Introduction
No one argues that the current economic model has failed big time in creating a global economy that offers prosperity, sustainability and equity within societies and between countries. Thus, the current capitalist system not only created major social gap within a single society, but it also created greater disparities between the countries of the North and the countries of the South.
Not only that? But relying on growth without paying attention to its positive impact on life has made governments measure their successes by growth rates, even at the expense of environmental degradation and excessive exploitation of resources. Focusing on growth without measuring the rate at which societies feel prosperity and decent living has made wasting resources without real social benefit.
In order to create this desired growth, the wheel of the economy has become firmly attached to the necessity of urging consumers to consume more, for what they need and what they do not need. Actually, marketing and consumer behavior institutes and companies have undertaken the production, packaging, refinement and experimentation of technologies and approaches that create new needs and desires for customers, and establish for them a culture of transformed fashion, new brand, exemplary beauty, and other dreams that make them consume more, and they impatiently await the release of new versions.
The problem with excessive consumption is that resources are diminishing, and many of them are used to meet invented and fabricated needs by the fashion system and marketing institutions, and not to meet basic needs, such as balanced nutrition, fighting hunger, preventing diseases, accessing schools, valuing tangible and intangible heritage, and preserving on the local culture of solidarity and cooperation.
Rather, the development of middle classes in the southern countries and the dominance of consumer culture has increased the race towards using resources to acquire luxuries under social pressure and a forced drift towards fashion, cosmetics and clothing, cars, jewelry, and others.
If governments continue to target growth at all costs, and the mechanisms of capitalism continue to encourage customers to consume excessively, resources will disappear without meeting the basic needs of the world's population. Furthermore, environmental degradation resulting from the exploitation of resources in unsustainable ways will lead to successive collapses in the system, in addition to the effects of climate change that has destroyed livelihoods in many regions of the world. This means that consumption as the basis of the current economic model is an unsustainable system, and may cause the collapse of order and security as a result of the growth of wars and conflicts over resources that are gradually disappearing.
Thus, we are in dire need of a system that does not depend on growth at any cost, but rather a system that is built on the foundations of individuals’ sense of security and reassurance, good health, and self-reliance towards oneself, the local cultural group, and nature, and a sense of being satisfied with what meets basic needs, and to begin seriously the shift towards financial freedom and this can only be provided with the Blockchain technology and cryptocurrencies.
Conclusion
Sustainable growth alone is not enough to achieve a sense of prosperity! Happiness is not just a material thing. It draws from systems related to the sense of belonging, the culture of solidarity, and doing things that do not have a material or social interest...
Adopting a sustainable growth index, devising mechanisms to calculate the material conditions for a decent life, as well as actions carried out by individuals, which do not have a utilitarian or profitable nature, but have a specific cultural and societal meaning that is important to individuals and groups, and adopting modern ideas and technologies such as cryptocurrencies, will give us a clear picture about Prosperity in its deep and sustainable sense, which is the true goal of growth, and the only way to protect life on Earth from extinction.
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