The problem is that seeking growth at all costs allows the accumulation of economic and political power. The people in charge do not distinguish between personal success and a better world, and therefore see no difference between economic growth and a better world.
It also funds everyone’s retirement. People start revolting pretty quickly when they learn they get paid almost nothing and they have to rely on a magic money making machine in the stock market to live out their twilight years.
Sounds like a good argument for government pensions. Thank you, comrade!
Anything that allows people to retire and doesn’t require unsustainable GDP growth I’m happy with LOL.
but what of the shareholders?
/s
This is the biggest problem with economical growth.
All the FAANG or whatever their called these days can hit 1000% growth tomorrow, and suddenly, our economical growth skyrockets.
But that doesn’t mean anything for the average person. At all.
The constant need for growth really bothers me. I live in a rural area. People move here because it’s natural and quiet and cost of living is low. Then they complain that there is no Target and no Chik Fila and not enough jobs. The board of supervisors is full of developers. Once they finish building out the county we will be just like every other suburban hell.
Not just the constant need for that sort of growth. In our late-stage capitalist society, companies are expected to make more profit than last year every single year. As if that is somehow sustainable.
Exactly, that is a ridiculous, anti-consumer and anti-environment standard.
Apple has made record profits of $X billion dollars this quarter. However, that is only $3 billion more than last year same quarter.
You’re right, Greg. One has to wonder: will Apple be bankrupt next year?
And then they will leave for a more idyllic life in the country because it’s so noisy.
I’m pretty sure the large open field behind my house, which used to be full of trees, is going to be turned into another gated neighborhood full of cookie cutter houses. And I just know someone is going to be close to my back yard, and they are going to whine about my wife’s chickens, especially since one of them is a rooster.
So they will piss and moan and try to make us get rid of the rooster. And then they will probably get a small dog that yaps all night.
Pasco County Florida by any chance?
No, not FL. Judging by driving around the US it’s happening all over. Walmarts and apartments and McDonalds everywhere you go. Many are fairly new and right next to rural land. No sidewalks or public transportation, just sprawl into rural areas.
Destroy capitalism.
Got it.
Capitalism has one positive, and that’s the notion of competition leading to the best outcome as they try to win over consumers.
We’ve lost that though with how unfettered it’s become in general. Companies merge and conspire, eliminating competition.
Public universities and research actually produce the most amount of innovation. Another one of capitalisms lies
There’s a difference between lab bench research and discoveries and then actually making them into usable products on a mass scale. That’s a big part of where engineering comes into focus, on that scale up. There’s a lot of research that proves impractical in reality because the synthesis of a material is really finicky or the purification of it is exceedingly difficult.
That said, I actually agree that private industry shouldn’t be part of this space. Companies shouldn’t be sponsoring research and picking winners like this. We need something analogous to national labs that’s focused solely on the scale up of discoveries – taking something discovered in a university or national lab and making it usable for the everyday person. And from there companies can get licenses from the government to offer the technology to consumers and make their own innovations, all of which must be reported to the government.
… So I think I’ve just convinced myself that you’re right and I agree with you, actually.
You said it better than I ever could
It’s become more of a competition as to who can fool and subsequently fuck over the consumers more.
Exactly. We’ve let them become way too powerful. They shouldn’t be able to do this.
Competition doesn’t lead to innovation in improving people’s lives, but company profits. See: enshittification.
I see that as a consequence of the absurd monopolies we have. The best product should be what’s the most popular, and enshittification is counter to that. It tanks the product quality, and in a market with lots of competitors, it would be punished.
It is one of the consequences of monopolies, but monopolies are a consequence of economic competition.
The “winner” gets the losers stuff and customers (mergers for example), making the winner bigger and more able to manipulate the market to their benefit.
When there are few enough companies profits can be chased without consideration for anything else (planned obsolescence, shipping jobs outside the country, lay-offs, etc.)
So, like you said except in a for profit market, monopolies are inevitable.
In the absence of regulation, absolutely. If we had more stringent anti trust legislation though it might be possible to avoid.
The best product should not be what’s most popular in Capitalism, what’s profitable to produce is what’s most profitable. With tons of competition, you just have competing levels of automation, corner cutting, and exploitation.
Competition and markets in general are the cause of enshittification.
That is a good point actually.
Yep, Marx predicted this actually. A huge portion of Marx’s literature is even more relevant today than ever before.
for context
That looks… a lot… like the Greendale Community College flag.
Removed by mod
I’d bet at a certain point of societal development economic growth is linked with many positives. Unfortunately, we probably adopted it as our only metric and the min/max’ers have taken it to its most extreme. Now when we look at the data we are way outside the range where it’s a useful indicator. Our targets are too high and we need to monitor other indicators of prosperity.
The wealthy have certainly reinforced growth as the ultimate metric.
So far as it represents human toil, yeah, it’s good. It’s not that anymore, though.
If your only goal is that most people can live decently and reduce exploitation, abuse, and such, yeah, sure.
But if you just want to amass money, then, no.
A choice was made.
“Lol. Um, what.”
- capitalists
Economic growth is fine to a point. Problem is measuring economic growth through the arbitrary price of a small group of companies using a market system designed for gambling rather than long-term investing. Better is to base it on the amount of goods exchanged across all levels of society. When the top has all the money and increases their stock prices by buying and selling their own stocks, and the rest can’t afford to participate in the economy beyond necessities, that’s not a good economy.
Unpopular opinion: If we ended fossil fuel use immediately a lot of people would die and the entire economy would collapse. People would starve because stores wouldn’t be stocked. People would freeze to death because they wouldn’t be able to heat their homes. Looting and violence would soon follow.
The only people who would likely be ok are the ultra wealthy.
Change takes time and right now there are no alternatives that can immediately absorb the extra load from cutting off fossil fuels.
I don’t think anyone is seriously advocating for stopping fossil fuels cold turkey.
The truly unpopular opinion is the one you’re pretending is popular, people aren’t advocating for immediate replacement without building up green energy and replacing it entirely.
You realize that people need money to actually fucking feed themselves and put a roof over their head, right?
Continuous growth is not a requirement for that.
Growth and stability of necessities aren’t mutually required.
You can have controlled or even negative growth and plenty of food and necessities.
Imagine it this way: what if we made it completely illegal to make party favors and other single-use items with no benefit? Growth would lower, but food production isn’t hurt in the slightest, and other jobs can exist.
I hate this elitist sentiment. 😒
Strong “i got mine so fuck you” type of mentality.
A degrowth society has to be an equitable society. Otherwise your criticism is entirely valid.
We are going to have a degrowth system regardless of any policy decisions, as the current growth system is burning through critical resources and destroying the environment. We can either plan for this, or we can have an unplanned existential civilizational crisis.
Degrowth for the west, let the rest of the world suffer yeaaaaaa. Everyone knows only the west matters anyways.
By equitable I meant ‘equitable for everyone’ not equitable for only the people of the core of the empire.
I mean we are saying the same thing… i am just saying that thinking this way is pretty elitist. There are developing african and asian countries that will soon surpass the US and EU in population. Im sure they will have the same mindset though.
If you don’t think corporations and governments in Africa have the same idea that there should be endless growth, I suggest you read up on them.
My last like 5 posts on this have been sarcastic. I think its incorrect to think that environmental policy starts and stops with the west. I also think its unrealistic to think a developing country doesnt aspire to become just as waste hungry.
We need equalization, which means drastic cuts for the west and massive leaps for the developing world.
