Paul Krugman referenced this post in his recent column where he comments Musk's plan to send a million colonists to Mars Elon Musk, Mars and the Modern Econom

Paul Krugman referenced this post in his recent column where he comments Musk's plan to send a million colonists to Mars Elon Musk, Mars and the Modern Economy https://www.nytimes.com/2022/06/07/opinion/musk-mars-twitter.html https://www.nytimes.com/2022/06/07/opinion/musk-mars-twitter... >What’s your reaction to that number? Does it seem absurdly high? In terms of the logistics of actually getting people to Mars, it probably is. But my original home field in economics was international trade. And if you know anything about trade, or for that matter the realities of industry, you realize that one million is actually an absurdly low number of people — far too few to support a modern economy. and then he explains why >... economies of scale mean that no one country can reasonably produce the full range of goods required to operate a modern, high-technology economy. International trade is essential, and more essential the smaller the economy — which is why Canada is far more dependent on imports than the United States, Belgium far more dependent than Germany, and so on >Now, given access to world markets, even small countries can have full access to the benefits of modern technology; life in Luxembourg is pretty good. But unless we actually invent the Epstein Drive or something, the realities of transportation costs mean that Musk’s hypothetical Mars colony would have to be largely self-sufficient, cut off from the rest of the solar system economy. And it wouldn’t have enough people to pull that off with anything like a modern standard of living. >As I said, I see Musk on Mars as a teachable moment, an unintended thought experiment that helps remind us of the positive aspects of international trade. Yes, there are downsides to globalization, especially to rapid change that can disrupt whole communities. But you really wouldn’t want to live in a world without extensive international trade. And you really, really wouldn’t want to live on another planet, cut off from the globalization we’ve created on this one.