Production - Economics and Ecology: United for a Sustainable World - page 65

5
Production
The beginning section of this chapter might sound familiar. If the previous
coverage of consumption begins with the need for economic output on the
part of human beings under the mandate of securing necessities, this cover-
age starts with the other side of the coin—the supply of those necessities. How
do producers produce? What do they assume? What are the systemic effects
of how they behave? In what ways have the how and why questions changed
over the years? These are the types of questions addressed in this chapter.
In light of the previous discussion of the theory of consumption, it is
tempting to conclude that individuals, as consumers, have left the producers
of goods and services with an onerous task. Given the standard assumption
of unlimited wants, no matter how much consumers are provided in the way
of goods and services, it will apparently never be enough. The theory, we
concluded, implies that the consumer can never be satisfied—a notion assid-
uously stimulated by the advertising industry in concert with producers.
Original Intention: Meet Human Necessities
In a subsistence society, the job of the producer is straightforward: provide
the material means to stay alive. In the ultimate version of a subsistence soci-
ety, a one-person world, the consumer is also the producer. This is a situation
economists are fond of calling “Autarky” or the “Robinson Crusoe Society.”
If people have to fend for themselves, they are responsible for all they con-
sume or use. This, almost by definition, would be a subsistence economy,
because accumulating wealth would have no meaning other than to secure
leisure time apart from the effort of gathering the means of survival from the
surrounding environment.
The economic dynamics of Robinson Crusoe do not change substantially
if we expand the analysis to encompass a tribe or village. The emphasis is
still on survival, albeit to that of the community and its members as opposed
to just the individual. Here, however, we are able to incorporate the issues
of specialization and division of labor. These terms represent the economic
characteristics that form the cornerstones of Adam Smith's seminal treatise
on economics, Wealth of Nations . Divide up tasks and prosper. Specialize and
trade. It is useful to create a simple example.
67