INSEAD Library

Includes bibliographical references and index

Digitized

Contents The Economics of Happiness The Economics of Happiness ... Acknowledgments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xi11 Foreword. by Herman Daly . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .xv Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xvii Chapter I : My Journey to Genuine Wealth . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . I Learning about natural capital and sustainability . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2 Encouraged by pioneering reports . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4 . Beginning the work in Canada . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8 Chapter 2: The Language of Wealth and Economics . . . . . . . . . . I 5 Whatiswealth? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15 What is value? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20 What does it mean to be genuine and have Genuine Wealth? ....... 21 What is an economy? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22 Chrematistics (money) or oikonomia (life) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .23 What does it mean to be competitive? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .- 2 5 . What is capital? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .-26 Life capital . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26 Chapter 3: What's Wrong with the Picture of Progress? . . . . . . .27 The Genuine Progress Indicator (GPI) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30 Making money. growing poorer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 34 TheAlbemaGPI . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39 Chapter 4: A Renaissance in Economics and Capitalism .......51 Economic ethics of ancient Israel . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5 1 China's xidokang philosophy of moderation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 53 The European Middle Ages: An age of moderation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 54 The birth of accounting: Luca Pacioli . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 55 Awakening the true soul of capitalism?. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .57 . Capitalism as a religion and spirit? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .61 Awayforward . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 64 .. Chapter 5 : The Genuine Wealth Model . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .65 Philosophical foundations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 66 A practical tool for measuring well-being . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .67 Examining our values. principles and virtues . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .67 What is the good life? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .68 . A taxonomy of needs. wants. wealth and poverty . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .69 Distinguishing between means and ends . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .71 The five capitals of Genuine Wealth . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7 4 Accounting for the five capitals of Genuine Wealth . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 77 The Genuine Wealth Assessment life-cycle. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 78 + Chapter 6: Personal Genuine Wealth . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 89 Conducting a Personal Genuine Wealth Assessment . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 89 Taking the Personal Genuine Wealth Survey . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 91 What the Inuit taught me about genuine wealth . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .94 Why not ask the children? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .97 Kate Kaemerle's story. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .98 . My own story of Genuine Wealth . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 105 Yoursto ry . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .'07 . Chapter 7: The Genuine Wealth of Communities and Nations . 109 Finding genuine wealth in Leduc. Alberta . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . I O T Leduc Genuine Well-being indicators and indices . . . . . . . . . . . . . . '14 What I learned from Leduc . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 123 The wisdom and genuine wealth of the Inuit of Nunavut . . . . . . . . . 124 Santa Monica: A sustainable city in the making . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .1-29 China's xiaokang society: An economy of moderation . . . . . . . . . . . . .132 Emilia Rornagna: An economy of cooperation. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .I34 '37 Bhutan's Gross National Happiness . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . A vision of an economy of Genuine Wealth for Canada . . . . . . . . . . . '40 Canadian Index of Well-being: Measuring what matters . . . . . . . . . . '45 Conclusion. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 146 Chapter 8: Genuine Wealth for Business and Organizations . . . 147 What is the purpose of an enterprise or business? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 148 Applying the Genuine Wealth model to business . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . I53 The future of business that builds Genuine Wealth . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 158 166 The cooperative business enterprise . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . BALLE: Business Alliance for Local Living Economies . . . . . . . . . . . 170 Ways forward . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 172 Chapter 9: Money and Genuine Wealth . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . I75 . The lights go on . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . i75 Our relationship with money . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . i79 What is money?. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 181 Why do we want money so badly? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 184 . How is money created?. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .184 . The role of the central bank in money creation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 190 The origins of usury: Charging interest on money . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 196 Towards genuine money and banking . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .198 Genuine Wealth banking and money . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 200 Chapter 10: The Economics of Happiness . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 215 The monetary value of happiness . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 216 Does money buy happiness? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .216 Does consuming more oflnature buy more happiness? . . . . . . . . . . . .222 Does more income buy more happiness? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .223 Can we ever have enough money? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .226 . Why the sudden interest in the economics of happiness?. . . . . . . . . . 226 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 229 . Glossary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .233 Epilogue Endnotes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 238 Bibliography . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 253 Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 258 About the Author . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 267 .