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There are zero-sum portions of the economy (land, non-renewable resources), and expanding-sum portions. However, the laws of supply and demand dictate that as t
by yunwal 4y ago
There are zero-sum portions of the economy (land, non-renewable resources), and expanding-sum portions. However, the laws of supply and demand dictate that as the marginal cost of producing a good approach zero, the cost goes down. This is why poetry is pretty much worthless in terms of money, despite providing value to many.
The issue here is that "growth" is ambiguous, and right now is mostly defined as "GDP" or some other measure of money. Unfortunately, the nature of money is that zero-sum portions of the economy can get more expensive, but expanding-sum portions have a fundamental price limit. Therefore, if you define growth as "money", you can't have endless growth.
Of course, you can have endless improvements to quality of life that don't involve constrained resources, it just won't increase GDP.
- pyuser583 4y agoWhat are the “zero-sum” goods? Land isn’t zero-sum. If an acre of land loses value, that doesn’t mean other acres must cumulatively raise by the same amount. Likewise, rises in value don’t need to be offset by losses elsewhere. Sorry if that’s nitpicky, but you’re placing a lot of importance on the “zero-sum” portions of the economy. The international currency market is zero-sum. If the dollar loses value, it must lose value against another currency, and that currency must rise. Do you think currency will eventually restrain growth, despite being (mostly) created by fiat?
- yunwal 4y ago> Land isn’t zero-sum Yes it is. There’s only a finite amount of land in the world, and the fact that you own some means someone else can’t. > Do you think currency will eventually restrain growth, despite being (mostly) created by fiat? There’s no “game” in life where the end goal is having currency in the economy. In the end currency is a means to an end (even if we may forget that). Land is one part of that end, and there’s only a finite amount.
- pyuser583 4y agoLand is a means to an end as well. It has lots of uses, but nobody is satisfied with just land. And frankly I’d rather have lots of currency than lots of land. Why doesn’t the zero-sum nature of currency markets prevent growth?
- yunwal 4y agoI'm satisfied with just land. If someone gave me land for free, I might choose to keep it!. If someone gave me money, I'd almost certainly choose to spend it at some point because money only has value for what you can exchange it.