Welcome! This site is a place to explore the idea of an Integrative Economy. The world is in huge transformational change, and no one knows how things will work out. We offer these ideas as a sane, rational way that change could begin—at the community and local levels—through an empowering model focused on quality of life.
Nine short one-pagers and three key actions lay out what an Integrative Economy is—and what has to change to build one.
Start reading → 02Four live conversations between Ann Kramer and Lawrence Winnerman: Imagining a New Economy, about four hours in all.
Watch Part 1 → 03Meet an Integrative Community Ventures team: twenty neighbors, one mile, and a Monday morning in the life of a new kind of business.
See the model →There are all sorts of names we could have used, but we settled on an Integrative Economy because we believe it reflects what the next economy will be: one that integrates the best of the past economies—agricultural, industrial, service, and the current knowledge economy. There were good things in all of them, but none is sufficient for the world we live in today.
An Integrative Economy will add new dimensions along with many features of the past. We developed this site as a way to discuss the concepts of IE and to explore ways it can be implemented. If you are visiting for the first time, we ask that you read the short one-pagers that outline the basics of what an Integrative Economy will entail—and watch the four-part video series Ann and Lawrence recorded together.
Four live conversations between Ann Kramer and Lawrence Winnerman about what comes after an economy that measures only money. Session One lays out the three expansions that make everything else possible.
We have no delusion that these ideas will be implemented quickly or easily. We are sure that dialogues around them are important. History shows us, time and again, that economies change through the accumulation of small things at first; then they coalesce into a force that makes the change so obvious no one even questions it. At that point, people living in the new economy think it has always been that way!
Remember a time when we didn’t drive? When big car factories weren’t the norm? If you were born in 1900, you’d say yes; if you were born in 1980, you’d say no.
So too can an Integrative Economy come into being. Small groups around the country will build it within their communities, establish networks with their universities and local businesses, and create new, thriving places where people like to live. The story will spread, and a few more will give it a try. If an Integrative Economy gets a foothold, who knows how long it will be before we say, “Remember a time when we didn’t have a quality-of-life economy? When local community capacity wasn’t its own work sector, and we didn’t have multiple ways to share wealth?” If you were born in 1980, you’d say yes—but let’s hope that if you were born in 2025, you’d say no.
All economies are made up of people who want to manage their lives and figure out how to do it, one way or another. There was a time when economies were based on the divine right of kings, and people managed their lives on the king’s word. Today, we are watching the end of a consumer and manufacturing economy and participating in a knowledge economy that is about to experience a massive increase in AI and machines that can do most of the jobs.
How will we manage life in this new world? We in the twenty-first century have the knowledge and the capacity to create an Integrative Economy—the most vibrant economy ever imagined. We hope you’ll be a small part of making it happen!
We are well aware of the political and economic upheaval caused by the projection that AI will replace most jobs. At the same time, there are serious concerns that an AI bubble could prove a bust and collapse the financial systems. It is our belief that either way, the development of an Integrative Economy makes sense. If most jobs are replaced by AI, then an IE with a strong local community capacity, built from the ground up, makes sense. And if AI is a bust and tanks the financial systems, then an IE with a strong local community capacity, built from the ground up, makes sense.
Because IE is a quality-of-life economy—one that we can all be a part of and create.
Leave your email and we’ll add you to our two Substack newsletters—Ann’s and Lawrence’s—where we publish the essays, videos, and dialogues behind an Integrative Economy. Both are free, and that’s where this conversation lives.