The Economy of Permanence: A Quest for a Social Order Based on Non-violence (स्थायी अर्थतन्त्र)

Economy of Permanence
the impressionable age of the child has been lost. Every village school, handling
children under eight, must be in the hands of women. One can almost say that
with rare exception no man teacher should be employed in such schools.
In the second stage of development of the child, we need persons who will
stimulate the thinking of the pupils and explain the why and wherefore of
phenomena. I had the opportunity of visiting a school in New York State run by
the Federation of Labour Unions. In that school the whole community lived to-
gether and the children took part in the supply of food products and all other
domestic matters. They had their own dairy; one of the teachers was in charge
and a few boys helped him. I attended an "economic class" of pupils of about
eleven years of age. The subject for the day was "Buying of a cow". The class
was taken charge of by a boy of about ten; the teacher sat in a back row with
me. The lad in charge (we shall call him Henry) described to the class what his
experience was when he went with the teacher (Bill) in charge of the Dairy to
an adjoining market to buy a cow. This is how the class went on: "Bill and I
went to an auction to buy a cow because we do not get enough milk from our
cows for us all". One of the pupils asked what an "Auction" was. The other
explained "An auction is a shop where they had no fixed prices. The shopman
brought out an article and the persons who wanted it told him what they would
pay for it and the shopman gave it to the one who 'bid¹ highest". Then followed
an explanation what a 'bid¹ was. Then another pupil asked why different
persons 'bid' different prices. Henry replied "the cow they bought started at 75
dollars and was 'knocked down¹ at 120 dollars for Bill". After the explanation of
"knocked down" he said that the first man suggested paying 75 dollars and
others went on increasing the price till Bill bid 120 dollars. After that nobody
came forward with a higher price, so it was sold to Bill. Another pupil asked
"why nobody wanted to give more than 120 dollars?" Henry described how
before the auction all the prospective buyers had gone through the records of
the cow and found how much milk per year it gave, what food it ate during the
year and other costs and found out what amount spent on its price would be
just covered by the price of milk. So the highest limit was calculated and those
who wanted an animal would stop bidding when it reached this limit. The whole
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