Is That It? Questioning Economic Success

Ethical Perspectives 10 (2):138-150 (2003)
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Abstract

This article examines the link between economic success at the national level and a population’s sense of well-being. It argues that a society where economic success is based on adaptation to the demands of competitiveness in global markets readily develops patterns of work and consumption which reduce the efficiency of economic growth in generating well-being.The perspective of the article is welcoming of economic growth and globalization.Until the 1990s, the Republic of Ireland, on whose experience the article is based, provided abundant evidence that a preoccupation with economic self-sufficiency and, subsequently, incomplete adaptation to international economic integration was undermining of societal well-being. This judgement appears unavoidable given the large percentage of the Irish population who could not find satisfying work on a sustained basis until the economic boom of the 1990s; significant numbers emigrated, remained in subordinate positions in their households, worked in jobs far below their potential, or were openly unemployed.The evidence explored here, therefore, is not fuel for those seeking to build the funeral pyre of globalization. It is consistent with believing that Ireland’s embrace of a set of social and economic policies in pursuit of strong economic growth under conditions of globalization has increased well-being in net terms, and probably substantially so. However, the evidence reviewed does suggest that patterns of work and consumption have developed which significantly lessen the well-being quotient of additional economic growth. The more nuanced thesis of the article, therefore, is that economic growth becomes steadily less efficient in generating well-being, unless certain specific patterns in work and consumption are challenged and corrected

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