Thoughts from Taoism

"Today, one is considered productive to the extent that she generates monetary profit for herself or others. In the determination of her social standing, her intelligence, innate talents, and service to others are secondary to her earning capacity. In practice, this means that individuals choose their work on the basis of what will pay rather than on what will give them the most enjoyment and provide the greatest service to others. Again, the Taoists would not see this as productive, for it limits human happiness and leaves many needed things undone, while we scurry about doing things of little real value."

"New gadgetry that comes at the expense of peace of mind or human relationships cannot be considered progress."

"In the later part of the nineteenth century, interest in this problem [of how to produce sufficient goods to supply people's basic needs] began to fade as a second problem came to dominate the thinking of the economists: How to overcome the problem of overproduction, or alternatively stated, How to increase consumption to insure sustained demand for ever-increasing production? The answer lay in tapping into what was conceived of as an endless resource - the human emotion of greed."

"'Constant change... through the entire gamut of material, color, design is essential to the prosperity alike of producers and distributors.'
It is our job to make women unhappy with what they have. --B. Earl Puckett, former head of Allied Stores Corporation."