capitalism and eternal growth

[opebo]

I applaud your inattention to ag, Tweed.  I have a solution for you - growth can be slightly mitigated by tremendous cataclysmic wars and to a lesser extend by plagues and other forms of 'die off'.  I admit we have not seen nearly enough of this solution yet, but perhaps more is coming.  I for one do hold out some hope for the 'zombie solution', but I suppose that's a bit of a fantasy given the source (B-movies).

[opebo]

I applaud your inattention to ag, Tweed.  I have a solution for you - growth can be slightly mitigated by tremendous cataclysmic wars and to a lesser extend by plagues and other forms of 'die off'.  I admit we have not seen nearly enough of this solution yet, but perhaps more is coming.  I for one do hold out some hope for the 'zombie solution', but I suppose that's a bit of a fantasy given the source (B-movies).

Well, well... Your own humanitarian view of that part of the world that you personally not screwing at the moment has been well-known around here Though, of course, you assume that you won't be among the victims. And you got annoyed at me addressing you "Your Lordship" )

It was humor.  Keep trying.

[opebo]

To be fair, the growth is necessary not for the operation of capitalism itself, and certainly not for the benefit of capitalism's 'stakeholders' (the owning class), but as a very important and perhaps indispensable part of the deception which is the defining innovation of capitalism itself.  It is possible that during a period of decline of standard of living due to 'lack of growth' portions of the servile class will realize and understand what is being done to them; at any rate such a realization does become perhaps more likely or common (though I suspect still not the norm).  

Does this mean the 'end of capitalism?  It seems unlikely - capitalism is a complex social and political (and yes, we can say 'economic' if you like) system of control that does not only depend this perception (accurate or not) of slight incremental 'improvement'.

[opebo]

The economy is changing all the time. Today's institutions are quite distinct from those 100 years ago, and will, of course, change in the future, growth or no growth.  Any society that has an economy that isn't growing at an accustomed rate will have a lot of unhappy people: irrespective of what its institutions are.

Actually no, you can't make that assumption - because, things are changing all the time.  So, it can't always be true, and in fact a society with virtually no growth but a population declining by a considerable amount every year might still have quite fine median income growth and a surfeit of employment opportunities for youth (as elders leave the workforce). 

Of course I'm being the devil's advocate there, but to some extent that does describe Japan: it really isn't anywhere near as 'unhappy' as you'd expect a country with no growth for decades to be.