A Sustainable Economy for the 21st Century (Open Media Series)

Looking back over the past fifty years, the U.S. experience raises troubling questions. We have more than doubled our productive potential, as a result of rising productivity. Had we channeled this “productivity dividend” into leisure time, Americans would have already reached the twenty hour week. But instead we used all of our economic progress t

Long-term job security is being substituted with temporary and casual employment, the use of consultants, outsourcing, and a variety of other techniques which erode commitments to employees.

giving more latitude to teams and people farther down the hierarchy.

Countries would have to abide by international codes of conduct on workers’ rights and environmental protections which would stipulate basic protections such as minimum wages, maximum hours of work, rights to representation, and non-discrimination by race and sex, as well as the regulation of air and water emissions, toxic wastes, etc.

the problems of the enterprise may ultimately be less an issue of size than of restructuring. We need new structures of governance, new models of behavior and new sets of incentives.

Any form of economy should be subject to the requirement of providing a good quality of life for all Americans in an ecologically sustainable way.

We might have saved ourselves the trouble by looking at the many examples of successful economies (Western Europe, Japan and Korea) in

social accountability, such as environmental sustainability, community revitalization, or global equity.

They put peace, meaningful work, and basic values above affluence.