Jim, My salient point was about people facing in the wrong direction and it not being random. You seem to think you've found a "misstatement" scab that you can pick at. You're facing in the wrong direction.
No, my comment about using more clean energy was not a typo. Increases in scale can easily overwhelm increases in efficiency. If you are ASSUMING that clean energy will cost so much that it will lead to an ABSOLUTE decline in energy use, then it's your assumption that YOU have to explain, not something implicit in my argument that I would have to defend. YOU are facing in the wrong direction, Jim, not me. Why is relentless GDP growth a "completely different matter"? That's exactly what Gene and I were talking about. Yes, I can see that to you, talking about what we were talking about is a "completely different matter" from whatever it is that you want to change the subject to. Since you ASSUME at the outset that THERE IS NO ALTERNATIVE to relentless growth why entertain our alternative? You don't. Because you are facing in the WRONG direction. On Tue, Feb 10, 2009 at 2:03 PM, Jim Devine <[email protected]> wrote: > Gene Coyle wrote: >> Let me back up a bit because this is important on dealing with global >> warming. Assume for my argument that the studies that say that despite the >> carbon tax, US GDP, i.e. income will rise relentlessly in the future... >> I'm not saying the carbon tax raises income but >> that income rises despite it. So then we;ll use more energy. > > That's a completely different matter. I guess Tom made a typo. > >> (Unfortunately most people, including many on this list, see that as an >> unquestioned good thing.) > > Have you done a poll to see if this is agreed to by "most"? > > My position, in case anyone asks, is that capitalism is set up so that > almost everyone is highly dependent on their money incomes for > survival or getting beyond that. We're hanging on to the tail of a > tiger. > > Because of this dependence, cutting incomes or even keeping them > constant without instituting massive methods of non-market > distribution -- i.e., something like a revolution -- would be a > disaster for almost everyone. It would be like a repeat of the Great > Depression. > > Keeping incomes constant would be a disaster because of the normal > increase in socially-created needs and the increase in the population. > Simple macroeconomics (Okun's "Law") tells us that if GDP growth > halts, unemployment soars. That can be changed, but it would again > require massive reforms if not something more. We need to replace the > tiger with a different animal. > > Capitalism is based on the "grow or die" principle, at least on the > micro-level, so we shouldn't expect to see a total halting of GDP > growth or a persistent negative growth of incomes in the absence of > massive institutional change. Capitalism will eventually recover from > the current financial/economic disaster, unless someone can replace it > with something else. > > To manage the system so that GDP growth is replaced by some more sane > economic system would require (at minimum) some sort of > social-democratic management. (Ecotopia?) That is likely insufficient, > since the micro-level grow or die impulse would chafe at the > restrictions, would seek greener pastures in other countries, etc. > There would likely be coup attempts and the like. > >> Joseph Green has been making interesting points against Cap & Trade and the >> carbon tax but I think an even worse thing to say about them is that they >> are business as usual with clean energy. That will be terrible. > > _All else constant_, i.e., ignoring all other needed reforms or > revolutions, would "cap and trade" or a carbon tax be "terrible"? > Might it be a marginal improvement, compared to the case where coal, > etc., continue to be burned at the current rate? Wouldn't an (all else > constant) reduction in pollution be a _good_ thing? > > What's wrong with using clean energy? wouldn't "business as usual" > using clean energy be better than "business as usual" without it? It > might slow down global warming, no? > -- > Jim Devine / "Disbelief in magic can force a poor soul into believing > in government and business." -- Tom Robbins > _______________________________________________ > pen-l mailing list > [email protected] > https://lists.csuchico.edu/mailman/listinfo/pen-l > -- Sandwichman _______________________________________________ pen-l mailing list [email protected] https://lists.csuchico.edu/mailman/listinfo/pen-l
