That’s why I’m skeptical of degrowth actually doing something to effectively reduce consumption. Because some individuals consume 3, maybe 4 orders of magnitude more resources (and the accompanying pollution or ecological destruction, however you want to measure it), I’ve always believed that reducing population runs a significant risk that the remaining smaller population will use far more resources than the previous larger population.
You see it in rich countries. We have low birth rates and high consumption rates, and our consumption grows exponentially even as our population does not. We run a serious risk of being very destructive childless retirees, and consumption and pollution and emissions and ecological impact need to still be worked on, even if we do shrink the population.
That’s why I’m skeptical of degrowth actually doing something to effectively reduce consumption. Because some individuals consume 3, maybe 4 orders of magnitude more resources (and the accompanying pollution or ecological destruction, however you want to measure it), I’ve always believed that reducing population runs a significant risk that the remaining smaller population will use far more resources than the previous larger population.
You see it in rich countries. We have low birth rates and high consumption rates, and our consumption grows exponentially even as our population does not. We run a serious risk of being very destructive childless retirees, and consumption and pollution and emissions and ecological impact need to still be worked on, even if we do shrink the population.