GDP Archives – Page 7 of 13 – Center for the Advancement of the Steady State Economy

Time to Stop Worshipping Economic Growth

October 28, 2015/1 Comment/in Economic Growth, Steady State Economy, The Daly News /by Brian Czech

by Brent Blackwelder

There are physical limits to growth on a finite planet. In 1972, the Club of Rome issued their groundbreaking report—Limits to Growth (twelve million copies in thirty-seven languages). The authors predicted that by about 2030, our planet would feel a serious squeeze on natural resources, and they were right on target.

In 2009, the Stockholm Resilience Center introduced the concept of planetary boundaries to help the public envision the nature of the challenges posed by limits to growth and physical/biological boundaries.

Appropriate Scarcity

October 15, 2015/8 Comments/in Consumption, Economic Growth, Economic Policy, Steady State Economy, The Daly News /by Brian Czech

by Robert A. Herendeen

… appealing to people to restrain themselves [by] self-enforced abstinence alone is a waste of time. By and large, we consume as much as our incomes allow…. changes… cannot take place without constraints that apply to everyone rather than everyone else. Manmade global warming cannot be restrained unless we persuade the government to force us to change the way we live.

—George Monbiot, Heat (2006/2009)

The results indicate that the likelihood of paying a positive amount for supporting renewable energy is higher under a mandatory scheme compared to a voluntary payment option in the UK.

Five Myths About Economic Growth

July 22, 2015/16 Comments/in Brian Czech, Consumption, Economic Growth, The Daly News /by Brian Czech

by Brian Czech

Myth #1. It’s economic.

To be economic, something has to be worth more than it costs. Economic activity, per se, is more beneficial than detrimental. Technically speaking, “marginal utility is greater than marginal disutility.”

If you liked a rug, but liked your grandkids more, it wouldn’t be smart to grab the rug out from under them. That’s basic microeconomics. Yet if we look around and reflect a bit,

Preempting a Misleading Argument: Why Environmental Problems Will Stop Tracking with GDP

May 13, 2015/1 Comment/in Brian Czech, Consumption, Economic Growth, Environment, Population, Steady State Economy, The Daly News /by Brian Czech

Brian explains how GDP growth will eventually stop tracking with environmental damage–but the reasons may not be what you’d expect!

The Guardian and Monbiot versus Forbes and Worstall

December 11, 2014/12 Comments/in Economic Growth, Steady State Economy, Technology, The Daly News /by Brian Czech

Daly explains how the conflation of growth and development, and a reliance on the Cobb-Douglass production function, can lead to the spurious conclusion that natural resources are unimportant factors of production.

The Kingdom of God: A Steady State Economy?

October 9, 2014/4 Comments/in Brian Czech, Economic Growth, Environment, Population, Steady State Economy, The Daly News /by Brian Czech

Brian Czech discusses a theological basis for a steady state economy.

An Economics Fit for Purpose in a Finite World

October 2, 2014/10 Comments/in Consumption, Economic Growth, Economic Policy, Environment, Governance, Steady State Economy, Technology, The Daly News /by Brian Czech

Our current economic policy goal is not fit for a finite and entropic world. But what would our economic policy goal be in a steady state economy?

Three Limits to Growth

September 4, 2014/8 Comments/in Consumption, Economic Growth, Economic Policy, Environment, Governance, Steady State Economy, Technology, The Daly News /by Brian Czech

Our economy faces a futility limit, ecological catastrophe limit, and an economic limit. Fortunately, the economic limit will likely be the first we encounter; hopefully we can implement a steady state economy before the others are reached!