Earthsky Interviews
Herman Daly on the case for a steady state economy
12-28-2009 - Human World
Earthsky spoke with Herman Daly, a professor at the University of Maryland and one the founders of a field of academic research called ecological economics – the study of how human economies and natural ecosystems interact.
Herman Daly: We live in a growth economy. But unfortunately, economy is part of a larger system – the Earth ecosystem, which does not grow.
For decades, Daly has advocated a transition to what’s called a steady state economy, in which both human population and physical wealth are relatively stable.
Herman Daly: It’s an economy in which the path of progress is not bigger, not more and more stuff. It’s an economy in which the path of progress is to get better, to design better things.
He said that, over time, it’s not possible to consume more materials, energy, or wealth than one planet can provide.
Herman Daly: The problem is that we’ve reached the point at which the value of what we’re displacing and sacrificing in order to grow is greater than value of the extra stuff we get from growth.
He said measures of economic growth don’t factor in the costs of growth.
Herman Daly: We just count production and consumption. There’s no account that talks about things which are lost from growth. We need to count the costs of growth, and stop growing when the costs of growth become greater than the benefits.
For example, Daly said, fossil fuels power our economic growth. But the emissions from fossil fuels contribute to climate change, and that’s leading to dangerous consequences for ecosystems. Daly described the advantages of a steady state economy as having more time for leisure and personal relationships, which he believes cultivate happiness, not the consumption of things.
Herman Daly: It’s a feedback from the larger system. It’s telling us, wait a minute, slow down. You’re growing too big.
Daly is credited with popularizing the idea of the steady state economy in his 1973 book, Towards a Steady State Economy.
Herman Daly: A steady state economy is an idea that goes back to classical economists. It’s not a new idea. It means constant population, and constant stock of physical goods.
He admitted that this idea goes against the grain of the prevailing global economic policy.
Herman Daly: All of the policies that are currently being talked about are how to get the economy growing again. You know, grow, grow, grow. I would say, we need to adapt to lower levels of consumption.
Written by Lindsay Patterson
16 Responses to “Herman Daly on the case for a steady state economy”
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Herman Daly
Herman Daly studies the relationship between the economy and the environment, and the relationship of ethics and the economy. He has won the Right Livelihood Award, the Heineken Prize for Environmental Science, the Leontief Prize for advancing the frontiers of economic thought, and the Medal of the Presidency of the Italian Republic. Daly founded ... >>
This is excellent! Restraint and moderation are always good paths to follow. As I read this, a thought occurred to me. There are those who say that we can “tame” mother nature and bend her to our will. I wonder, then, why these same people steadfastly refuse to believe that mere mortals can create climate change and have an impact on global warming?
I like earth sky I would like to see A new subject each and every day.
But when people go away and have no way to see earth sky I guest it is just to bad.Please put the radio stations that you broadcast back on your web site . thank you
Sincerely yours
Carole B. Dreyfus
I do really know that you have done a very hard work, creating your nice topic just about this post. Thus, that kind of job scholars do writing the thesis writing or the dissertation researching.
This is so obviously right.
No one in charge of anything is interested at all because religions want more believers, corporations want more customers, armies want more soldiers and politicians want more jobs and votes.
So how do we start to get it done?
Read FOR THE COMMON GOOD by Herman Daly and John Cobb. This prescient book was published in 1989. One is hardpressed to find economic departments that include the book in their curricula, or to find professors who recognize the fallacy of infinite growth within a finite environment.
There is another name for this: Communism. It will not work and will cause starvation, death and horror. Adam Smith was correct. Karl Marx was wrong.
There are a couple more points I need to make. This piece does, in fact, reveal the whole purpose of “environmentalism”. The absolute control of earth by a few meglamaniacs. Call it the New World Order or what ever you like. There it is. Those that read this might want to consider looking at the portions of the world that have “enjoyed” a command economy. Nazi Germany. North Korea. Cuba. USSR. And know this, these places have the worst environmental messes on this earth.
On the next subject: Do any of you realize that if this “steady state economy” is instituted, the biggest part of you will be owned slaces? You will BELONG TO the state and will be assigned jobs and living quarters. Mosdt of you will not be in the ruling elites and therefore will be expendable slaves. Really.
We, here in the United States have a Constitution. It celebrates and protects the rights, property and safety of the individuals. Quite a different paradigm than that represented by this article. And this is still the greatest country to have ever existed.
The environment here on this planet has not been damaged by human activity. CO2 is not a pollutant. The real danger is from omnipotent government. Humans are not a pathogen. I do believe, however, the self loathing expressed by those that hate humans, and therefore themselves, is a serious mental illness. Have you ever thought that folks like Ted Turner and Prince Phillip who both favored massive killing off massive numbers of humans never help out by leading the way? Kinda like the imams in Islam. You need to die for the environment, for Allah or whatever the cause du jour is this week.
I am not willing to live as a slave to any man nor any government. Are you?
Someone needs to get this message to Al Gore: http://www.snopes.com/politics/bush/house.asp
Benjamin, the parralells you a drawing between steady-state economy and communism are absurd. The idea presented is not to give a few elitists complete control of the world’s economy. The idea is to divert our government’s attention from the accepted idea of increasing production to meet demand, and replace it with legislation and engineering developments that keep the demand at managable levels.
No one had suggest killing off massive amounts of humans, quite frankly, I have no idea where you have got THAT idea from!
This is not about communism this is about preservation. You seem redicoulously paranoid of any ideas conflicting with the current government ideals of the United States – those that promote consumerism and economic growth – and we cannot grow econommically and in terms of population indefinatly before the majority slip below the poverty line. You can’t have your cake AND eat it. The sad fact is, we restrain our growth or we die. That’s it. And yes, even it does somehow end up with me having to belong to the state, as you say, well, it’s that or extinction.
James, Government ownership and control of property is the definition of communism. If you don’t have a free market economy, you have a bunch of clueless bureaucrats running everything. And it won’t work. Never has and never will.
as to the genocide: The UN and all of the rest of the Malthusian meglomaniacs that are supporting the New World Order, or, if you prefer, A Stable State Economy will indeed have to start limiting population by killing them off in order to feed them. See, no command economy can produce enough goods and services to support itself.
Ted Turner and the UN have publically stated that they need to reduce the human population of the earth to anywhere from 250,000,000 to one billion. The only way to do that is to kill one hell of a lot of people. The eugenicists have been around a long time. The founders of Planned Parenthood were revered by Hitler and they supported his efforts. These folks are criminal malthusian maniacs.
History speaks for itself. Stalin imposed severe rationing “for the cause”, and the results were horrific.
If you want to compare relative poverty between similar-size regions, look at Equatorial Guinea vs. Singapore. Which has all the natural resources? Which has economic freedom, property rights, and greater liberty?
And which has almost no poverty?
According to the interview Prof. Daly says “over time, it’s not possible to consume more materials, energy, or wealth than one planet can provide.” I heartedly agree and would like to ask the Professor if there have been any authoritative studies as to how many people the earth can sustainably support at say the Western European standard of living? Once such a number is determined, it could serve as a positive target level to shoot for, rather than just saying we need to “adapt to lower levels of consumption.” I look forward to his comments. Albert Rich
Here we go again, another elitist intellectual trying to spread doom and gloom when history has proven them wrong almost every time. Remember Paul Ehrlich and “The Population Bomb” and how we were all going to starve to death by 2000? One minute it’s global cooling, next it’s global warming and when the data disproves them they come up with “Climate Change.” They somehow get the idea that man has more to do with the climate than that giant thermonuclear reactor that sits 93 million miles away!
So now we all have to be allowed one child (forced abortions to anyone who would dare have more than one). We are only allowed to use “toxic” light bulbs now. Next we’ll all be forced to become vegans because we won’t be allowed to raise beef cattle due to their flattus causing climate change.
FREEDOM and LIBERTY will solve our problems, just like it has for thousands of years, when the snooty intelligencia allows it!
Daly is such a pessimist. Remember the famous Paul Ehrlich – Julian Simon wager on the price of commodities? Remember \”The End Of Affluence\”? They all neglected a simple fact: When a commodity becomes scarce and pricey, another replacement commodity comes along to supplant it.
The world is a dynamic place; mechanical vehicles have replaced beasts of burden. Peat is replaced by coal, in turn replaced by petroleum, in turn replaced by natural gas, perhaps next by nuclear energy or geothermal or tidal ocean power. There is no reason for such pessimism.
Mr. Emmert,
There is a lot to what you say. Cries that the \\\”Sky is falling\\\” are very frequent and usually overstated. Also, I agree that technology/science has always risen to the challenge of finding new ways to do things.
However, when a commodity becomes scarce, or when new information changes society, these events are often the cause of conflict. Those conflicts have only been limited by the nature of the weapons used. The parties involved used what ever technology existed at the time. They didn\\\’t hold back.
Because there are enough nuclear weapons on the planet to render it uninhabitable, do you feel that such weapons change the dynamics involved with when it comes to working through conflicts or the transitions from one set of cultural norms to a new set of norms?
I can’t help but feel that this whole issue is presented by Daly from a maligned set of premises. He targets economic productivity as the root cause of unsustainable growth. Such an argument overlooks some very basic issues that are well established by demographic studies
Demand on resources is a population growth issue, not an economic growth issue. Countries with the most vibrant and growing economies have the lowest reproductive rates, resulting in the lowest population growth rates and highest efficiency in resource utilization. For example, the United States has a current population of 304 million with a population growth rate of 9% per decade (per July 2008 statistics). The population growth trend is decreasing. In comparison, India has a current population of 1.14 billion with a population growth rate of 14% per decade. The trend is increasing. A good comparison of how improving education and economic growth slows population growth is China. Prior to China’s current educational and industrial revolution, it’s population growth was 19% per decade (despite its one-child policy). Its current population growth rate has dropped to 6% per decade. It’s population growth rate trend is decreasing.
The disparity between nations with high population growth and those with the lowest is mostly attributable to better education, better technological solutions to improve resource efficiencies, a political and social organization that supports collective solutions, and access to better health care. The result is a higher level of economic productivity. In other words, economic productivity is an effect, not the cause.
The fallacy of Daly’s doctrine is cutting economic growth will not improve conditions for the world’s inhabitants. It would have very much a reverse effect in that it would be disastrous for 2nd and 3rd world nations.
The real solution to managing resources needs to be a focus on promoting education, fostering political stability in 2nd and 3rd world nations, and technology transfer that targets improving resource management and improved reproductive choices. For the record I’m not in favor of eugenics or abortion – they’re bad substitutes for social sophistication, solving nothing in the long term (witness China). Until we start thinking along the lines of root cause, looking at what key factors actually contribute to reduced population growth and improvements in resource utilization, we’re just kidding ourselves.