Response to an NPR story about disparity of wealth in Panama:
The wealthy have more ability to maneuver into the most advantageous positions from which to exploit the commons or externalize costs.
The rich get richer.
Our society respects *private* property rights, but not *public* property rights, so it is possible to amass more and more personal wealth (and those with some wealth find it relatively easy to amass more), but there is no countervailing tendency that assures that some wealth will flow to all people, even though natural resource wealth is made through natural processes and cannot legitimately be claimed by one person any more than by another.
Natural resources belong to all. Natural law *requires* sharing of natural wealth.
Extreme disparity of wealth, economic 'cycles' of boom and bust and the “arc of civilization” of thrive and collapse are all the result of, they are caused by, our unequal sharing of natural resource wealth.
If we charge fees to industries when they take natural resources or put pollution, we will see them put more effort into reducing their impact on the environment. We need not leave an unstable civilization to the next generation. Natural resource wealth need not be depleted so rapidly that the sustainability of civilization is put at risk.
If fee proceeds were shared equally among all people, then no one would live in abject poverty. The disparity between rich and poor would be less of a problem. Within a paradigm of respect for *public* property rights, the part of the economy devoted to meeting basic human needs would be insulated from the worst vicissitudes of the business 'cycle'. If people get a significant fraction of their income from a natural resource wealth dividend, then employment status would have a less pronounced influence on people's psychological state (their confidence) and their willingness (and ability) to spend in support of their basic needs.
Boom and bust is made less severe, and 'thrive and collapse' is eliminated, when we charge fees to those who take or degrade natural resource wealth and give the proceeds to the people.
When will news reports mention equal ownership of natural wealth as a systemic solution to systemic problems?
Natural law requires respect of PUBLIC property rights, too:
http://gaiabrain.blogspot.com/2011/04/natural-law-requires-respect-of-public.html
Biological model for politics and economics (a cure for what ails the planet):
http://gaiabrain.blogspot.com/2007/09/gaia-brain-integration-of-human-society.html
Tue Apr 17 2012 20:28:39 GMT-0500 (Central Daylight Time)
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