3 ms·

Demand is strong, certainly, but productivity has topped out (ie: we're overfishing/we can't find new fish). Do subsidies lower the price for the consumer or s

by Qworg 9y ago

Demand is strong, certainly, but productivity has topped out (ie: we're overfishing/we can't find new fish). Do subsidies lower the price for the consumer or simply keep output high given the decreasing stocks (therefore decreasing the price)?

vuchhcjd 9y ago
It's been a couple years since I last looked but a quick glance at the explosion of farmed fish proves how wildly wrong you are.
- jessaustin 9y ago
  This is a non sequitur. Fish farms are not receiving the subsidies GP decries. Still, they remain profitable enterprises. Thus they are much better uses of scarce resources than wild fisheries that lose money despite subsidies. Thus "the explosion".
belorn 9y ago
Its not so much that we can't find new fish, it is that only a small portion of species is considered commercial profitable and those get fished to extinction. It is the least functional way to handle a ecosystem, and that is getting subsidized. Its like when nation subsidies farmers that is growing singular crops that kills the soil, decreasing prices while keeping output artificial high while each year get worse and worse. Its not that farming is inherently unprofitable or that farmers can't find fresh soil, but rather a system failure. The eco industry, while often subsidized, has gotten quote profitable but the equivalent thing for fishing seems to still be rather small. I have seen some minor political efforts in trying to give subsidies money to fishermen that target overpopulated or invasive species, but nothing big.
- newnewpdro 9y ago
  It seems like you're viewing this as an optimization problem, which strikes me as just a way of kicking the proverbial can down the road - just like the subsidies are doing. There simply need to be less people.
  - z0r 9y ago
    Which is at odds with current political and economic trends. Right or left, no matter what kinds of social or environmental causes people seem to care about, there is almost universal support for economic policies of unending growth. You almost never see Japan get touted as a model first world country - with both a shrinking population and economy - but maybe that's the way we all should be heading. Retirement investments and real estate be damned, maybe immigration and jacked up trade isn't so important if we care about having a diverse and healthy biomass for future generations to enjoy.
  - belorn 9y ago
    Discussing the global population will sooner or later turn into a discussion about space colonization, which then usually becomes a debate about current population, cost of space programs vs welfare, and a lot of politics. Some time down the road we will have to leave this rock. Today is not that day, so yes its an optimization problem in the (not very) short run and one that has rather big repercussions to the ecology.

by Qworg 9y ago

vuchhcjd 9y ago

It's been a couple years since I last looked but a quick glance at the explosion of farmed fish proves how wildly wrong you are.

jessaustin 9y ago
This is a non sequitur. Fish farms are not receiving the subsidies GP decries. Still, they remain profitable enterprises. Thus they are much better uses of scarce resources than wild fisheries that lose money despite subsidies. Thus "the explosion".

belorn 9y ago

Its not so much that we can't find new fish, it is that only a small portion of species is considered commercial profitable and those get fished to extinction. It is the least functional way to handle a ecosystem, and that is getting subsidized. Its like when nation subsidies farmers that is growing singular crops that kills the soil, decreasing prices while keeping output artificial high while each year get worse and worse. Its not that farming is inherently unprofitable or that farmers can't find fresh soil, but rather a system failure. The eco industry, while often subsidized, has gotten quote profitable but the equivalent thing for fishing seems to still be rather small. I have seen some minor political efforts in trying to give subsidies money to fishermen that target overpopulated or invasive species, but nothing big.

newnewpdro 9y ago
It seems like you're viewing this as an optimization problem, which strikes me as just a way of kicking the proverbial can down the road - just like the subsidies are doing. There simply need to be less people.
- z0r 9y ago
  Which is at odds with current political and economic trends. Right or left, no matter what kinds of social or environmental causes people seem to care about, there is almost universal support for economic policies of unending growth. You almost never see Japan get touted as a model first world country - with both a shrinking population and economy - but maybe that's the way we all should be heading. Retirement investments and real estate be damned, maybe immigration and jacked up trade isn't so important if we care about having a diverse and healthy biomass for future generations to enjoy.
- belorn 9y ago
  Discussing the global population will sooner or later turn into a discussion about space colonization, which then usually becomes a debate about current population, cost of space programs vs welfare, and a lot of politics. Some time down the road we will have to leave this rock. Today is not that day, so yes its an optimization problem in the (not very) short run and one that has rather big repercussions to the ecology.