I appreciate the detailed write-up but felt that this lacked a fair attempt to present the strongest arguments in favour of degrowth and then critique them (steelmanning).
It’s been a few years since I studied degrowth in my undergrad degree so my understanding may be weak/ rusty/ simply wrong. All the same, my impression is that a pro-growth attitude is the majority opinion in EA which makes a fair presentation of the alternative argument particularly important as many readers may be predisposed to agree with you.
I’m not an advocate for degrowth (more just have some sympathy for some its general principles but uncertain they can be applied very well) so other people can likely present a better case in its favour. Samuel’s comment goes into more detail than I intend to but to highlight a few points that stuck out for me:
1) I don’t think reducing population is a universal, or even dominant, objective amongst people who support degrowth. e.g. this blog post which discusses the topic and highlights that population reduction is unnecessary given the majority of emissions come from a minority of people. 2) It seems pretty clear that rich people produce a lot more emissions—e.g. reports like this or this highlighting huge disparity in emissions between the richest 1% and the poorest 50% globally. 3) It’s quite possible capitalism has led to people working more, not less. While a chart like this shows a decline in working hours since the end of the Industrial Revolution, it’s quite plausible people worked far less before the Industrial Revolution—e.g. here
I think it’s great to see engagement with ideas like degrowth on the Forum and appreciate anyone’s efforts to write up a more significant argument for what they think and then publish it, I would just encourage a more thorough engagement with the argument you’re critiquing in a post like this.
I didn’t particularkly steelman degrowth, because I thought the arguments in favor of degrowth are pretty obvious: you can decrease environmental impact by reducing economic activity and resource throughput. I tried to find reasons why such reductions would be most feasible and most effective, but couldn’t find them.
“I don’t think reducing population is a universal, or even dominant, objective amongst people who support degrowth.”> That’s why I called it the population degrowth approach, to be distinguished from the resource degrowth aproach. The common usage of degrowth refers to resource degrowth. but population degrowthers are arguing in just the same way as resource degrowthers, that reducing X (be it economic activity, consumption or usage of dirty technologies) is not enough, just like resource degrowthers are arguing that reducing Y (e.g. usage of dirty technologies) is not enough. Population degrowthers are skeptical about the potential of consumption reductions (econo-fix), just as resource degrowthers are skeptical about the potential of technology innovations (techno-fix).
“2) It seems pretty clear that rich people produce a lot more emissions—e.g. reports like this or this highlighting huge disparity in emissions between the richest 1% and the poorest 50% globally.”> True, but those richest 1% created 82% of the economic wealth (also from the same Oxfam source: https://www.oxfam.org/en/press-releases/richest-1-percent-bagged-82-percent-wealth-created-last-year-poorest-half-humanity). According to your Oxfam reference, the richest 1% cause 15% of carbon emissions. Hence, 82% of created economic wealth corresponds with only 15% of emissions. If you would reduce all economic wealth creation by the richest people, which means reducing it with 82%, you only reduce carbon emissions with 15%. This proves again my point about the non-linear relationship between GDP (created wealth, income) and carbon emissions. Income growth shows a decreasing marginal environmental impact. That makes degrowth measures like income ceilings less effective.
“3) It’s quite possible capitalism has led to people working more, not less. While a chart like this shows a decline in working hours since the end of the Industrial Revolution, it’s quite plausible people worked far less before the Industrial Revolution”> That could be true, but as long as degrowthers are not arguing to move back to preindustrial societies, I don’t think this point is relevant. Plus, importantly: humans have longer lifespans now compared to preindustrial times. That means it could be the case that I still have more leisure time over my whole life, than someone in the 16th century over her whole life. And what about our pensions? They didn’t have that in the 16th century.
I appreciate the detailed write-up but felt that this lacked a fair attempt to present the strongest arguments in favour of degrowth and then critique them (steelmanning).
It’s been a few years since I studied degrowth in my undergrad degree so my understanding may be weak/ rusty/ simply wrong. All the same, my impression is that a pro-growth attitude is the majority opinion in EA which makes a fair presentation of the alternative argument particularly important as many readers may be predisposed to agree with you.
I’m not an advocate for degrowth (more just have some sympathy for some its general principles but uncertain they can be applied very well) so other people can likely present a better case in its favour. Samuel’s comment goes into more detail than I intend to but to highlight a few points that stuck out for me:
1) I don’t think reducing population is a universal, or even dominant, objective amongst people who support degrowth. e.g. this blog post which discusses the topic and highlights that population reduction is unnecessary given the majority of emissions come from a minority of people.
2) It seems pretty clear that rich people produce a lot more emissions—e.g. reports like this or this highlighting huge disparity in emissions between the richest 1% and the poorest 50% globally.
3) It’s quite possible capitalism has led to people working more, not less. While a chart like this shows a decline in working hours since the end of the Industrial Revolution, it’s quite plausible people worked far less before the Industrial Revolution—e.g. here
I think it’s great to see engagement with ideas like degrowth on the Forum and appreciate anyone’s efforts to write up a more significant argument for what they think and then publish it, I would just encourage a more thorough engagement with the argument you’re critiquing in a post like this.
I didn’t particularkly steelman degrowth, because I thought the arguments in favor of degrowth are pretty obvious: you can decrease environmental impact by reducing economic activity and resource throughput. I tried to find reasons why such reductions would be most feasible and most effective, but couldn’t find them.
“I don’t think reducing population is a universal, or even dominant, objective amongst people who support degrowth.”> That’s why I called it the population degrowth approach, to be distinguished from the resource degrowth aproach. The common usage of degrowth refers to resource degrowth. but population degrowthers are arguing in just the same way as resource degrowthers, that reducing X (be it economic activity, consumption or usage of dirty technologies) is not enough, just like resource degrowthers are arguing that reducing Y (e.g. usage of dirty technologies) is not enough. Population degrowthers are skeptical about the potential of consumption reductions (econo-fix), just as resource degrowthers are skeptical about the potential of technology innovations (techno-fix).
“2) It seems pretty clear that rich people produce a lot more emissions—e.g. reports like this or this highlighting huge disparity in emissions between the richest 1% and the poorest 50% globally.”> True, but those richest 1% created 82% of the economic wealth (also from the same Oxfam source: https://www.oxfam.org/en/press-releases/richest-1-percent-bagged-82-percent-wealth-created-last-year-poorest-half-humanity). According to your Oxfam reference, the richest 1% cause 15% of carbon emissions. Hence, 82% of created economic wealth corresponds with only 15% of emissions. If you would reduce all economic wealth creation by the richest people, which means reducing it with 82%, you only reduce carbon emissions with 15%. This proves again my point about the non-linear relationship between GDP (created wealth, income) and carbon emissions. Income growth shows a decreasing marginal environmental impact. That makes degrowth measures like income ceilings less effective.
“3) It’s quite possible capitalism has led to people working more, not less. While a chart like this shows a decline in working hours since the end of the Industrial Revolution, it’s quite plausible people worked far less before the Industrial Revolution”> That could be true, but as long as degrowthers are not arguing to move back to preindustrial societies, I don’t think this point is relevant. Plus, importantly: humans have longer lifespans now compared to preindustrial times. That means it could be the case that I still have more leisure time over my whole life, than someone in the 16th century over her whole life. And what about our pensions? They didn’t have that in the 16th century.