It looks that income matters in the US, but then it does not matter across countries…
Well, this is the whole point. Some ways to organise countries achieve better social outcomes without the need of better GDP. You don’t have Bulgaria and Denmark in each US city in this sense, which is the sense that counts in this conversation.
But you cannot separate material and non material prosperity.
This is not what degrowthers claim and it is not what I claimed: “*Past a certain point*, the relationship between GDP and social outcomes breaks down *or becomes irrelevant*, at least for many indicators.” Logarithmic plots show pretty straight lines. This basically means exactly that past a certain point the relationship becomes irrelevant.
In any case, this all shows my point. Saying “Growth is good” is like saying “Intelligence is good”. Precisely the point of the post. All this is irrelevant if the ecological collapse degrowthers fear is a big enough thing. This would mean something leading to a pretty bad humanity’s state, far worse than stark degrowth. If you want to argue with a degrowther, you have to argue about that, not say growth is good. Same that advocates for AI development have to argue (and mostly don’t do) that developing AI is not dangerous, not saying how wonderful AI could be.
Well, this is the whole point. Some ways to organise countries achieve better social outcomes without the need of better GDP. You don’t have Bulgaria and Denmark in each US city in this sense, which is the sense that counts in this conversation.
This is not what degrowthers claim and it is not what I claimed: “*Past a certain point*, the relationship between GDP and social outcomes breaks down *or becomes irrelevant*, at least for many indicators.” Logarithmic plots show pretty straight lines. This basically means exactly that past a certain point the relationship becomes irrelevant.
In any case, this all shows my point. Saying “Growth is good” is like saying “Intelligence is good”. Precisely the point of the post. All this is irrelevant if the ecological collapse degrowthers fear is a big enough thing. This would mean something leading to a pretty bad humanity’s state, far worse than stark degrowth. If you want to argue with a degrowther, you have to argue about that, not say growth is good. Same that advocates for AI development have to argue (and mostly don’t do) that developing AI is not dangerous, not saying how wonderful AI could be.