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The Case for Degrowth

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Re: The Case for Degrowth

#161

Post by nicbou »

satyrnein wrote: post #151
cudgy wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

True, but the parent post did not mention use of force. We cannot deny that there is a brain drain in many third world countries that desperately need well trained workers that is accelerated by acceptance of immigrants into developed nations like the US. Who’s going to lead these countries into better governance and economic improvement if all the talent is incentivized to leave their home countries for greener past…

Immigration was compared to "colonial appropriation" which doesn't exactly sound voluntary. In contrast, it would be a terrible thing to forcibly lock people into their birth countries to stop brain drain.

It’s not voluntary to the drained countries

Re: The Case for Degrowth

#162

Post by LewisVerstappen »

dredmorbius wrote: post #109
LewisVerstappen wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sri Lanka banned the use and importation of chemical fertilizers before though.

A year ago, not in some distant past. https://www.reuters.com/markets/commodities/fertiliser-ban-d... https://www.vox.com/future-perfect/2022/7/15/23218969/sri-la... As the economic crisis was already in process --- it's been developing since 2019: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2019%E2%80%93present_Sri_Lanka...

After the fertilizer ban was implemented, then "Production of tea — Sri Lanka’s main cash crop — fell by 18% in a year. Production of rice — the main food crop — fell by even more" [1]

So you're saying this did not contribute to the food shortage (a drop in domestic production of rice)?

Or you're saying this drop in production would've happened irrespective of the fertilizer ban?

1 https://noahpinion.substack.com/p/why-sri-lanka-is-having-an...

Re: The Case for Degrowth

#163

Post by dariosalvi78 »

impossiblefork wrote: post #6

The problem with ideas like this is that it takes the ladder away from middle class and the poor. Both need growth in order to improve their conditions, and their place in society exists only because they can produce growth. Without it the power of the wealthy over them would become a weight pressing down with such force that it would intolerable.

you need distribution of wealth, not growth for that

Re: The Case for Degrowth

#164

Post by sprucevoid »

RandomLensman wrote: post #155
sprucevoid wrote: post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> So why now? From my reading of degrowth works the answer is: because now the global resource use induced by growth have accumulated enourmous negative externality costs, costs that will nedlessly increase further unless counteracted by degrowth policy. Food shortages, deadly heatwaves, property destruction. Direct dire costs to human health and welfare and rippling secondary effects. For example how would a scenari…

Fair enough on the intermediate step possibility. However, it is often sold more like a return to simpler lifestyles for forever - or maybe the proponents I encountered just happen to lean that way. As far as dire scenarios are concerned, I struggle with them as usually the realities play out differently. Arguably in part because people do consider such scenarios.

> a return to simpler lifestyles for forever

Seems to me it is often portrayed that way by opponents strawmanning it or by media simply very lossily compressing it into a few sentences/seconds chunks. But I'm not sure how many of the proponents really have that view. Even in cases where degrowth writers have "simple life forever!" type phrasings my impression is that that's not really the focus of their work and they're not really strongly wedded to such a vision for the long term. Their core focus is the imminent (as in 100 years) negative externalities, not the long future after that.

I think Jason Hickel is an interesting case. I've learned a lot from reading both his work and that of his critics. His "What does degrowth mean? A few points of clarification" is a good intro to his thinking[0]. I think very little there is really incompatible with expansion into space in the longer term.

[0] https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/14747731.2020.1...

Re: The Case for Degrowth

#165

Post by dariosalvi78 »

degrowth is unavoidable: population will stop growing soon and natural resources cannot be exploited at the same rate as they are now. So we'd better prepare for a nice and managed post-growth world or we'll face the worst consequences of it.

Re: The Case for Degrowth

#166

Post by jacquesm »

lokimedes wrote: post #150
patrick451 wrote: post #144

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What you're describing is a ponzi scheme.

We see a similar effect in Europe, people live longer, and a large group is on pension, while retaining voting rights. This incentivize conservation of the status quo as we now have majority ownership of the societal future in the hands of a “rent-seeking owner class” that is not there to experience it. Controversial as it may be, I’m thinking that voting should somehow be coupled to taxable contribution to the socie…

> Pensioners, children and other unemployed must be protected by laws instead of direct political influence.

Of course then nothing stops those that have the vote because they work to disenfranchise those pensioners and other unemployed (the children will be theirs as well so are likely going to be protected).

Laws are indirectly made by those who vote!

Re: The Case for Degrowth

#167

Post by Kbelicius »

thematrixturtle wrote: post #119
TeeMassive wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Brain drain is a real phenomenon and a real problem. Your personal feelings about it are irrelevant.

It's a "problem" only if you assume nation-states own the brains of their citizens, and have the right to dictate that they stay within their borders. There's a lot of brains draining from Russia right now due to Putin's policies. Should we deport them all back to Russia?

> It's a "problem" only if you assume nation-states own the brains of their citizens

It is a problem for a nation-state whether you assume that nation-state owns the brains of their citizens or not.

> There's a lot of brains draining from Russia right now due to Putin's policies. Should we deport them all back to Russia?

Nobody said anything like that. You should respond to what was written and not to what is in your head.

Re: The Case for Degrowth

#168

Post by jacquesm »

alfor wrote: post #127
roflyear wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is an obvious way out. Increase immigration. The US does this well. Why doesn't Japan? Because of racism and xenophobia. No one talks about it (wouldn't be surprised if I got downvoted for mentioning it) but Japan is mad racist. They do not like foreigners.

We are headed for a massive population collapse everywhere Countries get richer, people move to small apartments in cities, birth rate drop below replacement. Japan, China, Europe, Russia. The US are less bad, people want to go there and the birth rate is not as bad (more suburbia?) We are headed toward very different times with degrowth all over and a lot of infrastructure to maintain. Here (Canada) ’we are hiring’…

"Don't think of it as dying, think of it as beating the rush."

I suspect you may well be right but for different reasons: Societies have a life-cycle and there are quite a few of them that feel like they've passed their Zenith and are on the way down. I don't see how that can be reversed once it gains momentum and given the upside-down cost structure that we'll end up with collapse may be rather faster than how long it took to go up.

Immigration is just a shell game in this respect, though it may postpone the inevitable for a bit. Outsourcing manufacturing, food production and quite a few other critical components for a functioning society may yield short term gains but long term it isn't sustainable and the current perfect storm of war, climate change, covid and politics may well set off the avalanche.

Re: The Case for Degrowth

#169

Post by dariosalvi78 »

dr_dshiv wrote: post #29
Yoric wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, we do need food. But do we need it so highly processed? Do we really need video game consoles or Netflix? Do we need to change phone or car quite so often? I'm sure we all can find a number of things that we own and shouldn't really have bought. I'm not sure what it takes to degrow, but I'm pretty convinced that there's lots of fat in our consumerist lives that could be trimmed away even without changing our da…

Arguing for greater efficiency or arguing against luxury is so, so different from arguing for degrowth. Maybe I’m wrong, but it seems that degrowth is fundamentally misanthropic. And the core of the misanthropic philosophy is the belief that mankind and nature are two different things. We will likely die for the lack of philosophy.

it's rather the opposite, it comes from the observation that humans operate in a natural environment, which has limits

Re: The Case for Degrowth

#170

Post by jacquesm »

pessimizer wrote: post #113
cudgy wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

25k saved (the difference in price between the cars) is more than most people have in savings. It would at least delay the fall of the guillotine long enough to find another job.

Or it can be eaten up by one emergency room trip and three days of intensive care.

Quite a few countries have solved this problem.
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