Comments on: Why The GDP Says Little About Authentic Happiness

By: Morna Crites-Moore

Morna Crites-Moore — Wed, 19 Aug 2009 17:27:04 +0000

This is excellent. Glad to have found you. I am going to put a link to this post on my Facebook page.
Thank you!

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By: TripleGem

TripleGem — Tue, 13 Nov 2007 22:01:32 +0000

How about more Gross National Happiness instead?

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By: Josh

Josh — Tue, 30 Oct 2007 07:43:22 +0000

When it comes to criticism of mainstream economics, I like to geek out. Way out. I’ve found the writings of ecological economist Herman Daly to be especially insightful – and accessible to non-economists – in understanding some of the main fundamental flaws in the dominant paradigm.

You can find a selection of his papers here:

http://www.publicpolicy.umd.edu/faculty/daly/Dalypapers.html

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By: Tim Patterson

Tim Patterson — Tue, 30 Oct 2007 00:58:18 +0000

Great comment Rachel.

I’m also a believer in Josh’s message about the crisis of over-development and how true happiness and health comes from simple living amongst friends and family, close to the earth.

The most important thing we can do, in Gandhi’s words, is “to be the change we want to see in the world, and live the life we imagine.”

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By: Rachel

Rachel — Tue, 30 Oct 2007 00:05:36 +0000

Josh,

Your article is profoundly true. It’s great how you mention important examples of how economic development can actually reduce the quality of life. Thank you for your point of view, and for being a person who goes to these remote areas. We need to re-examine our definitions of “progress” if we don’t want the entire world to end up an overdeveloped mess with half of its peoples living in slums. Although that already seems to be the case.

Rachel

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By: Josh

Josh — Sun, 28 Oct 2007 09:37:59 +0000

On the community-owned land question…

There are a number of scenarios out there that range all over.

In Ladakh, the small farms are owned by families and passed down through generations. The tradition is for families to help each other out during the times of intense work, like during planting and especially the harvest.

In West Bengal, at least where I have spent time, land is held collectively by many owners. This has its plus and minus sides. If you want to buy a piece of land, for instance, you have to get all 75 of the owners to agree to sell it to you. That can be a real hassle, if you’re a small buyer. If you’re a powerful corporation, you may be able to get the state to send some thugs in to beat people up while you make a land grab. This happened earlier this year in West Bengal, with something like 14 people killed.

I can recommend looking into the work of Debal Deb and others on sacred groves in India. Many of these smallish bits of forests have survived exploitation by colonists and later corporations because they were held sacred by the local tribespeople. An example of a much more full way to value resources than the narrow economism of modern society.

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By: Mark

Mark — Thu, 25 Oct 2007 23:19:45 +0000

Greetings –

All I know is that when I lived in the jungles of New Guinea the people that I had daily contact with were some of the happiest and most genuine folks I have ever met.

Best,
Mark

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By: Eva

Eva — Thu, 25 Oct 2007 12:48:48 +0000

Thanks for this, Josh. Good stuff and remarkably clearly explained as always. Is Nick right that the land is communally owned in the societies you mention? That seems pretty crucial to me – not all agrarian societies are equally un-miserable, I think. The whole landlord-peasant thing we had going on in the West for so long was definitely uncool, which I think contributes to our twisted notions of progress as being anything that moves us further away from those times.

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By: Nick

Nick — Thu, 25 Oct 2007 01:05:14 +0000

Of course those people are miserable! They just don’t realize it. Here’s what needs to happen:

First, because I’m assuming they subsist on communally held land, their government needs privatize that land and sell the resources to rich western corporations.

Then, the folks who live off that land will have no choice but to move into an urban slum where they can get jobs working at factories making goods for those some rich western corporations.

After, that, the lives of those people will improve A LOT! They’ll be so thankful to have been liberated from their primitive lives!

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