest status?

If we follow the rules of Potlach to the absurd, AIG executives should have a higher status in the world than US Senators and the president (leader) of at least 150 countries in the United Nations.
Under the rules of Potlach is Bernie Madoff being unjustly incarcerated instead of feted?

One of the unstated rules of Potlach is that the receiver was bound to reciprocate in the gifting. Do you think Obama expects that GM will be delivering my gift car to my doorstep any time soon?

The potlatch ceremony involved dancing, feasting, and ritual boasting, often lasting for several days. This sounds a lot like the Congressional hearings on the "stimulus package, but I would go more for singing and dancing, drinking and eating.

The New Potlach for the United States.

My suggestion to congress: declare a new Potlach Day, May 30th, (for good weather most places).

Citizens are obliged to go outside singing and dancing in the streets. We can leave the ritual boasting to the President and the appointed loyal opposition spokesperson of the day.

The federal government feeds us all the surplus food they have stored up in silos. Lots of dried dairy products I'd bet.

At midnight every street has a big fire and we ritualistically burn all our clothing, furniture and electronics and smash our cars so that on June 1st we have to go out and buy new stuff with our credit, thus readying ourselves for next years Potlach Day.

Now that sounds like a fun governmental program, and also a way to avoid living in any kind of post consumer world.

Why we are enterring the post consumer economy.

This blog will be dedicated to musings (factual or fantastic) about why I believe we are entering a new "post consumer" economy and what it might look like.

I will post weekly, but just in the last few days the web has begun to sprout a considerable volume of "post consumerism" rhetoric (748,000,000 Google Hits) so maybe we will have more to say more often.

Why is the capitalist/consumer economy destined to change from a consumer product based system? and what will the replacement system look like?

The simple answers are: WE HAVE LOTS LESS MONEY TO BUY STUFF WITH, as to what the economy might look like, that's the subject for future postings.

I revisited the George Carlin monologue on "stuff" and its more relevant today than it was 25 years ago. To get into the correct mood for the new "post stuff economy" its worth re watching the master in his prime on YouTube. George Carlin on Stuff http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MvgN5gCuLac




MY PERSPECTIVE

Beyond the issue of massive price losses in 401K's and home equity for individuals, and beyond the falling consumer outlook numbers, and beyond the real un and underemployment rates of 16-20+%. Two things strike me as essential data that supports a fundamental change in how our economy will work in the near and mid term future.

1. The historical pricing for housing suggests that housing prices will return to the norm after dropping below the norm. (Many of you have seen this Case-Shiller Chart . Oh! gosh this chart is a little misstated. If you look at the ups and downs the pricing needs to fall way below the average before it seeks steady state. The graphic developer kind of tapered the final dotted line out at the norm. That's not how a pattern would be repeated. To repeat the pattern you need to see a significant drop below the norm before it spikes up again, so read it and weep or worse. I think the worst is yet to come).











My guess, at least another 40% DROP IN THE PRICE of a single family home price, which will mean a lot more foreclosures based on the following WSJ article. This will bear out if the banks push the mortgage rates to 10% or above to improve their interest spread positions. Monthly mortgage costs will have the effect of pushing the cost of the houses down. Exactly the opposite effect that we have seen over the last 15 years as mortgage rates fell housing prices rose.

• New Evidence on the Foreclosure Crisis by Stan Lieboiwtz.....What is really behind the mushrooming rate of mortgage foreclosures since 2007? The evidence from a huge national database containing millions of individual loans strongly suggests that the single most important factor is whether the homeowner has negative equity in a house -- that is, the balance of the mortgage is greater than the value of the house. This means that most government policies being discussed to remedy woes in the housing market are misdirected.....
  
  From The Wall Street Journal http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124657539489189043.html

I have to admit that of the three homes I live in, I own two and the bank and I own one. The shared ownership one is upside down for both me and the bank, but I like it, and the mortgage is still bearable. I got one of the last pesky interest only ones based on LIBOR (which I knew was a lie in my favor) before the mortgage system collapse. However, that mortgage doesn't reset for four more years and we will be in the new "post consumer" world by then, and I can wait a little while to predict what that will mean to me. (See future posts)

2. The financial industry is squeezing credit and trying to increase the net interest spread between their cost of money and the price that they sell that money. In 2008 financial institutions have significantly cut consumer credit card limits. Financial instituions will continue to cut consumer credit limits., and raise interst rates.

Bloomberg.Com reported in March that credit card companies will cut $2 Trillion in consumer credit in the next eighteen months. http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=adCwmmkzFI3U

That's $2 Trillion less in "stuff' Americans and Europeans will be buying from around the world. If you adjust that for some cycling of funds, say 6 times a year or $12 TRILLION NOT SPENT on "stuff" in the consumer market.

What will this amount of spending be replaced with in the "post consumer" economy?

My guess we will have much smaller private consumer product buying and selling , and more public sector buying and selling. We might also see some of that "green energy" development for our investment of the money we will save by not buying "stuff".

The folks down the street won't be getting a swimming pool,. but they will be pushing City Hall to build one for the community.

We won't be buying new GMs Fords or Chrylsers, but pushing City Hall for more mass transit, or maybe keeping that clunker running a bit longer by using it less.

We won't be working overtime for more cash to buy stuff, but we will be pushing our employers (who are cutting wages and benefits) to cut back our work weeks or at least let some of us work at home or bundle our hours into fewer days of commuting.

We won't be buying more wasteful big plasma screen TV's and we won't be wasting more electricity in our homes, but we might by that "big ticket" photovoltaic system (PV) for our roof or wind turbine for our backyard. (I did.)

This is the first post and in future posts I will be covering things like.


Everything the bankers and economist's think they know about the recovery is wrong.
The definition of Potlach.
Who will be the new captains of industry in the post consumer economy?
The "Slow Money" movement.
Everything we do becomes local.
The resurgence of brands that don't change their look every time the wind blows.
Products for the "post consumer" economy.
Service industry for the "post consumer" economy .
Higher education in the "post consumer" economy.
Careers for the "post consumer" economy.
Living the good life in the "post consumer" economy (for some of us).

And anything that is suggested or comes up.