Greater long-run savings and humanity in small, de-centralized businesses.

Quote for the month:

How can individuals assist the transition? Support the small, local alternative, even if it entails inconvenience. And often it will. The big, mainstream standbys (big banks, chain stores etc.) are often subsidized in hidden ways to make them more convenient, and to make them seem to the individual consumer to be more economical. According to dominant theory, bigness implies an "economy of scale" through mass production and bulk purchasing. But the real costs of added transportation resulting from centralized production and control (including extra pollution and its cascading environmental effects) are rarely factored into the accounting. Also we must learn always to question the ideology of efficiency, since many human needs and interests are only degraded by its ruthless, myopic calculus (should one, after all, strive to be an "efficient" parent, giving a minimum of love for a maximum of obedience?).

 - Richard Heinberg