NONPRODUCTIVE ECONOMIC SECTORS

By Roland Watson

Another critical perspective on an economy is an appraisal of its component parts, or sectors: if they are helping to meet the above goals, if they satisfy positive needs; or if they exist to satisfy negative needs, or even their own, parasitic, needs. We saw previously that government by and large satisfies a negative need, that of protection, and that it should therefore be as small and efficient as possible. From this perspective, one can see that it is a "drag" on an economy, and in this regard it is not alone.

The other major drags on an economy are shadow governments; the military; all other security apparatus, particularly the law enforcement infrastructure, including police, prisons and attorneys; and the entire corporate/media/advertising brainwashing machine. As we have seen, shadow governments rarely exist to make a contribution: their raison d'etre is to confront and undermine the current government. And militaries, although they have a legitimate function, are now in an age of decline and can be greatly slimmed down. The terms of modern warfare, in any case, are much more weapons-dependent than personnel-dependent. Massive force reductions, worldwide, are in order. As to law enforcement, the creation of the police has led to a great increase in the number of criminals, and this is perpetuating itself. While it also has a legitimate function, in our movement towards a just society it should be deserving of a smaller and smaller role, and therefore less funding. To accomplish this, all unjust and archaic laws should be eliminated, to deprive police of the justifications that they use to help create the criminal class. Finally, regarding the commercial machinery of form, it has no positive consequences whatsoever. It causes us to want what we do not need, and it inflates the price in the process.

All of these economic sectors are huge drains of resources, including financial, labor and natural, from our real task at hand, which is meeting the list of goals that I presented in the last article to construct a better society. And in this process, they are also all highly inflationary.

To the extent that society can reduce the costs of these sectors, this will free up resources for real progress, which in turn will reduce our reliance on the sectors even more. At that point we can focus more effectively on our goal to create a large store of value, a wealth of savings, such that we really do have a prosperous society, and that it extends to everyone.

But, of course, we are a very long way from there.

© Roland Watson 2016