We Should All Be Peasants Now We should all be peasants now. The phrase keeps returning to me. But what does being a peasant mean and why would I want to live that way? I think about this for a reason. It seems there has been a new round of colonialism spreading throughout the world….
Filling Up Your Stores
Filling Up Your Stores When I first started making, teaching (as in how-to) and gifting jam, folks would invariable suggest I should go into business. Though I understood it as a compliment, I was struck how quickly folks suggested I should go to market. But I’m an old timer. I still remember when stuff made…
Dear Smarty Pants
Dear Smarty Pants I’ve been thinking about trust. How its the bedrock of all relationships. I’ve been thinking about the economy and the environment and the way our business and political leaders have been minding them. I’ve been listening to all the pundits and economic forecasters posit on when things will return to “normal” and…
The Householders grab bag
Sacrifice Stew In a recent broadcast of Democracy Now, Amy Goodman told her guest, the award-winning investigative journalist and activist Allan Nairn , “The most hit word in the Merriam-Webster Dictionary is the word “austerity” in 2010.” I acknowledged Amy Goodman in my recent book because her reporting, her show, has helped me demystify the…
Learn more about permaculture
In trying to define the basic principles behind a backyard economy I realized all standard economic measures had to be redefined. Traditional economic systems were designed during the industrial revolution where measures of labor and productivity held little regard for the subtleties of the natural world. My backyard garden is an environment of infinite transactions…
What is embodied energy?
In trying to define the basic principles behind a backyard economy I realized all standard economic measures had to be redefined. Traditional economic systems were designed during the industrial revolution where measures of labor and productivity held little regard for the subtleties of the natural world. My backyard garden is an environment of infinite transactions…
Learn more about a true cost economy
In trying to define the basic principles behind a backyard economy I realized all standard economic measures had to be redefined. Traditional economic systems were designed during the industrial revolution where measures of labor and productivity held little regard for the subtleties of the natural world. My backyard garden is an environment of infinite transactions…
Alt. Economics – A Preemptive Strike
The Backyard Economist – Issue. 3 Alt. Economics – A Preemptive Strike by Harriet Fasenfest How to demystify the world of economics? We are so completely immersed in it yet we don’t really understand it. I have already mentioned that everyone has an individual economy (read The New Pear Standard) – a personal balance of…
My Trouble with the Modern World
The Backyard Economist – Issue. 2 My Trouble with the Modern World by Harriet Fasenfest I admit to having trouble with the modern world – its pace, technology, economy, entertainment and promise. It seems I am always on the look out for clues to a time when things made better sense. A time when actions,…
The Pear Standard
The Backyard Economist – Issue. 1 The Pear Standard by Harriet Fasenfest Welcome to the first installment of the Backyard Economist. As a disclaimer let me be clear, I am not an academic. I was never taught the principles of economic science. I forgo the requirement because I do not think it is necessary. In…