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The Real economy and the
equilibriums of the Future World
It is difficult to explain what the concept of Real Economy has to
do with the principle of Sustainable Development but in this article
I will try to explain the point of view. All of us living in
this slice of history are bombarded daily by news and economic
conjectures that more often than not, instead of clarifying, serve
only to disorientate. This aspect is by no means secondary.
Indeed, it represents something which must be clarified. If we
refer to a given space (local, national or international), we know
that the economy is based on both qualitative and quantitative
aspects. By economy - from the Greek οἴκος (oikos), "house",
also understood as "a good of the family", and νόμος (nomos), "norm"
or "law" – is meant both the use of scarce resources to best satisfy
individual and collective needs while containing expense, and a
system of organizing activities of this kind put into being by a
combination of people, organizations and institutions (the economic
system). Here we will deal with the aspect of the use of
resources as a means of satisfying human needs, resources that we
indeed know to be limited (renewable or nonrenewable). In fact,
it is the production of resources that interferes with the economy,
or indeed, as it is more correct to say, produces economy. If a
Country does not produce resources its economy will enter into a
crisis as its inhabitants, to be able to live, will need resources
that must necessarily be delivered from elsewhere. Such a country
will become poorer and poorer in a short time because the resources
have a cost (the price that we are prepared to pay for purchasing
them). The financial crisis has taught us that a certain type of
economy which is not based on real resources is in decline and
destined to die in a few short years or decades, with evident
political and economic repercussions. In fact, we know that
finance is the discipline that studies the processes with which
individuals, businesses, corporations, organizations and states
manage the monetary flow (collection, allocation and uses) over
time. Since the economy is defined as "the science that studies the
procedures for allocating limited resources among alternative uses,
with the aim of maximizing one’s own satisfaction", likewise finance
is "that science that studies the procedures for allocating money
among alternative uses, with the aim of maximizing one’s own
satisfaction." But it is here that the mechanism is jammed: the
enormous flow of finance produced by a historical economy (the
summation of the monetary equivalent of the resources produced until
now) has doctored, or if you prefer, doped the world Economic
System, based not on the real availability of resources but on the
effect of the production, over long periods, of the finances
derived. Such an economic aberration is so unreal that even a
common person can not help but notice it when he is bombarded by
financial Indexes like NASDAQ, MIBTEL, Dow Jones, PIL, etc., which
belong much more to financial indexes that to economic indexes.
Many countries have undergone a crisis, dragging down the whole
planetary economy through a domino effect, because, either through
political incapability or through the availability and productive
ability of the resources, they have become entangled due to
economies which are not based on a real and concrete evaluation of
their own resources. We can say that the old and never
negligible principle of the economic budget has been totally (and
often purposely) neglected also by famous economists or by the
politicians responsible. No state and therefore no healthy
economy can neglect the concept of balancing resources. A country
that consumes more resources than those it is able to produce is
destined sooner or later to fail, and with it its citizens,
notwithstanding all the financial indexes. But resources are not
unlimited and it is their exhaustion (or the ability to renew them)
that has taught us that the New Economy can have a Real value if we
are able to produce as much as the necessities and the customs of a
population require. The examples of oil and of many extracted
materials are emblematic of the economic immorality of many states
(also in Europe, above all Italy). For a certain period the
sudden economic development of many Countries has been linked to the
availability of these products, which have produced a fictitious
wealth, because they speeded up the processes that were at the base
of the ability to produce resources. Their methodical, and clearly
prolonged, use has slowly impoverished the financial resources of
these Countries. But if resources are limited and the ability to
produce them not so sure and evident, the Real economy of a Country
is its ability to produce resources without affecting internal
finances (public or private). Such a concept is the same as saying
that the real economy is based on the ability to create an "Internal
Reservoir" where the resource budget is always balanced. The
renewability of resources is therefore not only the First Principle
of the Real economy but also the Constitution of the liberty of a
Population. States without a real Economy cannot be free because
they are subordinate and dependant on other strong Economies. These
Strong Economies, however, will increasingly be those Economies
linked to Countries which are able to have a positive balance in
their ability to produce Renewable Resources. Therefore the message
is that the power of future States, once the economy based on
Finance (deteriorated Capitalism) has collapsed, will be linked to
the ability to create a Real Economy.
Guido Bissanti
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