Looking Forward. By Michael Albert and Robin Hahnel

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  8. Consumption Planning

 

"Larry knows that prevalence Of consumption requests requiring rote work reduces the quality of society's average work complex and thereby hurts work requirements he himself faces even if he doesn't produce any of the goods in question."

 

 

 

Larry, Pearl, and all other members of MLK county go through roughly the same procedure in the second round. They compare their first-round requests to first-round production proposals, see which of the goods they want are in excess demand and consequently have higher indicative prices than originally estimated, and which are in excess supply and have lower indicative prices. They check the value of their overall consumption requests against national averages, talk with their friends, and submit new proposals. Although indicative prices and projected values for average consumption guide decision making, a number of factors refine this relationship. In particular:

 

a) The quantitative data results from a social process that accounts for gradations in peoples' personal and social preferences.

 

b) The quantitative data is accompanied by meaningful qualitative information that informs consumers' calculations by providing details about the human sacrifices necessary to produce different goods.

 

For example, when Larry works on consumption requests he has information about which products embody more desirable work processes and which ones embody less desirable ones. Of course such differences are reflected in the indicative prices of goods, but detailed descriptions of job contents makes this information more humanly meaningful. Larry knows that prevalence of consumption requests requiring rote work reduces the quality of society's average work complex and thereby hurts work requirements he himself faces even if he doesn't produce any of the goods in question. He also empathizes with the workers who do produce these goods. Therefore, Larry tries to moderate his requests to emphasize goods requiring more desirable work and de-emphasize goods requiring dangerous and debilitating work.

Therefore, consumers pay attention to the work embodied in the goods they seek because it is in their individual and collective interest to do so, and because it becomes a natural way to behave. Participatory citizens do not have a new human nature nor do economic problems disappear. Rather, the structure of participatory economics has built-in features that promote feelings of empathy such that cooperative behavior becomes as common under participatory economics as competitive egoism is under capitalism.

 

For the third planning iteration Larry's adjustments are limited, as explained before. But beside limiting changes to less than 50 percent (toward equilibrium) and 25 percent (away from equilibrium) Larry decides to use a convenience option available on his terminal. Rather than worry about whether to reduce his demand for something by 14 percent or 22 percent, Larry selects the option that automatically calculates proposed changes for all goods toward equilibration at 5 percent (or 10 percent, or whatever he prefers). Alternatively, he might set the automatic global changes in some other pattern he knows to be a good rough fit to his own inclinations. Minimally, he might flag certain items as necessities for him and not subject to reduction (say, electricity) and use the reduction features only on more discretionary requests. In any event, after the automatic changes, he goes through the list of goods and refines the changes for items he wants more precise control over. This approach makes preparing his third proposal very quick, with little loss in quality since Larry makes all final choices himself. Pearl chooses not to employ the automatic feature, spending more planning time for greater flexibility. In any event, after all consumers settle on their choices, proposals are summed, expectations and
projections updated, and new averages compiled. As in other rounds, each individual submits a new, updated proposal, and these are summed for the commune, county, and society.

 

 

 

In the fourth round, proposals are submitted by neighborhood councils rather than living units. This reduces the burden of adjustments for the planning process and leaves much of the quibbling over living unit requests to the neighborhood councils.

 

At this stage a proposal might be challenged by neighbors if it's significantly above average in total or if it seems to contain items that may harm the community-such as excessive requests for liquor or drugs.

 

Daily Consumption and Changes in the Plan

 

In chapter 3 we described how consumers would get goods from public stocks and keep track of activities using pocket-size computerized "credit cards." Weekly updating of each individual's consumption would reveal divergences from the individual's consumption plan. These variations might only require a redistribution of goods as some households' increases for a good might be offset by other households' decreases, or increases in demand are met out of slack. Alternatively, it might be that changes in production are necessary or that consumers must moderate their new demands and stick closer to plans they agreed to earlier. In the latter case, consumption council boards would negotiate changes by procedures outlined in chapter 4. In either case, daily and weekly personal consumption allows for privacy, shopping, spontaneity, and changed plans while eliminating the need for bargain hunting and greatly reducing or eliminating hassles of lines and confusion over models, sales, advertising, etc. But the main change, of course, is the elimination of poverty and attainment of equity, goals whose overall implications will only be fully appreciated with their attainment.

 

Although this chapter's picture of consumer planning is of course incomplete, we hope it provided enough detail to explain how people could participate in planning their own consumption under equitable conditions. Next we consider price calculations and related national accounting.