Scarcity is real

[Carpo]

As I understand it many people believe that the current job crisis is created by automatisation. I think that is only a symptom of a resource crisis. Automatisation can be used to cut of people from resources.

Everyone consumes labour and natural resources on a daily basis. Of both there is a fixed amount. Now many people argue that natural resources are not fixed. They can be substituted. For example if there is no meat, that can be substituted by tofu, and if there is no tofu, it can be substituted by some new superfood out of a high tech algae tank. This logic has flaws. For example if there is no food that can be substituted by nothing. I am doing a thought experiment here: if population growth would be unlimited there must be a point in time were there is not enough food for everyone – regardless what high tech solutions are put in place the chemical elements available on earth constitute an unchangable limit.

Now long before we run into this limit we may have the problem with the high tech superfood algae tank. The idea is that if a resource is rare this can be solved by technological progress – producing food in tanks for example. Now there is not an unlimited supply of usefull inventions. Think of this: do you really believe that if this civilisation runs for a million of years it will make as many usefull inventions as it did in the last hundred years? One obvious reason why it will not work is that many of the most important inventions where result of scientific or mathematical discoveries, and there is simply a finite set of laws of nature to discover.

Even today many inventions already do not make things better but are simply there to maintain our living standard. An energy saving light bulb for example does not give more beautifull light, it just compensates rising energy costs. This might be wise but there is a limit of how much more energy efficient we can make our machines.

All economic modells tell us that growth will stop once technological progress will stop. But no scientist can tell how to monitor or measure inventions. It may have ended today. The patent registry will not tell you this because there is no mean of measuring the quality of patents submitted.

Once technological progress stops and population still growths there must be mass unemployment. Beeing unemployed/poor simply means that you need to reduce your resource consumption. The working population is than cutting of the unemployed population from limited resources.

[DJP]

But is demand infinite?Why is it that people are employed in the current social system?What is growth?

[Author]

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