> Consumer spending is not "wealth destruction" -- who makes the fantasy coffins? Who prints the banners? Local businesses!

If the local businesses were instead being hired to dig holes and fill them up again... oh wait, they literally are, except they're also instructed to make very elaborate artworks and put them in the holes before shoveling in the dirt. Anyway: Can you please examine the movement of real resources rather than pieces of paper? No society gets rich by making art which is immediately destroyed.

There's no good way to measure wealth creation. If people are getting what they want - if there's no extra government tax them to pay for the digging and re-filling of holes, but it's all done freely, out of desire to have it done - then it might be of some value, because they think it is.

We can say "but it plainly isn't purposeful", but the same applies to pets, vacations, every kind of art and craft, fancy cuisine, pure mathematics, dance music festivals, religion and all associated economic activity, all sports ... I'll stop there, but the two main points are: firstly, the value in life is about a lot more than moving real resources, or paper, or food and shelter; secondly, nobody knows what it is all about, man. It's hugely a matter of opinion, what's good and worthwhile. Economic activity is perhaps the ongoing process of making guesses about the answers.