Under­stand how to effec­tive­ly address the symp­toms of a fail­ing sys­tem before it falls apart completely.

“The future is already here—it’s just not very even­ly dis­trib­uted.”— William Gibson

The cur­rent eco­nom­ic sys­tem keeps widen­ing dis­par­i­ties because that’s what the sys­tem was designed to do. The more we make adjust­ments to increase eco­nom­ic efficiency

or pro­duc­tiv­i­ty along the lines of the cur­rent sta­tus quo (whether through extend­ed intel­li­gence, automa­tion, or oth­er­wise) we are, in fact, help­ing to approach a break­ing point at which the surest cor­rec­tive means will become rev­o­lu­tion­ary revolt. The peas­ants pick up pitch­forks. The pro­le­tari­at raise their ham­mers and sick­les. Peo­ple demand change by any means necessary.

Right now we’re col­lec­tive­ly plac­ing risky bets on the peo­ple with the most wealth rec­og­niz­ing the lessons learned from events like the French Rev­o­lu­tion cen­turies ago. Leg­isla­tive reg­u­la­tion might be a far more effec­tive approach to ensur­ing a more equi­table future. Yet, for now, a pos­i­tive sign of hope can be seen in the state­ment issued by 181 Amer­i­can CEOs com­pris­ing The Busi­ness Round­table on the organization’s web­site.⁴² These busi­ness lead­ers wish to rede­fine the “pur­pose of a cor­po­ra­tion” as an orga­ni­za­tion that should pri­or­i­tize mean­ing and dig­ni­ty in the lives of work­ers rather than share­hold­er val­ue.⁴³ While it remains to be seen how exact­ly this inten­tion will play out in actu­al­i­ty, the state­ment itself sig­nals a shift away from the pre­dom­i­nant think­ing of Amer­i­can busi­ness since the 1970s. Around that time, econ­o­mist Mil­ton Fried­man wrote an opin­ion piece in the New York Times assert­ing that com­pa­nies do not have social respon­si­bil­i­ty, and instead are respon­si­ble only for share­hold­er val­ue. Friedman’s essay can be under­stood in back­lash to the chang­ing social atti­tudes of the late 1960s counter cul­ture (which we feel is surg­ing through the col­lec­tive con­scious­ness once again). As always, the pen­du­lum of social norms, atti­tudes, and pre­vail­ing eco­nom­ic ideas shifts back and forth.

What we feel is dri­ving this new shift in think­ing is, not only 2020 Amer­i­can pres­i­den­tial can­di­dates like Bernie Sanders and Eliz­a­beth War­ren ral­ly­ing against cor­po­rate pri­or­i­ties for prof­it, but also a resur­fac­ing desire to ease the ten­sions between haves and have-nots. We know that strug­gle is con­stant in all cor­ners of this plan­et, yet so is per­se­ver­ance, deter­mi­na­tion, and the desire to work as a team.

In that spir­it of team­work and grit, we can see the roots of change grow­ing strong beneath a cracked sur­face of sys­temic malfea­sance. From these roots, a more robust and inte­gra­tive soci­ety will emerge. And this bur­geon­ing soci­ety will ulti­mate­ly mature into future gen­er­a­tions ele­vat­ing the base­line expo­nen­tial­ly toward sus­tain­able, equi­table, and bal­anced liv­ing systems.