Why quote one of these mindless surveys that falsly implies economic growth and standard of living trade-off. Economic growth is *good* for things like family values because it means that things like pensions, health care, education, roads, and so on can be paid for. Where, for instance, is the money going to come from to pay for the healthcare of the ever aging population without that economic growth ? Are we simply to going to increase taxes (already at the highest level ever) to pay for it ?

I also fail to see why environmentalists and scientists need to convince people to act. If people are already convinced there is a problem then cleary the job of scientist is done (apart from suggesting solutions) -- it is up to the average person to do whatever they can. Since people are not willing to do things like curtail car use, live in better planned cities etc. (i.e., smaller housing), pay for solar panels on their roofs etc., it just shows you that there is a great discrepancy between what people say and what people actually believe.

rc, If pensions, health care,education can be paid for, could you please let us in to the secret as to why they are not being paid for, instead we have $11.5 billion in surplus. This of course was garnished from the States Health funding, and Education and of course public housing for low income people, instead they are homeless, is this a Governments role, to make a profit out of the country.

I was led to believe Governments were to spend their money on these things also, however this Government has shortchanged the States in the last Federal/State Health Agreement in 2004 by nearly $1 billion over 5 years, and with State Schools educating nearly 70% of all students, they recieve only about 30% of the Federal Government's Education budget. As for pensioners, I can assure you we are not flying around the world anytime soon, we can barely afford to eat 2 square meals a day, in a wealthy country in the 21st century.

Do you have any explanation for this situation, as I would love someone to explain "why is it so."

I agree, rc. These things are a measure of perceptions, and seem to me to indicate more that the doomsayers and catastrophists have one over the hearts of people in a post-Cold War world, by projecting their fears onto an unknowable future. I, for one, hope our leaders don't respond and fall sway to this popular pessimism.

Richard, you say that "Government is lagging far behind both scientific evidence and public opinion on this shift in world views or frames of reference." That seems to be unlikely - if government and the opposition were so far adrift of public needs, desires and viewpoints, they wouldn't continue to get over 80% of the votes at elections.

That said, I agree that beyond a relatively modest point material growth in itself does not contribute to happiness and welfare. The Buddha clearly spelled out the basis for real happiness over 2500 years ago, but people continue to seek happiness in ineffective and deluded ways. Governments reflect this ignorance and delusion rather than lagging behind the "wisdom" of the people. If we had wise leaders, it would be easier for others in the community to develop wisdom; as it is, it's up to each individual to develop their own wisdom rather than decry its lack in others.

Statistics, Statistics !

John Winston Howard won his seat in Bennelong (2004)with 49.89%
He did not receive even HALF the vote in his own electorate, and he claims a mandate . HA!

Yes, economic growth is good for the country, if the government spends the money on the country, not on illegal invasions, support to big business etc etc. buying votes.

I think the thrust of the article is that -s l o w l y- people are opening their eyes to the effects of rampant economic rationalism.

My question is, what do we do when the oil runs out?

How many times do we have to say it, but unless you address the question of population, you are pissing into the wind.

rc, you raise a bunch of things that need comment:

The sort of economic growth that we have in Australia is not good for pensions, healthcare, education, etc, because it is growth generated by population growth. The per-capita growth rate is tiny even in economic rationalist terms, and negative in real terms when you factor in all the added pressures that an ever-greater demand on our resource base and environment create, as well as increasing social pressures. Current economic growth is essentially just providing a similar standard of living for more and more people.

It is a mindless self-defeating spiral; more economic growth is needed for an ever-larger population, but an ever-larger population is very strongly promoted in order to boost economic growth. It can’t get much crazier, especially with the blindingly obvious stresses and limitations evident with primary resources and environment.

We have had strong economic growth since the last so-called recession in 1991. But it hasn’t led to much in the way of continued improvements.

If economic growth could be confined to new technologies and better efficiencies that lead to real average per-person gains, without more rapidly depleting non renewable and potentially renewable resources or leading to environmental degradation, then fine. That’s the sort of growth we want. But our economic growth is almost entirely based on the continued increase in rates of resource consumption and expansion in the overall extent of economic activity.

That’s not going to help pay for healthcare or for an aging population. It will do precisely the opposite; it will more rapidly stress out our whole society, which means things will be cut back further and further.

If we want to be able to cover the forthcoming ‘bulge’ of baby-boomers reaching retirement age, we need to desperately stabilise the size of our economy and population and concentrate on improved efficiencies in industry and resource usage, fiscal policies that better distribute wealth, especially regarding taxation of the rich and of big business, and incentives to keep would-be retirees in the workforce.

Coyote, in any electoral system Howard would have won. In First Past the Post, he would have won by 16507 votes. In a preferential system, he won by 6656 votes.

If you want a candidate to only win his seat when he gains more than 50% of the starting vote, then you would find next to all the National party members in the parliament, some independants, and very few of Liberal or Labor. It would be a very empty room, and conservatives would still hold sway.

Regarding the article, the dualism at the end between faith in progress and fear of progress exists when it is feared that progress will not be able to clean up its inevitable mess... perhaps this move to use technology to clean up traditional energy sources is one that breaks this cycle and gives us hope?

The thought that we can simply sequest carbon or build nuclear power which emitt no Greenhouse gasses is far more inspiring and with a clearer goal than installing, bit by bit, renewable energies at large expense. Those who have, such as Denmark, live in an isolated bliss, as when the wind is not enough to power their nation, their power will be supplemented from nuclear stations in Sweden.

Well written article, Richard Eckersley.

The problem of human beings having far more concern for their own material well being than to some apocalyptic vision (regardless of it's validity), is rooted in human personality. Put simply, most people do not give a damn about anything unless it affects them personally.

Even todays youth, who sternly lecture their parents about how older people have ruined the environment, are far more obssessed with owning and wearing overpriced brand name clothing or buying the latest electronic trinket from Harvey Norman, than protecting the environment that they so solomnly decree is their fave cause. Ever seen the mounds of casually discarded litter left after a rock concert?

Greenpeace in Australia grew out of the ZPG (Zero Population Growth) Party but today it is far more concerned with the rights of asylum shopping "refugees" or saving non endagered whales from Jap harpoons than focussing upon atacking the philosophy of economic growth at any cost.

But don't worry Richard. As an Epidimiologist, you are fully aware that the Earth is sick because of the growth in a parasitic organism called The Human Race. But Bird Flue may prove to be an effective antibody.

Excellent article, Richard. BTW are you married ;-)

Anyway, yes sustainable growth in relevant industries would be a good start, as well as loosing the myth that infinite profit is an attainable and desirable goal as well as being mathematically impossible.

Redneck - your post, cynical but unfortunately holds much truth.

However, imagine a world where the USA, since 1990, had poured all its $ into R&D of renewables instead of waging war. We'd have solar batteries the size 20 cent pieces to power our homes and absolutely no need to control the economy of the middle east. I can but sigh and dream. Al-Qaida may never have happened. But, then what would we have to argue about on this forum?

Shonga : the government has a huge surplus because it is the highest taxing ever in Australia's history and we are at the top of an economic cycle after straight 15 years of economic growth. Presumably that will end with the next recession, which means over an economic cycle, there won't be a profit (there almost never is -- otherwise the goverment would have a huge pile of savings). Would you rather the goverment spend the money now whilst things are comparitively good or the next recession, when they are bad ?

Ludwig : I agree that simple economic growth figures hide indivudal reality (like growth per person) and that not all economic growth is good (it is just an overall measure, after all). Alternatively, I don't buy the argument that minor population growth (which might be useful as part of solution to keeping a higher % of the population working) increases resource pressure in any meaningful way. A fair amount of the resource pressure and environmental problems in Australia are caused by mining and agriculture, both of which are mainly export industries. Damage from those industries is going occur no matter what the population.

So the Government waits for a solution to the global warming problem that will not hurt the economy.
Meanwhile, the public waits for the Government to enforce laws to protect the environment, or force industries to make affordable products that minimise harm to the environment.
And the industries wait for the public to change their demands away from products that harm the environment.

Who is going to make the first move to redress this problem and prevent a future crisis?

Example: will the government make laws to regulate what sort of cars the car industry can make or what sort of cars the public can drive? will the public dispose of their beloved fuel-guzzling vehicles for more enviro-friendly cars? or will the car industries stop making fuel-guzzling cars and start building enviro-friendly cars only?

Or will a deadlock remain until the problem becomes much much worse?

rc, I wouldn’t call our rate of population growth minor. Our population growth most definitely increases pressure on our resource base. This very much includes mining and agriculture. A lot of our produce is exported, but not for the good of those who utilise the resources; for the good of those who benefit from the profits. An ever-greater population demands an ever-greater return from our export industries, just to maintain the same average standard of living. Continuous population growth exerts very real pressure to quarry Australia at a faster and faster rate and to push the limits of agriculture beyond what might otherwise be a sustainable level of production.

Obviously we have had massive agriculture and mining in Australia with major environmental problems, with a relatively small population. So the relationship between population size and environmental damage due to mining and agriculture has been small in the past. It has been due primarily to really bad practices. But even though these practices have been very considerably improved, the overall scale of operations continues to increase. This is very closely linked to population size and growth rate.

What had previously led to large-scale real improvements for the whole populace (the development of iron-ore mining in the Pilbara for instance) now really struggles to, as I said earlier, maintain anything like the same standard of living for ever-more people, with no real gains for the whole community.

You ask of Shonga; “Would you rather the government spend the money now whilst things are comparatively good or the next recession, when they are bad?”

The government should be using a large portion of this windfall to direct us towards sustainability and buffer us against the forthcoming resource crisis and consequent recession that will in all probability be triggered by stiflingly high fuel prices.

Ludwig : I think that mining and agriculture expansion, whilst correlated with population growth, isn't caused by it. As far as I'm concerned, these resources are basically exploited to their maximum possible capacity, irrelevant of population growth. If there was no population growth, I wouldn't expect that the expansion of mining would slow down, and nor would I expect agricultural land to be given back for other purposes. I doubt whether the money goes for good or evil (or whatever else) has any affect on this expansion. In any case, I think we agree that economic growth, if measured in a meaningful way that takes into account negative factors (like environmental destruction) not neccesarily accounted for in measures like GDP, is good. The fact that Australia is a rich country gives us far more options as to what further development might be pursued than many poor countries have.

On another note, I think it is generally believed that the relationship between between economic growth and population growth (at least in industrialized countries) is pretty weak, since people that move to new countries like Australia typically bring skills with them (often to Australia's great benefit -- like medical staff and so forth). One can imagine that such a relationship might potentially change given the new demographic structures that most industrialized countries are going to bump into (presumably it is going to be more beneficial to import young well skilled people), although since the rate of growth is slowing anyway (you can see the projections on the Aus Burea of Stats webpage), and immigration always seems driven by political pressures, I doubt it makes much difference

Plerdsus,

You continue to refer to population growth. My understanding is that economic growth and development tends to be linked to a lowering in population growth. So Kyoto-backers, for instance, who want to hinder economic growth, and thus the capacity to develop innovative technologies, are inadvertently contributing to high population growth, particularly in poorer countries, which already struggle to sustain their people. I admit I do not have a solid understanding of these complex issues, but this seems to be logical and borne out by the evidence. Perhaps you could comment or point me to where you have discussed this elsewhere on these pages.

Richard
The world is capable of taking care of itself. If the human race becomes too much of a burden I am sure that we will be removed.

It is sad that we have access to so much information and technology and then come up so short in the Wisdom department which would allow us to make good use of all the knowledge.

While we continue to spend so much in both money and effort in developing more and more weapons I do not see a lot of hope for us little humans being around for much longer.

hehe, good opening dude...1970! :)

“I think that mining and agriculture expansion, whilst correlated with population growth, isn't caused by it.”

I don’t think we have too much disagreement here rc. My point is that with continuous population growth we are hooked in primary production just to struggle to maintain the same standard of living, whereas in Australia’s formative years, these activities did increase per-capita economic turnover and income and did lead to real improvements in standard of living.

Back in the 60s we were in a position to pull back from marginal agricultural land and to moderate mining activities without it really hurting us (if we had only had the presence of mind to do so), but now, when the need to do these things is much greater, it is going to sting us directly. Thus population size and continuous growth is very closely linked to primary production, overexploitation of potentially renewable resources and environmental degradation, even in areas with very low population densities, which includes most of our mining, pastoral and most agricultural areas.

“…although since the rate of growth is slowing anyway…”

I don’t think our population growth rate is slowing. Projections show a decline in birthrate for the next three or four decades as the age skew evens itself out, but with high immigration this isn’t going to mean anything. And let’s face it, our political masters aren’t going to reduce immigration in a hurry

You are right, Ludwig. I am reminded of a New Scientist article some years ago about factory farming in Britain and how the farm animals are exempted from the animal cruelty laws. It came to the conclusion that nothing would change because cheap meat kept the poor people quiet and the politicians in power. More and more people simply dig us deeper into a pit where unsustainable practices can't be addressed because to do so would cut living standards.

rc needs to also consider the effects of more and more people on life in the cities. Species that were once abundant disappearing from fish markets. Shrinking block sizes, with a modest house in Sydney costing 10 years of average wages instead of 2 as in the 1960s. Permanent water restrictions, with people encouraged to spy on their neighbours. Long stressful commuting to work. Deteriorating infrastructure and public services because public money is being diverted into growth infrastructure. More and more monitoring and petty restrictions of all sorts on what we can say or do...

An even greater Australia Day reality fix

Chumley,

Thank you for responding to my comment about population, as most people simply don't want to know. In fact, you could say that the only issue on which the UN, Muslims, Conservative Christians, and almost all politicians are united is that we must have an endless, continuing unrestrained increase in population. Simple facts of arithmetic tell you that if the population grows x percent, then the production of all essentials must grow by at least x percent for people to just maintain their standard of living. If you think about it, each time an immigrant from the third world migrates to the first world the level of output, pollution, and everything else will increase. If I had my way our foreign aid would be entirely directed towards the education of young women in the third world, as there is a direct correlation between education and the number of children they bear. The only country that has done anything about this is China, and more credit to them. If you wish to see other posts of mine on this subject I suggest you go to the User Index.