by Rob Dietz
Indirect Methods to Limit Throughput
When economists consider ways to alter consumption habits, most of them sooner or later hit on taxation schemes. Taxes are able to influence behavior to some degree. For example, a “sin tax” on tobacco products attempts to reduce the unhealthy behavior of smoking by making it more costly. In addition to the deterrent effect, the revenue generated from sin taxes can be used to help mitigate the impacts of the undesirable behavior (e.g., paying the costs of medical care for smoking-related health problems). Ecological tax reform is a proposed system of sin taxes for curbing consumptive and waste-generating behavior. Ideally the tax burden is shifted onto items and activities that need to be limited in order to prevent environmental problems (e.g., pollution or vehicle miles traveled). The revenue generated from ecological taxes can replace revenue from other taxes, which can then be lowered or abolished (e.g., income taxes). As Herman Daly puts it, we should tax “bads” instead of goods.19
Sifting through an economics toolbox, you’d expect to find the tools for tax reform. But economists would do well to consider another tool for restricting throughput to a sustainable level—one found more often in an ecologist’s toolbox: the conservation of natural areas.
Jurisdictions all over the world, from communities to nations, have gained extensive experience establishing and managing protected areas. These protected areas, such as national parks, wildlife refuges, and marine sanctuaries, are excluded from economic production—laws prohibit exploitation of these lands and waters and the resources they contain. Yet despite their importance, existing protected areas aren’t getting the job done. In the United States, the majority of ecosystem types have relatively little of their area conserved.20 Biologists have found that land protection efforts in North America are more likely to focus on scenic, economically unproductive lands at high elevation—essentially, rocks and ice.21 Globally, the protected areas network has grown impressively in the last few decades and now covers more than 11 percent of the planet’s land surface, but it falls short of providing security for the long-term survival of many vertebrate species.22
One prescription for enhancing the effectiveness of protected areas is to emulate the new vision for investment introduced in Chapter 4: we need to invest in more protected areas and locate them strategically to conserve a wider range of ecosystem services and biological diversity. Doing so would reduce throughput by taking more lands and natural resources off the market and by helping restore the ability of ecosystems to assimilate wastes (e.g., uptake of carbon dioxide by forests). Filling this prescription, however, is a thorny political and financial problem, because the majority of high-priority conservation regions around the world exist in low-income nations where paying the costs of establishment and enforcement is difficult.23 Wealthy nations could help by employing “payment for ecosystem services” schemes, which offer financial incentives to farmers or landowners in exchange for managing their lands to provide some sort of ecological service.
Aldo Leopold, an early American ecologist whose work had a profound effect on the science of wildlife management, offered another prescription. He believed it was necessary to apply conservation approaches more broadly across the landscape—to adopt what he called a “land ethic.” In Leopold’s words, a land ethic “reflects the existence of an ecological conscience, and this in turn reflects a conviction of individual responsibility for the health of the land. Health is the capacity of the land for self-renewal. Conservation is our effort to understand and preserve this capacity.”24 Following Leopold’s ideas, societies need to embrace a philosophy of stewardship and work toward conserving the health of all lands, instead of just fencing in a collection of protected areas.
WHERE DO WE GO FROM HERE?
Humanity sits in a precarious position. The global household is consuming too much stuff, and it’s time to cut back. Success will likely require a combination of both direct and indirect policies, which may impinge on personal freedom to some degree. But regardless of the mix of policies, there are four prerequisites for moving forward.
First and foremost, we need to achieve a more equitable distribution of income and wealth (Chapter 7 discusses this topic in depth). As throughput-limiting policies take effect, available resources will decline. When this occurs, each person must be assured access to a fair share. What would happen if we maintained the current distribution of natural resources (and the goods and services that flow from them) in a scenario of limited resource use? The wealthy would capture an ever-greater proportion of the supply, and the poor would suffer. Therefore, any policy limiting the use of a resource must explicitly address how the value embodied in that resource can be fairly distributed among all citizens.
Second, we need a comprehensive monitoring system. Tracking economic throughput (and assessing whether that throughput is sustainable) requires good data collection and analysis systems. To see why, consider a limit on the use of fossil fuels. Such a limit would likely stimulate a significant increase in the production of biofuels, which could have unintended consequences on land use and food prices. Without monitoring, we’d have no way of tracking these indirect impacts, let alone the direct impacts of burning less fossil fuel. The information provided by monitoring programs could also help refine policies (e.g., changing the cap in a cap-and-share scheme in the event of unforeseen consequences), which would be very useful, as we undoubtedly will have to tinker with new policies to get them right. A good starting point for a nation to monitor throughput is to adopt green accounting procedures, such as the United Nations System of Environmental-Economic Accounts (SEEA 2003).25 SEEA 2003 provides a framework for consistent analysis of the contribution of environmental resources to the economy, and the impact of the economy on the environment.
Third, we need to adopt an incremental approach. Imposition of resource-limiting policies would require considerable cultural and institutional changes across society. Applying such policies incrementally would allow space for people to alter their behavior and restructure economic institutions.
Fourth, we need to improve cooperation and coordination across all levels of government. The power to regulate the extraction and consumption of resources primarily resides at the national level, but the impacts from the use of such resources are often experienced globally. For example, oil supplies and forests fall under the jurisdiction of nations, but the management of these resources affects global common goods, such as climate and biodiversity. In addition, if one nation enacts limits on throughput, there’s a real risk that capital and industry could flee to other countries that have not imposed such limits. A nation trying to establish sensible resource-use policies may face difficulties if other nations continue to pursue growth-based policies.
Resource limits, therefore, should ideally be set from the top down, starting at the global level and filtering through international regions, nations, and local communities. But the power to manage resources within these limits should reside with individuals and organizations at the local level. Such a process will require close cooperation among nations and coordination among smaller jurisdictions. Even though humanity has struggled to achieve such cooperation and coordination, encouraging precedents exist. The Montreal Protocol successfully restricted the use of chemicals that deplete stratospheric ozone (ozone protects life on earth from harmful UV radiation). Adoption and enforcement of the Montreal Protocol’s rules required intense negotiations and buy-in from the international community.
Limiting throughput to sustainable levels requires fundamental alterations to the economic landscape. These alterations will no doubt come with costs, but the greater costs to fear are the costs of doing nothing. Is it worth the risk of wrecking our global household by cramming it full of more stuff than is necessary for people to live good lives? It will be a challenge to convince entrenched, pro-growth elites to accept needed changes, but maybe the 88 Percent can tackle the challenge.
Most people have heard of the 99 Percent—th
e self-proclaimed group of people fed up with the exorbitance of the top 1 percent of income earners—but who are the 88 Percent? In a survey of residents (eighteen and older) of the state of Oregon, 88 percent of respondents agreed that the United States “would be better off if we all consumed less.”26 It’s hard to find any topic in politics on which 88 percent of people can agree—that’s a strong majority calling for enough, and a solid base of support for maintaining a healthy household metabolism.
[ CHAPTER 6 ]
ENOUGH PEOPLE
Stabilizing Population
I’ve never seen a problem that wouldn’t be easier to solve with fewer people. The same problem becomes harder, or ultimately impossible, when more people are involved.
SIR DAVID ATTENBOROUGH1
WHAT ARE WE DOING?
An unusual house sits in a typical middle-class neighborhood in the suburbs of Atlanta. Fifty homes that look like an early 1970s vision of the American dream line the neighborhood’s shady cul-de-sacs. The mass-produced houses sit on parcels carved out of the forested red-clay slopes typical of Georgia’s Piedmont region. These houses mostly look alike, since they share the same cultural and architectural roots, but the very last house at the end of the street stands out. It’s a custom job with unusual coffee-colored brickwork, small built-in courtyards for rock gardens, and a design that still strikes most observers as being modern. It is the home of a Chinese-American family, and the youngest of the family’s four children was my best friend when I was a kid.
It was obvious, even to a second-grader, that David’s house was different on the outside, but I also noticed something different the first time I saw the inside. On the wall of the study, the room where we spent time discussing crucial matters such as Halloween costumes and the best design for a bicycle seat (banana or standard?), was a row of framed photos of U.S. presidents, from Lyndon Johnson to Jimmy Carter. Now that’s an odd choice for a wall decoration, especially in a home adorned with scrolls, sculptures, and pottery from the Far East. Even odder was that each photo had a hand-written message and signature on it.
David’s big brother, Bobby, who was born in 1967, came into this world as the 200-millionth American. His baby photos appeared in a spread on the pages of Life magazine. Bobby gained a sort of fame, because people were interested to watch his life unfold, to see how this random representative of America’s population measured up. As a result, on each birthday, he received a signed photo from the president.
I hadn’t thought about Bobby’s status as the 200-millionth American for a long time, until a news story on October 17, 2006, brought it to mind. On that day, the 300-millionth American was born, and something about that fact unsettled me. It was the speed of the population growth. In less than forty years, we added 100 million people to the country. That’s like adding ten more states the size of Georgia (with today’s population) to the Union, or 185 more cities the size of Atlanta.
On the other side of the Atlantic, the population of the United Kingdom is also on the rise, projected to increase from its 2010 level of 62 million to 67 million in 2020, and 73 million in 2035.2 The fact that the United States and United Kingdom populations are growing is troubling, since both countries have ecological footprints that are already higher than their biological capacity. The U.S. footprint is twice the size of its capacity, and the U.K. footprint surpasses its capacity by nearly four times.3 Without further judgment of the sustainability of such population growth, it’s safe to say that it makes for big changes to the economics and social fabric of a nation.
Panning out to the global scale, at the time of Bobby’s birth, the earth held about 3.5 billion people.4 In the years since, we’ve doubled the population to 7 billion. Seven billion is a number that’s mostly outside of human experience, but the National Geographic Society has tried to make sense of it with a couple of compelling statistics:
• It would take two hundred years to count to 7 billion out loud.
• In 7 billion steps, you could circumnavigate the globe 133 times (assuming you could walk on water).5
Seven billion is still difficult to conceptualize, but understanding the very large effect that can arise from a very small rate of growth is even more difficult. The physicist Albert Bartlett has highlighted our mathematical shortcomings in his presentations, stating, “The greatest failing of the human race is our inability to understand the exponential function.” Recall that the rule of thumb for calculating doubling time is to divide 70 by the percentage rate of growth, so a growth rate of only 1 percent per year applied to a population of 7 billion means that in about seventy years, the population will double to 14 billion. In short, a small, but constant, rate of growth causes a rapid rise in population. Currently, both the world and U.S. populations are growing at a little over 1 percent per year.6
Population growth over the past few centuries provides a striking example of the exponential function at work. Now demographers are trying to figure out what will happen to population numbers in the future. In its “medium” population projection, the United Nations estimates that global population will reach 9.3 billion by the year 2050, and over 10 billion by 2100 (Figure 6.1).7
Although sometimes construed as a North-versus-South issue, population growth and overpopulation affect a diverse range of nations. As Figure 6.2 shows, some of the most densely populated countries, such as the Netherlands, Japan, and the United Kingdom, are in the global North.8 Even so, there is a demographic difference between the more- and less-industrialized nations. Most nations in the North have lower population growth rates than those in the South.
FIG. 6.1. Demographers expect world population to grow by another 1.2 to 3.7 billion people by 2050. The line from 1900 to 2010 shows historical data, while the three lines from 2010 to 2100 show the United Nations’ three population growth projections (low, medium, and high). SOURCE: see note 7.
Much has been said about the decline in population growth rates in industrialized nations. In European countries, Japan, and Russia (among other nations), fertility rates have dropped below the level associated with a stable population (generally around 2.1 children per woman in industrialized nations).9 Population size is already shrinking in some of these countries, and it will likely fall soon in more (the United States is an exception—even though the rate of population growth is not as high as it used to be, record numbers of babies are being born, and population growth remains robust).10 In light of the environmental consequences of overpopulation, stabilization and decreases might be viewed as a positive development. But nations with falling populations seem to fear this trend. They worry about what an aging population and a declining workforce will mean for pensions and social programs. Perhaps they’re also worried about waning influence on the world stage, as the most populous nations tend to play bigger roles. In some cases, nations have acted on these worries by offering incentives to increase births. The Russian government initiated a program in 2006 to pay 250,000 rubles ($9,200) to women choosing to have a second baby—a huge payment that was higher than the average salary that year.11
FIG. 6.2. The world’s most densely populated nations form a diverse group, both geographically and culturally. Data are for the year 2007 and exclude small city and island states. SOURCE: see note 8.
It’s a different story in many of the less-industrialized nations, where fertility rates remain high. For example, Niger has the highest total fertility rate of any nation at 7.6 children per woman. Fertility rates in nineteen other countries are above 5 children per woman.12
A cursory exploration of the numbers allows us to draw a simple conclusion: we live on a crowded planet, and it’s growing more crowded, despite declining fertility rates. What are the implications of an increasing population? The total resource use of a country will increase when either the number of people living in the country increases, or the amount that each of these people consumes increases. The “I-PAT equation” summarizes how population interacts with other variables to produce env
ironmental impacts.13 It states that
I = P × A × T
where I quantifies total impact on the environment, P stands for population size, A represents affluence (calculated as income per person), and T explains the effect of technology (calculated as the environmental impact per unit of income).
To prevent I from growing too large and undermining planetary life-support systems (e.g., by destabilizing the climate), societies must manage the values of P, A, and T. Frugality and sufficiency can constrain A, and environmentally benign behavior and technological progress can constrain T, but there are limits to these capabilities.14 Stabilization of P is necessary as well to construct an economy in balance with nature.15 Such a balance will not be achievable if current population growth trends continue.
As described in Chapter 2, the ecological footprint of the global population is too large, and we are pushing beyond the safe operating space of planetary boundaries. But overpopulation is more than just an environmental issue; it’s also an issue of social justice. The greater the world’s population, the smaller the share of natural resources available to each person.
If the planet’s resources were divided equally among all people, it’s questionable whether there would be sufficient resources to provide a good life for all in a world headed toward 9.3 billion. Even if the situation could be sustained, it would be far from optimal. To alleviate poverty, citizens in wealthy nations must consume less, and population levels in all countries must be stabilized or reduced. We need smaller footprints, but we also need fewer feet.
Unfortunately the issue of population growth invites controversy, and people struggle to discuss it in a constructive way. Population growth is tied to divisive topics such as poverty, reproductive health, women’s rights, immigration, and cultural and religious beliefs. People on both the left and right tend to shun the issue. Some fear that focusing attention on population detracts from what they view as more pertinent social justice issues, such as redistributing wealth from the rich to the poor.16 Others fear that discouraging population growth will encourage abortion, or that halting population growth will cause economic hardships.17 Still others see addressing population growth as an attack on human rights (e.g., the free movement of people or the right to reproductive choices).18 The issue of population growth lives, politically speaking, in a limbo.
