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Conventional wisdom says we need a continuously growing population to support a continuously growing economy. The problem, of course, is that growth can\u2019t continue forever. Sooner or later we\u2019re going to run out of places to put all the people. We\u2019re going to run out of farmland to grow their food and out of fresh water to keep them alive. And we\u2019re rapidly running out of the fossil fuels that keep the modern economy moving. <\/p>\n
We\u2019ve blown by previous estimates of the human carrying capacity of the Earth. That leads the mainstream to assume that \u201cscience\u201d and \u201cprogress\u201d will always find a way for us to add more and consume more. But we\u2019re already driving many other species to extinction. We\u2019ve already got millions of people crammed into cities that disconnect them from the land. And we\u2019ve already dumped enough carbon into the atmosphere to begin to raise the temperature of the Earth to inhospitable levels (for humans, anyway).<\/p>\n
Perpetual growth \u2013 of populations and of economies \u2013 is not possible.<\/p>\n
As the article points out, population growth is solving itself \u2013 Western Europe, Japan, and much of the United States show how. As women become more prosperous and as they gain more control over their lives and their bodies, they choose to have fewer children. While cultural differences will influence this trend in Asia and Africa, long term it is reasonable to expect that the human population will slow its growth, level off, then begin to decline.<\/p>\n
This means an economic model that assumes continuous growth will become even more unworkable than it already is, a problem that will be exacerbated as fossil fuel supplies continue to decline and as the impact of climate change consumes more and more resources. <\/p>\n
Isn\u2019t it time we started reconfiguring our economy and our lives not for growth but for sustainability?<\/p>\n
How do we do that? We won\u2019t do it with a top-down command economy. That\u2019s been tried and it was a miserable failure. <\/p>\n
Nobody told European, Japanese and American women to stop having so many children. They saw their lives would be better off that way and made the decision themselves. <\/p>\n
![](\"https:\/\/1.bp.blogspot.com\/-QH-UjwDR5EM\/UPX4h1gdw3I\/AAAAAAAACak\/pHBr7UNQVsM\/s1600\/Suburbia_by_David_Shankbone.jpg\")
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