We are overloading the planet: Now What?

[Elixir]

Growth tends to concentrate wealth at the top, the super rich, the politicians, leaders of industry, the movers and shakers.

Would that be the case in a “steady state” economy? I would intuit that the effect would be mitigated.

 

[bilby]

Growth tends to concentrate wealth at the top, the super rich, the politicians, leaders of industry, the movers and shakers.

No, it doesn't.

For centuries the European economy showed little growth; During which time, wealth was intensely concentrated at the top - the kings, dukes, earls, and counts had most of the power, and most of what little wealth there was.

Then came a period of far higher growth, at the end of which the peasantry have so much wealth that famine ceased to exist, and the aristocrats have so little that they have to let the peasants wander around gawping at their mansions (for a fee), in order to afford the building maintenance expenses.

Growth observably correlates with decreased inequality. That doesn't imply that it causes that reduced inequality; But it does imply that it's not making inequality worse.

 

[Swammerdami]

Growth observably correlates with decreased inequality. That doesn't imply that it causes that reduced inequality; But it does imply that it's not making inequality worse.

Cite? Much evidence points in the exact opposite direction. I'll summarize some Illustrations from Piketty's famous and highly respected book.

[Figure I.1] In 1920 the top decile of U.S. had 38% of national income. The 1920's were a roaring boom, with that statistic peaking at 48% in 1928. The figure was 32% in 1944 -- the early 1940's were an economic "boom" but the high production went to overseas military, not to rich capitalists. Inequality went up during the Reagan years, but was still only 39% in 1991. By 2007, after big booms (or bubbles) it was 49%, slightly beating the 1928 peak. We enjoy high growth right now, and Piketty expects income inequality to continue this upward trend.

[Figure 10.5] In 1810 the top decile of U.S. had 25% of total wealth. This was 32% in 1870 and 45% in 1910. The period 1870-1910 was a period of major industrial growth.

Piketty's Figure 11.11 is interesting. It answers the question "What percentage of a [French] generation inherits wealth equivalent to a lifetime's of earning by a laborer?" This was 2% for those born ca 1920, and is projected to be 15% for those born ca 2030.

 

[bilby]

Growth observably correlates with decreased inequality. That doesn't imply that it causes that reduced inequality; But it does imply that it's not making inequality worse.

Cite? Much evidence points in the exact opposite direction. I'll summarize some Illustrations from Piketty's famous and highly respected book.

[Figure I.1] In 1920 the top decile of U.S. had 38% of national income. The 1920's were a roaring boom, with that statistic peaking at 48% in 1928. The figure was 32% in 1944 -- the early 1940's were an economic "boom" but the high production went to overseas military, not to rich capitalists. Inequality went up during the Reagan years, but was still only 39% in 1991. By 2007, after big booms (or bubbles) it was 49%, slightly beating the 1928 peak. We enjoy high growth right now, and Piketty expects income inequality to continue this upward trend.

[Figure 10.5] In 1810 the top decile of U.S. had 25% of total wealth. This was 32% in 1870 and 45% in 1910. The period 1870-1910 was a period of major industrial growth.

Piketty's Figure 11.11 is interesting. It answers the question "What percentage of a [French] generation inherits wealth equivalent to a lifetime's of earning by a laborer?" This was 2% for those born ca 1920, and is projected to be 15% for those born ca 2030.

FFS. Americans seriously think that history started in the 1780s, don't they?

My "cite" is European economic history, over the past millennium.

Every part of your "rebuttal" considers microscopic adjustments in the period of "high growth, low inequality" we have seen for the last two centuries or so, and that I am contrasting with the eight centuries of "low growth, high inequality" that preceeds it.

 

[bilby]

Piketty's Figure 11.11 is interesting. It answers the question "What percentage of a [French] generation inherits wealth equivalent to a lifetime's of earning by a laborer?" This was 2% for those born ca 1920, and is projected to be 15% for those born ca 2030

This would appear to support my contention, rather than yours.

There was an initial concentration of wealth as growth accelerated through the industrial revolution, then a reversal of that trend between the wars as society restrictured, and that inverse relationship between growth and inequality has been sustained ever since.

More people receiving large inheritances is an indicatior of greater equality - the wealth is going to a larger percentage of people.

 

[Swammerdami]

FFS. Americans seriously think that history started in the 1780s, don't they?

Calm down, for heaven's sake. Does everything have to turn into an insult?

I browsed through Piketty's List of Illustrations looking for the earliest dates. Piketty has the weird habit of using real and reliable documented data and thus may not have what you want.

Other sources tell us other things; and the thesis you're pushing is not COMPLETELY wrong. But it is at best incomplete.

The Colonies and U.S. during 17th and early 18th centuries were NOT industrialized and had very low inequality (and consequently relatively high prosperity of the masses) compared with Europe. How does that fit with your thesis?

The periods of lowest inequality in Europe have been during and soon after very destructive wars. IOW growth didn't cause those periods of low inequality; destruction did! How does that fit with your thesis?

I'm not going to hunt down the He said/She said/We Said/They Said that led to this whole sub-quibble. But one point stands out:

The world today is very different from the world 1000 years ago. Welcome to reality. Welcome to common sense!​

 

[Swammerdami]

More people receiving large inheritances is an indicatior of greater equality - the wealth is going to a larger percentage of people.

Uh... I'd check your arithmetic there! How many average people do you know that inherit a lifetime's worth of wages?

 

[bilby]

The Colonies and U.S. during 17th and early 18th centuries were NOT industrialized and had very low inequality (and consequently relatively high prosperity of the masses) compared with Europe. How does that fit with your thesis?

The periods of lowest inequality in Europe have been during and soon after very destructive wars. IOW growth didn't cause those periods of low inequality; destruction did! How does that fit with your thesis?

Pretty well:

Growth observably correlates with decreased inequality. That doesn't imply that it causes that reduced inequality; But it does imply that it's not making inequality worse.

It seems that I have accurately summed up the evidence.

The link between growth and inequality is tenuous at best, and so the claim I was addressing:

Growth tends to concentrate wealth at the top, the super rich, the politicians, leaders of industry, the movers and shakers.

... is effectively refuted.

I'm not going to hunt down the He said/She said/We Said/They Said that led to this whole sub-quibble. But one point stands out:

The world today is very different from the world 1000 years ago. Welcome to reality. Welcome to common sense!

Well, it's nice that you agree with me. A thousand years ago, there was low growth and high inequality; today things are very different.

Clearly, it would be wrong to claim:

Growth tends to concentrate wealth at the top

 

[bilby]

More people receiving large inheritances is an indicatior of greater equality - the wealth is going to a larger percentage of people.

Uh... I'd check your arithmetic there! How many average people do you know that inherit a lifetime's worth of wages?

I am not sure why who I know has anything to do with it.

The arithmetic is simple. For any given benchmark of wealth, the more extreme the inequality is in a society, the smaller the proportion of people will be who exceed that benchmark.

"Inheritance of a sum equal to a labourer's annual income" is a rather tortuous benchmark, but the arithmetic is the same as it would be for any other.

In a maximally unequal distribution, where one person has all of the wealth, the number of heirs that met that benchmark would be one - that person's heir. If the wealth were split between just two wealthy people (clearly a less unequal, though still hugely unequal, situation), the number would double to two.

Starting from a highly unequal society (which we clearly are at any point in the time series of the graph), a decline in the percentage of such wealthy heirs therefore implies an increase in inequality.

Equality doesn't need to imply eliminating wealth; It can also (and better) be achieved by eliminating poverty.

 

[Swammerdami]

Returning to thread topic. has there been discussion of this page that Merle cites? It claims that six of nine indicators (all related to overpopulation) are at risky levels.

Three show even higher normalized parameters than that for climate change.
Very briefly these three are:

* Extinctions and "functional Biosphere integrity". What do optimists propose here? Design micro-drones to perform pollination; and we don't need frogs and birds anyway?

* Huge usage of phosphorus- and nitrogen- compounds in fertilizer poses ecological risks.

* "Novel entities" pose risks. These include "hundreds of thousands" of synthetic unregulated chemicals, GMO and more. The chemicals, some used to increase agricultural yields as needed for overpopulation, have been implicted in animal disorders, and even human cancers and hormonal changes.

Optimists might want to review and point to any alleged flaws in this paper.

 

[Elixir]

Optimists might want to review and point to any alleged flaws in this paper.

Why?
Out to destroy optimism, or just optimists?
Seriously, I don’t think reading about it is going to turn any optimist “woke”.

 

[Swammerdami]

Clearly, it would be wrong to claim:

Growth tends to concentrate wealth at the top

The thesis you're pushing is that NON-growth in medieval times left wealth concentrated at the top. Hardly a refutation of the claim you call "wrong."

In another months-ago thread I mentioned that real wages (a rough proxy for income equality) were above £3000 in the mid-1400's, actually higher than most of the 1800's! Why? That was a period of LOW population. England's population was estimated at 4.78 million in 1347, a level it did not reach again until 1621. (Here "real wages" is meant to show earning power per the 2010 £. The £3000 real annual wage in 1445 was 87 shillings in 1445 money.)

And as I just mentioned upthread, the early U.S. is a counterexample to your thesis: growing prosperity compared with Europe, but with unusually LOW income inequality.

 

[Swammerdami]

Optimists might want to review and point to any alleged flaws in this paper.

Why?
Out to destroy optimism, or just optimists?
Seriously, I don’t think reading about it is going to turn any optimist “woke”.

"Optimists" was a euphemism for "Overpopulation Deniers." And anyone hoping to claim the intellectual high ground should be happy to refute scientific papers that argue against their position.

 

[bilby]

Clearly, it would be wrong to claim:

Growth tends to concentrate wealth at the top

The thesis you're pushing is that NON-growth in medieval times left wealth concentrated at the top. Hardly a refutation of the claim you call "wrong."

Only if by "hardly" you mean "exactly".

In another months-ago thread I mentioned that real wages (a rough proxy for income equality) were above £3000 in the mid-1400's, actually higher than most of the 1800's! Why? That was a period of LOW population.

Because, uniquely in the medieval era, that was a time of high social mobility, due to the same cause as the low population - the blue fever (today called the black death) had just killed vast numbers of people.

England's population was estimated at 4.78 million in 1347, a level it did not reach again until 1621. (Here "real wages" is meant to show earning power per the 2010 £. The £3000 real annual wage in 1445 was 87 shillings in 1445 money.)

And as I just mentioned upthread, the early U.S. is a counterexample to your thesis: growing prosperity compared with Europe, but with unusually LOW income inequality.

I don't have a thesis; I am falsifying one proposed by DBT.

For me to be right here requires only that there's not a clear and consistent correlation with DBT's claim. Not that there is any kind of support for a claim of the opposite.

 

[DBT]

Growth tends to concentrate wealth at the top, the super rich, the politicians, leaders of industry, the movers and shakers.

Would that be the case in a “steady state” economy? I would intuit that the effect would be mitigated.

Given a stable equitable economy, it would appear so. I'm not sure that we are capable of it, yet growth cannot be maintained forever and eventually something has to give.

 

[DBT]

Clearly, it would be wrong to claim:

Growth tends to concentrate wealth at the top

The thesis you're pushing is that NON-growth in medieval times left wealth concentrated at the top. Hardly a refutation of the claim you call "wrong."

Only if by "hardly" you mean "exactly".

In another months-ago thread I mentioned that real wages (a rough proxy for income equality) were above £3000 in the mid-1400's, actually higher than most of the 1800's! Why? That was a period of LOW population.

Because, uniquely in the medieval era, that was a time of high social mobility, due to the same cause as the low population - the blue fever (today called the black death) had just killed vast numbers of people.

England's population was estimated at 4.78 million in 1347, a level it did not reach again until 1621. (Here "real wages" is meant to show earning power per the 2010 £. The £3000 real annual wage in 1445 was 87 shillings in 1445 money.)

And as I just mentioned upthread, the early U.S. is a counterexample to your thesis: growing prosperity compared with Europe, but with unusually LOW income inequality.

I don't have a thesis; I am falsifying one proposed by DBT.

For me to be right here requires only that there's not a clear and consistent correlation with DBT's claim. Not that there is any kind of support for a claim of the opposite.

Correction, you are trying to falsify my claim. That has not been achieved. Given the issues described, destruction of ecosystems, species loss, resource use, etc, we in fact have a problem with the notion of perpetual economic growth, ecology and overshoot. That has not been falsified, and the illusion of perpetual growth is something that was recognized by classical economists such as Adam Smith.

 

[Merle]

https://www.footprintnetwork.org/Also worth pointing out that Wiedmann et al support a point that several people have made in this thread and the last: our environmental crisis is the fault of a small minority of the world's population, and we need to change their behaviour, not blame our problems on overpopulation.

The affluent citizens of the world are responsible for most environmental impacts and are central to any future prospect of retreating to safer environmental conditions. We summarise the evidence and present possible solution approaches. Any transition towards sustainability can only be effective if far-reaching lifestyle changes complement technological advancements.

Scientists’ warning on affluence - Nature Communications

Current environmental impact mitigation neglects over-consumption from affluent citizens as a primary driver. The authors highlight the role of bottom-up movements to overcome structural economic growth imperatives spurring consumption by changing structures and culture towards safe and just...

www.nature.com

LOL! Have you even read what I wrote? Because I wrote extensively that the problem is consumption, especially in rich countries. And I wrote an entire section on limiting affluence, which is basically what you say. See https://mindsetfree.blog/we-are-overloading-the-planet-now-what/#Affluence . Can you read it please, before you tell me I would be right if only I would say what I actually say?!?

Suppose that we will soon be in overshoot by more than 200%, that it would take 2 planets the size of Earth to support our lifestyle. We could easily reach that point soon if we extrapolate our Ecological Footprint as calculated by the Global Footprint Network.

Question: If 100 years from now we needed to cut our consumption in half, which would you prefer:
a) 125% of the current population living at an average of 40% of today's consumption or
b) 50% of the current population living at an average of 100% of today's consumption.

Please answer. If a person refuses to answer that question, how can he be taking this discussion seriously?

 

[Merle]

You seem to be confusing economic hardship and collapse. Having more retired people per working age person is a hardship. It is not the same thing as collapse.

Depends on how it's managed. At the moment only a few countries are experiencing such low fertility rates and are only just starting to experience population decline. They can manage this by accepting migrants to stabilise the labour force and by relying on a strong export market, but they can't do either of those things if every other country is experiencing the same demographic crisis.

Accepting migrants is one possibility. If a person is willing to become a part of a new society, accepting them is certainly a lot cheaper than raising our own children and educating them. And if a migrant doesn't have a skill that is needed in the new society, but is willing to learn while living at a low standard of living, then we should have training programs in which he is expected to contribute to that training.

But let's say the hardship of having more retired people per working age person is too big to bear. Then what do you suggest? Do we just put our heads in the sand?

I'd suggest fixing the actual problems we're facing instead of pretending that we can fix our problems with a population nosedise.

In other words, you will choose to ignore the question. That question must have been a stomper.

Again, some people have complained that having a higher ratio of retired people to working-age people will cause the collapse of our society. Their argument is ridiculous, but they have made the argument with a straight face, so we need to address it. I say that the benefits to future citizens of living in a world with a civil, humane descent to 4 billion people instead of 10 billion people will be so great that they should gladly be willing to work to find solutions to facilitate caring for the retired, including a later retirement age.

If instead of reducing population 50%, we choose to reduce affluence 60% while letting population increase to 125%, in what way is that better for the people of the year 2100? Will they gladly accept living at 40% of our affluence, and say that at least they have the same ratio of retired people to working-age people? I don't think so. At 40% of today's affluence level, the elderly might well be left to die of deprivation. I see that problem as being far worse than a slight increase in the ratio of retired people to working-age people.

"Fundamentally, we need to talk about a future of less instead of a future of more." ( Nikiforuk, 2023). If we need to talk about a future with less, how do we do that? Can we really expect all the rich to scale back? In what way would that be better for the economy than reducing births?

I expect the rich to act in their own myopic self-interest. We should be making companies (and therefore their customers) pay for externalities such as environmental damage, and we should be legislating specific requirements for products to be more sustainable.

And this is exactly the solution we have been trying for years, and it clearly is not working. Technology clearly is not keeping up with the demands on the environment. We keep falling further behind. In the work you cited (https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-020-16941-y) it says:

Remarkably, consumption (and to a lesser extent population) growth have mostly outrun any beneficial effects of changes in technology over the past few decades. These results hold for the entire world as well as for numerous individual countries. Figure 1 shows the example of changes in global-material footprint and greenhouse-gas emissions compared to GDP over time. The overwhelming evidence from decomposition studies is that globally, burgeoning consumption has diminished or cancelled out any gains brought about by technological change aimed at reducing environmental impact.

 

[Bomb#20]

We should have stabilized at no more than two billlion.

How??

Population reached that milestone in the late 1920s. Using only the technologies and geopolitical structures available at that time, how could population have possibly have been "stabilized"?

Piece of cake -- worldwide communist revolution. Look how many people Lenin stabilized just in Russia.

 

[bigfield]

LOL! Have you even read what I wrote? Because I wrote extensively that the problem is consumption, especially in rich countries. And I wrote an entire section on limiting affluence, which is basically what you say. See https://mindsetfree.blog/we-are-overloading-the-planet-now-what/#Affluence . Can you read it please, before you tell me I would be right if only I would say what I actually say?!?

I've read your school essay.

Suppose that we will soon be in overshoot by more than 200%, that it would take 2 planets the size of Earth to support our lifestyle. We could easily reach that point soon if we extrapolate our Ecological Footprint as calculated by the Global Footprint Network.

Question: If 100 years from now we needed to cut our consumption in half, which would you prefer:
a) 125% of the current population living at an average of 40% of today's consumption or
b) 50% of the current population living at an average of 100% of today's consumption.

Please answer. If a person refuses to answer that question, how can he be taking this discussion seriously?

I'm certainly not taking your hypotheticals seriously.

Actually, Wiedmann et al provide a clue to help answer this question:

...the world’s top 10% of income earners are responsible for between 25 and 43% of environmental impact. In contrast, the world’s bottom 10% income earners exert only around 3–5% of environmental impact.

That suggests that we shouldn't try to reduce the world's population uniformly, just eliminate the top one or two deciles of consumers.

That doesn't line up with either of your choices, though.