Resource-Based Economy

With the resource ecology available, we are able to replace market-based pricing with resource-based prices, where the value of any resource reflects what it costs to be produced. When a product is requested, its resource-based price is calculated. The values of its component resources are summed together, cascading through recipes until the most basic resources at the extremities of the food web. Here, the value graph is rooted in the most fundamental physical units like energy and human time.

Since the value of every resource is directly equal to the sum of the values of its constituent resources, prices come to reflect the true costs of production. Thus, a fair-trade economy is established, free from profits, economic rents and speculation which seep into market-based prices.

Resource-based pricing enables us to directly relate all of our economic activity to its impact on the resource base. Since resource-based prices are not measured in dollars, but rather physical units, economising on price directly implies economising on resources. Cradle-to-cradle life-cycle costs, from production to end-of-life can also be traced and included in the prices of goods the moment they are created. Moreover, the needs-based incentive gives the resource ecology no incentive to produce surplus to what is needed. Sustainability and a circular economy becomes an emergent consequence of the protocol.