"Equal" Income Presupposes Abundance. Equal Time Value, Scarcity

Time arbitrage is a form of equal time value, which could provide means for groups and individuals to better manage and coordinate mutual responsibilities, by using the actual time at their disposal. Such options are becoming all the more important, given the present day struggles of budget obligations. Only consider that when economic time value doesn't have an equivalent for money's medium of account function, policy makers end up "hiding" extensive time based requirements in default policy positions.

However, it's important not to confuse the equal resource management capacity of time value, with redistribution arguments such as "more" equal pay. Income based approaches to inequality, are a never ending chase to meet what are essentially self imposed consumption requirements. Whereas equal time value is a supply side response to adjust consumption requirements, through better managed (time based) production.

Arguments for more "equal" income distribution at the lower end, include an implicit assumption there is sufficient wealth in aggregate to continue shifting income downward, for existing consumption needs. Yet this approach is becoming more problematic, as nations begin to follow the lead of the U.S. for further monetary tightening. Income adjustment arguments, tend to assume the rewards of material abundance have not already been assigned to functions involving high value skill and merit. Whereas time arbitrage, with its recognition of time scarcity, reorients the focus on time as a central scarcity which needs to be acknowledged in relation to other existing resource capacity.

A rationale of existing abundance, as though held back by lack of will, was also reiterated in a recent Project Syndicate Post, "Should We Be Worried About Productivity Trends?" The authors begin:

Economists trying to explain the apparent structural slowdown in productivity growth have been asking the following question. Where is the missing increase?

One mentioned possibility was "a paucity of investment opportunities". However, there's a flood of extensive human capital investment in the marketplace, which has yet to be recognized for what it actually suggests in terms of production potential. Education for time based product, is production input. Today's educational losses are quite similar to other investment losses. It would be as though a factory were expected to invest (purchase capital) for up to two decades  - such as today's formal educational processes - before it could begin to even sell its product in the marketplace.

This circumstance is all the more problematic, given the scarcity of our time use potential in relation to other forms of resource capacity. Michael Spence and Sandile Hlatshwayo continue:

But it may also be useful to consider a more fundamental question. How much productivity growth do we really want, and at what cost?

Perhaps what's being missed in this argument, is the still dependent state of non tradable sector activity, on strong output levels via tradable sector activity. A self sufficient marketplace for non tradable sector activity, could add to wealth creation and possibly increase the long term growth trajectory, without leaving lower income levels behind - as is currently the case. Again, from the Project Syndicate article:

All of this suggests that a substantial share of the decline in productivity growth may not be the result of some deep problem with resource allocation...governments should devote resources to reducing inequality, regardless of the shifting preferences of the average citizen.

Apparently, according to their argument, I've been suggesting there is a "deep problem" with resource allocation. Plus, I believe the "shifting preferences of the average citizen" are of utmost importance for time based service product outcomes. Who doesn't want - and deserve - a say in their service accommodations when they experience failing health, for instance?

We have to be careful in assuming structural income coordination issues can be solved away, by shifting resource flows between skills sets which presently hold wide variations in marketplace value. Even if it were possible to do so, this wouldn't increase access to high skill time based product, for those who are presently left with low marketable skill. Aggregate resource abundance is not the same thing as potential availability for time based product. It's best to acknowledge existing time scarcities for what they really are, in order to achieve a better result.

At first glance, one might confuse arguments for "more" income compensation, with the equal time value of time arbitrage, given their emphasis on a common value. Nevertheless, these two resource constructs are completely different in nature. Coordinated time value is subject not only to the limits of what an individual can provide for others in the course of a day, week, month or year, but also the fact that individual's time is already being coordinated with a limited set of individuals. One only need imagine the rural doctor (where they do exist) who can accept a mere fraction of potential local patients.

Last but not least: Some assume that you can't expect much productivity out of a service economy if people perform those services. Fortunately, this does not have to be true. Productivity is currently being lost, because too many human capital inputs are not being accounted for, as the first phase of a services production process. Economic time value needs a position in which it can incrementally proceed, or generate new marketplace output, via the purchase of other time value. Without economic options to pay for human capital as it is acquired, time scarcity issues will continue to weigh  heavily, on those whose time value is insufficient, to purchase the high skill time value that requires decades of inputs before output is possible.

Wrap Up for June 2017

Since Congress sets the basic parameters of monetary policy, what goals should the Fed be trying to achieve? And what tools are appropriate? Scott Sumner and Patrick Horan for U.S. News

Recommended by David Beckworth, this paper from David Schleicher also takes legal issues into account which impact economic mobility: "Stuck! The Law and Economics of Residential Stability"

Is it possible to use the word "and" too many times in one's paper? This post from Tim Harford, explaining why he could relate to Paul Romer's frustration re excess complexity, made me smile. http://timharford.com/2017/05/economics-lessons-from-dr-seuss/

"Reducing the supply of reserves while doing nothing to reduce banks' demand for them is a recipe for demand driven deflation..." (George Selgin) https://www.alt-m.org/2017/06/01/ioer-and-banks-demand-for-reserves-yet-again/

Why jails are booming: https://www.citylab.com/politics/2017/06/why-jails-are-booming/528759/

"...the race for a better understanding of what drives the income distribution is just getting started..."

Why does the Fed still believe that low unemployment is contributing to inflation, especially given the lack of evidence? (Marcus Nunes)

A conversation with Timothy Taylor

If it's free, there's important reasons it's not being measured.

Larry Summers has his own concerns about the Fed.
Has Summers become a market monetarist? Scott Sumner takes a closer look.

If only occupational licensing were "good politics"!

The oil glut has not been advantageous for OPEC.

"Oil will increasingly have to compete for customers"

From Ed Luce, in a Q &A with James Pethokoukis:
"What we need is somebody...to talk about what would happen if there were a big investment program, an intelligent large scale one - with the private sector involved as partners - in the skills, lifetime skills not just one-off hits, the continuous learning skills of people in the middle class and beyond. And that's actually not such a hard thing to imagine."

"Officials will not take their rate hike plans and go quietly into the night, even in the face of low inflation." (Tim Duy) https://www.bloomberg.com/view/articles/2017-06-22/fed-s-labor-market-forecasts-don-t-make-sense

"In-Work Poverty in the United States"

"Nursing homes account for 42 percent of all Medicaid spending, even though only 6 percent of Medicaid enrollees use them. 64 percent of Americans in nursing homes depend on Medicaid."

A speech from Ben Bernanke: "When Growth is Not Enough"

Nick Rowe responds to a recent post from Miles Kimball.

"A better monetary policy wouldn't set any inflation target."

Scott Sumner provides a summary of his views on monetary economics.

When Markets No Longer Feel "Free"

Of course, in a sense, markets have never been free. That fact partly accounts for this blog's all too sober name. Even as I advocate to regain monetary equivalence for time value, there's no denying the ongoing reality of tight monetary conditions across the globe. NIMBYs appear to have won the day. I was reminded of extensive political interference in markets, and the excessive confidence of free market defenders who don't appear concerned, by a recent post from Gavin Kennedy, who is as well versed as any economist I know, regarding Adam Smith.

Regular readers already know what I believe to be missing from the marketplace: time value. I'm convinced that it's crucial, for individuals to have a functioning marketplace for the time they actually have, to meet their own personal obligations. Too many markets are constructed, so as to make it impossible for individuals with limited income to use their time effectively. When free market defenders dismiss those with additional burdens, and neglect to explore proactive alternatives for the crony capitalism which causes these problems, free market defenders ultimately risk the demise of the markets they celebrate. If and when people lose the ability to freely exchange with one another, some are going to lose faith in the process.

Time is the one resource we all have, which naturally functions as an exchange behavior: whether through our physical abilities, our skills, or both. Yet time value has been subtracted from economic exchange in too many instances. We need the full approximation of our time to build and maintain our environments and seek exchange with others - particularly when monetary representation is limited, due to general equilibrium constraints.

As to the ongoing reality of exchange as a human trait, and in response to an article which highlighted Adam Smith, Gavin Kennedy writes:

In short, exchange behaviors are not unique to a 'capitalist economy', nor specifically only to markets. Smith notes that the 'exchange propensity' functioned long before capitalism... 

The notion that a "capitalist economy works efficiently to determine what people really want as opposed to what they say they want" is pure fantasy. That capitalism can be more efficient than non-capitalist and pre-capitalist economies is broadly true; that they are always faultless is less certain...

Free markets do not, and arguably never have, operated in the real world. Smith understood this and indeed makes many references to the behaviour of 'merchants and manufacturers' who in his day (and still in ours) colluded with each other and with governments to introduce the very same 'peverse effects'...

No one who feels strongly about a dynamic marketplace should be resting on their laurels now, especially as attacks from the left become more insistent in the Trump era. What's unsettling about this latest round, are the numerous historical examples when (spreading) lost faith in markets, ultimately meant lost national dynamism. Lest policy makers and pundits in the U.S. imagine themselves "immune" to this problem, why even take a chance on misplaced confidence becoming the "pride before the fall"? If no one is willing to pursue measures which can finally generate dynamic non tradable sectors, we may all be in for a bumpy ride, in the foreseeable future.

Time value has often been a crucial economic element, when populations didn't have sufficient money at their disposal for the local markets which are now referred to as non tradable sector activity. If funds were limited, people built dwellings through their own stamina and natural resources, and coordinated their time to realize mutually desired ends. The progress of the last century has fooled us to some extent, in assuming no one needs to rely on neighbors anymore for economic purposes. While these assumptions may hold true for higher income levels, lower income levels have not only lost the resource patterns of the past, but are quickly losing access to the expected patterns of the present, as well.

Because of this circumstance, I've promoted a new institutional construct, which - since it would generate an alternative equilibrium for local non tradable sector activity - could be referred to as an equilibrium corporation. Via alternative equilibrium for non tradable sector activity, people could more closely anchor the use of their time to the requirements of their local environments. The equilibrium corporation would be designed to preserve pathways for economic freedom - at least to the extent it is possible, given the natural constraints of time and resource capacity.

Every nation needs to make certain they don't lose the capacity of their citizens with limited incomes. Granted: it's okay if higher income levels don't want mass produced lightweight building components for living and working, especially if these components would reduce local property values. But it's not okay that lower income levels don't have these options, and equilibrium corporations would make building components central to an asset creation role which combines tradable and non tradable sector functions.

Only remember that when political leaders ignore the circumstance of their own citizens, even the strongest economies can falter. Adam Smith also knew, how the possibilities of falling backward were always there, even when nations were experiencing tremendous economic progress. "The Wealth of Nations" was understandably viewed as a celebration of prosperity. Still, this important work held warnings which are still important, centuries after he penned them. If policy makers do not stand behind strong economic pathways that allow freedom of choice, the intentions which do win the day, could be the ones which make freedom a forgotten memory.

Notes on Human Capital in Relation to Productivity

Why have we been slow to recognize the relation of excessive inputs for human capital, for the total output of time based product? Possibly one reason, are expectations for rising income over time, as automatic with aggregate output gains, regardless of sector. To this end, purveyors of time based product have additional rationale to increase aggregate inputs (human capital investment requirements) in relation to total output, as a quality factor.

Rising wages as automatically correlated with rising productivity, are a major point of contention, where productivity mysteries are concerned. Since productivity benefited from centuries of expanding tradable sector output, it's an understandable societal expectation. But ever more demands on human capital input in relation to output (for time based product), greatly affects total factor productivity. There's also the Baumol effect, which lends further weight to the expectations of human capital input, prior to output.

Also interesting, are the cultural factors involved. The difficult impasse of today's healthcare as a contributor to poor productivity, is due in part to society's acceptance of low final product output, in relation to the human capital input that has been required. Many years of formal education take place, before students can pass the torch of knowledge to others, either through understanding or knowledge application. Even though such requirements detract from total factor productivity, these organizational patterns are backed by such strong cultural expectations, that it is difficult to contextualize them as lost output or marketplace capacity.

Indeed, one normally associates cultural factors with positive economic gains, even though cultural expectations for human capital investment, stand in the way of long term growth and productivity! Fortunately, for a long time, tradable sector productivity was dominant to such an extent, it provided sufficient revenue that extensive cultural requirements for human capital weren't so problematic. In "Good Capitalism, Bad Capitalism and the Economics of Growth and Prosperity", the authors (including William Baumol) agree with the importance of culture for economic dynamism, while wondering if Hernando de Soto's emphasis on turning informal economic activity into formal activity, might have been oversold to some degree.

Yet as it turns out, Hernando de Soto has been proven right in downplaying culture's role as a positive contributor to economic dynamism. All the more so, since many individuals held reservations regarding his efforts to formalize capital. In all of this: Only remember that when human capital is held in check by excessive input in relation to total output for time based product, this gets reflected in the physical capital that receives a "green light" for aggregate representation. Not everyone wants the additional wealth valuation for general equilibrium settings, which is also expressed via monetary means.

Human capital investment in the form of education "inputs" (also noted in "Good Capitalism, Bad Capitalism") ultimately occurs in a total factor productivity context. At least one recent study has highlighted the problematic nature of total factor productivity since the Great Recession, alongside what I believe to be a consequent diminished labour force participation. Again, note the confusion of human capital as it relates to total factor productivity, in tradable/non tradable sector context, where Liberty Street Economics explains,

A major economic concern is the ongoing sluggishness in the growth of output per worker hours, generally called labor productivity. In an arithmetic sense, the growth of the economy can be accounted for by the increase in hours worked plus that of labor productivity.

However, standard productivity gains have accrued on behalf of employees, due to a centuries long process of output gains via tradable sector dominance. What has yet to be actively considered, is that non tradable sector time based product works differently, which is particularly important given its recent market dominance. Marketplace expansion takes place when time participation is allowed to expand through both inputs and outputs. Yet when wages automatically rise for time based product alongside tradable sector wages, equilibrium coordination for time based services gradually becomes reduced to higher income categories. Which then limits the total marketplace for time based product. The result? Limits to both labour force participation and total factor productivity (marketplace size), as mentioned (above) in "The Disappointing Recovery of Output after 2009".

Understandably, economists continue to view rising income - regardless of sector - as crucial to progress. However, this view of continuous progress was established long before anyone imagined a services dominant economy, in which total inputs (while externalized in the form of educational investment) might come to dominate actual output. Again, what matters in terms of time based product, is what the consumer can buy. If output could be incrementally gained alongside input, individuals with limited incomes would no longer remain locked out of vital, time based service markets.

Tradable sectors multiply output gains via resource capacity. Whereas the time based product of non tradable sectors, contributes to marketplace output and knowledge diffusion via replication and additive means. Or, one could express this as passing on the torch of knowledge for economic progress, two people and one shared interaction at a time. Continuous output, while it can certainly appear as though small and incremental, nonetheless adds up a lot more quickly than decades of human capital preparation, so often required before many have a chance to participate on economic terms for the first time.

In alternative equilibrium settings, the human capital investment that is part of time based product, would quickly become eligible as continuous output for final product. Individuals would have the chance to pass on the torch of knowledge, even as they are experiencing its benefits for the first time. The result? Not unlike the output gains in relation to input, which are a result of far more complicated versions, of technological progress.

Preserve Knowledge Through Books and Time Value

Those of a certain age, remember knowledge as a tempting marketplace housed in books, in second hand bookstores filled to overflowing with every imaginable subject just "begging" to be read. This morning I recalled one Houston bookstore from three decades earlier, which had a good sized room solely dedicated to history books. Just history books!

Today, knowledge has become even more important in the marketplace. Nevertheless, our basic time scarcity has not changed one iota, even as digital information further expands the choices for our focused attention. Hence making room in one's life for the pleasures of the printed page, not to mention pursuing intellectual challenges with others on personal terms, means even more difficult choices are involved.

Perhaps these claims on our time, help to explain the occasional struggles re what "should" be included in high school history books, for instance. Some worry: might required exposure to a subject be the only storyline some students encounter, especially if their interests lie elsewhere? As to that requirement aspect of learning: It's one thing to argue for or against interpretations, via one's own written format which others can support as they wish. But what happens when these arguments instead become part of a roster of educational expectations?

Consequently, multiple threads of interpretation and persuasion end up mercilessly jumbled, in a single, somewhat incoherent source. Among other problems, these combinations don't readily tell convincing stories, which students can later recall. For Texas in particular, many subjects tend to end up as ideological battles. Recently, the local news asked in their "question of the day": should LGBTQ history, be taught in Houston public schools? Indeed: Doing so could be difficult, since Texas has laws on the books which prevent teachers from "discussing gay and transgender issues in a positive light".

Jumbling multiple fragments of history together in a single required book, is in many respects a disservice to all concerned. The integrity of historical thought is lost, for different historical strands need to be discovered via personal means. The marketplace for intellectual challenges, needs better representation on terms that are far more spontaneous than what is occurring today. Yesterday's local bookstores once provided the story lines that contributed to critical thinking - not to mention lasting connections to individual authors who could made subjects far more interesting than the ways they were often presented in classrooms.

Indeed, many classrooms are experiencing limits, in their ability to make knowledge vital for the course of our daily lives. Even the subjects which do make their way into today's history books, may be passed over by teachers who are already pressed for time. When education is expected to be take place mostly through the efforts of credentialed teachers, the preservation of knowledge as challenge and shared critical thought, can be lost.

Unfortunately, the association of formal education with the value of books, is also not as strong as one might suppose. Over the course of my lifetime, the homes I've visited which contained a wide range of books, sometimes belonged to individuals without college degrees. And while visiting homes of those with college degrees, often they contained no books in places which were obvious to their visitors.

Credentialed teachers cannot be expected to serve as a sole knowledge source for students, who need economic opportunities to explore subjects on more personal terms. Yet it's not the credential which is the problem, but rather, the misplaced expectations of many educational settings. Students especially should not be limited to subject matter which has become part of a societal minefield. And while much can be discovered or achieved online, it's shared dialogue that gives subject matter its most meaningful context. This is when it becomes possible, to pass the torch of knowledge to others in ways that can be measured and quantified.

In a recent and more spontaneous past, brick and mortar booksellers contributed to the marketplace of knowledge, even on the back roads and hidden places. Many a non fiction writer was discovered, and consequently supported, by those who simply loved to wander about far flung towns and communities to see what they could discover. And it wasn't just independent booksellers (often without college degrees) who offered options such as these. Many other store keepers who sold second hand goods, also maintained broad book selections to tempt the student of life.

Students need the ability to share their own subject interests with others, in settings that are also reinforced at an economic level. So many ideas and concepts which contribute to critical thinking, are the result of spontaneous interaction. Time arbitrage would provide new opportunities for experiential education, instead of a required format for economic access. Presently, the latter doesn't quite serve the purpose which it was built for. Everyone has the potential to be a torch for knowledge. It's time to free our desire to learn about the world, from the struggles over the curriculum of formal education.

Healthcare: Societal Burden, or Wealth Potential?

According to Reuters, "Most Americans Say Republican Healthcare Plan Will Be Harmful":

When U.S. Senate Republicans unveil their plan to overhaul America's healthcare system, they will face a skeptical public that already does not buy the justification for an earlier version that passed the House of Representatives...a majority of the country thinks the American Health Care Act would be harmful for low-income Americans, people with pre-existing health conditions and Medicaid recipients.

Among those polled, even a Trump supporter said, "It'll make people's deductibles skyrocket. So I'm not for this healthcare act. I'm for insurance for everyone." And Joseph Antos, a healthcare expert for AEI, said of the still rising costs, "It would be great if a politician had the nerve to be brutally honest. None of them seem to."

How to think about the fact, so many are "giving up" on healthcare as even having the potential of positive outcomes? Whichever way one slices it, the news does not appear good. While policy makers will likely reduce healthcare access wherever possible in the foreseeable future, these reductions still don't get at the root circumstance today's healthcare has generated, regarding long term federal budget obligations. Indeed, that would still hold true, even without the added consideration of aging demographics.

As healthcare (in its present organizational capacity) continues to become a larger part of GDP, relatively less revenue from other sources remains available, to fund its growing costs. As a dependent equilibirum component, healthcare's present requirements for (excessive) input in relation to total output of time based product, contribute to the present low productivity patterns of economic stagnation. This unfortunate reality leaves policy makers on both sides of the aisle, with few choices or long term solutions.

Plus: Even as more healthcare cuts inevitably take place, more senior citizens will seek access to healthcare in the years ahead. Since today's healthcare is still equilibrium dependent rather than capable of providing equilibrium growth, it slowly - but surely - reduces the same economic growth which so many had hoped would be able to reverse its growing burdens. Paradoxically, the way healthcare is currently organized, contributes to its dependent equilibrium status. What is needed, are ways that healthcare could actually contribute to wealth creation, instead of detracting from wealth creation.

In the meantime, the crowding out effects of healthcare are also exacerbated by monetary policy. The Keynesian 20th century approach to inflation, was an approach which had little means to respond to the crowding effects of relative inflation or deflation, depending on sector. Healthcare has become a major source of supply side inflation. Yet when central bankers attempt to compensate, they inadvertently make the situation much worse, by leaving less money for the representation of other vitally important marketplace obligations.

There are ways out of this dilemma, but they include thinking about today's healthcare burdens somewhat differently. Ultimately, populations could internally coordinate healthcare alongside other important time based services. There are wide swathes of knowledge which could can be tapped, that have been available for centuries and are not subject to the same knowledge use protections, as present day "cutting edge" procedures. New wealth could be incrementally built by focusing on everyone's skills capacity, and healthcare could function with other knowledge as components of tangible, time based product. This increased quantification could do much to restore productivity.

Eventually, healthcare would become part of a broader marketplace where - until now - productive agglomeration has largely been missing. These new service generated marketplaces would relieve considerable pressure on policy makers, not to mention the pressures for services which have been borne by taxpayers, governments and employers alike. Human capital investment would be compensated as a continuous part of educational processes. This is all the more important, since the normal investment burdens of today's physicians make it difficult for them to practice in rural areas of the U.S. By making organizational capacity for healthcare less equilibrium dependent, the healthcare of the future would no longer have to present such a societal burden.

Time Based Product: The Same Results Via "Less" Effort?

What if we were to think about achieving the same (aggregate) result with less effort, in terms of time based product, at a macroeconomic level? The productivity of time based product, includes some hidden factors which have yet to be explored. Individual firms often reduce time input via automation for time based product, in order to reduce budgetary burdens. Nevertheless, potential losses of time based product, need to be understood, in relation to the inputs that society already expects for human capital investment, as one's personal responsibility.

Time value needs better representation as aggregate supply potential. Today's managed pools for aggregate demand, are resulting in arbitrary input reductions at the level of the firm, in spite of ongoing input expectations of human capital investment, outside the firm. This result also suggests problems for Solow Residual effects in time based product. Not so much because of firm specific input limits, but in terms of broader limits to output potential. It means that due to externalized investment expectations for human capital, there are far more investment inputs than are actually being utilized by today's knowledge use organizational patterns. Some human capital investment never gains economic compensation, while other investment processes for human capital end up reimbursed many times over; by consumers, governments, businesses and taxpayers alike.

If one were to consider the production of input requirements (formal education) in a total or aggregate input/output context, the ongoing losses for wealth potential and marketplace formation, would become more obvious. When extensive human capital investment (input) is required before output ever becomes possible, multiple institutions and populations are held responsible for the balance. Individuals bear ultimate responsibility for building time value, and the consequent human capital losses for knowledge use production primarily as institutional aggregate demand, have not been well understood.

One can only imagine, how an incomplete production process such as this would impact tradable sectors. It would be as though multiple suppliers were making tangible product, of which only a small portion would finally be sold as final product. Few companies in such a position would last very long. Yet this has been the institutional process for time based product, thus far. We are fortunate indeed, that so much lost human capital potential in the twentieth century, did not have the negative effects which are beginning to accrue in the present.

A more rational approach is more output via better use of already existing input, for time based product. Time based product needs to be understood as a macroeconomic variant, to the normal institutional application of the Solow Residual. By internalizing input and output for services generation, more educational inputs would result in matched time use outputs, for all concerned. Through time arbitrage, one's human capital investment would begin to receive compensation much earlier than is presently possible, by making services output an integral part of the process. Whereas now, formal education has little room for output formation, until the participant has spent years completing input requirements.

Historically: So long as tradable sector activity remains dominant over non tradable sector activity, management of time value as pools of institutional aggregate demand, need not be problematic. But once non tradable sector activity and its associated knowledge use comes to the fore, it is no longer enough to treat time value as institutional demand. The introduction of time value as an aggregate supply function, could restore the productivity patterns which move growth forward. Managed pools of human capital supply, would bring greater transparency to the input to output ratios that are currently required for human capital.

In summary, if we consider educational inputs as part of the reality of aggregate input, the entire picture for aggregate input in relation to aggregate output (for time based product) takes on a whole new meaning. Yet the current dependence of today's time based product on other existing wealth, has obscured this important fact. Instead of creating more uncertainty for human capital investment through arbitrary reductions of time value, better results could be achieved by reinforcing educational input as continuous output. At issue is not so much a further reduction in input as contrast with output, but instead, allowing aggregate output in time based product, to gain greater quantification and representation, throughout the entire process.

How Common are Non Compete Settings? Or, You Don't "Own" That!

Now that I think about it, there seem to be examples everywhere I look. For instance: Why does it bother some schools, when their teachers gain additional work related income beyond salaries? Consider the framing, in "Teachers are Making Millions Selling Their Lesson Plans Online". From the article:

Some legal experts argue that the resources teachers produce while working for a school district may actually be the property of the school district.

Yet behind the stories of a handful of millionaire educators, is a different reality of low cost provision, for time savers that include the teachers' ingenuity. Marketable lesson plans are certainly practical, given the fact schools don't compensate teachers for the hours in which they prepare for classes. In yesterday's post, I noted time saving mechanisms such as these as a useful form of fixed (human) capital, which contrasts with the working capital employers often expect employees to provide via their own time and resources.

Alas, public institutions appear to be following the lead of closely held knowledge use in private sectors - much of which takes place as non compete agreements. Even as policy makers become aware of consequent limits to long term growth, many such restrictions are local in nature, which also factors into the difficulty of a broad based response. The growing atmosphere of closely held ownership - regardless of subject or object - has become so widespread, it even translates into cultural appropriation outrage, something I never expected to witness in my own lifetime.

Apparently, cultural appropriation has become the latest version of you don't "own" that, so you can't use it! Some of this ownership hoarding, which is just as impractical as money hoarding, has been around for a long time. In the seventies, a friend made improvements in lab work which were appropriated by the company, but with no recognition of his contribution. Almost two decades later, while preparing to open a bookstore, I found myself unexpectedly making certain no legalities stood in the way of doing so. That's when I first became aware of non compete agreements.

Miles Kimball recently touched on an anti-growth aspect of non compete settings in storified tweets with Dan Abrams. Kimball wrote:

To do better at state level, Dems should push pro-growth occupational licensing reform as Obama Administration did.

To which Abrams explained that while this would be good policy, it would unfortunately be poor politics, because

There's an organized block of current licensed hairdressers. No block of future hairdressers.

Again, helping those who lack economic access, remains a thousand battles in a thousand places - and many places lack a sufficient organized block, on the part of those who seek entry. However, even though national governments are in no position to force greater competition on anyone, they do have the option of backing new settings in which people have sufficient production rights to recreate non tradable sector growth. This is an important reason why I've suggested alternative equilibrium settings, as a single organized productive response to the closely held ownership which stifles economic dynamism.

Such settings would be clearly delineated to a degree that all concerned, understand the potential of the knowledge which could be shared, and the new forms of construction which could take place. In the future, communities might once again be willing to embrace competition, if they see how it in fact can contribute to long term growth. If we are able to create economic settings where the use of knowledge is more widespread, perhaps some of the present day cultural backlash will fade away as well.

The Lifestyle Illusion of Working Capital Requirements

How might one contrast the productivity gains of fixed capital, with the expectations and requirements for personal time as working capital? Prior to the Industrial Revolution, working capital was far more widespread than fixed capital. Consequently, populations expended tremendous efforts, for levels of aggregate output that were not always enough for survival.

Even though widespread abundance is now taken for granted (since the Industrial Revolution), extensive requirements for personal working capital, are beginning to eat into the gains made possible in recent centuries through fixed capital. While these shifting ratios may not be obvious at high income levels, lower income levels - in spite of post Industrial Revolution abundance - face working human capital requirements which - once again - don't always take care of basic needs.

What this boils down to, are ratios of aggregate input, in relation to aggregate output. Remember that time based product includes human capital as both input and output. Product formation for the latter - due to intangible quantification - also makes extensive hidden demands on output. Even though automation ultimately strikes at the heart of skills based requirement expectations, automation cannot address the necessity of maintaining humanity as integral to supply and demand processes.

As luck would have it, automation versus time based economic effort, is a decision making process which populations will need to address via their own unique sets of terms. Whether or not we can experience gains in productivity in the near future, comes down to all of us. Otherwise, time based product - in times of economic stagnation - could claim such so much revenue in the form of required input, that lower income levels lose the ability to successfully coordinate for services, via the monetary representation of other existing output.

Input requirements for human capital investment, lead to substantial lifestyle illusion. This, in turn limits both discretionary time and income for broad swathes of the population. While reading the first edition of "Before the Industrial Revolution: European Society and Economy, 1000-1700", by Carlo M. Cipolla, I've thought about the relationships between fixed/working capital and aggregate input/output. He has an interesting perspective on economic processes which encouraged me to consider various contexts for fixed and working capital in macro/micro settings. How might fixed capital reduce the need for time or resource capacity? Cipolla writes:

Fixed capital consists of those economic goods produced by man which are repeatedly used in the course of a number of productive cycles.

While technological innovation quickly comes to mind, Cipolla stresses that technology is not the only form of fixed capital, and I would also add that time replication patterns have the capacity to contribute to output gains. He discusses how prior to the Industrial Revolution, the greater abundance of working capital in relation to fixed capital, accounted for the fact that no matter how hard people worked, they struggled to meet even basic consumption needs. As the British economist John Hicks also noted, it was when fixed capital assumed a central position in production "that the revolution occurs". Finally, progress spread far and wide, once societies gained enough confidence in fixed capital constructs, to stabilize and increase output gains.

Despite the tremendous gains of the Industrial Revolution, we have inadvertently lost some of that additional capacity, by requiring ever larger components of working human capital (in relation to fixed aspects of human capital) for time based services production. Consequently, for a substantial part of the population, many of the forward steps of progress via tradable sector production, have been followed by the backward protectionism of our non tradable sectors. Not only have these sectors required unnecessary working capital in services generation, but also in multiple aspects of building and infrastructure requirements.

Without a marketplace for time value, the working capital costs of time based services product, could eventually limit time based services to higher income levels. Lest anyone hasn't noticed, services generation for middle income levels has been counted one of the greater achievements of our age. How would policy makers and economists successfully defend free markets, should this capacity be lost?

It's time to include human capital as a fixed capital component in relation to working capital, so that low income levels are not overcome by working capital requirements which in some ways resemble those of earlier eras. I believe that time arbitrage could provide a useful form of fixed capital. As applied human capital, service generation would finally be recognizable as a tangible good. Best, this version of fixed capital would allow knowledge application to occur within a broader economic context.

Aggregate Time Value: Demand, Supply, or Both?

System imbalance between today's tradable and non tradable sector activity, is exacerbated by the lack of aggregate time value for supply, in the latter. An apt example of untapped labour abundance - given a demand dominated role for time value - is the consequent restrictions in housing supply.

Unless time value also serves as an active source of supply, individuals can gradually lose their ability to contribute to economic progress. Such an occurrence is more likely, if governments and special interests choose to limit the economic freedom of time value, as a potential supply function. While time representation as demand remains sufficient in tradable sector activity (via output gains for a full range of product), human capital supply potential is being lost, in today's non tradable sectors.

When human capital is mostly tapped via institutional demand terms, it can become incapable of contributing to full marketplace participation. Even though tradable sector activity achieves production gains via reduced time contributions (the Solow residual), non tradable sector activity inadvertently diminishes the marketplace, with this approach.

In order for time based services to contribute to a more complete marketplace, aggregate time value needs to move beyond the demand management functions it is presently assigned. While managed demand pools for institutional needs are quite valuable, they lose the ability to move economic progress forward, in historical time frames when secondary (wealth dependent) market activity is dominant.

The twentieth century offered ample opportunities to grow the marketplace through pooling for demand management of human capital - both in educational and workplace context. The main reason human capital was able to contribute to long term growth in this arrangement, was its association with tradable sectors which continued to expand output in relation to the increments of time involved. As output has come to be more closely associated with human capital than with tradable sectors, it becomes increasingly important to consider how growth can be achieved on human capital terms. A recent post from Tyler Cowen regarding the compound interest of learning, provides helpful ways to think about the process. He writes:

Compound learning occurs when your new learning, and your new analysis, builds steadily upon the old. Over time, learning is a bit like compound interest and it accumulates. When compound learning is possible, you wish to keep a relatively well-defined set of analytic pieces on the table. It is fine and indeed essential to add to those pieces, but then the new piece should be one that you may learn with it. Furthermore, it should be readily shared with other people...

I was glad to see Cowen highlight the fact that knowledge use accumulates as wealth capacity, through active sharing. However, it can be difficult to secure knowledge gains - even when individuals commit to steady work habits and schedules, when their personal circumstance becomes subject to stresses that make it difficult to maintain or share earlier time investment gains. An institutional framework is needed, which makes a productive knowledge continuum more likely for all who commit to human capital investment, in the course of their lifetimes.

It would be easier to recognize learning as economic processes capable of compound interest, if time were used as a vessel (economic increments) to create a knowledge continuum for individual and group participation. Time value works as a supply side component when the time of one person can build new wealth, through the purchase of time on the part of others - especially to reinforce education and learning as a part of workplace structure.

A time continuum of pooled supply management, much as the learning space of a given individual, gives opportunities for human capital compound interest which are not yet being tapped. Aggregate time as demand, gives opportunities for compound interest in the form of social capital for the group. Nevertheless, this process is associated with individuals who experience only a partial knowledge continuum with today's organizations.

For instance, formal schooling thus far has been a cut off point for an otherwise organized continuum of human capital. It stops precisely when individuals and groups need to start taking advantage of mutual learning gains with one another. Likewise, when firms require non compete clauses, they restrict the compound interest potential of knowledge gains in society - especially when firms can't fully utilize the capacity inherent in any given employee, beyond what takes place in normal workplace hours.

Even though today's institutions contain important elements of compound interest for learning, their present organizational capacity is too thin, to preserve knowledge use in the event of catastrophic events or political setbacks which often disturb important organizational patterns. Fortunately, knowledge use can be preserved via managed pooling for supply functions, to move progress forward, when human capital demand aggregates face the limits of secondary market dominance.

Notes on the Economic Core and Periphery

One feature of present day economic stagnation, is interfirm inequality, which has become more pronounced in recent decades. Much of this has been driven by changes in core and peripheral economic activities which were once included in the same institutional settings. As the economic core of economic activity becomes closely aligned with high skill levels, lesser skills are spun off into separate firms, which consequently feature lower income levels. And since populations now prefer to cluster according to income commonalities, employees of peripheral firms aren't always able to generate common spaces with core firms, where those spaces would still prove beneficial to all concerned.

Much of the separation of core and periphery can be correlated with a growing prominence of non tradable sector activity, in relation to tradable sector activity. Nevertheless, automation in word processing, is one factor which contributed to a substantial amount of firm division, regardless of sector. For instance: In the seventies, I was one of many others who took a chance on office work providing income similar to what a four year college degree could offer. Indeed, in the seventies and early eighties, this was still the case. Hence when baby boomers such as myself lost access to office work with traditional benefits, the new option was periphery firms, in which workers were closely packed in small spaces, with work largely bereft of benefits or reliable full time schedules.

Granted, traditional secretarial and administrative assistant positions, still exist alongside core economic activities. Nevertheless, these jobs are now mostly reserved for individuals with college degrees. Prior to the separation of core and peripheral work, secretaries and other office workers once shared office space, local neighborhoods, and other cultural attributes, with firm management.

Why might the separation of core and periphery be more prominent in non tradable sector institutions? While tradable sector activity separates many production processes prior to final product, non tradable sectors may not need to separate core production processes as frequently. In other words, a wider range of tradable sector firms have more "skin in the game" for wealth creation, since product components are built at multiple locations. Spreading production responsibilities more equally, means the possibility of less income divergence, across tradable sector firms.

Unfortunately, wealth redistribution isn't so simple, when product is more closely defined as knowledge or skill. When final product value is closely held, firms are more likely to keep the most important (core) activity in single settings, while contracting for work not essential to final product. Hence wide income differentials become segmented by company definition and job function.

Decades earlier - once opportunities for secure office work diminished - it was an easy decision for me to abandon peripheral office work for more lucrative options. Today, however, potential employees may refuse peripheral work for different reasons entirely. Again, geographic income clustering presents a coordination problem, since low income clusters usually travel further to reach work locations. Hence transportation issues figure prominently, in the personal reservation wage of potential employees.

More peripheral functions are likely to be automated over time, for firms which find it difficult to hire and retain workers close nearby. Consider also, why the revenue dependence of non tradable sectors makes it more difficult to redistribute income, given the level of compensation necessary for employees who committed to extensive human capital investment via their own means. Only remember that this form of organizational capacity has to reimburse human capital input which is not internally generated.

When firms can't find the skills they need, it helps to consider the overall economic circumstances. Demand for specific human capital has shifted over time, to what is not as widely available via formal education, by definition. In other words, the skills these institutions still need, are not broadly represented by existing educational institutions for good reason. To prepare for skills in current demand, is to suggest more educational provision of these skills, which in turn makes the effort less of a strategic advantage, over competitors.

Problems such as these in both core and peripheral organization, also suggest a level of system fragility. Too little skills capacity is actively being sought, for nations to feel confident about their economic futures. The separation of core and periphery, while an understandable response to general equilibrium demands, no longer offers system wide possibilities for full employment.

Tradable sector activity has been able to share income and benefits more broadly, in part because integral parts of production have been divided among different participants in the process. Also important, is the degree to which resource capacity for inputs and outputs alike, is internalized. Fortunately, time arbitrage could also internalize inputs and outputs for time based services, so that more participants would ultimately be able to share in the benefits of the entire process. Given how populations prefer to cluster in similar income groups, it is becoming increasingly important, to generate non tradable sector organizational patterns which are aligned for a full range of local skills capacity.

Labour Abundance is Impacting Middle Class Dynamics

Even though the reality of labour abundance has been noted in recent years, this problem has yet to be productively addressed. For the most part, full time employees are doing well, with sufficient salaries for both basic needs and discretionary consumption. However, employees working on contract - especially in firms that are subsidiary to core activity - sometimes lack the salaries to purchase basic needs on today's non tradable sector terms.

The growing use of contract labour in the 21st century, with its associated lack of benefits or job certainty, is one of the more prominent examples of labour abundance. While one can point to earlier examples of labour abundance, some societal developments (at least in the U.S.) are becoming more obvious as unemployment related, in retrospect. Until recently, unemployment was closely associated with one's personal shortcomings - whether perceived or real. Indeed, the correlation of many societal burdens with a declining labour force participation rate, is one of the few economic associations that is obvious.

And the U.S. in particular, benefited from relatively low unemployment statistics for decades, in part due to the ramped up use of imprisonment. Another institutional response has been disability assistance, which individuals with health issues sometimes turn to, after a protracted struggle to maintain steady employment. More recently, zoning restrictions and the costs of scarce productive agglomeration, have contributed to both reduced internal migration and long term unemployment. Excessive labour abundance can also be traced to homelessness, drug overdose deaths, and the black markets which include slave and sex trafficking. Often, the latter is perpetuated through dubious enticements, for what the victims believe to be legitimate jobs.

In "The Wealth of Humans", Ryan Avent stressed the fact that labour abundance would continue impacting middle class dynamics, well into the foreseeable future. He noted that while formal education was once an appropriate response to labour abundance (when people left the farms for the cities), education could no longer be expected to to work the same magic, in the 21st century. Even if everyone "miraculously" gained a college degree, today's institutions would not be able to hire everyone, on the same middle class income terms.

Nevertheless, policy discussions have yet to truly focus on Avent's warnings. Instead, policy makers tend to double down on the earlier recommendations of "more education" and additional income support. Alas, in his book, Avent explained how responses such as these were insufficient for the present.

Fortunately, there are strategies to counter labour abundance, which could prove more productive than preparing ever more skills for the institutions which presently need less of our skills, in aggregate. Education in particular, needs a strong reorientation. Educational input, as human capital investment, could become part of an institutional process which measures both input and output for mutually desired time based services. Both local infrastructure and building components need extensive improvements in the decades ahead. This last measure is especially important, if citizens are to regain their confidence in the capacity of their own income potential.

Granted, it's not easy to focus on the need for institutional adjustment and structural reform. But labour abundance needs to become a positive in the marketplace, so that already existing skills sets and investments will not be lost. It's important to face up to the reality of labour abundance, before the labour force participation rate trends even further downward. As Avent emphasized in "The Wealth of Humans, history is not always kind, when labour is abundant. It's time to put our present day abundance to good use.

Time Value as an Alternate Equilibrium Lever

In the economic conditions of general equilibrium, time based product lacks the economic leverage, which local group management could otherwise provide for service creation. Presently, personal time preferences are not a marketplace consideration. In other words, time - the one resource we all share via the same provision - still lacks the economic representation, which would allow it to contribute to aggregate skills preferences.

When skills are not coordinated within an understandable time continuum, skills product cannot be readily stored for either current or future use. Since would-be providers don't know the actual time product preferences of would-be consumers, considerable skill potential and human capital investment slips away. If time value were a valid marketplace construct, perhaps it could be considered a power law form of leverage. As Shane Parrish (of Farnam Street) writes:

A power law is a relationship between two things when a change in one can lead to a large change in the other, regardless of the initial quantities. In the case of leverage, a power law relationship exists between the effort exerted on the lever (actual or metaphorical) and the outcome.

Notice his emphasis on quantities, which in this instance applies to both skill and knowledge. Plus, consider how much easier it can be to measure the time context for skill and knowledge use, than to measure the actual skill or knowledge which is applied to individual circumstance. Parrish also highlights the book "Decision Making", in which Alan C. McLucas discusses the importance of leverage:

Leverage is built on the notion that small, well-focused actions can sometimes produce significant, enduring improvements if they are applied in the right place. Tackling a difficult problem is often a matter of seeing where the leverage lies.

...a leverage point is where a small difference can make a large difference. Leverage points provide kernel ideas and procedures for formulating solutions. Identifying leverage points helps us create new courses of action...

With time preference as a lever, knowledge use and skills capacity could coalesce around a common supply and demand structure for time based product. When time coordination is applied in a continuum to both human capital investment and output measure, it becomes possible to manage services creation, so as to mimic the internal wealth creation processes of tradable sector production. Even though time based product can only be "stored" for the future to the degree that participants are simultaneously available, the system works to make these possibilities a greater likelihood, than is the case when time based product is approached via the external coordination of general equlibrium.

The ways in which we wish to apply our economic time with others, are just as important as what we ultimately apply our time to provide on their behalf. We gain personal leverage, for instance, when we mutually coordinate for both leisure time and what we know to be our most productive moments of the day. By allowing individual and group time preferences to act in concert, as a lever for skills actualization, we gain more productive means to manage skill capacity. Indeed, far too much skills capacity has been lost, given the limited human capital investment which is actually tapped by today's institutions.

Voter "Stupidity"? Or Poor Democratic Options?

What ever happened to the reasoned logic of professionalism, given the rise of populism? Hmm, what indeed. Even though I have my own concerns about growing populism, it's hard to remain convinced that elites have the "answers". After all, the groups which hold the most power, are responsible for a now lingering economic stagnation. Does anyone wonder why the populists are in full revolt?

The uncertainties of populism, make it easy for some to blame "too much democracy" and "stupid voters" for society's ills. In a recent Brookings essay from Benjamin Wittes and Jonathan Rauch, they complain that people only want more direct democracy over time, even though these processes have not worked out well. They argue that "the best way forward is to rebalance the reform agenda away from direct participation and toward intermediation and institutions."

Ilya Somin responds, and notes that he agrees with much of their analysis. He writes:

In particular, they are right to conclude that political ignorance and irrationality are dangerous menaces that are unlikely to be cured by increasing political participation, greater access to information, or other conventional remedies.

Even though Somin wasn't convinced that empowering political professionals could counter voter ignorance (not to mention the strong incentive to exploit ignorance), he lacked a clear alternative, other than the ability of citizens to vote with their feet in the marketplace.

Yet poor voter options for the resource capacity that matters most, is precisely the problem. Political professionals and the elite have slowly, but surely, diminished marketplace vitality and economic progress. Given this unfortunate reality, voting with one's feet, too often means walking away from basically all the choices on offer. For instance, consider how many individuals are now held in jail for not paying their medical bills. How, exactly, does that "public service" help anyone? Seeking a doctor when health circumstance gives one cause for fear, isn't exactly on the scale of robbing a bank. Yet in some states it is treated as such. Hence the main lesson for many rational folks, is to think twice before opting for healthcare services.

Given how the "non stupid" have made a travesty of what were once free markets, I'm not ready to call voters stupid - regardless of the conspiracy theories that are encouraged - while irrational force is used to maintain today's marketplace structure. When the validity of the voting process is questioned, this gives professionals more reasons to double down, on mistakes that have already been made. Again, I blame arbitrary limits to knowledge use for much of our present political problems, more than any supposed stupidity on the part of the average voter.

It's time to quit pretending that the supply of healthcare was somehow handed down on a stone tablet, for doing so makes all of us appear far more stupid than we actually are. At root of today's political turmoil, lies the artificially restricted supply of knowledge use. In the meantime, instead of having democracy as a valued tool to coordinate healthcare provision and consumption, we are reduced to political shouting matches and aggressive threats against the "wrong" constituency.

None of these potential issues for production rights were lost on our country's founders, either. They were greatly concerned about the tyranny of the minorities who could effectively reduce the production rights of citizens, over time. Let's not forget what they understood. There is still time to generate production reform, on behalf of the average citizen. Nothing less than the prosperity of nations, is at stake. Everyone deserves a better framing in which to cast their votes. A framing which doesn't require making stupid decisions, such as who supposedly doesn't "deserve" the useful skills of others.

Preserve Economic Time Value, Not "Guaranteed Jobs"

In response to a proposal to address job creation from the Center for American Progress (HT Marginal Revolution), Adam Ozimek notes that "Guaranteeing Everyone a Job is Harder Than it Sounds". He writes:

The plan lists several jobs that apparently are a good fit for the currently non-working and also in high demand: home care workers to aid the aged and disabled, affordable child care, teacher's aides and EMTs. So the basic plan, if I understand it correctly, is that the federal government will pay for jobs for people to work in the public or private sector, and the government will pay for training as needed.

Crowd out is obviously a big problem here. Will the employers being paid to create these "guaranteed jobs" actually create new jobs or just replace existing ones? Or perhaps they will "create new jobs" that were going to be created anyway...The incentive to crowd out is strong for local government especially. The CAP piece justifies the demand by pointing out that many local governments are "cash strapped".

There are delicate equilibrium balance issues at stake. Consider also, the fact local governments have already scaled back hiring out of necessity, in response to existing local pension obligations. Again, we are faced with what could be considered a"mature" general equilibrium which does not have room for all comers on the same sets of terms. The basic template of this equilibrium for economic participation has many interconnected features, which presently lack the flexibility to respond to major shifts in existing resource capacity.

It has proven difficult to discuss new economic possibilities, in part because economic access in general needs better framing. Alas, for populations to maintain the social cohesion that was (largely) possible in the twentieth century, we need continual efforts to improve the production and consumption potential of our non tradable sectors. This, instead of ever more calls for income gains which can only stretch so far, when basic resource flow patterns have long since been committed.

When economies were primarily based on expanding tradable sector output, the drumbeat for ever more income gains perhaps made more sense. But once economies become increasingly focused on time based services, everything about the basic structure of output begins to change. Ultimately, that also translates into less of the traditional output which once meant broad wage gains. An important aspect of this historically recent development, is the fact not everyone can productively engage, on today's government/private sector dictated terms.

Yesterday's middle class was built on strong tradable sector output. If that prosperity is to be continued, most aspects of output potential for non tradable sector activity, will need close examination. Meanwhile, the recent article from the Center of American Progress ("Toward a Marshall Plan for America: Rebuilding Our Towns, Cities and the Middle Class"), almost feels as though an audible sigh and wish, that people who didn't complete their college degrees (such as myself, though I didn't vote for Trump), didn't have these problems to begin with. The authors wrote:

The truth is, progressives should be as concerned about the declining fortunes of those who do not go to college as any other group. Not because they are disrupting politics - though they are - but because they are our brothers and sisters too.

Once, long ago when Obama was voted into office, I wrote letters to him, detailing the plight of rural America. There was no response. Sometimes I wonder, had I finished the college degrees I so wanted, would I be a progressive, today? The answer really isn't important. But degrees would have meant having the option of city life in these later years, and progressive friends as well.

We need to preserve economic time value for all concerned, instead of trying to guarantee jobs to the ones who have been left behind. Fortunately, even though jobs are a cost, it is not necessary to define all costs on what have become expensive technocratic terms. Once we step outside the weak tea of "make work" and artificial service roles, we can remember the concerted efforts people have always been willing to assume - either because those work efforts are perceived as necessary, desirable, or possibly, both.

Both constructs suggest a world of worthwhile work, which because there is a lack of suitable framing for economic time value, ends up defined as not feasible or possibly just "unimportant". Yet understanding the difference between personally initiated versus externally mandated work, is important, for time value to gain economic legimitacy. People want to be responsible for themselves and for others, in ways that matter at a personal level. Why not approach a revitalized economy on these terms?