What's the point of growth if it creates so much misery? | Lynsey Hanley

Forget the 'high-skill, hi-tech' obsession: we should invest in everyday services to create a society run for collective goodThe late Prof Mick Moran, who taught politics and government at Manchester University for most of his professional life, had, according to his colleagues, once had "a certain residual respect for our governing elites". That all changed during the 2008 financial crisis, after which he experienced an epiphany "because it convinced him that the officer class in business and in politics did not know what it was doing".After his epiphany, Moran formed a collective of academics dedicated to exposing the complacency of finance-worship and to replacing it with an idea of running modern economies focused on maximising social good. They called themselves the Foundational Economy Collective, based on the idea that it's in the everyday economy where there is most potential for true social regeneration: not top-down cash-splashing, but renewal and replenishment from the ground upwards. Continue reading...