"toolbox" for those in the trade of concentrating spending power as they see fit. So in the end it's a question about distribution of latent spending power (wealth) and active spending power. In the end it is a question of the allocation of real resources. The question is whether real resources, which were initially part of the commons, should be allocated on the basis of wealth/income or on the basis of effectiveness and efficiency in balancing a global economy. This is a political choice, but not a simple one, since wars have been fought over how it should be made. At the moment, the balance is toward the former, the top quintile having most of the wealth and income and doing most of the spending, enjoying the fruit of most of leisure as well. Some people think that this is as it should be based on meritocracy, others see it as unsustainable imbalance and unfair to boot, since the game is tilted by wealth toward wealth. This is the dialectic of social, political and economic history, and the historical trend has been toward increasing egalitarian societies. The question now is which direction globalization will take. While the existing Western "free market" capitalistic model dominated by neoliberal and neoconservative ideology is predominant now, it is far from certain that this will end up being the prevailing paradigm. Indeed, we are discussing alternatives to it here. Hey, maybe instead of a property tax, we could tax ideology! It would be based on