Saturday, October 29, 2011

What was Alvin Toffler writing about in Revolutionary Wealth? What is the knowledge Economy? What is the knowable future?

In the knowledge economy, capitalism's two stalwart pillars, property rights and the assumption of limited supply, are crumbling.

Property will become increasingly less tangible, the Tofflers argue, while free-flowing knowledge, upon which new wealth increasingly will be based, won't ever run out.

And, they suggest, America, like capitalism, may be facing a comedown. Although the authors insist that the U.S. is still the nation best-equipped to lead the science-based wealth revolution, they see it facing a challenge initiated by its own multinationals: a transformed Asia.

The most contemporary and compelling chapters in the book may well be those dealing with China, India and Japan.

Foreign-exchange-rich China is pouring money and talent into the sciences - graduating 465,000 scientists and engineers a year.

An America that allots less than 2% of its gross domestic product to science research is bound to come up short against countries funding more dynamic ambitions. In the future, the Tofflers conclude, Asian powerhouses will have the upper hand.
-- Susan Witty, Barron's review of Alvin Toffler's book Revolutionary Wealth
Read the full review

When I share $100 with you, I have to give you $50. When I share a meal with you, I lose half of the food.
When I share information with you, it's win-win. I don't lose anything when I share what I have.
This is the fundamental point of Toffler's "prosumer" economy.

The Future Happened Yesterday. (service mark by Jack Latona)
We used to think of the future as something that was created five or ten or fifty years from now. The future of living longer meant waiting twenty or thirty years for new developments in cancer prevention and life extension.

New bits of information arrive in such abundance that we can't keep up. We might have some time tomorrow to read about what happened today... -- so (for us) the future happened yesterday.

www.LetterFromMexico.com by Jack Latona





1 comment:

  1. These comments arise from a meeting with Jack Latona who was in Fort Lauderdale in October 21 to Nov. 1 to share insights about "The Future of an Emerging Culture of Northern Mexico and Southwestern USA"

    He calls for more research. If anyone knows of research about the impact on Mexican culture of frequent back-and-forth border crossings and the flow and influence of US expat residents in Mexico, please contact Jack at Latona.anthony@gmail.com ... Thank you.

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