Whats is prosperity?
The notion of prosperity has long been at moot and the definition and the real meaning of it has always been a point of controversy. Prosperity consists of two words “Pro” and “Spere” that means comprehensively “hanging on to hope”. Now, of course prosperity may mean differently for every person, but it embodies a sense of optimism and betterment regardless of its context. Prosperity however today is misinterpreted as a life with luxury and high-class consumption that the owner can show off by them. It has become a game of purchasing goods and services for even an unneeded or unnecessary purpose and it continues going on and is absolutely unstoppable. This is a distortion of the circular flow of income in which there are only two main prices functioning, one is the price of household’s labour and the other is the price of goods bought that can also produce profits for firms subsequently. The unstoppable appetite for buying unnecessary products alters the normal way of trade and creates a “novelty price” with which you cannot thwart the way you want more and more because something is new.
In Tim Jackson’s words, “we love new stuff psychologically”. This continuous consumption is also the one that changes the properties and workings of price mechanism, making it more complicated in sending signals to consumers and suppliers. For example, in the case of veblen goods, if the price is higher you buy more because you think it is more reputable like jewelleries. Aristotle also calls it an unnatural use of money that keeps money flowing not to buy needed stuff but to spend or even splurge unwisely.
In the other side of the argument, businesses rightly put forward the fact that they only can work when they earn proper money. In fact, the economy grows by a fast transaction and transmission of bank notes and that is what circulates the businesses particularly huge companies like Apple. They precisely mention the importance of profits, as this is what encourages them to go forward and produce more one their allocative efficiency has risen.
In this situation, there we encounter a great difficulty: Should we stop growing or should we grow in economy? This is a dilemma that Professor Tim Jackson calls it the dilemma of growth. Growth, especially when it is measured by GDP is not going to end anywhere. This is because as advertisement support and foster greater consumptions and companies expand dramatically they even become more greedy to make more profit and people become more interested in faster updates of goods or services. They however do not feel happy or satisfied because they buy not because of needs, but because of a violent appetite that escalates as they buy more. This is an aeroplane that does not land, it goes to infinity according to Kate Raworth’s words.
Now, what is the solution? How to stop this trend without harming the market mechanism? There are solutions set out by a lot of scientists like Dr. Henrietta Moore and other researchers. The one that I think may work well, is the reduction of materialism. Long we have thought that physical materials give a sense of fulfilment. If we gauge our satisfaction using material items we always depend on our money and so nobody will be happy as there is always someone having more wealth and nobody feels like that he is that person. If we get back to our immaterial gaiety, that does not depend on any factor at all, we always will feel satisfied and no harm will trouble businesses as we cut back to our normal spending over time, not overnight.
The way we can achieve the sense of self-satisfaction or a true innate prosperity is still being discussed in leading institutions and universities, and relates much more to psychology, philosophy and religious studies, however I tried to elaborate the economic side of the argument to make it clearer that the problem is structural and that we should all cut back to a better life, not by buying, but by stopping its excessive repetition.
