Association:Economic association,Communitybuilding
Associations (economic community building) In order to keep the economic organism in a healthy, viable state, a balance between consumption and investment activity, fair and equitable prices, a reasonable distribution of consumption, borrowing and gift money, decisions on goods to be developed and produced and the distribution of income are necessary. If this is not consciously regulated by people, but left arbitrarily to the alleged market forces, economic distortions and crises will occur, as has been the case in recent decades. On the other hand, such a task can also only be regulated in a decentralised rather than a centralised manner, because any form of planned economy restricts the individual's ability to develop and fails because of the complexity of the task. The diversity and scope of the economy require concrete decisions to be taken by people with the appropriate professional skills, as close to the real situation as possible. The decision-makers in these associations must be aware of the real conditions, problems and possible solutions on the ground, and people from the fields of production, trade (distribution) and consumption must be able to contribute their views in such a way that a common solution acceptable to all can be found. "The judgement that must be formed in economic life must be formed from immediate concreteness. And this can be done in no other way than that for certain areas, whose size results from the economic process, the associations are formed in which all three representations of what occurs in economic life are located equally from the most diverse branches: production, consumption and circulation", (B024, 31.7.1922). In the associations the areas of production, trade and consumption come together people who try to connect economic with moral thinking. "There is no other possibility than to build economic judgement not on theory but on living association, where the sentient judgements of people are now really effective, where from the association it can be fixed from the direct experiences how the value of something can be", (B024, 2.8.1922). It is just so if goods are only judged according to cost accounting aspects, then goods that are in the first stages of development will be disadvantaged, then creative work (e.g. research) will receive too little in return and this will have a lasting and above all long-term negative effect on economic development. Where market forces act uncontrolled, people in positions of more power and rights (ownership of land, companies, capital) will always be tempted to use them for personal advantage. To create a higher income for themselves. To distort prices in their favour (real estate prices, share-holder value). Where decisions are taken at supranational or state level, ideological delusion and incompetence can have disastrous effects on the economic sector. In individual economic processes, the egoism1 of the individual must be at work, but to keep an economic system alive, the egoism of the community must counteract this. So a look at the well-being of the community. It is therefore a sense of community that should be at work in the associations, that is capable of transforming the individual egoisms that are at work in daily economic life into a good for all. A community of people in economic life, who have acquired sensitivity and experience for the processes and who, in cooperation, pursue the goal of shaping economic processes for the good of people, nature and the world. It is a "... complementing each other, correcting each other so that the right circulation can take place in the economic process", (B024, 2.8.1922). There can be no selflessness in the exchange processes, in buying and selling, but selflessness must be active in the economic structure, in the contexts. A released monetary system Mammon causes that uncontrolled amounts of money lead to social, economic and mental damage. People who can decide this from their moral and professional competence would have the task here of constantly ensuring a balanced condition between the individual monetary spheres. Today there is far too much loan money on the stock exchanges. This would have to be reduced (old money must disappear) or moved into the gift sphere. For the association2 such people should therefore be recruited who can judge well to which people loan money and to which people gift money should be given, so that the distribution of capital favourable for the economic development is given, a monetary fair distribution! Very young consumption money that gets its value by giving it to people who create new goods from nature, money that is many years old is given as a gift to the spiritual realm. "... the one who lends money, do not let the money be lent to him in a senseless way, but he is connected with his association. This gives him the most reasonable way to lend and gives him the most reasonable way to give", (B024, 4.8.1922). It is necessary here to transfer from central banks organised by the State to banking institutions of the associations (B157, 5.8.1922). Today, production and logistics processes at all levels are consciously designed so that the availability of raw materials, goods routes and human capabilities and needs can come together in a meaningful way. In the question of how to handle money, price formation, income and the selection of goods to be produced, these conscious design skills are still being abandoned today in favour of "free" market forces. But it is precisely this conscious shaping that is the challenge and also the possible solution to today's economic, social and intellectual problems. As we have seen, the balance between economic work and intellectual activity is essential. Associations can intervene accordingly by distributing loan and gift money. "... when free mental work declines. That then too little is given, and they will see the connection from the fact that too little is given. " (B024, 29.7.1922). Today the spiritual life and the economic system is in an unhealthy state because of the too little gift money. We can "...achieve recovery through the associative being, by diverting capital into free spiritual institutes", (B024, 29.7.1922). This can be achieved by people who are directly involved in economic life and who can see the connections. "... the associative nature is that which alone can make the economic process healthy, because the economic process, viewed in the right way, nevertheless leads to the fact that it can also be directed in the right way." (B024, 29.7.1922). It does not help to make rigid concepts of what is going on in the economy. Rather, it helps you to come to a lively view, to come to the imagination. "However, we will never be able to establish a real economic science without moving on to pictorial ideas, without being able to imagine the individual economic detail processes in a pictorial way and to imagine them in such a way that we have something dynamic in the picture itself and know how such an economic detail process works if it is designed in one way or another", (B024, 2.8.1922).
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