[Buddha-l] Peter Junger

[jkirk]

Since we just got word of Peter Junger's death, here is a sample copied from 
a 2002 post to the list of the progressive commentary he was capable of. 
Four years later, some of us feel marginally less burdened by the recent 
elections, but what he wrote about hasn't changed a bit.
Joanna
=========

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Peter D. Junger" <junger at SAMSARA.LAW.CWRU.EDU>
To: <BUDDHA-L at LISTSERV.LOUISVILLE.EDU>
Sent: Friday, November 15, 2002 2:06 PM
Subject: Re: Buddhism & Complicity in a capitalist society

I think that it is important for Buddhists and everyone else to understand
the economic beliefs that lie behind the global changes---the headlong
descent into dukkha---that now confront us.

The first thing that one must realize is that the basic (micro) economic
models that are worshipped by all but the most heterodox economists, and
are given at least lip-service by most businesspeople and politicians,
are inhabited not by men, women, and children, or by any form of sentient
being, but by ``rational maximizers,'' whose sole properties are (i.)
that they maximize something---often called ``utility'' or
``well-being''---that is a monotonic increasing function of the number
of goods that they possess (although different profit maximizers may
assign different utilities to different goods, so long as the utility is
always a positive amount; furthermore, it is generally assumed that as
the amount of a particular good an individual has increases the amount of
utility that individual assigns to each additional unit decreases
asymptotically towards zero) and (ii.) that they are ``rational'' in the
sense that if they prefer A to B and B to C then they prefer A to C.

Such a rational maximizer or homo oeconomicus is said by the economists
to be ``better off'' if its utility increases, that is, if the amount of
``goods'' that it has increases.  It is, of course, noteworthy that
a homo oeconomicus is, if perhaps not identical with, at least cousin german 
to, a preta or hungry ghost.

A homo oeconomicus is ``better off'' if it gets what it wants, and the more
it gets the better off it is, according to the microeconomic gospels.

As far as I know no economist has ever considered the possibility that
one might be made better off simply by wanting less rather than getting
more.

The macroeconomic gospels teach in turn that ``society,'' which is conceived 
of as a heap or skandha of these profit maximizers, is made better off to 
the extent that the individual profit maximizers are made better off.  Thus, 
for example, it becomes a religious duty at Christmastide for each economic
unit to acquire as many goods as possible and, if, through some failure
of resources or of greed, not enough goods are so acquired, then the stock
markets will crash, there will be massive unemployment, the undeveloped 
world
will be consumed with famine and pestulance, while the ``West'' will have
to abandon its war against terrorism and instead dedicate its miltiary
forces to the extirpation of those who teach that greed is the source,
not of well being, but of dukkha.

And unmanned ``Preditors'' will appear in the sky over Dharmsal gunning
for the Dalai Lama.

--
Peter D. Junger--Case Western Reserve University Law School--Cleveland, OH
 EMAIL: junger at samsara.law.cwru.edu    URL:  http://samsara.law.cwru.edu
        NOTE: junger at pdj2-ra.f-remote.cwru.edu no longer exists