Societal Needs - Revisited

A while back I posted about what society needs organized into their respective priorities. In terms of the whole concept, the categories are vague enough to work, but when used to organize specific resources, they tend to breakdown. In summary, I want to simplify the model. Even though doing so seems counter-intuitive, the reasoning is that by simplifying categories which are already vague, each category can be implicitly broken down into their exact components later on. Instead of making many categories that could potentially overlap, fewer categories can end up being more specific.


Needs such as work or purpose can be combined with exercise.
Risk, safety and regulation, and social security can be worked into a tax category (along with income or property taxes).
The need for company, religion (or charity), education, and the arts can be combined into one social category.

The new breakdown reads as follows:



Primary - each primary need must be available as an easily accessible, unpolluted, and temperate function of life.

• Water
• Food
• Shelter

Secondary - although not absolutely necessary, providing for secondary needs allows small groups to exist in one location over a long period of time.

• Clothing
• Work
• Electricity
• Recreation
• Waste

Tertiary - these needs allow for many large groups to coexist with others harmoniously, and for even denser urban areas to function over longer periods of time.

• Goods
• Transportation
• Communication
• Healthcare
• Taxes
• Social
• Savings

Expressed as a budget, with resources allocated to each need, one would use their income to take the difference, and then arrive at their savings.