My blogging pal Lou Grinzo from The Cost Of Energy emailed me as he was leaving for his family’s Christmas gathering. He wished me happy holidays and voiced some really nice appreciation for Diamond-Cut Life’s “conspicuously human take” on climate change issues. Lou’s phrase that particularly leapt out at me, though, was in reference to [...]
Entries Tagged as 'economy'
Alison Cassandra Barcelona
December 23rd, 2009 · 2 Comments · energy, global warming and climate change
Tags: Cassandra·coal·collapse·economy·Jared Diamond·Lou Grinzo·mythology·oil·sacrifice
About Furloughs And Household Finances
October 25th, 2009 · No Comments · community, lifestyle, money, work
Would you like a day off from work? Say, a Friday all to yourself, in which to do anything you’d like? The only catch is that you’re not paid for your day off. As an employee of the state of Oregon, I had my first furlough day last week. Like most of my coworkers, I [...]
The Inconvenient Truth of the Diamond-Cut Life
January 4th, 2008 · 3 Comments · lifestyle, sustainability, work
Bad news here for the advertising industry, but good news for human beings and all other species. Research from many countries shows that after people’s survival needs and some reasonable pleasure needs are met, consumption piled-higher-and-deeper does NOT create more happiness. Rich is not great. Greed is not cool. Working harder might be moving you backward.
Inconvenient, at least for 20th century notions of economic growth and GDP, but
Tags: carbon footprint·culture·economics·economy·environment·GDP·global warming·happiness·Jared Diamond·life·time management
Seeking A Diamond-Cut Life
January 2nd, 2008 · 1 Comment · simplicity, sustainability
I’m back after a break! Pulitzer prize winner Jared Diamond points out in the New York Times today that we in the U.S. are consuming 32 times more than the citizens of developing countries, and that that has to change because the earth’s resources are running out.
A little more surprisingly, he also says something I have been maintaining for years: our quality of life is not directly tied to our
Tags: carbon footprint·conservation·culture·economics·economy·environment·global warming·happiness·Jared Diamond·Juliet Schor·quality of life·social justice
Simplicity and its Implications
October 25th, 2007 · No Comments · lifestyle, simplicity
In the late 80’s I led a workshop on simple living at a conference on peace and social justice. This was at a Quaker church in my hometown of Whittier, California and two of my workshop attendees were an older couple with kind and careworn faces. As we all spoke of our experiences it became clear to me that this couple had been living lives of simplicity and conviction
