The answer is these things have an immense amount of value. To even say the value of technology an average person accesses today is double that of 1970 is wrong, it is a lot more than that. Much or even most of that value is underutilized.
I think a combination of the following lead to a completely perverted understanding of money:
- politicalization of economics
- the reflexive nature of markets
- the tendency of both academics and professionals to seek the assignment of natural laws to market behavior
- time lags in the market making it take years or even decades to discover something was worth a lot less than the amount invested
Fundamentally money is just meant to be a way to account for limited resources between trading parties. If the trading parties are doing something destructive, money doesn't know that. I've also used the analogy before that the trying to measure things in prices as money supply changes is also like trying to use a yard stick which changes in size frequently. Simple if you have some metrics from the central bank, but actually not so simple because of all the complex moving missing pieces (including what other currencies are doing.)
The real global fear factor right now is that a great deal of institutions and individuals have a strong interest in inflation rather than deflation. These are groups whose future is based on prices for things largely going one direction, up. If you earn a living by spending borrowed money -- or being paid by earned interest -- you need this.
A lot of people thrive in situations where someone can hand them a blueprint of what to do along with a bunch of money. They follow it, copy, and get the output. That is largely what current growth numbers measure.
The reality is, of course, everything can't grow forever. That isn't a bad thing.
What I think is the greatest concern right now, the greatest danger, is not 1% global growth or even -1%. Instead, it is how nation states decide to react to slow growth. Quite a few are trying to finance their way out. Others may attempt to do disruptive things such as wars. I think we are more than a decade in to these reactions, by the way.
If fossil fuels are as dangerous as we think, a global slow down or contraction may end up saving us. Right now the countries which are growing are still copy and pasting their way to a pretty non-sustainable future.
There is another situation where real growth is negative but available money supply is increasing and prices are going up. That is very painful to be in, but a real future possible outcome.
