Betterness: Economics for Humans (Kindle Single)

When a person is wealthy relationally in social capital, environmentally in natural capital, managerially in organizational capital, personally in human capital, emotionally in emotional capital, and intellectually in intellectual capital, he or she might be said to be authentically, broadly, and deeply rich.

Consider what Kuhn famously argued: that a paradigm shift happens when we encounter anomalies that can’t be explained by the paradigm responsible for progress thereto. So here’s our anomaly: that industrial-age wealth hasn’t neatly powered lives lived meaningfully well; that near-term profit, gross product, and hyperconsumption haven’t produced a f

what would work held to a timelessly, agelessly high standard in your market, industry, or category look like? If your enterprise were to survive not merely for another year, but a century, what would still be distinctive and compelling about its where, when, what, and how? Second, which kind of imperatives would it take to make it happen, not as a

Business, today, is fighting back hard against the inexorable rise of constraints—demanded by constituents across the globe—largely by expending hard-earned cash on influencing the political process.

Imperatives are what demand work that’s timeless and ageless, not just transient and disposable.

Ask yourself: What kind of products won’t we offer? What products and services will we discourage people from consuming?

the goal of competitive constraints is to support and protect a generative advantage, a surplus in real marginal wealth.

When an organization can say, “We exist to create this specific kind of marginal wealth because it has these consequences for people, communities, society, the natural world, or future generations,” it has crafted an ambition.