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>Historically, the only way countries have been able to lift themselves out of poverty is by burning fossil fuels for energy This is an interesting point, but

>Historically, the only way countries have been able to lift themselves out of poverty is by burning fossil fuels for energy This is an interesting point, but I don't get the cause and effect scenario here. What bothers me is the ideological trap that fossil fuels are the only resources that can be exploited to bring people out of poverty. Are we so lacking in innovation that we cannot come up with sustainable development models?

ip26 6y ago
They are not the only such resources. But they have been the cheapest, which means they have been the fastest track out of poverty.
- ClumsyPilot 6y ago
  We have the cheapest credit in human history, yet we can't fund renewable projects with positive ROI. Meanwhile people are 'investing' in bitcoin, and pumping meme stocks.
  - imtringued 6y ago
    Christine Lagarde (head of ECB) also got a lot of flak for announcing that the european central bank will keep reducing it's exposure to CO2 intensive companies. At this point the amount of self harm in the population is so great that there is nothing to be done. Is this the curse of right wing populism? Why do disenfranchised people love voting for people that don't care about them? Trump didn't win the election but he still had lots of support even though he was only looking out for himself (and others like him) during his presidency. Green investments are such an incredibly easy way to implement jobs programs yet people hate on them because they believe not subsidizing anything is more important than solving real problems like domestic underemployment. Yes, when I talk about green investments I am not even considering how you are doing something for the planet, I'm just talking about the economic impact of building up a domestic industry. For all intents and purposes you could also have spent money on maintaining roads or building lots of houses for all I care but when you listen to someone like Trump he would spend it on useless crap like coal. There are very little employment opportunities (if you ignore the work needed to undo the CO2 emissions) in a dying industry. But hey, it's got high visibility and is an emotional topic so lets shoot renewables down in favor of it even though you had more to benefit from the "green scam" (hyperbole) than coal. China is doing an extreme amount of jobs programs. All those ghost cities are there to employ construction workers first, sell capital to wealthy individuals and eventually be populated by immigrants. They also loan money to developing countries and build infrastructure for them.
  - ip26 6y ago
    Yeah, I don't know why investment isn't available, especially if the ROI is good. Wish I did.
javajosh 6y ago
>Are we so lacking in innovation that we cannot come up with sustainable development models? Well, yes. We Americans are fat, lazy and comfortable. 70 years of being on top will do that to you. But we are still voracious, even in old age, and will happily burn resources on our vanity, greed, and, perhaps worst of all, mere convenience. We are not willing to inconvenience ourselves to address global threats. (And that alone is enough to disqualify us from any kind of global leadership role.) (In fact I believe it was a twin existential threat that led them to loose their minds. Global climate change requires of Democracy what I call a "voluntary contraction". This is impossible to accept by the many people in this culture who feel entitled to earn/consume even more than their parents, and their grandparents, because it's been that way for 80 years. Sustainability changes this; it means accepting that you'll have less material wealth than your parents. The other threat is more personal: politically correct thought policing from the left, complete with mob enforcement through cancel culture. Together these threats might be powerful enough to cause a delusion in which one is saved from reality by a reality TV star.)
- imtringued 6y ago
  > Sustainability changes this; it means accepting that you'll have less material wealth than your parents There is actually more wealth to be gained for the average person because green investments can be an effective domestic jobs program. Central bank money is merely increasing the relative value of wealthy people's assets. So it's a net loss for the working class. If wealth inequality grows by 2x they owe the rich twice as much. If that money could be channeled in a way that pays the income of workers and actually gets spent it would mean that economic growth will come back and incomes will grow over time instead of stagnating.

ip26 6y ago

They are not the only such resources. But they have been the cheapest, which means they have been the fastest track out of poverty.

ClumsyPilot 6y ago
We have the cheapest credit in human history, yet we can't fund renewable projects with positive ROI. Meanwhile people are 'investing' in bitcoin, and pumping meme stocks.
- imtringued 6y ago
  Christine Lagarde (head of ECB) also got a lot of flak for announcing that the european central bank will keep reducing it's exposure to CO2 intensive companies. At this point the amount of self harm in the population is so great that there is nothing to be done. Is this the curse of right wing populism? Why do disenfranchised people love voting for people that don't care about them? Trump didn't win the election but he still had lots of support even though he was only looking out for himself (and others like him) during his presidency. Green investments are such an incredibly easy way to implement jobs programs yet people hate on them because they believe not subsidizing anything is more important than solving real problems like domestic underemployment. Yes, when I talk about green investments I am not even considering how you are doing something for the planet, I'm just talking about the economic impact of building up a domestic industry. For all intents and purposes you could also have spent money on maintaining roads or building lots of houses for all I care but when you listen to someone like Trump he would spend it on useless crap like coal. There are very little employment opportunities (if you ignore the work needed to undo the CO2 emissions) in a dying industry. But hey, it's got high visibility and is an emotional topic so lets shoot renewables down in favor of it even though you had more to benefit from the "green scam" (hyperbole) than coal. China is doing an extreme amount of jobs programs. All those ghost cities are there to employ construction workers first, sell capital to wealthy individuals and eventually be populated by immigrants. They also loan money to developing countries and build infrastructure for them.
- ip26 6y ago
  Yeah, I don't know why investment isn't available, especially if the ROI is good. Wish I did.

javajosh 6y ago

>Are we so lacking in innovation that we cannot come up with sustainable development models? Well, yes. We Americans are fat, lazy and comfortable. 70 years of being on top will do that to you. But we are still voracious, even in old age, and will happily burn resources on our vanity, greed, and, perhaps worst of all, mere convenience. We are not willing to inconvenience ourselves to address global threats. (And that alone is enough to disqualify us from any kind of global leadership role.) (In fact I believe it was a twin existential threat that led them to loose their minds. Global climate change requires of Democracy what I call a "voluntary contraction". This is impossible to accept by the many people in this culture who feel entitled to earn/consume even more than their parents, and their grandparents, because it's been that way for 80 years. Sustainability changes this; it means accepting that you'll have less material wealth than your parents. The other threat is more personal: politically correct thought policing from the left, complete with mob enforcement through cancel culture. Together these threats might be powerful enough to cause a delusion in which one is saved from reality by a reality TV star.)

imtringued 6y ago
> Sustainability changes this; it means accepting that you'll have less material wealth than your parents There is actually more wealth to be gained for the average person because green investments can be an effective domestic jobs program. Central bank money is merely increasing the relative value of wealthy people's assets. So it's a net loss for the working class. If wealth inequality grows by 2x they owe the rich twice as much. If that money could be channeled in a way that pays the income of workers and actually gets spent it would mean that economic growth will come back and incomes will grow over time instead of stagnating.