Economics for a Sustainable World

Man made environmental changes are killing the planet. The things we are doing are not accidental, they are intended and deliberate actions, often subsidized by governments. Our stated intention is "economic growth". We believe that without "economic growth" we cannot maintain full employment. Without full employment poverty would be more widespread and there might be social unrest and political instability. This is some sort of self made trap. To escape from it we must first of all understand it.

Some Economic Contradictions

1. We must "save" for retirement, but the value of our savings is depleted by inflation. Money loses it's value.
2. We must be better educated to succeed, but training and indoctrination is everywhere replacing education.
3. We must export to become wealthy, but every nation is seeking export led wealth. That's an impossibility.
4. To encourage full employment, wages should be lower, but without wages people can't buy what they make.
5. To encourage full employment the government must increase the money supply, but that destroys the value of money.
6. To encourage productivity and growth government must reduce taxation, but that creates deficits and inflation.
7. For 40 years US Presidents have promised to make America less dependent on oil. No progress so far.
8. There is a new promise, to limit climate change. The latest data shows CO² continuing to rise.
9. After 40 years of pursuing "economic growth" real wages are actually falling, in the USA and many other countries.
10. After 40 years of pursuing economic growth public health care and education are is a worse state, not better.
11. To succeed we must be more innovative, but massive social and political forces prevent meaningful innovation.
12. The Economy is a subsystem nested inside the Community. The economy can't "buy" community.
13. The Community is nested inside the Natural Environment. The Community can't make the environment.
14. Subsystems can never take over the systems they are part of. We get cause and effect muddled.
15. Neither business nor government create wealth. Wealth is created by the Earth and converted for use by people.
16. We demand "full employment". So we create debt we can't repay and waste that destroys the Planet.
17. We increase the age of eligibility for pensions to 65+, when lots of people are permanently laid off in their 50's.

All the problems listed above are related. The economic theory we've been taught is a nonsense. But we are trapped by the ideas in our heads, and by the fact that other people also share those ideas. We choose to destroy the environment in which we live because we are unable to change how we think. We choose to die and to cause the death of others (Including our own children and grandchildren.) because we THINK there is no other choice.

We MUST find new ways to think and new ways to behave. If what we choose to do kills the planet, we kill the planet. That's simple enough. Every action has it's effect. We can't plead "I didn't know". We do know. We've been told for more than 40 years that what we are doing cannot continue. So what's wrong with us? We are afraid.

Economics - What the World Needs Now is a New Economics
Video Clips about alternative economic initiatives.
Dr Herman Daly - Steady State Economics
Dr Philip Lawn - Steady State Economics
Garett Hardin on Economics and Ecology
Video Clips from the Gund Institute on Steady State Economics
Center for the Advancement of Steady State Economics
A Documentary Film from Earth Economics.

The Ecology of Natural Productivity
Jean-Pascal van Ypersele, Vice-Chair Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change at the Club of Rome
Fish Stocks Around Iceland
The Use and Abuse of Wetlands
Solving the most Complex Problems - A New Architecture is Needed