Re: MUTUALISM -- Part 1 -- LIFEBOAT

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Date Posted: 10:39:51 07/18/00 Tue
Author: SwimmingUpstream
Subject: Re: MUTUALISM -- Part 1
In reply to: Binkie1966 's message, "Re: MUTUALISM -- Part 1" on 17:41:08 07/08/00 Sat

Dear Binkie,

Are you referring to the idea that is essentially a spin-off of Proudhon's "worker credit"?

As I understand that "social credit" idea it is a means of giving economic credit to those who labor at tasks that are
not directly materially productive, but which are nonetheless socially vital -- in essays #8 and #9 I list some of
those types of labor.

One problem with this idea is that it retains the institutional strangle hold over HOW MUCH labor "social laborers"
must perform in order to acquire eubsistence level material necessaries. In other words, it doesn't get at the
tyranny of the pricing structure of goods nor at the wage-setting structure which flows from private or state
ownership of the means of production.

Further, it relies on Money -- which means that it will either be financed by taxation of some sort, or by monetization.

In the former case it leaves the problem of igdignance at having some of one's "earnings" taken from one. This
indignance has got to be excised, and it never will be so long as taxation exists.

In either case it puts the government, or some other economic oversight institution, in charge of wage-setting for
"social labor" -- and becomes indistinguishable from State Capitalism, to which I am opposed.

In both cases it puts some institution in a position of assessing which types of labor qualify, how that labor shall
be performed, how that labor shall be verified as "performed", etc.

Mutualism is a better means of addressing the problem. And it has the benefit of expanding personal liberty --
which is intricately connected to one's ability to find Valued Places in society, something vital to social
cohesiveness and human well-being.

You wrote me about what it is to be "modern". I think Mutualism would be more "modern" than "social credit", as I
understand "social credit".

Do you mean something different from what I mean when you asked about "social credit"?

Kindest Regards

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