On Money - John Wesley's Take

Gain all you can,
Save all you can,
Give all you can
~ John Wesley

I've had some interesting conversations this past week about voluntary simplicity, money, finances, the economy, and giving of ourselves to the larger world. As sometimes happens, this week I also ran across an article I had bookmarked a long time ago about Wesley's view on money. Charles Edward White published an article for Leadership magazine for the Winter 1987 edition. An adaption of that article can be found here: http://www.missionfrontiers.org/oldsite/1994/0910/so949.htm

While the article talks about Wesley's understanding of money, and his teachings upon money, it doesn't mention much about Wesley's greater work in alleviating dangerous working conditions, and the systemic problems that were keeping people poor. In this, the article is lacking in some of its context. None-the-less, I find this article to be inspiring and challenging, especially considering these views came from Wesley, one of the richest English preachers of his day.

Here is a brief synopsis of Wesley's teachings:
Wesley grew up poor, he even watched his father hauled off to debtors prison. But as a professor/lecturer at Cambridge, he found himself making 30 pounds a year. Yet, he found himself unable to give any money to the poor. This started a life of earning money, and giving most of it away. During his lifetime, he kept his living expenses as close to 28 pounds as possible, giving the surplus away. Consequently, when the time came that he made 192 pounds, he used 28 upon himself, and gave 92 away. Or the year that he made close to 1400 pounds, he lived on 30 and gave the rest away. When he died, he left his books, and change in his pockets and drawers.

Here are his views:
Gain all the money you can - but not at the expense of yourself (health - both spiritual, physical and environmental) or at the expense of others (dangerous working conditions, etc.).
Save all you can by living simply, for this allows you to ...
Give all you can. Wesley's understanding is that all money is God's to start with, we are merely the trustees.

He then instructed the Methodists to follow these four scriptural principles, which Wesley interpreted as follows:

1. Provide things needful for yourself and your family (I Tim. 5:8). The believer should make sure the family has "a sufficiency of plain, wholesome food to eat, and clean raiment to put on" as well as a place to live and enough to live on if something were to happen to the breadwinner.
2. "Having food and raiment, let us be therewith content" (I Tim. 6:8) . "Whoever has sufficient food to eat, and raiment to put on, with a place to lay his head, and something over, is rich," he said.
3. "Provide things honest in the sight of all men" (Rom. 12:17) and "Owe no man anything" (Rom. 13:8). Wesley said the next claim on a Christian's money is the creditors'. He adds that those who are in business for themselves need to have adequate tools, stock, or capital for the carrying on of that business.
4. "As we have therefore opportunity, let us do good unto all men, especially unto them who are of the household of faith" (Gal. 6:10). After the Christian has provided for the family, the creditors, and the business, the next obligation is to use any money that is left to meet the needs of others.*

But what about those things that don't quite fit in the above "rules," what then? Wesley provided a series of questions:

1. In spending this money, am I acting like I own it, or am I acting like the Lord's trustee?
2. What Scripture requires me to spend this money this way?
3. Can I offer up this purchase as a sacrifice to the Lord?
4. Will God reward me for this expenditure at the resurrection of the just?*

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*from the adapted article at: http://www.missionfrontiers.org/oldsite/1994/0910/so949.htm

A Book Review: Harlan Hubbard's Shantyboat

In 1944, Harlan (an artist and viola/violin player), and his new wife Anne (a librarian and cello player),  build a shantyboat on the shore of the Ohio River (at Brent, just downstream from Cincinnati) and drift down to the Gulf of Mexico.

I had no theories to prove. I merely wanted to try living by my own hands, independent as far as possible from a system of division of labor in which the participant loses most of the pleasure of making and growing things for himself. I wanted to bring in my own fuel and smell its sweet smoke as it burned on the hearth I mad made. I wanted to grow my own food, catch in the river, or forage after it. In short, I wanted to do as much as I could for myself, because I had already realized from partial experience the inexpressible joy of so doing (Hubbard, 38).

They spend two years after the construction learning their "apprenticeship" to river life, and growing a garden along the shore to stock up their provisions. Down the Ohio they go, stopping at Payne Hallow after a winter of drifting. Here they set about growing a large garden, fishing and bartering for eggs and milk during the spring, summer and fall before setting off down the river again. Little do they know at the time, that they will return to Payne Hallow and homestead there. The next spring, they stop at Brizzle's Bluff on the Cumberland River. Again a season is spent growing garden crops before setting out for another winter drifting, this time moving quickly to the Mississippi. Their next layover is at Natchez. Then the following winter they are off again, getting to New Orleans in March, 1950. The total distance is 1385 miles.
One of the interesting things about this voyage, and the book, is that Harlan never mentions the United States is fighting World War II, nor that the war ends, while they are drifting down the river. This story is told with delight, humor and an overriding sense of passion about living life. Lest you think they are a young couple, Harlan is 44 and Anne 41 when they marry. And, as Wendell Berry points out, this experience shapes their relationship to one another and the world around them. In some ways, their homesteading is a continuation of this way of life.
Many people have an idea that cruising, or shantyboating, costs lots of money. But it needn't. I'm not saying the life that the Hubbards lived on their shantyboat is for everyone, but I will say that their life provides a different way to live, one that is full of time for leisure as well as work. (For those familiar with the Nearing's books on the Good Life, you may find some similarities here).
By traveling every winter, the Hubbards were able to use the strength of the rivers' currents to move their boat/home. Their only other power was of a human kind (sweeps on the shantyboat, oars on the john boat) plus a few times in which they are towed a short distance. This allows them to grow/catch their own food, and by canning, keep it until they are able to grow more. For eggs and milk (and the like) they barter what they have for what they don't (i.e. catfish for milk and eggs). For heat, and other supplies, they use drift wood.
Harlan lived, as Berry points out, a life of faith: "What we need is at hand" (Berry, 93). Is this not truly seeing the world as a place of abundance?

How are we living? Are we living in ways that give us growth: in spirit, in character, in creativity, in accomplishment, in pleasure, in joy?
Here's to a New Year filled with this kind of growth!
Blessed Be
Rev. Joel

***
See Harlan Hubbard's Shantyboat: A River Way of Life. (University of Kentucky Press, 1953) and Wendell Berry's Harlan Hubbard: Life and Work. (University of Kentucky Press, 1990).
Or visit the website devoted to the Hubbards: Harlan Hubbard.com

"What’s the Economy for Anyway?" John de Graaf asks.

“What’s the Economy for Anyway?” John de Graaf

With an economic down turn to the economy, the United States trying to push more money into the economy (read that in terms of printing money), many citizens of France protesting the rise of the retirement age from 60 to 62, Britain reminding her citizens that their will need to be some serious cuts, one wonders how John de Graaf would respond after this article. Yet, it seems that the European countries are looking at what the cuts, etc. mean for them as a whole, while here in the USA we tend to reflect on what this means for us as individuals. The reality is that both systems are in trouble.

And I still think the question is worth asking:

What’s the Economy For Anyway?

Again, this article comes from the anthology Less Is More.

Originally this was first published in The New American Dream, "What's the Economy For Anyway?", or watch it on YouTube "What's the Economy For Anyway?". I’m merely posting tidbits/sound-bites to get you interested in reading the entire article.

When positing any alternative to the status quo, often the first question asked is “What will that do to the economy?” de Graaf asks if they really believe that the economy’s purpose is to achieve the grossest domestic product and allow the richest among us to multiply their treasures without limits?

But what happens if we frame the question in different terms, like those used by Gifford Pinochot (first chief of the US Forest Service) did a century ago: “The greatest good for the greatest number over the long run”?

After increasing social equality and greatly improving health and other quality-of-life measures (including major increases in leisure time) from World War II until the mid-1970s, the United States abruptly changed its economic trajectory.

“It will be a hard pill for many Americans to swallow," Business Week predicted in October, 1974, "the idea of doing with less so that big business can have more. Nothing that this nation or any other nation has done in modern history compares in difficulty with the selling job that must now be done to make people accept the new reality."

Emboldened by Richard Nixon’s landslide 1972 victory, extreme conservatives moved to reduce the responsibilities (and increase the wealth) of wealthy Americans, while cutting back on public services for the poor and average working Americans. These policies accelerated during the 1980’s and early 1990’s and are now enshrined in the “you’re on your ownership” attitude of the present federal policies.

Meanwhile, Western European nations took a different course, maintaining their social contracts and at least modestly improving their safety nets for the poor. Their provision of more public goods – health care, education, transportation, common space, etc. – supported by higher and more progressive taxation measures than in the United States reduced the need (or desire) of individuals to maximize their own incomes (pp. 236-7).

Productivity per worker hour: On average, in 1970 Western European workers were producing 65% as much as American workers. But by 2000, Western European workers was 95% of American workers.

Consumption of Goods and Services: Western European (measured in GDP per capita) remained close to where it was in 1970 – roughly 70% of that of Americans (year 2000).

Working hours: 1970 – European working hours were slightly longer than Americans, but by 2000 dropped to 80% of American working hours.

We could say that Europeans traded major portions of their productivity increases for free time instead of money, while Americans – consciously or otherwise – put all their gains into increasing their per capita GDP.

Pose the question, ‘What did that do to the economy?’ and the answer appears clear – Americans, with a much bigger GDP, are the obvious winners.

But ask instead, ‘What is the economy for anyway?’ and a different answer emerges. For most of the final quarter of the 20^th century, Europeans improved their quality of life relative to Americans in almost every measure (237-8).

Heath: The United States once ranked near the top in terms of overall health, Now the US rates below that of every other industrialized country, despite spending more on health care.

Equality: The US was near the median among industrialized countries in terms of economic equality in 1974, now has the widest gap between rich and poor.

Savings (a key indicator of security for many people): 1970 – American personal savings rates (10%) slightly higher than Europeans, “Last year” [2007?] Americans (-1.6%) were much lower than European EU members (12%).

Sustainability: “EU countries require only half the energy consumption per capita as that of Americans, while producing 70% as many goods and services. The average American has an ecological footprint (the productive land and water necessary to produce his or her lifestyle) of 24 acres; for Europeans, the average is 12 acres” (239).

Genuine Progress Indicator (an alternative to GDP that measures 24 quality-of-life indices): “shows a fairly consistent decline in well-being in the United States since a peak in 1973. Similar indices for Europe show consistent improvement in most areas of life, even if increases are sometimes slow or spotty” (239).

Economic Competitiveness: “According to the World Economic Forum, the United States ranks second in world economic competitiveness. So it’s possible to do things our way – reducing government, slashing taxes, cutting the safety net and widening the divide between rich and poor – and be competitive.

“But is it necessary? Consider that the other four most competitive nations are Finland (ranked first), Sweden, Denmark and Norway. In fact, European nations make up most of the top ten. All are far more globalized and far more subject to international competitive pressures than we [USA] are and have been for years. And all of them are far more egalitarian than the United States.

“Finland has, in fact, the smallest gap between the rich and poor of any nation. The Finnish social safety net is a generous one, and workers enjoy a great deal of leisure time – an average of 30 days of paid vacation. The story is similar in other European countries. Clearly, it is possible to have a more just and people-friendly economy and compete globally” (240-1).

____

Page numbers refer to Cecile Andrews and Wanda Urbanska’s Less is More: Embracing Simplicity for a Healthy Planet, a Caring Economy and Lasting Happiness. New Society Publishers, 2009.

“1978” or “Intergenerational Equity”

I was amazed to read that within in my own lifetime, and yet before my younger sisters were born, we as a human species crossed the threshold of the Earth’s sustainable yield by our consumption. The year was 1978. Prior to this date, when humans over consumed, we took away from the other species trying to survive upon the planet. After 1978, we started consuming other humans’ share, at the expense of future human generations. This figure is in part linked to the growth of the human population. However, the World Bank is actually predicting a slowing down of the human doubling rate, the first time this has happened since we humans reached a billion in numbers. Women in less industrialized nations are giving birth to four rather than six children (a drop from thirty years previously). While unsure as to the reasons behind this trend, demographers are now predicting, if all factors remain the same, a peak in the human population between 10 and 11 billion people by 2100.*

The Earth produces a tremendous amount of life each year. When unstressed, and unconsumed this life adds to the bioproductivity that can be used currently, and into future generation. When more is consumed than is produced, we wear down the Earth’s systems, leaving less for future generations. If these growth predictions are true, then in 2050 the earth will contain 9 billion people, and the $980 a year share of the world’s GNP will have shrunk to $650 and humanity will be overshooting the world’s carrying capacity by 88 percent.**

Of course, we humans could decide to address these issues and make the significant changes necessary …

The key to Intergenerational equity is passing down to the next generation (especially the yet unborn generation) the Earth with no degradation, or even more bioproductivity, reversing in the degradation process. To do so, we have to scale back our annual take on an already overworked system.

As Jim Merkel sums up: “In the 150 or so years since the Industrial Revolution, we’ve doubled the population 4 times and doubled the size of the global economy 20 times … Currently, humanity takes 20 percent more than is produced, thus wearing down the Earth’s systems. Might it be wise to scale back our annual take to help the overworked systems rebound? We can either err on the side of caution or gamble with our children’s future.”***

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* Jim Merkel Radical Simplicity: Small Footprints on the Finite Earth. (New Society Publishers, 2003.) 64.
** Ibid. 63.
***Ibid. 64. 65.

“Interspecies Equity” or “4.7 Acres”

All Creatures of our God and King,
Lift up your voice and with us sing,
O praise ye! Alleluia!
O brother sun with golden beam,
O sister moon with silver gleam!
O praise ye! Allelulia! Alleluia! Allelulia!

(Francis of Assisi, ca. 1225; trans William H. Draper, 1925, 

adapt. 1987)

Francis of Assisi was known for his love of all creation. So was Albert Schweitzer, who apparently had his wooden organ covered with cooper while serving as a doctor in Africa so that he didn’t have to poison, kill or injure the wood bores who were in the process of attacking it. I wonder, how anthropocentric a world view did either Francis or Schweitzer have?

Jim Merkel provides some thought-provoking details, especially if we long to follow in the just as radical today as it was then footsteps of Francis or Schwitzer.

Ecological Overshoot of the Human Economy, states that there are 28.2 billion acres of bioproductive land on Earth – the total surface area minus the deep oceans, deserts, icecaps and built-up land. When divided between six billion people, each person gets a 4.7-acre share – we’ll call this area each person’s “personal planetoid.” But this assumes that humanity uses the entire planet’s annual production. The question then becomes “How much of my 4.7-acre share do I want to use for myself and how much do I want to leave for other life forms?” You might think, “I want to share it all.” A generous thought. But the reality is, you need to consume to survive. And what you use is not available for the deer, rabbits, or coyotes. For example, assume I am fenced into a one-acre garden with one deer and we eat the plants almost as fast as they grow, but don’t deplete them. After 60 years, the land is still just as productive as it was when w entered. Generous me then invites a friend inside the fence. Now the plants can’t keep pace with our appetites, and the land becomes depleted. Renewable “resources,” or the planet’s “bioproductivity,” takes time to regenerate. They are only renewable if they’re consumed at a rate slower than their annual growth or yield.
With a mere 1.5 million of the estimated 7 to 25 million species identified worldwide, caution is in order. And, with the current extinction rate estimated at 100 to 1,000 time faster than the natural rate, humanity’s current idea of sharing nature is deeply challenging.*

As I will mention in a later blog, this is in part due to humanities consuming beyond the tipping point. We are no longer just consuming nature, we are consuming ourselves (see 1978 or Intergenerational Equity to come).

Remember too that the 4.7-acres is to deal with our complete footprint (carbon, waste, housing, etc). 

If a visual would help, an acre (4,840 square yards) is slightly smaller than a USA football field (5,330 square yards).

Conservation biology looks at the question of interspecies equity through the needs of entire ecosystems. “Reed F. Noss, a specialist in the field, has outlined four objectives that will maintain native biodiversity in perpetuity:

• Represent, in a system of protected areas, all native ecosystem types and serial stages across their natural range of variation.
• Maintain viable populations of all native species in natural patterns of abundance and distribution.
• Maintain ecological and evolutionary processes, such as disturbance regimes, hydrological processes, nutrient cycles, and biotic interactions, including predation.
• Design and manage the system to be responsive to short-term and long-term environmental change and to maintain the evolutionary potential of lineages.**

Noss further figures that to create such an arena where biodiversity and viability of species is preserved would require between 25 to 75 percent of the total land area in most regions would need to be put into reserves with buffer zones surrounding them.

To put this into perspective:

To maintain a minimum population of 1,000 animals would require 242 million acres for grizzly bears, 200 million acres for wolverines, and 100 million acres for wolves. Even the six-million-acre Adirondack Park, which contains the combined areas of Yosemite, Yellowstone, Olympic, and Grand Canyon National Parks struggled to support a reintroduction of lynx. … If the area outlined … was extensively restored, a 200 million acre (312,000 square mile) core area could be formed in New England and Canada. With a drastic reduction of roads and traffic, and a citizenry ready to co-exist with wildlife, these animals might make their way back down from Canada. Sound impossible? Living in British Columbia for seven years among grizzlies, cougars, and wolverines, I leaned that co-existing is not rocket science, not costly, and not even difficult. But it would take a redesign of the human environment and a willingness to change habits.***

Merkel points out that the real issue is one of Anthropocentrisms, in which we hold that humans are the measure of things. A Biocentric or Deep Ecology viewpoint might be needed if we were to truly change course.

I might also add, from a theological viewpoint, that anthropocentrism can be a hindrance in understanding the Divine.

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* Jim Merkel. Radical Simplicity: small footprints on a finite Earth. Gabriola Island, BC: New Society Publishers, 2003. 55–6, 56–7 .
** Ibid. 57. Merkel quotes Reed F. Noss. “The Wildlands Project: Land Conservation Strategy”, Wild Earth Special Issue (1993): pp.10-21.
***Ibid. 57, 58.

Interhuman Equity

Imagine a potluck dinner in which all 6 billion plus people of our planet attend, Jim Merkel invites. You are in line first. How much food do you take? After the meal, you go to gather the supplies you need for the year, again, how much do you take?

Let’s consider two hypothetical scenarios. After you green grass and blue sky dinner, the ten people at your table get a basket of money equal to ten sustainable, equitable shares of the world Gross National Product (GNP). To determine how much is in the basket, we first divide the total world GNP - $29,340 billion – by six billion people for a $4,900 share. But because the total economic activity of humanity overshoots the globe’s carrying capacity by 20 percent we adjust the share to $3,900. At this level of GNP, we still have humanity consuming the entire global bioproductivity. Let’s say we scale back total human impact in terms of GNP by 75 percent to make room for the millions of other species. Each person would now have an annual equitable share of the world GNP equal to $980. You begin to try to imagine living on $980 a year, gulp… and you freeze. Impossible!

The basket has $9,800, or 10 times the $980 equal shares. This money is laid out in bundles of 100 one-dollar bills. Now each draws a number from a hat. You draw first, and can take what you want. Everyone watches in silence. How much to you take?*

Merkel switches scenarios slightly. Now you can approach an ATM machine behind a curtain, with no societal pressures, you could take as much as you want, you’re first after all, and no one will know but you how much you took. Again, how much to you take?*

Merkel again posits these hard questions of global living in a remarkable way. So far we have been touching on the GNP, economics, and later he speaks of how much land is equitable for us humans to use. Not in terms of living on, but in terms of use: CO2 absorption, food production so that we can eat, etc. At the same time, he is asking us hard questions; he also gives us hope from the past. The western understanding of the way of relating to one another and the world hasn’t and isn’t the only way. He also gives inspiration.

Charles Gray, from Eugene, Oregon, author of Toward a Nonviolent Economics, developed the concept of World Equity Wage (WEW) and capped his wage at $3.14 an hour, and worked no more than 20 hours a week. His voluntary “deprivileging” was motivated by a goal of sharing the available work and wealth with humanity and restoring the environment. When we meet in 1995, he had already been living for 17 years on what he calculated to be the World Equity Budget (WEB), and averaged $1,190 in total annual living expenses from 1978 to 1993. He is a delightful, open-minded person and his book is an inspiration.

After 14 years of living on $5,000 per year (placing me amongst the wealthiest 17 percent of humanity), I know it would take a quantum redesign of my life and significantly reduced expectations of services to approach equity. I know it is hard in the context of an unsustainable culture, but every bit of societal level change, be it bike lanes, mixed zoning, or local organic markets will make the whole process easier.**

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* Jim Merkel Radical Simplicity: Small Footprints on the Finite Earth. (New Society Publishers, 2003. 58-60.
**Ibid. 61-2.