I. SETTING THE LIMITS
Never does man come to the end of his search into the nature expecting to
gain more things to fill his ever-wanting storehouse. From the outset, he
is doomed to face a world that tends to reduce his ability as he
recognizes his hands are too short and his feet are too slow to catch up
the swift flow of existence. Nature endows him with a body as an effective
instrument to enjoy the taste of life, but at the same time it burdens him
with a heavy load. To enjoy life he has to feed the body. Hunger and
thirst ceaselessly urge him to move. However, never satisfactorily is
hunger relieved and thirst quenched down. Now he finds himself facing a
reality that drives him to make prompt decision. Drink up your fill before
the rivulet runs dry. He had to choose this one and forgo the others,
either engaged in work or taking leisure. Working or leisure, the world
appears before him with its limitation in space and time. Somehow, it
draws a curve the two ends of which would set the fragment of existence,
the very instant of life. Every instant is marked with the rising and
falling of things, their appearance and disappearance. The continuity of
instant after instant constitutes the duration of life. That where on the
curve man should pin down his decision to optimize his gain over loss
depends on his store of knowledge about the world around him. Nature
appears to offer him, to the point of his observation, infinite resources
that would ever satisfy his wants. Nevertheless, being sandwiched between
time and space, he could not move at will to get what he wanted at
anytime. Resources appear to be infinite to his vision but scarce within
his reach. What he should do is to learn how to reasonably allocate the
resources.
Before learning how to do this, he is suggested to learn what to know.
He is convinced to know by whom this world was created, and how it was
created. Otherwise, human existence is supposedly meaningless; life and
death are by incident, irrationally and aimlessly. If the Bible did not
contain the book of Genesis, people would not know what the face of the
world might have been as they think of today, better or rather worse.
Nevertheless, such a question has been set aside by Buddhists.
Once upon a time, a young monk named Māluṅkya (CūḷaMāluṇkya-sutta, M.
i. 426ff.) thought he had rather challenged the Blessed-One to see if He
knew or knew not whether the world is or is not eternal; it is or is not
infinite; whether soul and body are identical; and so on. Let the
Blessed-One declare He knows if in fact He knows. And let the Blessed-One
declare He knows not if in fact He knows not. Otherwise, the young monk
would deny the Buddha and return to his worldly life. It is better to
conduct a worldly life enjoying sensual pleasures like every other
ordinary person than to observe ascetic disciplines without having answer
to the questions concerning the origin and nature of the world.
Much against his expectation was the Buddha’s negative answer. On this
very account, some might have accused Buddha of trying to
unsophisticatedly evade the problem; many others attributed to Him a
detestable agnosticism.
Instead of explaining how the world was created and what it is for, the
Buddha admonished the young ascetic not to waste his time about the
questions beyond the reach of human knowledge but rather to concentrate
his effort to know his actual conditions. He gave a smile. A man was hit
with a poisonous arrow. Time was not generous to him with asking about
where the arrow came from, what kind of wood it was made of, and who had
shot it. The most pressing importance for him to do first of all was to
plug out the poisonous arrow, treat the wound. Survival first, the rest
would be accomplished later.
As your eyes have yet to be amplified with a sophisticated tool such as
a telescope, don’t be anxious to locate the orbit of Pluto’s satellite. In
addition, a telescope cannot be fabricated with mere human labor, ignoring
other materials, which require some amount of capital to produce.
Although there is a saying that people do not live merely with bread,
there is a truth that on the edge of starvation he might have died before
he could learn to know how a bicycle was made. Think of the majority of
people in the poorest country of the world. Trying to teach them how the
universe has expanded, from the Big Bang or anything else, rather than
trying to teach them how to get food successfully, not only makes fun of
the problem but also exposes the outrageous aspect of human life.
In a Sutta, (Kuṭadanta-sutta, D. i, p. 133.) while explaining to a
brahmanic priest the true meaning of, and how to celebrate, a great
sacrifice, an important ceremony of the Brahmanic religion then, the
Buddha relates in disguise a story of the past. Once, a king intended to
hold a great sacrifice for the benefit of his kingdom. He consulted the
highest priest. The latter gave him a homily on what to do first. The
kingdom was then suffering poverty and unrest, rife with robbers and
rebels. If His Majesty was thinking about raising tax and crushing those
robbers and rebels by force and death punishment, a number of them would
be still at large and go on devastating the kingdom. Yet there was an
effective measure to improve the situation. To those engaged in
agriculture and husbandry, supply them with seed. To those apt to do
commerce, supply them with capital to invest. To those tending to public
servants, supply them with wages. Should people be employed, robbery and
rebellion would be reduced. As long as the national treasure is abundant,
people live in prosperity, and a great sacrifice can be expected.
As we have seen, economic growth is the basis for social order and
peace, hence its development including the expansion of religious
practice. This aspect in the Buddha’s teaching was very often neglected,
and the emphasis, if not excluded, was laid upon the ethical behavior.
Ethical perfection is, of course, the lofty goal of Buddhist practice, but
meditation can never be practiced by those who are starved out.(Loon,
Louis van, "Why the Buddha did not Preach to a Hungry Man: Buddhist
Reflections on Affluence and Poverty," Bodhi Leaves No. 121, Buddhist
Publication Society, Kandy, 1990.) This is implied in a Buddha’s saying:
“All sentient beings are subsisting on food.” (Saṅgīti-sutta, D. iii, p.
211: sabbe sattā āhāraṭṭhitikā.) In modern view, this can be considered as
an economic background of Buddhism.
II. WHAT TO PRODUCE: THE DOCTRINE OF NUTRIMENT
Thus, there must be a Buddhist economics.(Cf. E.F. Schumaker: Small is
Beautiful, HarperPerennial, 1989, p. 56; and Samuel Cameron: The economics
of sin: Rational Choice Or No Choice at All? (Edward Elgar, p. 60): “The
first overt attempt by Schumacher, in 1968, to claim that there was such a
thing as “Buddhist economics” began with a startling claim: ‘Right
Livelihood is one of the requirements of the Buddhist’s Noble Eightfold
Path. It is clear therefore, that there must be such a thing as Buddhist
Economics’ [Daly (1973, p. 241)]. Indeed there must be if one were to go
along with the position of Elster quoted earlier in this chapter. Many
would not go that way and might stake the claim that simply stating the
propositions of Buddhism as they apply to the economic sphere of life does
not a body of economic thought make.”)
It is not only of the kind that teaches how man should dhammically,
that is, legally and honestly, earn his living, but it also teaches how he
could make use of his gains for the benefit of his own and others.
Accordingly, it does not neglect the problem of production and
consumption.
It is commonplace to say the modern economics is trying to tackle the
problems of what, how and for whom to produce. Much is focused on the
production of goods, or to name it distinctively, goods and services.
These are but a general denomination of a variety of articles produced for
sale or for use.
Whether it is essential of economic studies or not, it is out of
controversy that what man in the first place and ultimately tends to
produce is the need for life, and what gives him satisfaction. Economics
may study how to optimally allocate scare resources and how markets work
for the allocation, and whatever definitions there may be, if and only if
human living exists.
Man, this complicated and sophisticated composition of matter and
spirit as commonly assumed, is the first motive and final cause of every
human activities. Practically, man needs material food for the sustenance
of his physical body and spiritual food, so to say, for his spiritual
development. Generally speaking, the modern economics has as its object
the contemporary man, the living organism that has reached its relatively
high, but, of course, not final evolution as it is at the present day.
However advanced may be his level throughout his history of evolution, man
likely started his life in embryo, which at the very first moment of
conception is but a lump of matter. The question if human life begins with
embryo is the controversial issue among religions and ethics, economics
unconcerned. Normally economists include this first stage of human life in
the first period in the two period model of economy. For our particular
purpose, we will deal with embryo and foetus as independent consumer.
Basically man needs material food for his material life. This begins at
the first moment of conception until ending up in death. Food needed in
this condition of nutrition is of matter, which is composed of primary
elements universally found in all other varieties of matter. Because at
the first period of his life man was not capable of production, so he
lived on endowment economy. Economically he was then borrower. What he had
borrowed yesterday he had to pay today and what is done to day will be
retributed tomorrow: that is the law of action and its retribution based
upon the doctrine of karma. Man is a debtor of his own and of others in
the past and present. What should be taken in consideration in this regard
is not merely quantitative but qualitative as well.
We suppose the doctrine of karma is well known to those who have
acquired a basic knowledge of Buddhism, so it is not necessary to be dealt
with in details here. Anyhow, it suggests that the problem of consumption
and savings can be treated on the foundation of the doctrine of karma.
III. FOR WHOM TO PRODUCE: LEVELS OF EXISTENCE
Now, the question is set up: what does human being need for its
subsistence and development? In the first place, as a sentient being it
merely needs physical food. In its evolution, as an animal it needs one
more kind of food: contact food. To the higher level of existence, as a
human being it needs all four kinds of food: physical food, contact food,
mental food and consciousness food. It is said in Sutta: “There are these
four kinds of food for the subsistence of beings who have taken birth or
for the support of those in search of a place to be born. Which four?
Physical food, gross or refined; contact as the second, mind and will the
third, and consciousness the fourth.”(Sannādiṭṭhi-suttaṃ, M. I, p. 47:
Cattārome, āvuso, āhārā bhūtānaṃ vā sattānaṃ ṭhitiyā, sambhavesīnaṃ vā
anuggahāya. Katame cattāro? Kabaḷīkāro āhāro oḷāriko vā sukhumo vā, phasso
dutiyo, manosañcetanā tatiyā, viññāṇaṃ catutthaṃ.
It is inspired by L. von Mises (Human Action, the Schola)
If we examine the life of a sentient being from its first moment of
conception to the last point as death, its development can be traced back
from the time immemorial when the first living came about to the world
until now. Within a limited span of life, a living being is marked with
its first existence as a mere germ of physical material. It is
differentiated from the other class of nonliving being by the kind of
material of which it is composed. Ultimately primary elements are
intangible, invisible. The differentiation of matter is due to the way in
which elements are distributed, arranged in the construction of organism.
In the first stage, supplied with physical nutriment, the germ of
physical material expands in proportion to the amount of food consumed at
a rate of growth. This process goes on while sensory organs gradually
develop. Up to a definite stage mind appears and engages in actions like a
speculator. ( It is inspired by L. von Mises (Human Action, the Scholar’s
Editon, p. 58): “action necessarily always aims at future and therefore
uncertain conditions and thus is always speculation.”) It accumulates data
with the cooperation of sensory organs, processes them, and converts them
into information. Based on this information, perception is brought to
operation. The latter gathers all information thus given to construct a
world that is conceived as reflecting the true reality. Nevertheless, the
image of the world is not taken once forever as a photograph. It ever
changes in quantity as well as in quality as sensory organs develop in
stable condition and operate more effectively in response to the demand of
mind and will. The image of the world is stored up as a positive ground on
which mind ascertains its existence and deploys its activities.
In every stage of development, consciousness is given rise immediately
as soon as there is the interaction of external object and internal
sensory organ. But on the lower level, the appearance of consciousness is
too dim to collect knowledge of the world. On this level, consciousness is
merely a blind will of subsistence.
As sensory organs reach their maturity, the image of the world is
reflected clearer and more distinctively, and the knowledge about it is
more rational, more synthetic. On the higher degree of this progression,
consciousness develops to self-consciousness, recognizing the existence of
the outer world as well as the existence of its self. Consciousness as the
fourth kind of food is needed for this stage of evolution.
Thus, the evolution of beings depends on what kind of food they
consume. On the lowest level of existence, a living being is hardly
different from the vegetative state of life, and only the physical food is
needed. On a much higher level, in which a living being is endowed in
addition with the least sensory organs sufficient to detect the danger
from the external world, contact food is added. This evolution can be
tracked in the development of an animal, including a human being, from the
very first moment of conception to the instant when it is brought to
daylight. From then onward, for some species of animal the process of
evolution comes to a stop. Even to certain human beings whose sensory
organs are fully endowed, but for some unknown reason their mind cannot
reach beyond the sphere of animal.
Mental development depends on the accumulation of experiences. If the
processing of accumulation fails, the functioning of sensory organs yields
no good effect on mind. This means that facts as mental food have not been
supplied sufficiently, or the structure has refused this kind of food. The
third kind of food could be called food for thought. It is converted into
kind of energy, which makes the mental organization work, and consequently
the social structure is motivated and the civilization of mankind is
engendered. Food for civilization to be kept going and developing is
consciousness.
What to produce is the first concern of economics. Goods and services
are produced to satisfied human wants. Among other things having been
created by God, the “dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl
of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth” was
given to the first man. This means since the time of Genesis, the material
production, that is, to produce physical food including clothing, and
shelter, and the like, was marked as the main occupation of human
livelihood.
According to Buddhist tradition, as related in the Aggañña-sutta, (D.
iii, p. 88.) in the beginning human being collected natural resources for
his food and clothing, “lived on a kind of naturally ripened uncooked
rice.” We can imagine that natural resources mentioned here collected by
the primitive men was nonstorable, (Cf. David Aldolfatto: Macroeconomic
Theory and Policy (Preliminary draft), p. 211) “What they collect in the
evening for evening meal will growth again and ripen in the morning; what
they collect in the morning for morning meal will growth again and ripen
in the evening.” (ibid. ) This was due partly to his lack of technology
and most essentially due to his lack of the idea of accumulation. It is
only up to a later definite stage of evolution that human being began to
engender in his mind this idea: “Why should I collect rice in the evening
for evening meal and in the morning for morning meal? I would rather
collect it once for two days.” And he did it. Soon this goaded others into
outdoing him. Thus the idea of accumulation entailed speculation.(Murray
N. Rothbart (Man, Economy and State, the Scholar’s edition, p. 7): “All
his actions are of necessity speculations based on his judgment of the
course of future events.”) Eventually struggle among rivals within
community was aroused and the primitive society of mankind started a new
turn engaged into social conflict.
It is easy to recognize the primitive man mentioned in the above
quotation from Sutta is far from the real one. But in terms of economical
treaty it might serve as a simple economic agent with which a number of
models, agent-based models for example, can be built for the convenience
of economic analysis.
It is a matter of common sense to take the primitive accumulation as
being activated by human laziness. According to the Buddhist theory of
nutriment it was due to the growth of the demand for food compatible with
the development of human organs. In the first stage of human living,
fragmentedly physical food was needed, collaboratively consumed by organs
of olfaction, gustation and tactition. In grown-ups, sight and hearing
need enhancing for their ability to perceive the external world, so more
kinds of food must be supplied in addition. As mind developed sufficiently
to make decisions of what and how was to be collected for its agent’s
benefit, man now was faced with the limitation of time. He had to allocate
his time optimally between labor and leisure. He had to learn how to make
choices.(To quote L. von Mises (Human Action, the Scholar’s edition, p.
3): “The general theory of choice and preferences goes far beyond the
horizon which encompssed the scope of econimic pronlems as circumscribed
by the econimists from Cantillon, Hume and Adam Smith down to John Stuart
Mill.”) In this regard we involve both consumption and idleness in the
leisure time. Consumption is meant to signify enjoyment of goods and
services produced by man’s labor to satisfy his wants, while idleness
implies enjoyment of those given by nature. To higher levels of evolution,
leisure time is thoroughly dedicated to enjoyment of four kinds of food.
Bread, and anything of the kind, is consumed for sustaining biological
body and the stable state of inner organism. Seeing and hearing,
sightseeing and listening to music for instance, serve as contact food for
the accumulation of experiences hence enhancing the ability of judgment
and making choices between the better and the worse. The thinking and
willing are fed with mental food, the third kind, by virtue of which human
action is taken off aiming at the ultimate end of his destination.
Moreover, his future depends on what he is doing in the present.
Economically speaking he must learn how to allocate resources across time:
how much time for work and consumption he should optimally decide on today
so that he would live a life of contentment tomorrow. This lifetime budget
constraint is drawn on the substratum of life, that is, the continuum of
consciousness, without which no future time is conceived. The latter is
irrigated with food termed as consciousness which is marked with the
notion of self.
When the sensory organs reach their maturity for sensation and
perception, the balance of food consumption, so far having been tilted to
the physical one, now begins to lean toward the others, the first being
contact. The enjoyment of seeing and hearing in leisure time passively
impressed by nature is no longer sufficient to satisfy the wants of
accumulation of experiences as energy resources for motivating mental
structure to work. Materials serving as contact food must be produced as
items of goods. All the same, physical food needed for sustaining
biological body cannot be reduced. He has, therefore, either to double
working time or improve his skill in production. The primitive man
mentioned in the above-cited Sutta doubled his product, but there is no
hint of how he had managed to do so. It makes sense to suppose that along
with the full-fledged development of sensory organs he had made a
considerable progress in acquiring technological knowledge which enabled
him to increase the quantity of his product.
IV. HOW TO PRODUCE
Though mystified with the form of legend related in sort of vernacular by
the Sutta, some economic models can in fact be constructed based on the
primitive agent. He had as his counterpart in another system of economy
Robinson Crusoe (Cf. Murray N. Rothbarth: Man, Economy and State,
Scholar’s Editon, p. 47 ff.) who started his living on a deserted island
where in his early days of making a living he was endowed merely with his
own labor using his hands and what given by nature circumscribed by his
environment. Goods produced by the mix of labor and nature-given elements
are naturally nonstorable. Without having aid of any other tools than his
own hands, he had to spend most of his time for productivity. At the same
time, he also needed a shelter to protect him from danger and damage
likely engendered by environment. Within limited total hours of day, even
if rationally and proportionally divided between working and leisure – of
course he needed a rest or recreation after having toiled –, he was forced
to reduce the hours spent on food collection as to spend on building a
hut. Unconsciously he constructed in mind the production possibilities
frontier which allocates his scarce resources optimally.
The metaphor of Robinson Crusoe enables us to reason out the increase
in productivity by the primitive man – doubling the quantity of rice
collected sufficient for two days consumption instead of just one day.
Given the production function, other things are held constant – land, and
labor in the present context remains unchanged–, a change in technology
will alter the output.
In this connection, based on Buddhist theory of four kinds of food, the
demand for consumption goods as physical food – supposed in the long-run
economy – when reaching the last unit of its marginal utility will be held
constant over a period of time and then fall down along with the decay of
human life which is subject to the law of the material world. The other
three, in the first place fundamentally considered as mere complements to
physical food, will be diminished as the body, which they have as support,
decays. But in the ultimate sense, contact is meant to signify the
threefold combination of consciousness as subject, its corresponding
object and sensory organs as its support. Accordingly, whenever
consciousness exists contact is currently working. In the material world,
sensory organs are full-fledged only at a definite stage after sentient
being was given birth. On account of this, their development is subject to
the physical law, and their activity will fade as their support is falling
into decay. If the support is unsteady, the structure of mind will be
unstable and the activity of consciousness is weakening. Nevertheless, the
state of sense contact could be sublimated by the appropriate practice of
which meditation is the most effective. Just as sanitary food is
beneficial for the health of body, aesthetic works as contact food – food
for sight such as paintings and food for hearing such as music and the
like – are helpful to the soundness of mind. Relying on the soundness of
mind, mental structure operates in an equilibrium state to absorb more
sublimate food supplied through sensory organs and converts it into
information. Greed, hatred, delusion are noxious food for mind and
information converted from data detained with these defilements will form
false judgments and give a distorted image of the world.
Modern economics by definition yet controversial is dealing with the
production of goods and services to satisfy human wants in terms of
material resources. Human wants, however, are unlimited, and natural
resources are exhaustible; he is, therefore, permanently facing the
problems of scarcity. (L.W. Mises (Human Action, 263): “The economists
were and are still today confronted with the superstitious belief that the
scarcity of factors of production could be brushed away, either entirely
or at least to some extent, by increasing the amount of money in
circulation and by credit expansion.”)
According to Buddhist psychological view, living being is a substrum
(upādāna) on which mind and body are supported, with which and by means of
which fuel for life and action is supplied. Terminologically, this fuel is
named as taṇhā – craving or thirst or hunger for existence. Directed by
the conception of a self and subject to a world that is perpetually
inclined to decay, a living being is depressed by the thirst for fuel to
light up its existence and the expectation of the moment of life to come.
(Canonical definition of taṇhā (craving, thirst for existence): “That
which is leading to future existence, associated with desire and pleasure,
delighted with expectation of becoming so and so, is taṇhā).” (Cf. S. iii.
p. 26)) Being conscious of living is having a mind in becoming, expecting
to get a more satisfactory state of affairs against the current situation
which is ever marked with uneasiness.(The idea can be traced back to L. W.
Mises (Human Action, p. 878): “Within the universe the existence of which
our reason cannot explain, analyze, or conceive, there is a narrow field
left within which man is capable of removing uneasiness to some extent.”)
Nevertheless, under the spell of the law of impermanence, spurred by the
thirst for life, man incessantly runs like a thirty horse in moor after a
mirage he thinks a stream of water. The more it is seen just a distance,
the farther it appears to move away. Never would the thirst be satisfied.
This urges man to act more, to move forward to look for further
satisfaction. But limited by environment and the biological nature of his
body in addition to the scarcity of resources, man never reaches the end
of his satisfaction.
In the story of the primitive man as mentioned above, it is said that
as people vied with each other for gathering rice to store up for the
future consumption, the so-called naturally ripened uncooked rice
disappeared and a new kind of rice that required man’s labor to produce
replaced it. In the present context, it is understandable that his double
collection of rice was not simply due to his want of having more time for
tomorrow’s leisure, rather in fact it is meant to signify a primitive act
of saving against an uncertain future, for nobody knew for sure what would
happen to him or to his environment. Because he could not reduce the
quantity of goods currently consumed such as food and housing and the
like, he had to increase product. In comparison with the situation of
Robinson Crusoe as much preferred by economists, in which all that he
could get in hands were elements given by nature, but no tools were
available other than his own labor to produce things he needed to satisfy
his even few wants, he was forced to make a choice of either consuming to
his fill all he had gotten today or reducing a portion as saving for
tomorrow; in the case of the primitive man, saving was not made by
reducing today consumption for tomorrow use, but increasing the quantity
of output by improving his productivity. In the present context, it is
acceptable that in Buddhist view as stated in the above-cited Sutta that
originally, before any model of economy could be imagined, when facing the
limitation of environment, and the scarcity of external means to satisfy
his wants, man saw the increase in product as his best choice. The
creation of mankind is not once forever; but is an evolution instead,
ranging from microbiology to as human being.
Another detail in the Sutta is worth notice. The concurrence of
speculation caused the disappearance of the primordial food, originating
the scarcity which required men much more labor to tackle. This is the
crucial point which is easily overlooked in the Buddhist view on the
approach to the problem of scarcity. As we have seen, although there is no
explicit explanation on the part of the Sutta as cited above, its
implication is clear enough for us to recognize the fact that as mankind
has made progress to a higher level in his evolution here possibly
embodied in a lifetime wants have increased while material resources have
remained as they have been, and man has had to develop his technological
knowledge to increase production to meet quantity demanded.
The corollary proposition that follows is that material consumption has
its marginal utility, but human wants compatible with far higher evolution
have no limit, therefore human must manage to reduce working time for
increasing material goods so that more time for feeding mental structure
and consciousness stratum may be spared. As a logical consequence, it is
not the mere richness of material quantity which may be valued to some
extent as economic growth, but the quality of spiritual consumption
supplied with food for mental structure and consciousness stratum that
demonstrates the social progress and the rise in standard of living. This
does not mean, however, material production should be neglected; in
contrast, it must give support to spiritual consumption. Accordingly,
material growth must be in proportion with spiritual development.
As a matter of fact, in dealing with the problem of scarcity, it is not
correct to state as some economists do that Buddhist approach is “to alter
the nature and level of wants… St. Francis of Assisi and Buddhist monks
shared a desire for a more meaningful life by reducing wants or desires
for material possessions. In the secular, industrialized world, this
approach is not often mentioned.” (For example, R. Larry Reynolds:
Alternative Microeconomics, Electronic Text; p. 14. For further quotation,
L. W. Mises (Human Action, p. 880): “It is neither more nor less rational
to aim at riches like Croesus than to aim at poverty like a Buddhist
monk.”)
Nevertheless, the criticism is not ungrounded. Evidence for its
justification can be found in the historical fact that for many centuries
most of countries in Asia under influence of Buddhism failed to eradicate
poverty and fell behind in comparison with the West. Buddhism, judged on
the background of its assumedly pessimistic view of life, was likely to
blame for the Asian backwardness.(Anyhow, Shinichi Inoue was able to prove
the economic success under the reign of Emperor of Ancient India, and
Prince Shotoku of Japan. Shinichi Inoue: Putting Buddhism to Work. A Book
Review, Buddhanet Magazine Articles.
http://www.buddhanet.net/mag_text.htm.) That “they can model their
economic development plans in accordance with modern economics” (E. F.
Schumacher: “Buddhist economics”, Small is Beautiful, HarperPerennial
(1989), p.56.) is not apt to justify their failure, rather than to
emphasize that “the destiny of modern civilization as developed by the
white peoples in the last two hundred years is inseparably linked with the
fate of economic science.” ( L. W. Mises, ibid. p. 10.) Needless to say,
that “economic science” is modelled on the frame of western mentality.
Notwithstanding the material achievement as currently seen in the West
since the time of colonialism up to today antiterrorist war, the western
civilization somehow proved its superiority over the eastern economic
behavior. Its technological progress has improved the standard of living.
However, this does not mean people are happier. Instead, the amazing
achievement of science and technology is pushing human kind to the brink
of mass destruction. (It suffices in this consideration to quote
Wickramasanghe: “Although advancement of technology and ensuing so called
socio-economic progress has raised the level of material comforts to some,
majority of the people, particularly living in the third world, have been
overlooked. To some people life has become more difficult. Risk to life is
getting more and more increasing day by day. Environment has been
destroyed to the extent of making healthy living practically impossible.
Wars and civil commotions are increasing than ever before.” http://www.
appropriateeconomics.org/ materials/ people_friendly_
economic_development.html.)
V. PRODUCTION AND CONSUMPTION
To live means exist and become. Existence, firstly biological one on which
mental structure operates, is sustained with external materials given by
nature. It is due to the will for existence that urges living beings to
act as to make a living. It is a chain of ever changing events, prone to
change and become something other than its current state, for better or
for worse. Being perpetually threatened by the danger inherent in
surroundings, conscious of its power to act circumscribed by its own body,
facing a scarcity of external factors on which its satisfaction depends, a
living organism evolves into a structure suitable for accumulation of past
events as food for will and thought to form the expectation of a better
future, and to judge and make choice of what is good and helpful.
Dealing with an unknown and uncertain future, man proceeds to
speculation, accumulating as much as possible whatsoever within his reach.
Things to be stored for future use require a minimum quantity and
preferable quality. Man is not content merely with gifts gratuitously
dispensed by nature; he is apt to re-make them so that they could be
suitable for his today consumption and accumulation for tomorrow. Thus, to
live, in a sense, is to act. Action implies production.
Among other definitions of economics, I would like to refer to one that
would seem fit for contemporary capitalism as it states “economics as a
science that studies the production of wealth under a system of division
of labor…” (George Reisman: Capitalism (online), p. 16.) In this
definition the importance is attached to the production of wealth, for
wealth in the present context is the accumulation of all material goods
produced by man’s labor capable of satisfying to some extent human needs.
Moreover, it is wealth that enhances one’s position and authority in
social relations.
In a Sutta, (Cakkavattī-suttam, D.iii. 75: asītavassasahassāyukesu,
bhikkhave, manussesu tāyo ābādhā bhavissanti, icchā, anasanaṃ, jarā. M.
ii. p. 180.) it is stated that in ancient time, or in the era when
people reach the legendary highest development, there were only three
varieties of need: desire, hunger and old age. As time elapsed, when human
society was getting into fierce conflict, more varieties of need appeared.
This statement gives a general view on the evolution of mankind, from the
simple form of life to the complicated one. The notion of wealth is
conceived as human beings are conscious of their existence as a self that
acts as a master over its surroundings. According to the Esukārī-sutta,
(M. ii. p. 180.) in the time of Buddha there existed a classification of
wealth under four categories with which social hierarchy was determined.
Accordingly, a man’s wealth was all he had in his possession; it is means
by which he earned a living. This conception of wealth suggests the
notions of production and consumption as are likely understood to some
extent by modern economics. Nonetheless, Buddha promoted the supreme Law
as the ultimate wealth that human being was recommended to seek. The
Supreme Law thus mentioned consists of seven factors or constituents of
wealth; they are faith, virtue, shame of sin, fear of sin, learning,
generosity and wisdom, (Saṅkhitadhana-sutta, A.iv. p. 4: saddhādhanaṃ,
sīladhanaṃ, hirīdhanaṃ, ottappadhanaṃ, suta-dhanaṃ, cāgadhanaṃ,
paññādhanaṃ.) of which the sixth, generosity or liberty, attained by
generously giving up in practicing charity, implies the possession of
material goods, for one would give up to others only what one, a wealthy
man or instance, had in possession. Accordingly, these constituents of
wealth should be regarded as factors of production of goods of highest
quality. Nonetheless, most economic writers would be reluctant to approve
such likely idealistic a definition of wealth, for in their assumption by
wealth are meant “both real assets (a house, automobiles, television sets,
and other durables) and financial assets (cash, savings accounts, stocks,
bonds, insurance policies, pensions) that households own.” (Campbell R.
McConnell & Stanley L. Brue: Economics: Principles, Problems, and
Policies; 15th edition, p. 164. But George Reisman (Capitalism, p. 39f )
excluded financial asstes and related the meaning of wealth with goods.)
In general, things, of which the causal connection with human needs is
recognized and which men have power to direct to their satisfaction, are
conceived as goods.(Purposefully I adopt Carl Menger’s the general theory
of good, in which he states “all four of the following prerequisites must
be simultaneously present: 1. A human need. 2. Such properties as render
the thing capable of being brought into a causal connection with the
satisfaction of this need. 3. Human knowledge of this causal connection.
4. Command of the thing sufficient to direct it to the satisfaction of the
need.” (Principles of Economics, p. 51 f).) Goods thus characterized
implies the meaning of wealth.
Suffice it to say in this implication of wealth that in the ordinary
sense all human action is aimed at satisfying his wants and needs. In hope
of reaching this end he has to gather all that are thought beneficial to
him. They constitute his wealth. In other words, men make an effort and do
labor to produce a variety of goods for current consumption and in
expectation of a better future.
As we have seen, it is commonplace to distinguish between material
goods that achieve one’s worldly satisfactions and higher goods that serve
as means of attainment of ideal satisfactions. Because economics deals
with only things in this world, it follows as a logical consequence that
only material consumption is concerned.
Buddha, in fact, never denied the need of material goods consumed as
requisites for sustaining human biological existence that serves as a
basis for higher development. In the Sutta of Debtlessnes, (Ānaṇya-sutta,
A. ii. p. 69.) He recognizes four kinds of well-being: the enjoyment of
having, the enjoyment of making use of wealth, the enjoyment of being
debtless, and the enjoyment of being blameless. Here a man enjoys having
righteous wealth righteously gained through his effort and labor; he
enjoys rationally consuming and making merit righteous wealth righteously
accumulated; he experiences joy to own no debt; and he experiences joy as
thinking of the blamelessness of his actions performed with body, speech
and thought.
In this passage, the conditions of well-being are by no means improved
and increased merely by gaining and accumulating a quantity of wealth even
though “righteously gained through one’s effort and labor.” Wealth is
beneficial only if it brings men enjoyment and happiness with both
material consumption and spiritual development.
In another Sutta, (Dīghajāṇusuttaṃ, A. iv. 281-5.) once a man came to
Buddha and asked for the teaching in compliance with which could live
happily, in peace and prosperity in the very present life and in the
future as well, those who were “householders, enjoying worldly pleasures,
being in bondage to wives and children…” The Blessed One then offered him
in the first place four conditions that lead to the present bliss. They
were industry, protection, good friends and right livelihood. Industry
means he makes a living in pursuing a career, and he is good at his
occupation, practicing it assiduously, tirelessly. Wealth gained with such
industry should be safely guarded in such way that it would not be taken
away by thieves, destroyed by fire, swept away by flood, or going bankrupt
with spoiled children. Had these two conditions been fulfilled, wealth
would have been accumulated and increased only in a favorable environment,
with good social relationship. In addition, at last, the household has to
hold a balance between income and expenditure.
Thus, in brief, economical behavior is instructed. In production,
industry or assiduity is emphasized. Exertion, energetic, industrious,
assiduous (viriya, uṭṭhāna, padhāna, etc.), sometimes can be understood as
describing the same state of mind or consciousness, though their
psychological activities are of a minor difference. However, in general,
they often express the most important element in practice, namely
vigilance (appamāda). Buddha said: “Vigilance is the way to Deathless.
Indolence is the way to Death.”(Dhammapada, verse 21.)
Negligence, carelessness, indolence, and laziness: these are the inertia
of mind or consciousness. It awakens in men a declination to work.
Economists might just as well call it leisure versus labor. As it should
be in this context to quote Mises (L. W. Mises (Human Action, Scholar’s
edition, p. 131-2).): “Leisure, other things being equal, preferred to
travail.” That is, by nature men have an inclination to enjoy more time
used for leisure. Working to him is a must only when he chooses to
increase material goods to satisfy his wants and needs.
Nonetheless, strictly speaking, leisure is not negligence or laziness
as it appears to be. As it is defined by economists, leisure is a category
of consumer’s goods that can be measured in terms of units of time. (Cf.
Murray N. Rothbard (Man. Economy, and State with Power and Market, the
Scholar’s edition, p. 44): “For almost all actors, consumer’s good, to be
weighed in the balance against the prospect of acquring other consumer’s
goods, including possible satisfaction from the effort itself.”) As
combined with consumption goods it forms a bundle for consumers to make
choices; for leisure by this definition means any time spent not working
in the labor market. Accordingly, as a worker tries to increase his
income, in the case that other things are equal, i.e. other variables in
the production function are held constant, he has to increase the
expenditure of labor, that means he should reduce the time spent on
leisure. Thus, labor is the opportunity cost of leisure.
With the aid of technological progress, today worker can rise the
productivity of labor that yields higher wage rate without curtailing time
for leisure. His standard of living is increased, and his income is
maximized; he has both wealth and leisure to enjoy the pleasures of life.
This is a feature of the modern civilization which is dubbed as that of
material consumption worked out on the western model of economy.
It is, however, unjustified to blame the West for the unrest of the
today world only on account of its material achievements; for the
inclination to enjoying sensuous pleasures is inherent in every sentient
being. The satisfaction of it should first be sought in the material
factors that constitute physical food as stated in the doctrine of
nutriment. Hankering after sensuous pleasures keeps living beings on the
track of carnal appeal, incessantly seeking for material objects to
gratify the demanding body. In a Sutta, (Puttamaṃsūpama-sutta, S. 12. 63
(ii. p. 98).) Buddha likened material consumption to the child-eating of a
couple. Once a couple bringing with their only son crossed a desert.
Halfway through, their travel rations ran out, and they were driven to
consent to kill and sparingly eat the only son. As they were eating their
only son, they lamented over him. The simile reveals the marginal utility
in material consumption. Things, like physical food, here composed of
material elements, are supposedly needed for the removal of a human
being’s hunger or thirst, his felt uneasiness. In proceeding with
consumption of one kind of subjectively homogenous food, as one more unit
is added, the marginal utility of good consumed is diminished; up to a
point, as for the last unit, the marginal utility is negative and no more
good consumed is needed. However, this does not mean the saturation of
material enjoyment is reached. Man’s longing for sensuous pleasures is
never satiated. As a rule, the total utility of a good consumed is treated
with its quantitativeness; but to a consumer its qualitativeness – hence
its subjectivity, should not be neglected. Time of consumption is as well
a factor that affects the change in the total utility. One more unit of
time augmented lessens the favor with enjoyment. A substitution of daily
disk is desirable. The fact is that as the supply of one thing is full
while desire for enjoying it remains insatiable, another is appealed for
substitution.
Economists are normally concerned with the problem of overproduction –
whether it is relative and causes depression, but they have paid no
attention to the problem of overconsumption. The effect we call
over-consumption could be compared to people, albeit being full,
continuing to eat excessively to their obesity.
Buddha recognises four requisites: food, clothing, housing, and
medicine. They are of material elements and classified under physical
nutriment. The need for them is not unlimited, but the want or desire for
their enjoyment is somewhat unconstrained. Almost all-human production is
concentrated on the productivity of material goods. Economic growth is
exclusively based on the quantity of goods and services that have been
produced for the sake of the satisfaction of material consumption. Any
incentive that encourages consumption, thus makes increase in quantity of
demand.
This concentration on material production and consumption, lacking
other kinds of nutriment – that we call mental or spiritual ones – needed
for an ultimate evolution of mankind, has caused the disparity between
bodily and mental growth. Today with the wonderful progress of science,
and somewhat miraculous accomplishment of technology, people know a lot of
how matter works, yet their knowledge of how mental structure is composed
and which kind of food is to be taken, is lamentably narrow. Dietetics
would advise to people as to what to be eaten is beneficial to health and
against what is noxious, but for mental health, little is warned against
detriment. Adultery, rape, drug traffic, violence, a myriad of social
disorders; all these symptoms of social obesity are in fact the outcome of
the disparity of economic development.
Economic growth of the world today has risen the standard of living of
mankind in general to a considerable level. Nonetheless, the
overproduction and overconsumption entail the inevitable inequality in the
distribution of wealth on the world scale. The cause and effect of this
mal-distribution has been much studied and analysed among economists, and
I suppose that I have no special contribution to the estimation.
Nonetheless, it is advisable in this concern to makes some references to
the Buddha’s instructions on the current issue.
Once, (Ādiyasutta, A. iii. p. 45.) Buddha gave householder Anāthapiṇḍika
instruction on five conditions to accumulate wealth:
1. The householder, using the wealth righteously earned through his
effort and labor, enjoys himself with pleasure, benefits his parents and
family, living rightly with pleasures.
2. He benefits his friends and associates from wealth that has been
righteously accumulated.
3. He keeps safe the wealth that has been honestly gathered, warding off
from fire, flood, thieves, from being dissipated by depraved heirs, and
confisticated by the king.
4. Using his righteous wealth, he performs five oblations: oblation to
relatives, to guests, to the dead, to the king (taxation), and to gods.
5 Using his righteous wealth, he accumulates merits for the future life by
giving to priests, to charity.
In another Sutta, (Sīgalovāda-sutta, D.iii. p. 188. ) Buddha instructed
a young householder to rationally optimize his income by dividing it into
four portions: One portion used for his wants; two portions spent on
business, (In Chinses translation of Āgama (Taisho 1, No 1, p. 72b.),
these include the investments in agricculture and business. ) and the
fourth kept away for times of need. (ibid.: ekena bhoge bhuñjeyya, dvīhi
kammaṃ payojaye; catutthañca nidhāpeyya. By commentary: dvīhi kammaṃ
payojayeti: dvīhi koṭṭhāsehi kasivāṇijjādikammaṃ payojeyya. DA. iii. 951.
) In more details as stated in the corresponding Sutta translated in
Chinese Āgamas, (Taisho 1, No 1, p. 72b.) two additional portions are
added: one for building shrines and the sixth for construction of
monasteries.
It is interesting to take notice in the Chinese translation of Āgama in
which the role of god worshipping shrines and monasteries in Ancient India
is to be matched with today’s economical and social institutions. They do
not imply the meaning of religion as we understand nowadays. Monasteries
at the time of Buddha were converted almost pleasure-grounds or parks
originally owned by kings or queens, or nobles, or the wealthy; later they
were dedicated to religious or sectarian groups for their preaching and
practicing. Religious or doctrinal debates sometimes took place among
current sects involving Buddhism. At those places, not only were religious
dogmas taught but many other branches of knowledge also. Oftentimes,
subjects chatted about among different communions were denounced in
Buddhist canon as futile, useless, or a mere waste of time. (These were
considered as tiracchāna-vijjā, pseudo-science, ususally understood as
science of magic. Cf. D. i. p. 9 ff) Generally speaking, their roles were
kind of cultural and educational establishments where new thoughts and
even technological knowledge were from their spread and transmitted. The
dedication to religious purposes of a portion of the disposal income of a
household as instructed by Buddha is to be taken as a contribution to the
cultural and educational activities, kind of an investment in human
capital.
VI. CONCLUSION
So far we have dealt with some aspects that can be considered as the
Buddhist foundation of economics. There are many left to be discussed.
Generally speaking, writings concerning the problem were mostly focused on
the moral issues and blamed for the situation of the world today.
Many writers on Buddhist economics criticise Adam Smith for his theorem
of the “invisible hand” according to which if individual behaves on the
basis his own interest then social benefits will be promoted. To some
extent, this is not a normative theory, but a positive one.
The fact that cannot be denied is that this self-interest, or more exactly
selfishness, has been the motive for the economic growth that has been
longed for by almost countries outside Europe and her scions. As Smith may
have affirmed, had individual’s self-interest not been motivated, no
economic development would be made. It is accepted in the theory of
general equilibrium that competitive markets are adjusted among themselves
under the effect of the interaction between buyers and sellers, households
and firms. The interaction is brought about as partners in competitive
markets are trying to do the best, to gain the most profit they can.
In order to have a closer look at the picture, let’s put the situation
into Keynes’s words: “It does not count the cost of the struggle, but
looks only to the benefits of the final result which are assumed to be
permanent. The object of life being to crop the leaves off the branches up
to the greatest possible height, the likeliest way of achieving this end
is to leave the giraffes with the longest necks to starve out those whose
necks are shorter.” (John Maynard Keynes: The End of the Laissez-faire,
1926.) As a logical consequence, it is needless to say about the outcome
of this pattern of competitive economy that it on one hand motivates
craving for profit as incentive for material achievement by means of which
people’s standard of living has been considerably improved – despite the
unjust distribution of wealth, and on the other hand it entices humans to
manufacture unimaginably lethal weapons and innumerable apparatuses of
exploitation and oppression.
Thus, the root causes of economic growth, for better or worse as seen
today, are entangled with greed, hate and delusion. The elimination of
these three poisons is the ultimate goal of Buddhist life. Nonetheless,
selfishness associated with evil root-causes as revealed in the profit
maximization, if Buddhist psychological attitude is to be taken, is the
driving force of every human action. Based on the doctrine of nutriment,
as the biological body keeps subsisting even after the saint has attained
the state of destroying the evil root-causes, four kinds of food remain
required until the saint enters Nirvana as the body composed of five
aggregates comes to a total disintegration. In this perspective, a certain
economic system still exists as to supply him the requisites. But Buddha
never taught anything that goes far beyond the reach of human capacity. To
those who choose to follow the path that leads to the ultimate liberation,
to the attainment of Nirvana, He instructs the practice of the absolute
renunciation of worldly pleasures. To those who are bound up with sense
pleasures, He gives the teaching of mundane life so that they might live
in peace and happiness in the very present life, as well as in the future.
The teaching for the latter is simple: generosity and virtue. Generosity
here consists of offering to monks and giving to the poor. To be able to
practice generosity, he must possess a certain amount of wealth.
Thus, economic behavior of a lay Buddhist is a purposeful action aimed at
gathering tangible wealth for material consumption and accumulating merits
for the future life. Merit by canonical definition is profitable deeds
that are good for the actor himself and for others in the present as well
as in the future. In relation to this purposeful action, the ground for
increase in wealth of a lay Buddhist is said to be comprised of ten items:
land, capital, children, servants, cattle, faith, virtue, learning, giving
and wisdom. (Vaḍḍhi-sutta, A. v. p. 137.) Accordingly, conditions for
economic growth must be a balance of material consumption and spiritual
development.
Nonetheless, Buddhist economics, if any, is feasible only on the
condition that an individual’s goal in this life must be established and
his deeds are directed with virtue; no matter if the theory of selfishness
or profit motive is in question. In this respect, the Buddha’s teaching
related to the right livelihood (E. F. Schumacher (Small is Beautiful,
Harper Perennial): “Right Livelihood is one of the requirment of the
Buddha’s Noble Eightfold Path. It is clear, therefore, that there must be
such a thing as Buddhist economics.” Statement is much quoted as Buddhist
economics is dealt with.) is expected to contribute a good deal of leading
principles for economic studies.
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