A Bill of Economic Rights and Responsibilities - InformationRio+20 gives the opportunity to produce new proposals to conceive and organize the transition towards sustainable societies. This section will try systematically to gather them progressively during the process.
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February 19 2012
A Declaration of Economic Interdependence
Details of the Proposal
Context
Carmine Gorga, a former Fulbright Scholar, is president of The Somist Institute, a research organization in Gloucester, Mass. Through The Economic Process, To My Polis, and numerous other publications in economic theory and policy, he has transformed economics from a linear to a relational discipline. Dr. Gorga blogs at http://me-a-new-economic-atlas-and-you.
A Working Draft
Fully appreciative of the many blessings of the Declaration of Independence it might now be an appropriate time to draft A DECLARATION OF ECONOMIC INTERDEPENDENCE.
Whereas the Declaration of (Political) Independence has, without open discussion, been transformed into a Declaration of Personal Independence;
Whereas this ideology has given rise to the Age of Entitlements, an age dominated by the conception that there can ever be rights without responsibilities;
Whereas the lack of personal and civic responsibility has generated the conception of Life as One-Against-All
Whereas this emphasis on our own welfare — independent, if not at the expense, of the welfare of our fellow citizens has created economic insecurity for everyone, rich and poor alike,
We affirm that our greatest political need is to build a society in which the reality of Economic Interdependence is fully acknowledged.
Proposals and abstracts
In this society, we declare, the fundamental conception of Life is One-With-All
- and we trust that the effect will be economic jubilation for all.
In order to build such a society
we are called upon to realize the political ideals of Liberty, Justice, and Goodwill toward one and all.
In order to build such a society our challenge is to deny
all structures of individual and societal selfishness and
to affirm
THE PRINCIPLES OF ECONOMIC JUSTICE
as enunciated in A Bill of Economic Rights and Responsibilities (see below).
The best explanation of economic interdependence that this writer has found is an article by Leonard E. Read entitled
“I, Pencil: My family Tree”. It is available from The Foundation for Economic Education, Inc. at www.fee.org
A longer explanation of economic interdependence is contained in Carmine Gorga, The Economic Process: An Instantaneous Non-Newtonian Picture. Lanham, MD, and Oxford: University Press of America, 2002 and 2010.
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A Bill of Economic Rights and Responsibilities
"We need an Economic Bill of Rights."
Martin Luther King, written in 1968 just before his assassination
"We'll never revitalize our market economy till ...
every single American is protected by
an economic bill of rights."
Jerry Brown, "We the People, Take Back America"
"Under a second Bill of Rights a new basis of security and prosperity can be established for all - regardless of station, rank, or creed."
President Franklin D. Roosevelt
State of the Union Message, Jan. 11, 1944
***
"At the United Nations, the Pope urged the rich to show solidarity with the poor. His social teaching has emphasized that this moral commitment should not be done by dole that creates dependency, but by empowering the poor to become full participants in economic life."
George Weigel, President, Ethics & Public Policy Center
Article 1
We all have the right to receive economic justice;
we all have the responsibility to grant economic justice to others.
Article 2
We all have the right to peace and to the economic benefits of law and order;
we all have the responsibility to pay for the instrumentalities of peace, law and order.
Article 3
We all have the right of access to natural resources;
we all have the responsibility to pay taxes as compensation to the rest of the community for the exclusive use of those resources.
Article 4
We all have the right of access to national credit;
we all have the responsibility to repay the loan issued on the basis of national credit.
Article 4a
All communities with taxing power have a right of access to national credit for the financing of public works programs;
communities have the responsibility to repay the loan issued on the basis of national credit.
Article 5
We all have the right to own the fruits of our labor;
we all have the responsibility, if working with and for others, to offer services commensurate with the value of the reward received in the form of stocks -- eventually, no longer wages.
Article 6
We all have the right to protect our wealth;
we all have the responsibility to respect other people's possessions.
Article 7
We all have the right to healthy air, water, and food supplies;
we all have the responsibility to accept the higher prices that result from the provision of those qualities.
Article 8
The poor have the right to society's surplus;
the poor have the responsibility to make good use of
society's surplus.
Article 9
The government has the right to raise taxes to administer money, peace, and justice;
the government has the responsibility to administer
money, peace, and justice efficiently.
