money
Debt as Wages and Steve Jobs
I read this article here, about capitalism. The part where debt was used to allow for declining wages, as, according to the article, began in the 70’s here in America, shows how we perceptually revalue things, as an ability within each of us. In this case, in this article, the measure of earnings and money lending, used resources and labor and reconfigured it is such a way to allow greater amounts of money to accumulate into the hands of a few. No doubt, the law industry also benefitted from this, as schemes were ordered, constructed to support that change via that measure of using debt to pay wages.
And the media, as this was running full steam by the time we hit the 70’s , filled in the dreams of what one could do within taking out loans and building that home. All the while, as one is so occupied with the dream, the hope, the desire, that looking at how debt was being used to pay wages was not noticed. Were it , and perhaps there was the lone whistle blower that had no space to voice their concerns, as the media was already owned by those who had accumulated enough wealth to construct lending structures that were a means of hiding lowering wages.
What is astounding is the obvious in all of this. This means that humans are the means to investigate form and ‘ pull on the stings of formation’ in time and space, and that no one human being can be more than another in this system, as all parts are needed to do what is a form that is devious by definition and presented as a false positive. Hence, no few can own anything that is the structural foundation of being a living person on this earth.
This reminds me of what Steve Jobs was quoted to have said towards the very end of his life. He said that what he owned and the power he had were meaningless. These were things he could not take with him. It was the connection to others, that was the value. Hence he realized the value was being, was living, was being present here. He realized that this game that we have all accepted and allowed of winning power and things, is the illusion. And as we see, within the debt use of wage support and the slight of hand going on behind the racing to win a home ONLY, is game we as a collective accept and allow that is not what is best for us. The consequence of this game, is that the debt is now the elephant in the room, and the laborers, the ones that are the parts that built this, are too expensive and can be replaced by automation, leaving fewer jobs. This leaves fewer possibilities for humans to realize their value, which is to interact with others and do what men can do, which is to come up with new ways of doing things, as a group, because this is how this is done, on this planet where resources cannot be owned unless it is believed to be a truth, when it is not. Steve Jobs makes this clear.
A basic income, a Living Income Guarantee , would be to realize that value Steve Jobs was talking about. Perhaps, he would still have discovered with the many others he discovered with, his discoveries would have happened, yet they would have happened in tandem with really living the value being life; meaning he would have had the time to discover and investigate and come up with new ways of doing things, and spend time enjoying his family and his community and the many values on this earth, as the plants and the animals, and the soils. Obviously, Steve jobs does not exist alone, he is a part of the whole. And, perhaps he is the consequence of what came before, birthed into existence as the sum of development that existed before him. This would mean that he is you , he is life in another form. If he is this, as this is how this works, this is a movement, in a way, that is a celebration of life. It is such a huge and great thing; it means that the value of creation is being and playing with what is formed and realizing in word and deed and thought, that we create what is here, and it is all of us working together that is the value.
It is time to remove this pyramid scheme of inequality to life. It is time to realize that poverty is a crime against life. It is time to realize, in deed and systemic form that war is a crime, it is destructive as it is not transformative – it is not using what men can do in constructive ways to create a world where life on this earth is dignified in and as the practice of realizing the value is being here, interacting with others, realizing their perspective to build awareness and to come up with new ways of doing things that improve and respect this physical manifestation of life. We can do this, we can stand together, as we have done, and stand as what is best for all. It is said that one cannot know what is outside of one’s awareness, yet the steps forward are visible, one needs only take that step to see the next. I mean, this is how this is done! Support a Living Income Guarantee. Time to create a systemic form that is the voice and structure of realizing the value is being life.
Investigate the Living Income Guaranteed Proposal
The Capital is Mine
We’re all trying to find ways to let the “Capital be Mine”, or better said, to let Capitalism work for us. Over the years we’ve been able to witness how that played out in all parts of our daily life. Proponents of Capitalism, as we know it today, say that greed has been used to place Capitalism within a pejorative context. When we look at the definition of Capitalism in the Merriam-Webster dictionary it’s written that Capitalism is an economic system characterized by private or corporate ownership of capital goods, by investments that are determined by private decision, and by prices, production, and the distribution of goods that are determined mainly by competition in a free market. Wikipedia adds the factor of profit as a characteristic of Capitalism when they say that this system in which trades, industries and the means of production are largely or entirely privately owned and operated for profit. That makes Capitalism into a deadly and doomed cocktail of competition and profit where the fittest will survive and the majority is submitted to wage labor and slaves of the components that are in power within society.
The 21th century is marked by Capitalism, which could work in theory and on paper, though we’re still slaves of masters as if we were still in times of Feudalism. Back in the Middle Ages between the 9th and 15th century we had Feudalism as our economic system, which was a way of structuring society around relationships, derived from the holding of land in exchange for service or labor. We we’re not free citizens that were able to do exactly that what we wanted. When Capitalism emerged from Feudalism it looked like we had more freedom. We were all able to invest money in order to make a profit and become rich, which then resulted into wanting to make money through profit as an end in itself.
Capitalism which is an economic system has now almost turned into a religion, we believe strongly that one day the Capital will be ours on the back of another, if we follow the rules or rites of Capitalism. Free market processes will emerge where anything can be sold from a pair of panties to the air that we breathe and the water that we drink to stay alive. When we add the survival of the fittest to it we know we’ll be heading on the road to greed. Greed, that according to the Merriam-Webster dictionary means an intense desire for wealth or possessions. They add to not let greed for riches control you and that’s exactly what we’re controlled by, through denial or acceptance. Greed exists in all of us to a greater or lesser extent. Some of us can control it, others are out of control without any form of regret. We’re a product of our own Capitalistic product and we see it as normal, the norm to live by. We see money as our God to turn to and to comfort us. When we’re deprived of money we feel as if God is punishing us, we’re not worthy. So we need to become greedy, monsters without regret to become the fittest to survive.
This Capitalistic religion was carried out through the world by means of Globalization though Imperialism in the 19th century. Capitalism was spreading like an oil stain in the ocean and still a product that third world countries would like to have or invite to their country, without looking at the Trojan horse effect that Capitalism in fact has. When inviting Capitalism, the countries religion will be changed and it’s money will be worshipped from now on. It’s almost like a STD, first you indulge and enjoy before you can even grasp the consequences.
When we look at how we’ve given away our directive principle when it comes to money, and how most of us have become the 99% , we can see that institutes like banks are the pubic louses in our crotch that we allow to feast while thinking that we were the ones that had a great party. Capitalism by the means of Globalization has brought us a banking system that infected the entire Capitalistic system where we think that eternal growth is the norm and greed is a virtue. Our banking system consist of people, people who know that they can make fortunes once they are in and at the same time know they can be out on the streets any time the system wants to eject them for not being the best money maker for the bank. This way of thinking as a reward system stimulates and enlarges the mechanism of the survival of the fittest where it is a breeding place for greed without regret. The bankers that took the world to the 2008 crisis are still not having regret and are looking back at a great time and many opportunities. And why do they not have any regret? Because we allow them to be greedy and take, we rewarded them with bail outs and sent them the message that they can get away with their behavior while we stay put, which isn’t a surprise when we know the same greed is within all of us. So in a way we look with jealousy in our eyes how the bankers can get away with it while not directly getting why we allow it and have not yet come with solid solutions to turn the tide.
We can even see that the political arena has become a springboard for politicians to end up in the banking sector earning triple the salary they had and handing over their influential service record to the banks. Corporations use the same trick to get influential people inside their organizations to guarantee immunity and build a facade of trust with these public figures that are trusted by the greater public. We can conclude that our global banking system is the tumor within Capitalism. In order to get a form of Capitalism that is great on paper and great in real life we do not only have to get rid of the tumor, but also see that the cause of the cancer is our greediness and thus clear that point.
Clearing this point of greediness includes that we as humanity have to become responsible citizens again. We have to take responsibility for ourselves as well as for ourselves as a group. We can’t depend on the few that are profiting from our Capitalistic system; we need to build a system where all can have a foundation even if we’re not the fittest. At the same time it would be irrational to say that Capitalism isn’t working when certain parts of Capitalism are sucking the blood out of the system. We can come up with economical systems that would work so much better, but absolutely not ready to implement within our current society. In times like this we do not need fantasies of what could be, there is no time to reminisce about things. We’re living within a time that is screaming for direction and cooperation. We need to be willing to not only go for our own greed, but also go for the greater good.
What if we, for the time being, keep Capitalism and “inject life into capitalism” as Marlen Vargas Del Razo said in a life Google hangout. We could rebuild our society with the use of cooperatives where its members, we the people, own the ‘company’, make revenue which strengthens the cooperatives and goes straight to its members. So after expenses each member gets a part of the money the ‘company’ makes, which would be called profit within Capitalism and surplus within a cooperative. Capitalism is close related to the cooperative’s way of making money and that makes it easy to start thinking about Cooperative Capitalism. Where we can bring communal sense back into society, learn from each other, support each other, volunteer and make money. Making a cooperative web of support avoiding the need for greediness. Cooperation on all levels of society to make ourselves ready for the next step and smoothly shift into another economic system like for instance a Living Income Guaranteed.
Capital is mine can then evolve in Capital is mine and yours, because no one should be without any form of support. It’s very simple, what if you become me one day or I become you and end up less fortunate? Do we want to be forgotten, do we want to be looked at with disgust and eyes full of hatred, because we might have inflicted our misfortune upon ourselves. Every being needs a hand that reaches out to them no matter how or why they got themselves in the situation they’re in. We can take our authority in our own hands again, we can cooperate because we are inherently social beings living in groups, why not use such a trait and make a ‘profit’ out of it for the betterment of all? The world only needs a yes from you and things could change in ways you can’t believe right now. Blinded by survival we’ve lost touch with ourselves and our surroundings while the Capital, real life, has always been waiting for us. We can take the Capital; we may take it and in return give it equally to others. The Capital is ours!
Investigate the Living Income Guaranteed Proposal
The Math is Simple: We Need a Living Income Guaranteed
By Kelly Posey
So I am going through my college classes, math in particular, so going over things like fractions and rations and linear equations. Being that I am now over 30 and have been living life for a while and not just fresh out of high school, and not still living at home with parents, I have actually practically applied a lot of this math within my day to day living, within things like budgeting mainly. And as I go through the course, this is actually the practical application that is shown for this math – is that it is useful for doing your own personal budgeting and such.
So we have here in this math a really cool and useful tool to be utilized in the distribution of resources and goods to everyone, the things that we need and use on a daily basis in our lives. It has helped me to figure out whether or not I can afford certain things, and just how much I can afford to pay in rent for a place to live for example. The problem comes in however when your numbers just don’t add up to being enough to provide you what you need.
It seems strange that we would allow such problems to exist where individuals can be faced with not having enough to cover all our basic needs, where no matter how you do the math, there is just no solution. You would think that we humans don’t even grasp the simplest of math to see that for so many it doesn’t add up. It’s even stranger still that there are those who would seem to even deny that such a situation exists and would imply that it is simply due to individuals not managing their money properly or living ‘within their means. But there is a bottom line that if your income is below that, you just don’t have enough and no amount of money management is going to solve that.
Interesting that we are taught this math in school to help us with finances but not really taught that ‘hey- you might end up not actually having enough to pay all your bills though.’ I mean, maybe I would have geared up and gone to college right after high school instead of taking my chances with the ‘real world’ and trying to go straight into getting a job, if I’d had any idea that pretty much the only jobs I would have access to would be those that don’t pay enough. At the time, I was afraid to incur a huge college tuition loan, when I didn’t really even yet know what I wanted to do with my life. But if I had known that in the end I would be no better off than I was 10+ years ago, maybe I would have had a different perspective.
However, even then, it is still a numbers game. Even if you have a degree, it doesn’t necessarily guarantee that you won’t still end up in one of those jobs that doesn’t pay enough. Because over time, those types of jobs have been increasing, and the better paying jobs decreasing. The ones that provide better pay, decent benefits, paid leave, or any leave at all, and maybe some kind of retirement, or even pay raises. When we have heard politicians say they are making more jobs, we should have asked what kind of jobs? Ones that actually will support us? Or treat us as cheap labor?
Our economy is screaming for a Basic Income program like the Living Income Guaranteed. Just look at the numbers. I see more and more homeless on the streets literally every day. I am approached more and more frequently by individuals asking for some money. I see more and more shops closing and vacant buildings. The signs are all around and I don’t want to wait to see how bad it gets. If we are not going to make sure that we have enough jobs that pay enough, then we need a proper support system to make sure everyone has enough for a decent life.
It only costs us more to try and help individuals once they aren’t being effectively supported by the system. We have so many costly programs that only exist to try and help the problem after it’s already been created, that often still aren’t enough to keep people on their feet. It is much more cost effective to prevent causing problems that need to be cleaned up. The numbers don’t lie so it’s about time we listen to them and make sure that everyone really is in a position to effectively work out a proper budget.
LIG Hangouts with Kelly Posey
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[21] Labor in the U S and Living Income Guaranteed
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[24] Is Capitalism the Problem?
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[25] Bridging the Income Gap with Living Income Guaranteed
Check Out the Links for More Information on the Living Income Guaranteed
Redemption and the Right to a Living Income
For anyone who thinks and believes that those that are unemployed, receiving assistance from the state or federal government, or living on the streets are lazy and no good, feeding off the system, I suggest you watch the HBO documentary Redemption.
Here we watch people all over the streets of New York collecting bottles and cans as a way to survive. To them this is their full time job, walking block after block, day after day, going through trash that sits on the corner to collect all and any bottles or cans that can be recycled. Why do they do this? Because for each bottle or can, they can receive five cents. This seems hardly anything to be working so dam hard for, yet they are doing it. They are doing it with their children because they cannot afford childcare, and because they are extra hands to help out, they are doing it without sleeping, they are doing it to afford to live in a one bedroom apartment with seven other people. They are doing it because money matters in the fight for survival and is the only option available to them.
Before you assume to think these are people who put themselves in this situation, as if they deserved it, think again and watch the documentary. These are people with degrees, who have worked for such companies as Microsoft, who worked at the World Trade Center, who fought in wars for ‘our freedom’, who cannot survive on the social security they receive alone.
These are people who are doing what they can to survive, because the harsh reality is that if you make one wrong move, you too can be put out on the street without a helping hand. And you will then see what it’s really like to live for your survival. Money gives us a buffer, we do not see the extent to the consequence our system of life on Earth creates – because we did not pull the shorter stick.
Anyone who suggest that someone does not deserve a Living Income, a dignified life with the resource required to survive, simply because they are not working the job we define as ‘acceptable’ – put yourself in the shoes of another. What would you do to survive? Is your right to food, shelter, hot water, clean clothing more valid then someone who isn’t working, or not doing a job we classify as normal? Would you be willing to walk the streets of New York, digging through trash bags in front of fine dining establishment, simply to ensure you can buy yourself a sandwich for the day? What does shame have to do with anything when it comes to survival?
I suggest anyone that has such a judgment on those that are down and out and willing to do ANYTHING to make a few bucks, to watch this documentary, to put yourself in their shoes, and to then ask the question, why are Human Rights not a RIGHT given to all, unquestionably?
Investigate the Living Income Guaranteed proposed by the Equal Life Foundation. The core principle is that all humans have unalienable rights to life – that means food, water, shelter, clothing, education. These cannot and should not be denied to anyone, whether you are not able to find a job, in between jobs, victim of layoffs, whatever – that no matter your situation, YOU have the right to a dignified life, and that you are not FORCED to sift through the rubbish of other humans to collect your income.
For Further Information, Follow these Links:
Living On Stolen Money – Decision or Consequence?
A life of crime is two-part documentary (I’ve posted embeds of the videos in the bottom of the post), where a filmmaker follows some criminals during two periods in their lifetime. The first time he meets them they are in their late twenties and still quite strong and vigorous, and they are sustaining themselves through shoplifting. In part two he meets them when they are in their middle thirties and life has begun to take a toll on them.
What is so interesting about this documentary is that it reveals the mindset of the criminals, the WHY of their decision to become criminals. Several times throughout the documentary they exclaim that they are able to make much more money through stealing than through having a regular job. Working one day as a shoplifter makes them around 3000 dollars, while working one day at McDonald’s makes them about 80 dollars. Thus, what is clear is that these people are not driven by some form of bad moral, or psychopathic desire to cause harm to others. No – in-fact these shoplifters are economist’s showing to us what kind of consequences our current economic system create.
It’s obvious that thieves, shoplifters and burglars are not an incident or mishap, they are consequence, they are not an anomaly, they are a predictable outcome – the result of an equation. For those of us that have led a life of money, it’s hard to relate to and understand what goes through a person’s mind when he or she decides to become professional shoplifter, because most of us born in economically stable environments would perceive it as immoral, wrong and barbarian. However, for someone born at the very low end of the hierarchy theft and a criminal life is a way of escaping a permanent sentence to a life poverty, and hard work.
Economists would probably agree with me, because it’s simple mathematics, when there is no support for those at the bottom, no hope for a better life, no ability to rise and build a life for oneself, then crime is a way out = supply and demand = cause and effect = problem and consequence.
Thus, realize, when crime rise, it’s not something bad, it’s actually an indication that something is very, very wrong with society, and that there are some drastic changes required. Realize that when prisons are filled to the brim with people, then we have a sick society, and that sickness can be traced back to the unequal distribution of money and resources.
This is where we require embracing a paradigm shift, because in order to make our lives better, our society more safe, our life experiences more rewarding, we must learn to give – we must learn to give, as we’d like to receive. Most of us have extremely difficult to grasp this concept, and when confronted with it, we shiver and turn inside, immediately out of our mouths comes the statements that “it’s unfair!” – “they should work for their money!” – “we can’t change that!” – “there will always be crime!” – but see, this is not common sense, this is assumptions, ideas, projections, and in actuality useless opinions that have no significance in terms of how reality actually works.
The fact is that, when we make the decision to give all an equal opportunity to make something worthwhile of themselves in this world, we are doing ourselves a significant favor. We will in doing that release so much pressure, fear, and society will become a completely different place, where crime will be significantly less.
One of the solutions we’re able to implement is a minimum wage, and not just any minimum wage, but a big minimum wage with which one can buy luxurious items, start a family and make one’s life comfortable and enjoyable. Manual labor such as working for McDonald’s, or similar, shouldn’t be awarded with a salary that merely puts one on the breadline. Instead dedicating oneself to contributing to society should be awarded amply; it should be more profitable to live honestly than to make living as a criminal.
So, the key to designing a successful society is to ask us the question WHY? Because everything that happens in this world does so for a reason – our physical reality is filled with equations and these in turn produce various results, and through changing the variables, we’ll change the result.
Investigate the Living Income Guaranteed and allow yourself to step up and become a social engineer, question the movement of your daily life, what happens, why it happens, and how it could be changed in such a way that all are included. Because it’s clear that – there are SOLUTIONS – we must simply be brave enough to see and apply them.
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The Theory of Economy
This summer I had the mixed pleasure of reading a course in Microeconomics and International trade. In microeconomics the primary focus of the researchers is to establish ‘What is the market really doing and why?’ – and this is attempted to be done utilizing mathematical formulas; primarily utilizing the famous graph where two lines cross each-other, the one line sloping downwards (demand) and the other sloping upwards (supply) – and where they meet each other = that’s apparently the optimal price for the product and the optimal quantity of that product in that given market.
What first struck me as being fascinating about these theories was that they seldom predicted how the market would behave in reality, and neither could they be verified with empirical evidence – and most of the time the authors of the my books where busy trying to find reasons and various viewpoints as to why these theories wasn’t working “as they should” – and how they probably did work but it was just that the inventors missed to take into consideration some important factors and variables.
Though, what was the most fascinating about this entire area of research, was how there was this complete worship to the idea that lower prices = higher consumer satisfaction; and that apparently for a market to be functional, what is required is that we produce as many products as possible, to the lowest prices possible, because then the consumers are able to buy as much as possible, and then we’re apparently okay, happy, and have a fruitful existence here on earth.
Obviously, when I looked at these ideas, I silently chuckled – because the logical flaw of this assumption is glaringly simple = the producers are the consumers! YES – that’s the secret of economy and the reason why we’ve got so many unemployed in this day and age is because we’ve failed to understand that when a product is cheaper, someone at the other end gets less money, which in turns means that a (employee) consumer gets less money, which in turns means that the producer gets less customers = and it all ends up in such a way that most lose but a few that manage to reap the monopoly profits of those very low-priced products – because they’ve priced out everyone else.
It’s clear that we have to develop a new way of looking at economics, and that mathematics and statistics isn’t the way to go – no – we actually require to look at the actuality of what is going on. For example, poverty, what is the actuality of poverty? Why does poverty exist to begin with? It’s not a matter of mathematics, rather it’s a matter of seeing what is behind everything in this world – and that is MONEY – money that in itself is a completely innocent creation meant to be but a way of distributing goods and services to where they are required and wanted the most; but in our current system – money has become a point of control – where those that are already rich and on top of things with all possible means make sure the keep those stricken by poverty in place – else we wouldn’t anymore have a functional slave labor force that can produce all of our various gadgets and other mechanics of entertainment.
Thus, what we must ask ourselves, and economists more importantly, is why have we never used our knowledge to produce a sustainable system where all of us are able to create a life that is dignified, cool and enjoyable? What is required for us to do that? MONEY – and what do we need to bring through such money into this world? Resources – so what is then the solution – the real economic master plan as to how to create a world that would be sustainable and practical for all its inhabitants? To agree that we share the resources – at least the basic and most essential resources – those that we MUST HAVE in order to live.
Thus, I stand behind the Living Income Guaranteed – which is a functional, effective and sustainable way of creating a new world for all people where money will be shared – and for those economists that want to make a difference – I suggest that you investigate this concept and bring your knowledge to the table and help to create something from which we can all benefit!
For Further Support, Follow these Links:
There is Enough! Stopping the Cycle of Ignorance with LIG
There is enough. This statement is crucial for the continuation of our species in the times ahead, where all we hear is that we do not have enough, not enough food, not enough money, not enough housing, but if one look behind who is in fact saying these statements, you will find the corporations who have a vested interest in us continuing to believe this and so live out this belief that there is not enough. The corporations who control now the resources, the private banks who control the money supply, and the governments that control our livelihoods all have a stake within making a lot of profit, while we continue to believe that ‘there is not enough.’ So we cannot accept and allow any longer this notion that there is not enough resources or food or money in this world, we have to educate ourselves on the reality of what is here and how to walk the path to understand and so live the statement that There IS enough!
We know that money is made out of thin air, there is no value inherently within the paper it’s made from, it’s simply a medium for commerce, and within this we the people give it meaning. So saying there is not enough money is a scapegoat for admitting to the fact that some want more than others, and will do what it takes to make this continue to happen as it is and has been a reality for most of our recorded history. All are responsible within this ignorance we have accepted and allowed where some go with nothing and some go with enough, we all live here and so accept this money system as it is now, so we all have to face the consequences and change the outcomes to be best for all. It’s on each one being a part of this change because nothing will change until we stand up within ourselves and change who we are from within to the without.
If we look at food for instance, here are some statistics about hunger and
also statics on the food waste in the United States:
- Total number of children that die every year from hunger –
1.5 million - Percent of world population considered to be starving –
33%- Time between deaths of people who die from hunger –
3.6 seconds- Each year, about
40 percent of all food in the United States goes uneaten. It’s just tossed out or left to rot. And that’s a fairly large waste of resources. All that freshwater and land, all that fertilizer and energy — for nothing. By one recent estimate, Americans are squandering the equivalent of $165 billion each year by rubbishing so much food. - Time between deaths of people who die from hunger –
So we have 33 percent of the world population that is considered starving and we have on the other extreme 40 percent of the food in America is thrown away due to not being processed effectively or not reaching the desired aesthetic picture the shoppers demand for. This seems like a sick joke we are playing on ourselves, I mean this doesn’t make any rational sense to allow such a play out of life and death to exist, but it does, it is happening every day.
What we fail to see or realize within the system we live in is that we are more and more interconnected and so dependent on each other to continue to exist. When we allow such a contrast of basic needs where some have a lot and many others have little to nothing, we have to stop and consider what we are in fact doing here. There has to be a point in each one’s life where we have to question the way things are. This is determined and will be determined by each one within themselves and so will determine their own lives and existence, but it’s suggested to find solutions for all human beings to be given the necessary basic rights that we all are given at birth, the conditions for a decent life.
The Equal Life Foundation of which I support and contribute to with research and funding, have proposed a Living Income Guarantee, They have set out the basic structure for a new way of life for everyone, where those that require it will be given a living income to be able to buy what is needed and be sustained in a dignified way through changing parts of the current system that is currently in place. This will be walked as we start to open up the relationships and pathways once there is more support and funding involved, but we are not there yet. We have to start from the ground up as we see, realize, and understand that starting from the top down will not change things as this is the way it’s always been, and there has been no significant change in human life in the last 2000 years. We as the people that can hear the message and see that the way forward is a way of walking the talk and living the solution as ourselves, can move to positions and solutions that will continue to propel this best for all principle forward and walk what is necessary in all avenues until it is eventually done. Never giving up, continuing to push forward, empowering ourselves and so others as we move forward.
We do have enough on this planet, so this is not the problem as the Earth has given all the resources/sustenance/common sense to walk the best for all principle for each one to equally benefit from this reality. If we start with a living income, to create a standard of living that gives all dignity then we can also start looking at how and through what means we can change the way we do things to create efficiency and sustainability, we can start the path of honoring life and not wasting and destroying it due to our own ignorance.
Support the Equal Life Foundation and the Living Income Guaranteed Proposal to start and create the change that is needed to live the principle of ‘best for all life’, which will always be best for you.
Watch the Documentary: Dive!
For Further Support, Please check out Links:
- Living Income Guaranteed Website
- Living Income Guaranteed Proposal
- Equal Life Foundation
- Equal Life Foundation Blog
- Living Income’s YouTube Channel
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What is payment? We got it wrong this whole time!
By Blaž Cegnar
We are raised up by the society to believe that we pay for things with money. You know: paper, coin, digits on the bank account. Whenever we want something that we don’t have or is not ours, we pay for it in the store with money and then it’s ours. Then we can do with it whatever we want, because WE paid for it with OUR MONEY. Then there is this division in our society where some believe that one should always work to earn one’s money and that those who don’t do ‘real’ work are bad people, lazy, selfish. Others like the capitalist idea where one invests one’s money (earned, stolen, inherited or all of the above) so that the money ‘works’ for you and one just gets the benefits, the profits. But what all have in common is that all live in the illusion of money and payment, because everyone believes that we pay for things with money. I did too, but boy, was I wrong.
We don’t pay for things with money. Nothing is actually paid for with money. So, what is the real payment for a product or a service? Who does in fact, actually pay for it? If I walk into a store and buy some milk, who paid for it and with what? Me with my money? Nope, this is a complete illusion. Can you see it? Wake up – who really paid for the milk? The cow that produced it. The farmer who collected it, the people who packed it and moved it to the store. All these beings PAID for it WITH their WORK. This is the only REAL payment that exists, ever. Everything is paid for with work, with effort, with movement. Giving some ‘money’ over the counter is not a payment, it is a joke. It is some ‘kids’ playing games, imagining things. This is what we are doing when we believe that we actually paid for something when we give our money or when we transfer some digits to another’s bank account – we are imagining things. We aren’t really doing a damn thing, we are only taking what is already there and shuffling some paper and digits around because we care so much about them – the digits and the paper we call money. But we only care about the amount of our digits and our paper, not about another’s. But no, we don’t even dare to talk with anyone openly about our money, our digits and our paper, or theirs, because it’s a secret. If I have less money than you then I am ashamed and if I have more than you then screw you, that’s how life works. But it doesn’t. This is how we created the system of money to work in our minds – big difference.
Money is just a tool, a mind tool in a game with rules that we create, and it can be very useful to help us disperse the goods in a more equal, reasonable, practical way. Money is not evil or bad. We are evil and bad, because of the way we use it to abuse each other – Life – with it. So, our society today does not use money to disperse goods in an equal, reasonable, practical way for all to live a Dignified Life. We use the money to enslave each other, we use the money to say who is worthy of life and who is not worthy of life. We use the money to define whose life is worth more and whose life is not worth a penny. And we take it dead serious. We do not give a shit when people suffer and die because we do not allow them to have enough money. We allow them to work to the bone though, of course, but we do not recognize the payment that they do, the REAL PAYMENT, THE PAIN-MENT.
All these abused workers do all the pain-ment for us while others mostly just shuffle the paper – ‘money’ – around and then we actually believe that the hardest PAIN-MENT that the ‘lowest’ workers do is worth the least amount of credit? We obviously do believe this, because we give the workers who work the most and the hardest, the least amount of credit for it. We came up with this rule that such people, who work the hardest and the longest, who do most of the ACTUAL HARD PAIN-MENT for all of us, should get the least amount of credit for it. Would we like to be in their shoes? Would we give ourselves the same amount of credit if we had to work in their shoes? No, be serious and be self-honest. Oh, did we get this whole payment thing wrong on all the levels imaginable! So, here we see that we have to redefine the word PAYMENT, which we dared to define and understand so selfishly and contrary to the actual reality of things, so that we can stop abusing and stop creating abuse of Life with it and actually come up with a definition that is supportive for all.
Current definition (from Wiki): A payment is the transfer of an item of value from one party (such as a person or company) to another in exchange for the provision of goods, services or both, or to fulfill a legal obligation.
Re-definition: PAYMENT – the pain-ment of work, labor and effort that one gifts into an activity, product or service. These people, who work to the bone in sweatshops all over the world and all people who work anywhere, are the ones who actually pay and make the PAIN-MENT for our shit that we then buy with money: our iPhoneys, our fancy plastic fantasies, our clothes etc. Workers are the ones who paid for it.
So, the next time I see myself say or think: “Hey, I paid for that!”, I’ll stop, breathe and realize: Wow, I did not really pay for that at all, I just gave my money for it, my credits, my imaginable value. And mostly not even to the being who ACTUALLY paid for it with their own physical labor. That being is probably suffering somewhere in a sweatshop, being abused by all who don’t understand where the actual payment happens, who do not value the Life of all beings equally as their own and do not give all the equal credit for the work and the pain-ment they do. I will no longer allow the abuse of money and payment and I will speak up for all beings that do not get their equal credit in spite of all the PAIN-MENT they do. I will work to implement a new system, where Life, work and pain-ment of all the beings is valued equally and where all receive their equal credit for being alive and sharing their Life with me, so that we can all be alive together in a Life worth living.
So, taking this new definition of the word payment: how does it affect one’s awareness of reality and how should the money system change according to it so that there is no more abuse?
Firstly, we become aware that no one is actually paying for anything with money, because the only form of real, actual payment is movement / labor / work / effort itself, towards a goal, product, service that is best for all, that supports all. When we are aware of this, we can see that we cannot really value work through money, because most of the work can be valuable and useful for the society in some way or another. Sure, some work is more urgent than another and so, some work must be done prior to some other work. For example; producing food for all is more urgent than painting a picture, but this does not change the value of work itself – it only changes the priority, the urgency of it, the order in which the work should be done – very important to realize. So, what is the value of baking bread? What is the value of building houses, producing electricity, assembling iPhoneys, designing and planning new things? What is the value of singing, painting, making a sculpture? Can we really put a value in digits on any work? Sure, any random number will do… But it is still just and illusion of the mind, a thing that we made up. So, really, what is the real value of any work and effort that supports Life? It is the value of Life itself, because Life expresses self through work, effort, expression, art, movement…
So, you see, the value of any work that supports Life equals to the value of Life itself, because Life does it. Can you see? Wake up – do you see it yet?
So, in a system where this would be fully realized and implemented people would work firstly on things that are necessary to sustain a Dignified Life for all and then they would work on anything they like – and all would still get an equal amount of credit for it, based on the value of Life itself. So simple, yet so hard to grasp through a mind of selfishness. So, back to where we are at the moment in our reality, of course we cannot just remove all money and say every work is priceless, because we have been living in the illusion of money and payment for so long. Thus we need to gradually realize the illusion, like I explained above, and step by step implement the necessary changes in the system that will – in the end – lead to a Dignified Life for All, where money as we know it today will no longer exist.
We can start by implementing a solution that is described in the Living Income Guaranteed Proposal. This proposal / goal is not an Utopian world. What I am talking about is a world of common sense, a world where Life is actually recognized and honored in all. What we have today and what we have been trying to live until now – this is the real Utopia, because we are trying to live according to illusions that we create in our minds. And whenever we try to live out illusions that are not in consideration with the actual reality – we create suffering.
As long as we create suffering, we are doing it wrong and we are trying to live out the illusions of our minds that are not real, that are selfish. So simple, yet so hard to see through our minds, as long as we try so hard to avoid any self-responsibility.
I dare you to join me and see through the deception of money and payment that we have today. The economic solution I suggest to read about: Living Income Guaranteed
Further information:
Living Capitalism
Problem:
This has become the one system that we have come to live by whether one calls it socialism, communism, democracy or any other ideology that we harbor in our minds as a system we submit ourselves to in the belief that one cannot avoid being ruled by it, driven by the fear of ourselves taking responsibility for ourselves as all that is within this existence and standing up for who we are in it and as it.
One must realize that socialism as it is lived as communism is capitalism in disguise, because the focus is on money, on capital, on the survival through money, the imprint of money on the people in similar ways as in ‘free market’ capitalism, with no actual freedom of trade and only the few on top, the 1% pocketing 95% of the profits. Capitalism is a state of being captivated by money expressed by the desire for more stuff or for more profit, more power and control, basically the greed for more. It is the cap of the pyramid where the base is comprised of the natural resources and the human resources – life and resources that have been misappropriated and abused for the very few on top – though with each and everyone focusing on being part of the top, the cap, those being superior over the ones underneath, having it made in acceptance of the disadvantage of others, the abuse of all ‘inferior’, thus each accepts the struggle for superiority on the given terms of capitalism, the competition and fight for survival.
Abuse and suffering is accepted and allowed in every second all over the world on all levels and dimensions, but strangely humanity doesn’t consider changing it. Most support it and will defend it rigorously as if we had been brainwashed into believing we do and will not question capitalism. It is not a natural state as proclaimed by Darwin as the fight for survival of the fittest, which is being put forward and maintained as a justification to one’s resistance to change the system and allow everything as it is – in a ‘don’t worry be happy’ mentality of those that are able to stand in the system in some way or another based on the fear of losing the little one has painstakingly earned or fearing actually having to limit oneself in one’s perceived right to consume because ‘I can afford to’, ‘I worked for it’.
Thus we are willing to accept the majority of the beings on this planet crying out in pain and suffering each second of the day, a second-by-second holocaust for the majority of beings in this existence for our own comfort and the comfort zone of our minds. To be clear: We are actually accepting and allowing mass murder, rape, child abuse, victimization, starvation, animal abuse, deliberate infliction of pain and suffering for the promise of money at the end of the week or month. For printed paper that doesn’t even actually belong to us, as is stated by the banks, the agreed upon value of which can be nullified at any moment. How brainwashed are we? How dumb can we be? How little common sense do we have left, if at all?
There are not many who realize that we’re dealing with a man-made creation which we are able to change so that every one being is considered and taken care of. And even if we do realize it, we have more immediate things to do in the moment, continue with what is due in our jobs, then get groceries, the children, cook, clean and watch the news, sigh, watch a film on TV and go to bed because the job requires you to be fit, and so the whole hamster wheel routine starts all over again till we are simply too mentally and physically tired to consider any other way and ultimately we give up on questioning: Why is it that this extensive crime against Life is being allowed ‘by others’? Everything is fine as long as it doesn’t happen to my family, to myself. Some turn to religion, to some underlying superior plan and rationalize their experience and observations, or do drugs or revert to games, sex and entertainment.
Solution:
We must see, realize and understand that and how we have detached ourselves from this reality and ourselves. We have allowed ourselves to develop such a mistrust of the physical, of ourselves as the physical because of the identification with emotions and feelings, with energetic experiences – where we no longer comprehend what is actually real, where one is to direct one’s focus and attention to, what is of real significance, substance and value and what is of projective nature and doesn’t hold true because it’s based on fear and becomes the figments and paranoia of and as the mind.
The system is us and we as-it are holding each of us by choice prisoner to it / to ourselves as a system of ‘Life’, ‘Death’ and ‘Struggle’ – that has manifested as capitalism of ‘Grow or Die’. We must understand the brainwashing within the acceptance that suffering is a natural part of life and step out of this mental dysfunction and let go of the concept of ‘having to work for a living’, ‘having the right to work to earn a living’ and instead see that we all have a right for Life, the right of Life, because we are of Life, we are living beings. Our capital is Life, the physical resources – so all will profit in being given an equal and one opportunity to practical physical survival/living in this physical existence. We will manage and live this system through our contribution to make it work for ourselves and for all. We can capitalize on the resources of each human being contributing to life on earth.
So it is pertinent to give to all an equal right to life, which we inherently have, because we are life / of life but what we abdicated our responsibility for, we aren’t standing in self-responsibility for and as ourselves as Life. So we must all commit to a process and standing from survival to living / to Life / as Life and realize that this is something that has actually always been and always will be everyone’s equal right.
A step toward this end is to see, realize and understand one’s own ‘mind-traps’ where one goes into justifications and reasons why a new Economic System will ‘never work’ – where the excuses usually exist around ‘others will deceive’ and ‘what if ‘others won’t work equally’ or ‘what if others use the opportunity to again deceive people’ or ‘I won’t change because others won’t change’, ‘Why me first?’ One must be prepared to see how one deceives oneself and others and see what one allows oneself to be within it, what statement one is making by continuing within the secret mind, inner conversations and backchat, because that is what separates oneself within oneself, from others, the world, reality, existence, Life. It’s a process of aligning oneself with reality and becoming real and making a different statement on who one is, based on the principle of oneness and equality, of giving how one would like to receive, of true care for and consideration of Life and all living beings in this existence.
It is to personally walk through what one perceives as the comforts of capitalism, to understand the fear behind it, wherein one allows oneself to want to hold onto things as a substitute for true ‘comfort’ as and within the physical as what is actually supportive for the body’s well-being. And so to also consider the ones that suffer, to consider walking in their shoes for a one day and within that seeing the reality of capitalism and its outgrowths of debt, poverty, horrible diseases and starvation due to corruption and greed. To then make a stand in saying ‘Stop. To here and no further!’
There is the LIG Living Income Guaranteed platform that incorporates a life manifesto stating the living principles on which a fair system that supports all life equally can be implemented, which one is able to support and make known. It is a step toward equality with respect to one’s financial means in the system as base support to be freed up time-wise to work on aligning oneself with Life and the living principles within and as oneself and within that to speed the process for a complete implementation of the principle of oneness and equality for the best of all in form of a system that forms the structure and mechanisms of providing for all equally pertaining to a fair distribution Earth’s resources and seeing to the point of sustainability and managing added value within a ‘labor system’ that actually respects Life and allows for self-expression instead of abuse.
Benefits and rewards:
People are given enough to live within a system as how it is proposed in Living Income Guaranteed. There will be no need to take on jobs that compromise you as who one is as a human being and in that there is a chance to create jobs that channel one’s self-expression and creativity, that are actually fun to do and open up innovations that are needed for the support of our planet ecologically and for health care and other fields. There would be a rebalancing of the extremes that are now allowed, because the abuse would not have to be carried out to survive due to the inequality. There will be an environment of support where there is no focus on money and survival but on a dignity of life and living. One will work toward the actual profit of a having a clean planet with clean water for all. The statement of value of each Life and living being will be made and eventually lived. Thus from such capitalism life itself will benefit, each human, the animals, nature and the earth – we capitalize on the physical resources to direct this physical existence… the system to the best outcome for all.
Investigate the Living Income Guaranteed Proposal and Join us for discussion.
Credits:
Yearly Salary “Raise”
It sounds cool when the company sends you the letter about the raise in your salary yet when taking the inflation into account which is two times higher than the raise we then realize that our purchasing power has actually diminished. And that’s what has been happening for many many years now where the human labor is slowly but surely devalued.
It is a slow process where the change is not very noticeable ensuring that there is no reason in peoples minds to have any uprising and claim for their rights. Corporations keep doubling their profits while people that do the actual labor remain stuck in the mode of survival and constant fear to try and move for any change.
When I hear people having a conversation about the guys on top and how they exploit us a common statement keeps appearing in the end ” aaa it’s a useless fight”. That’s how deeply we have accepted our condition, because as far as we see it’s always been that way and always will be. You can try and go against the big guys and possibly win few percent increase in your salary or some little improvement in your working conditions but beyond that is a no go area, useless to even consider. So yeah the programming is surely deep where alternatives don’t ever enter the conversation in any way, only sometimes in a form of a joke.
I would like to bring, however, a new consideration, which is not actually new but is basically disregarded due to effective brainwashing which was pushed by those that fear and understand that this consideration does actually make sense and that if this idea would reach people without being filtered through the imposed filters of fear, majority would agree and most likely push for the realization of this idea.
Nationalization of Resources
Yes, it has been portrayed as something unholy where we have been made to prefer the free market to take care of things for us without realizing that free market only allowed a few to freely abuse all others. Government is bad, too much corruption and abuse, we keep reading daily in the newspapers and of course that is a problem because even there we have completely abdicated our responsibility to make any decisions or have any say in what happens with our daily affairs. Still in many ways government still works for the people while corporations are only interested in the well being of their shareholders.
Isn’t it strange that those shareholders are sitting somewhere far away from all the real processes that happen daily while common people work their assess off to keep the company running, yet they don’t have a share in this company, nope, they are no shareholders. They get only the tiniest piece of cake, it’s called a crumble which again, as I mentioned above, gets tinier with each passing year. How is this fair? How can this be allowed to continue unquestioned and ever even considered?
There is a need to start the process of bringing this awareness back into the minds of people by explaining through past examples about the benefits of having resources nationalized and how this can work for all people. What changes need to be done within governments in order to avoid any abuse and how to best allocate this huge increase in available resources that could really accomplish great things in bettering lives of all human beings of let’s say that specific country.
Suggestion is to start looking at our global initiative called Living Income Guaranteed which besides this suggestion has other crucial points, ideas which upon their realization would, through mathematical determination, bring enormous improvement in the quality of peoples lives. There is still much work to be done and the more of us join and participate the faster we can move and end the current accepted slavery once and for all.
Living Income Guaranteed 
