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14
APARIGRAHA - THE HUMANE SOLUTION
Another important pitfall of the economics of affluence is the persistence of inflation, which throws individual, family, and social budgets out of gear. 'Inflation, earlier had been an outcome of wars, civil disorders, famines, natural disasters. In recent times, it has acquired new habits, it persists in periods of peace and rising prosperity. Everyone deplores the failure of effective action against it, but no one suggests a remedy... Everyone agrees on the importance of stable prices but no specific action or serious suggestion is made to remedy this evil. It simply confines to conversation..........."
The effects of continuous inflation not only confine to the economic side of the individual's life. They have great bearing on his psychological side too. The desire to acquire more and more in terms of both goods and money, is in direct relation with inflation, since what one has as “sufficient' today is insufficient tomorrow, and since 'today' is of very short duration and 'tomorrow' is of a very long duration, one. cannot sensibly forego 'tomorrow' for 'today'. Thus the unseen 'tomorrow' becomes very powerful in comparison to the seen today', creating feelings of anxiety and insecurity. This feeling of insecurity could be a reason for the individual's covetousness, greed, lack of selfcontrol, all of which can lead to mental disturbance and anxiety amongst the masses. This psychological state is bound to have repercussions on man's moral plane. A very small group of people, however, may remain unaffected by the inflationary trend, and they are the ones who have significant control on economy. Their argument may be that inflation could be controlled by more and more production, -many economists adduce similar solutions, but as Galbraith has suggested and logically explained, this is a very superficial solution; because more production would mean more and more nurturing of created wants; and an increasing demand for a product would keep inflation uncurbed. The complexity of this problem is, therefore, cleverly handled by policy makers and those with vested interests by a policy of inaction or of postponement of consideration of the most complicated issues. Galbraith points out that though economists are able to understand this contemporary attitude 1. Affluent Society- J.K. Gailbraith
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