It’s easy to agree and disagree with Ted Trainer at the same time. The steady-state or shrinking economy will arrive, certainly in regard to population numbers, because that’s what happens with increasing prosperity. And it is true that we do not seem to cope too well whenever the economy slows down even a little, mainly because the change in growth rate is not distributed evenly among the population and some lose their incomes completely. That does need to be fixed somehow.

But a “transition to mostly small, highly self-sufficient and cooperative local communities and communities which run their own economies to meet local needs from local resources... with ….. provision of security and a high quality of life for all via frugal, non-material lifestyles”? Nothing to stop people living like that right now, and some choose to do just that, usually when they are young and fit. So what’s Ted on about? Oh, he wants everyone to live like that. And how does he propose to bring that about? I guess it’s all in the book. Something like the forced agrarianisation of society perhaps? Well, it might sound nice but let’s first remind ourselves that it has been tried a few times and didn’t work out all that well. Pretty badly, actually, if you start counting skulls.

Ted needs to remember that the two things he really seems to hate, ‘capitalism’ and ‘consumerism’, are merely what happens when all the other ‘isms’ get out of the way. They are the natural consequences of freedom and prosperity. They may not offer Arcadian bliss but they sure beat the competition.

I agree with Ted that I cannot see how capitalism is compatible with a steady state economy. Any economy of fixed size in which interest is payed by one to another must mean acumulation of wealth with the latter.

Tombee makes the error of assuming that we will have a choice over whether to become more frugal or not. Declining resources mean that there will be no choice - unless Tombee means the choice by a few powerful to accumlate the declining resources for themselves at the cost of putting the rest of us into even more severe poverty.

"They must have the sense to focus on the provision of security and a high quality of life for all via frugal, non-material lifestyles."

I agree with most of what Ted had to say, but I take issue with the part quoted. The resources will not be available for a high quality of life. In the longer term, a vastly reduced population, even in Australia, will have no alternative but to live a very frugal lifestyle indeed as Michael has just said.

The planet cannot sustain even a steady state economy at our present rate of consumption.

David

Every economic down turn throws up 'theorists' like Ted. After the Great Depression, they became spies for Soviet Russia. The clue to this article is Ted's use of the term 'growth maniacs'. That is to say, anyone who disagrees with Ted is a maniac. Excellent, a bit of personal abuse - exactly the right way to persuade people to your point of view.

I believe in economic growth and the economic construct espoused by Adam Smith. It has, in its 20th and 21st century manifestations delivered more people from abject poverty than at any time in human history.

Unfortunately, it is going to deliver an even greater number of people back into poverty, even if not into oblivion. Fortunately, you and I may not be around to see it.

David

< Dick Smith on growth; emphatically yes...and no >

I disagree.

Emphatically yes….and yes!

Ted I agree with your praise of Dick Smith, but I strongly disagree with your criticisms.

<< Growth is not like a faulty air conditioning unit on a house, which can be replaced or removed while the house goes on functioning more or less as before. It is so integrated into so many structures that if it is dumped those structures will have to be scrapped and replaced. >>

But we wouldn't be dumping growth! With a so-called zero-growth economy, we would still have growth, but just not enormous expansionism.

There seems to be a big inherent fault in your argument; you have lumped good growth and bad growth together, with no differentiation.

The sort of growth that we need to get away from is expansionism. That is: just more and more of the same, just increasing the scale, increasing demand, increasing resource exploitation, increasing waste production, increasing pressure on the environment and life-support systems….without increasing the average per-capita gains or quality of life.

The sort of growth that we need to continue with is technological advancement, improved efficiencies, renewable alternatives to currently non-renewable resources, etc. All of this would add up to a substantial continuation of growth and wealth-creation….and average per-capita gains, once the population-expansion part of the equation has been halted or greatly reduced….which is something that could so easily be done in Australia.

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